27 ideas
| 14255 | We understand things through their dependency relations [Fine,K] |
| Full Idea: We understand a defined object (what it is) through the objects on which it depends. | |
| From: Kit Fine (Ontological Dependence [1995], II) | |
| A reaction: This places dependency relations right at the heart of our understanding of the world, and hence shifts traditional metaphysics away from existence and identity. The notion of explanation is missing from Fine's account. |
| 14250 | Metaphysics deals with the existence of things and with the nature of things [Fine,K] |
| Full Idea: Metaphysics has two main areas of concern: one is with the nature of things, with what they are; and the other is with the existence of things, with whether they are. | |
| From: Kit Fine (Ontological Dependence [1995], I) | |
| A reaction: This paper is part of a movement which has shifted metaphysics to a third target - how things relate to one another. The possibility that this third aim should be the main one seems quite plausible to me. |
| 17713 | After 1903, Husserl avoids metaphysical commitments [Mares] |
| Full Idea: In Husserl's philosophy after 1903, he is unwilling to commit himself to any specific metaphysical views. | |
| From: Edwin D. Mares (A Priori [2011], 08.2) |
| 14259 | Maybe two objects might require simultaneous real definitions, as with two simultaneous terms [Fine,K] |
| Full Idea: In Wooster as the witless bachelor and Jeeves as the crafty manservant, and one valet to the other, we will have the counterpart, within the framework of real definition, to the simultaneous definition of two terms. | |
| From: Kit Fine (Ontological Dependence [1995], III) | |
| A reaction: This is wonderful grist to the mill of scientific essentialism, which endeavours to produce an understanding through explanation of the complex interactions of nature. |
| 17715 | The truth of the axioms doesn't matter for pure mathematics, but it does for applied [Mares] |
| Full Idea: The epistemological burden of showing that the axioms are true is removed if we are only studying pure mathematics. If, however, we want to look at applied mathematics, then this burden returns. | |
| From: Edwin D. Mares (A Priori [2011], 11.4) | |
| A reaction: One of those really simple ideas that hits the spot. Nice. The most advanced applied mathematics must rest on counting and measuring. |
| 17716 | Mathematics is relations between properties we abstract from experience [Mares] |
| Full Idea: Aristotelians treat mathematical facts as relations between properties. These properties, moreover, are abstracted from our experience of things. ...This view finds a natural companion in structuralism. | |
| From: Edwin D. Mares (A Priori [2011], 11.7) | |
| A reaction: This is the view of mathematics that I personally favour. The view that we abstract 'five' from a group of five pebbles is too simplistic, but this is the right general approach. |
| 14253 | An object's 'being' isn't existence; there's more to an object than existence, and its nature doesn't include existence [Fine,K] |
| Full Idea: It seems wrong to identify the 'being' of an object, its being what it is, with its existence. In one respect existence is too weak; for there is more to an object than mere existence; also too strong, for an object's nature need not include existence. | |
| From: Kit Fine (Ontological Dependence [1995], I) | |
| A reaction: The word 'being' has been shockingly woolly, from Parmenides to Heidegger, but if you identify it with a thing's 'nature' that strikes me as much clearer (even if a little misty). |
| 14261 | There is 'weak' dependence in one definition, and 'strong' dependence in all the definitions [Fine,K] |
| Full Idea: An object 'weakly' depends upon another if it is ineliminably involved in one of its definitions; and it 'strongly' depends upon the other if it is ineliminably involved in all of its definitions. | |
| From: Kit Fine (Ontological Dependence [1995], III) | |
| A reaction: It is important to remember that a definition can be very long, and not just what might go into a dictionary. |
| 14251 | A natural modal account of dependence says x depends on y if y must exist when x does [Fine,K] |
| Full Idea: A natural account of dependence in terms of modality and existence is that one thing x will depend on another thing y just in case it is necessary that y exists if x exists (or in the symbolism of modal logic, □(Ex→Ey). | |
| From: Kit Fine (Ontological Dependence [1995], I) | |
| A reaction: He is going to criticise this view (which he traces back to Aristotle and Husserl). It immediately seems possible that there might be counterexamples. x might depend on y, but not necessarily depend on y. Necessities may not produce dependence. |
| 14257 | An object depends on another if the second cannot be eliminated from the first's definition [Fine,K] |
| Full Idea: The objects upon which a given object depends, according to the present account, are those which must figure in any of the logically equivalent definitions of the object. They will, in a sense, be ineliminable. | |
| From: Kit Fine (Ontological Dependence [1995], II) | |
| A reaction: This is Fine's main proposal for the dependency relationship, with a context of Aristotelian essences understood as definitions. Sounds pretty good to me. |
| 14254 | Dependency is the real counterpart of one term defining another [Fine,K] |
| Full Idea: The notion of one object depending upon another is the real counterpart to the nominal notion of one term being definable in terms of another. | |
| From: Kit Fine (Ontological Dependence [1995], II) | |
| A reaction: This begins to fill out the Aristotelian picture very nicely, since definitions are right at the centre of the nature of things (though a much more transitional part of the story than Fine seems to think). |
| 14252 | We should understand identity in terms of the propositions it renders true [Fine,K] |
| Full Idea: We should understand the identity or being of an object in terms of the propositions rendered true by its identity rather than the other way round. | |
| From: Kit Fine (Ontological Dependence [1995], I) | |
| A reaction: Behind this is an essentialist view of identity, rather than one connected with necessary properties. |
| 14256 | How do we distinguish basic from derived esssences? [Fine,K] |
| Full Idea: How and where are we to draw the line between what is basic to the essence and what is derived? | |
| From: Kit Fine (Ontological Dependence [1995], II) | |
| A reaction: He calls the basic essence 'constitutive' and the rest the 'consequential' essence. This question is obviously very challenging for the essentialist. See Idea 22. |
| 14258 | Maybe some things have essential relationships as well as essential properties [Fine,K] |
| Full Idea: It is natural to suppose, in the case of such objects as Wooster and Jeeves, that in addition to possessing constitutive essential properties they will also enter into constitutive essential relationships. | |
| From: Kit Fine (Ontological Dependence [1995], III) | |
| A reaction: I like this. If we are going to have scientific essences as structures of intrinsic powers, then the relationships between the parts of the essence must also be essential. That is the whole point - that the powers dictate the relationships. |
| 14260 | An object only essentially has a property if that property follows from every definition of the object [Fine,K] |
| Full Idea: We can say that an object essentially has a certain property if its having that property follows from every definition of the object, while an object will definitively have a given property if its having that property follows from some definition of it. | |
| From: Kit Fine (Ontological Dependence [1995], III) | |
| A reaction: Presumably that will be every accurate definition. This nicely allows for the fact that at least nominal definitions may not be unique, and there is even room for real definitions not to be fully determinate (thus, how far should they extend?). |
| 17703 | Light in straight lines is contingent a priori; stipulated as straight, because they happen to be so [Mares] |
| Full Idea: It seems natural to claim that light rays moving in straight lines is contingent but a priori. Scientists stipulate that they are the standard by which we measure straightness, but their appropriateness for this task is a contingent feature of the world. | |
| From: Edwin D. Mares (A Priori [2011], 02.9) | |
| A reaction: This resembles the metre rule in Paris. It is contingent that something is a certain way, so we make being that way a conventional truth, which can therefore be known via the convention, rather than via the contingent fact. |
| 17714 | Aristotelians dislike the idea of a priori judgements from pure reason [Mares] |
| Full Idea: Aristotelians tend to eschew talk about a special faculty of pure reason that is responsible for all of our a priori judgements. | |
| From: Edwin D. Mares (A Priori [2011], 08.9) | |
| A reaction: He is invoking Carrie Jenkins's idea that the a priori is knowledge of relations between concepts which have been derived from experience. Nice idea. We thus have an empirical a priori, integrated into the natural world. Abstraction must be involved. |
| 17705 | Empiricists say rationalists mistake imaginative powers for modal insights [Mares] |
| Full Idea: Empiricist critiques of rationalism often accuse rationalists of confusing the limits of their imaginations with real insight into what is necessarily true. | |
| From: Edwin D. Mares (A Priori [2011], 03.01) | |
| A reaction: See ideas on 'Conceivable as possible' for more on this. You shouldn't just claim to 'see' that something is true, but be willing to offer some sort of reason, truthmaker or grounding. Without that, you may be right, but you are on weak ground. |
| 17700 | The most popular view is that coherent beliefs explain one another [Mares] |
| Full Idea: In what is perhaps the most popular version of coherentism, a system of beliefs is a set of beliefs that explain one another. | |
| From: Edwin D. Mares (A Priori [2011], 01.5) | |
| A reaction: These seems too simple. My first response would be that explanations are what result from coherence sets of beliefs. I may have beliefs that explain nothing, but at least have the virtue of being coherent. |
| 17704 | Operationalism defines concepts by our ways of measuring them [Mares] |
| Full Idea: The central claim of Percy Bridgman's theory of operational definitions (1920s), is that definitions of certain scientific concepts are given by the ways that we have to measure them. For example, a straight line is 'the path of a light ray'. | |
| From: Edwin D. Mares (A Priori [2011], 02.9) | |
| A reaction: It is often observed that this captures the spirit of Special Relativity. |
| 17710 | Aristotelian justification uses concepts abstracted from experience [Mares] |
| Full Idea: Aristotelian justification is the process of reasoning using concepts that are abstracted from experience (rather than, say, concepts that are innate or those that we associate with the meanings of words). | |
| From: Edwin D. Mares (A Priori [2011], 08.1) | |
| A reaction: See Carrie Jenkins for a full theory along these lines (though she doesn't mention Aristotle). This is definitely my preferred view of concepts. |
| 17706 | The essence of a concept is either its definition or its conceptual relations? [Mares] |
| Full Idea: In the 'classical theory' a concept includes in it those concepts that define it. ...In the 'theory theory' view the content of a concept is determined by its relationship to other concepts. | |
| From: Edwin D. Mares (A Priori [2011], 03.10) | |
| A reaction: Neither of these seem to give an intrinsic account of a concept, or any account of how the whole business gets off the ground. |
| 17701 | Possible worlds semantics has a nice compositional account of modal statements [Mares] |
| Full Idea: Possible worlds semantics is appealing because it gives a compositional analysis of the truth conditions of statements about necessity and possibility. | |
| From: Edwin D. Mares (A Priori [2011], 02.2) | |
| A reaction: Not sure I get this. Is the meaning composed by the gradual addition of worlds? If not, how is meaning composed in the normal way, from component words and phrases? |
| 17702 | Unstructured propositions are sets of possible worlds; structured ones have components [Mares] |
| Full Idea: An unstructured proposition is a set of possible worlds. ....Structured propositions contain entities that correspond to various parts of the sentences or thoughts that express them. | |
| From: Edwin D. Mares (A Priori [2011], 02.3) | |
| A reaction: I am definitely in favour of structured propositions. It strikes me as so obvious as to be not worth discussion - so I am obviously missing something here. Mares says structured propositions are 'more convenient'. |
| 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 |
| 17708 | Maybe space has points, but processes always need regions with a size [Mares] |
| Full Idea: One theory is that space is made up of dimensionless points, but physical processes cannot take place in regions of less than a certain size. | |
| From: Edwin D. Mares (A Priori [2011], 06.7) | |
| A reaction: Thinkers in sympathy with verificationism presumably won't like this, and may prefer Feynman's view. |
| 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. |