15094
|
I now deny that properties are cluster of powers, and take causal properties as basic [Shoemaker]
|
|
Full Idea:
I now reject the formulation of the causal theory which says that a property is a cluster of conditional powers. That has a reductionist flavour, which is a cheat. We need properties to explain conditional powers, so properties won't reduce.
|
|
From:
Sydney Shoemaker (Causal and Metaphysical Necessity [1998], III)
|
|
A reaction:
[compressed wording] I agree with Mumford and Anjum in preferring his earlier formulation. I think properties are broad messy things, whereas powers can be defined more precisely, and seem to have more stability in nature.
|
15099
|
If something is possible, but not nomologically possible, we need metaphysical possibility [Shoemaker]
|
|
Full Idea:
If it is possible that there could be possible states of affairs that are not nomologically possible, don't we therefore need a notion of metaphysical possibility that outruns nomological possibility?
|
|
From:
Sydney Shoemaker (Causal and Metaphysical Necessity [1998], VI)
|
|
A reaction:
Shoemaker rejects this possibility (p.425). I sympathise. So there is 'natural' possibility (my preferred term), which is anything which stuff, if it exists, could do, and 'logical' possibility, which is anything that doesn't lead to contradiction.
|
15101
|
Once you give up necessity as a priori, causal necessity becomes the main type of necessity [Shoemaker]
|
|
Full Idea:
Once the obstacle of the deeply rooted conviction that necessary truths should be knowable a priori is removed, ...causal necessity is (pretheoretically) the very paradigm of necessity, in ordinary usage and in dictionaries.
|
|
From:
Sydney Shoemaker (Causal and Metaphysical Necessity [1998], VII)
|
|
A reaction:
The a priori route seems to lead to logical necessity, just by doing a priori logic, and also to metaphysical necessity, by some sort of intuitive vision. This is a powerful idea of Shoemaker's (implied, of course, in Kripke).
|
15100
|
Imagination reveals conceptual possibility, where descriptions avoid contradiction or incoherence [Shoemaker]
|
|
Full Idea:
Imaginability can give us access to conceptual possibility, when we come to believe situations to be conceptually possible by reflecting on their descriptions and seeing no contradiction or incoherence.
|
|
From:
Sydney Shoemaker (Causal and Metaphysical Necessity [1998], VI)
|
|
A reaction:
If take the absence of contradiction to indicate 'logical' possibility, but the absence of incoherence is more interesting, even if it is a bit vague. He is talking of 'situations', which I take to be features of reality. A priori synthetic?
|
7669
|
We cannot attain all the ideals of every culture, so there cannot be a perfect life [Herder, by Berlin]
|
|
Full Idea:
For Herder, we cannot attain to the highest ideals of all the centuries and all the places at once, and since we cannot do that, the whole notion of the perfect life collapses.
|
|
From:
report of Johann Gottfried Herder (works [1784]) by Isaiah Berlin - The Roots of Romanticism Ch.3
|
|
A reaction:
Herder seems to be the father of modern cultural relativism. The idea is hard to challenge, but the ideals of some cultures should be ignored, if they diminish rather than enhance the good life for all.
|
7668
|
Herder invented the idea of being rooted in (or cut off from) a home or a group [Herder, by Berlin]
|
|
Full Idea:
The whole notion of being at home, or being cut off from one's natural roots, the whole idea of roots, the whole idea of belonging to a group, a sect, a movement, was largely invented by Herder.
|
|
From:
report of Johann Gottfried Herder (works [1784], Ch.3) by Isaiah Berlin - The Roots of Romanticism
|
|
A reaction:
Hm. Broad generalisations are an awful temptation in the history of ideas. As a corrective to this, trying reading the two Anglo-Saxon poems 'The Wanderer' and 'The Seafarer'. Very Germanic, I suppose. Interesting, though. Leads to Hegel's politics.
|
15093
|
We might say laws are necessary by combining causal properties with Armstrong-Dretske-Tooley laws [Shoemaker]
|
|
Full Idea:
One way to get the conclusion that laws are necessary is to combine my view of properties with the view of Armstrong, Dretske and Tooley, that laws are, or assert, relations between properties.
|
|
From:
Sydney Shoemaker (Causal and Metaphysical Necessity [1998], I)
|
|
A reaction:
This is interesting, because Armstrong in particular wants the necessity to arise from relations between properties as universals, but if we define properties causally, and make them necessary, we might get the same result without universals.
|