6 ideas
| 12354 | A 'categorial' property is had by virtue of being or having an item from a category [Wedin] |
| Full Idea: A 'categorial' property is a property something has by virtue of being or having an item from one of the categories. | |
| From: Michael V. Wedin (Aristotle's Theory of Substance [2000], V.5) | |
| A reaction: I deny that these are 'properties'. A thing is categorised according to its properties. To denote the category as a further property is the route to madness (well, to a regress). |
| 12358 | Substance is a principle and a kind of cause [Wedin] |
| Full Idea: Substance [ousia] is a principle [arché] and a kind of cause [aitia]. | |
| From: Michael V. Wedin (Aristotle's Theory of Substance [2000], 1041a09) | |
| A reaction: The fact that substance is a cause is also the reason why substance is the ultimate explanation. It is here that I take the word 'power' to capture best what Aristotle has in mind. |
| 12346 | Form explains why some matter is of a certain kind, and that is explanatory bedrock [Wedin] |
| Full Idea: The form of a thing (of a given kind) explains why certain matter constitutes a thing of that kind, and with this, Aristotle holds, we have reached explanatory bedrock. | |
| From: Michael V. Wedin (Aristotle's Theory of Substance [2000], Intro) | |
| A reaction: We must explain an individual tiger which is unusually docile. It must have an individual form which makes it a tiger, but also an individual form which makes it docile. |
| 7350 | The Torah just says: do not do to your neighbour what is hateful to you [Hillel the Elder] |
| Full Idea: What is hateful to you, do not unto your neighbour: this is the entire Torah. All the rest is commentary - go and study it. | |
| From: Hillel the Elder (reports [c.10]), quoted by Paul Johnson - The History of the Jews Pt II | |
| A reaction: Johnson suggests that this idea, of stripping everything from the Torah except its basic morality, was passed on to Jesus by Hillel. Suppose you hate Arsenal, but your neighbour supports them, and they just won the European Cup? What should you do? |
| 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 |
| 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. |