Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'fragments/reports', 'Ordinatio' and 'reports'

unexpand these ideas     |    start again     |     specify just one area for these texts

---

13 ideas

8. Modes of Existence / B. Properties / 1. Nature of Properties

16648	Accidents must have formal being, if they are principles of real action, and of mental action and thought [Duns Scotus]
	Full Idea: Accidents are principles of acting and principles of cognizing substance, and are the per se objects of the senses. But it is ridiculous to say that something is a principle of acting (either real or intentional) and yet does not have any formal being.
	From: John Duns Scotus (Ordinatio [1302], IV.12.1), quoted by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 10.5
	A reaction: Pasnau cites this as the key scholastic argument for accidental properties having some independent and real existence (as required for Transubstantiation). Rival views say accidents are just 'modes' of a thing's existence. Aquinas compromised.

8. Modes of Existence / E. Nominalism / 1. Nominalism / a. Nominalism

15386	If only the singular exists, science is impossible, as that relies on true generalities [Duns Scotus, by Panaccio]
	Full Idea: Scotus argued that if everything is singular, with no objective common feature, science would be impossible, as it proceeds from general concepts. General is the opposite of singular, so it would be inadequate to understand a singular reality.
	From: report of John Duns Scotus (Ordinatio [1302]) by Claude Panaccio - Medieval Problem of Universals 'John Duns'
	A reaction: [compressed] It is a fact that if you generalise about 'tigers', you are glossing over the individuality of each singular tiger. That is OK for 'electron', if they really are identical, but our general predicates may be imposing identity on electrons.

15387	If things were singular they would only differ numerically, but horse and tulip differ more than that [Duns Scotus, by Panaccio]
	Full Idea: Scotus argued that there must be some non-singular aspects of things, since there are some 'less than numerical differences' among them. A horse and a tulip differ more from each other than do two horses.
	From: report of John Duns Scotus (Ordinatio [1302]) by Claude Panaccio - Medieval Problem of Universals 'John Duns'
	A reaction: This seems to treat being 'singular' as if it were being a singularity. Presumably he is contemplating a thing being nothing but its Scotist haecceity. A neat argument, but I don't buy it.

9. Objects / A. Existence of Objects / 5. Individuation / a. Individuation

16632	We distinguish one thing from another by contradiction, because this is, and that is not [Duns Scotus]
	Full Idea: What is it [that establishes distinctness of things]? It is, to be sure, that which is universally the reason for distinguishing one thing from another: namely, a contradiction…..If this is, and that is not, then they are not the same entity in being.
	From: John Duns Scotus (Ordinatio [1302], IV.11.3), quoted by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 08.2
	A reaction: This is a remarkably intellectualist view of such things. John Wycliff, apparently, enquired about how animals were going to manage all this sort of thing. It should appeal to the modern logical approach to metaphysics.

9. Objects / A. Existence of Objects / 5. Individuation / d. Individuation by haecceity

13094	The haecceity is the featureless thing which gives ultimate individuality to a substance [Duns Scotus, by Cover/O'Leary-Hawthorne]
	Full Idea: For Scotus, the haecceity of an individual was a positive non-quidditative entity which, together with a common nature from which it was formally distinct, played the role of the ultimate differentia, thus individuating the substance.
	From: report of John Duns Scotus (Ordinatio [1302]) by Cover,J/O'Leary-Hawthorne,J - Substance and Individuation in Leibniz 6.1.3
	A reaction: Most thinkers seem to agree (with me) that this is a non-starter, an implausible postulate designed to fill a gap in a metaphysic that hasn't been properly worked out. Leibniz is the hero who faces the problem and works around it.

9. Objects / B. Unity of Objects / 1. Unifying an Object / b. Unifying aggregates

16770	It is absurd that there is no difference between a genuinely unified thing, and a mere aggregate [Duns Scotus]
	Full Idea: It seems absurd …that there should be no difference between a whole that is one thing per se, and a whole that is one thing by aggregation, like a cloud or a heap.
	From: John Duns Scotus (Ordinatio [1302], III.2.2), quoted by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 25.5
	A reaction: Leibniz invented monads because he was driven crazy by the quest for 'true unity' in things. Objective unity may be bogus, but I suspect that imposing plausible unity on things is the only way we can grasp the world.

9. Objects / C. Structure of Objects / 8. Parts of Objects / c. Wholes from parts

10919	What prevents a stone from being divided into parts which are still the stone? [Duns Scotus]
	Full Idea: What is it in this stone, by which ...it is absolutely incompatible with the stone for it to be divided into several parts each of which is this stone, the kind of division that is proper to a universal whole as divided into its subjective parts?
	From: John Duns Scotus (Ordinatio [1302], II d3 p1 q2 n48)
	A reaction: This is the origin of the concept of haecceity, when Scotus wants to know what exactly individuates each separate entity. He may have been mistaken in thinking that such a question has an answer.

9. Objects / F. Identity among Objects / 8. Leibniz's Law

16768	Two things are different if something is true of one and not of the other [Duns Scotus]
	Full Idea: If this is, and that is not, then they are not the same entity in being.
	From: John Duns Scotus (Ordinatio [1302], IV.11.3), quoted by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 25.3
	A reaction: This is the contrapositive of the indiscernibility of identicals, expressed in terms of what is true about a thing, rather than what properties pertain to it.

16. Persons / E. Rejecting the Self / 4. Denial of the Self

5517	Individuals don't exist, but are conventional names for sets of elements [Buddha]
	Full Idea: There exists no individual, it is only a conventional name given to a set of elements.
	From: Buddha (Siddhartha Gautama) (reports [c.540 BCE]), quoted by Derek Parfit - The Unimportance of Identity p.295
	A reaction: I take this to arise from an excessively spiritual concept of a human being, which faces Descartes' problem of how to individuate non-physical minds, when they have no clear boundaries. Combine dualism with a bundle theory, and you have Buddhism.

26. Natural Theory / A. Speculations on Nature / 5. Infinite in Nature

1748	Archelaus was the first person to say that the universe is boundless [Archelaus, by Diog. Laertius]
	Full Idea: Archelaus was the first person to say that the universe is boundless.
	From: report of Archelaus (fragments/reports [c.450 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 02.Ar.3

27. Natural Reality / G. Biology / 3. Evolution

5989	Archelaus said life began in a primeval slime [Archelaus, by Schofield]
	Full Idea: Archelaus wrote that life on Earth began in a primeval slime.
	From: report of Archelaus (fragments/reports [c.450 BCE]) by Malcolm Schofield - Archelaus
	A reaction: This sounds like a fairly clearcut assertion of the production of life by evolution. Darwin's contribution was to propose the mechanism for achieving it. We should honour the name of Archelaus for this idea.

29. Religion / C. Spiritual Disciplines / 3. Buddhism

7600	The Buddha believed the gods would eventually disappear, and Nirvana was much higher [Buddha, by Armstrong,K]
	Full Idea: The Buddha believed implicitly in the gods because they were part of his cultural baggage, but they were involved in the cycle of rebirth, and would eventually disappear; the ultimate reality of Nirvana was higher than the gods.
	From: report of Buddha (Siddhartha Gautama) (reports [c.540 BCE]) by Karen Armstrong - A History of God Ch.1
	A reaction: We might connect this with Plato's Euthyphro question (Ideas 336 and 337), and the relationship between piety and morality on the one hand, and the gods on the other.

7601	Life is suffering, from which only compassion, gentleness, truth and sobriety can save us [Buddha]
	Full Idea: Buddha taught that the only release from 'dukkha' (the meaningless flux of suffering which is human life) is a life of compassion for all living beings, speaking and behaving gently, kindly and accurately, and refraining from all intoxicants.
	From: Buddha (Siddhartha Gautama) (reports [c.540 BCE], Ch.1), quoted by Karen Armstrong - A History of God Ch.1
	A reaction: Christians are inclined to give the impression that Jesus invented the idea of being nice, but it ain't so. The obvious thought is that the Buddha seems to be focusing on the individual, but this is actually a formula for a better community.