7 ideas
17555 | 'One' can mean undivided and not a multitude, or it can add measurement, giving number [Aquinas] |
Full Idea: There are two sorts of one. There is the one which is convertible with being, which adds nothing to being except being undivided; and this deprives of multitude. Then there is the principle of number, which to the notion of being adds measurement. | |
From: Thomas Aquinas (Quaestiones de Potentia Dei [1269], q3 a16 ad 3-um) | |
A reaction: [From a lecture handout] I'm not sure I understand this. We might say, I suppose, that insofar as water is water, it is all one, but you can't count it. Perhaps being 'unified' and being a 'unity' are different? |
14590 | If we accept scattered objects such as archipelagos, why not think of cars that way? [Hawthorne] |
Full Idea: In being willing to countenance archipelagos, one embraces scattered objects. Why not then embrace the 'archipelago' of my car and the Eiffel Tower? | |
From: John Hawthorne (Three-Dimensionalism v Four-Dimensionalism [2008], 2.1) | |
A reaction: This is a beautifully simple and striking point. Language is full of embracing terms like 'the furniture', but that doesn't mean we assume the furniture is unified. The archipelago is less of an 'object' if you live on one of the islands. |
14591 | Four-dimensionalists say instantaneous objects are more fundamental than long-lived ones [Hawthorne] |
Full Idea: Self-proclaimed four-dimensionalists typically adopt a picture that reckons instantaneous objects (and facts about them) to be more fundamental than long-lived ones. | |
From: John Hawthorne (Three-Dimensionalism v Four-Dimensionalism [2008], 2.2) | |
A reaction: A nice elucidation. As in Idea 14588, this seems motivated by a desire for some sort of foundationalism or atomism. Why shouldn't a metaphysic treat the middle-sized or temporally extended as foundational, and derive the rest that way? |
14589 | A modal can reverse meaning if the context is seen differently, so maybe context is all? [Hawthorne] |
Full Idea: One person says 'He can't dig a hole; he hasn't got a spade', and another says 'He can dig a hole; just give him a spade', and both uses of the modal 'can' will be true. So some philosophers say that all modal predications are thus context-dependent. | |
From: John Hawthorne (Three-Dimensionalism v Four-Dimensionalism [2008], 1.2) | |
A reaction: Quine is the guru for this view of modality. Hawthorne's example seems to me to rely too much on the linguistic feature of contrasting 'can' and 'can't'. The underlying assertion in the propositions says something real about the possibilities. |
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 |
14588 | Modern metaphysicians tend to think space-time points are more fundamental than space-time regions [Hawthorne] |
Full Idea: Nowadays it is common for metaphysicians to hold both that space-time regions are less fundamental than the space-time points that compose them, and that facts about the regions are less fundamental than facts about the points and their arrangements. | |
From: John Hawthorne (Three-Dimensionalism v Four-Dimensionalism [2008], 1) | |
A reaction: I'm not quite sure what a physicist would make of this. It seems to be motivated by some a priori preference for atomism, and for system-building from minimal foundations. |
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. |