41 ideas
| 23770 | Reductive analysis makes a concept clearer, by giving an alternative simpler set [Williams,NE] |
| Full Idea: A reductive analysis is one that provides an alternative set of concepts by which some target concept can be understood. It must be non-circular, and given in terms of concepts that are themselves better understood. | |
| From: Neil E. Williams (The Powers Metaphysics [2019], 01.2) | |
| A reaction: There seem to be two aims of analysis: this one emphasises understanding, but the other one concerns ontology - by demonstrating that some concept or thing can be understood fully by what happens at a lower level. |
| 20768 | Like spiderswebs, dialectical arguments are clever but useless [Ariston, by Diog. Laertius] |
| Full Idea: He said that dialectical arguments were like spiderswebs: although they seem to indicate craftsmanlike skill, they are useless. | |
| From: report of Ariston (fragments/reports [c.250 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 07.161 | |
| A reaction: Useful for the spider, but useless to Ariston. |
| 23769 | Promoting an ontology by its implied good metaphysic is an 'argument-by-display' [Williams,NE] |
| Full Idea: The form of argument which sells an ontology on the basis a metaphysic is known as an 'argument-by-display'. | |
| From: Neil E. Williams (The Powers Metaphysics [2019], 01.2) | |
| A reaction: [Attributed to John Bigelow 1999] New to me, but I'm quite a fan of this. For example, my rejection of platonism is not based on specific arguments, but on looking at the whole platonic picture of reality. |
| 23783 | Change exists, it is causal, and it needs an explanation [Williams,NE] |
| Full Idea: There is a phenomenon of change. I am starting with the assumptions that it is a causal phenomenon, and that it requires explanation. | |
| From: Neil E. Williams (The Powers Metaphysics [2019], 06.1) | |
| A reaction: That is, I take it, that we need a theory which explains change, rather than just describing it. Well said. Williams says, roughly, that each stage causes the next stage. |
| 23784 | Processes don't begin or end; they just change direction unexpectedly [Williams,NE] |
| Full Idea: No process every really starts or ends. …A process we see as derailed is really just an expected sequence that continues in an unexpected direction. | |
| From: Neil E. Williams (The Powers Metaphysics [2019], 06.3) | |
| A reaction: Obviously if you cannot individuate processes, then the concept of a process is not much use in ontology. Williams rejects processes, and I think he is probably right. He breaks processes down into smaller units. |
| 23790 | Processes are either strings of short unchanging states, or continuous and unreducible events [Williams,NE] |
| Full Idea: Processes can be modelled in two ways. They are drawn out events encompassing many changes, but dissectible into short-lived states, none including change. Or they are continuous and impenetrable, and to split them is impossible. | |
| From: Neil E. Williams (The Powers Metaphysics [2019], 09.3) | |
| A reaction: Obviously a process has temporal moments in it, so the unsplittability is conceptual. I find the concept of changeless parts baffling. But if processes are drawn out, they can't be basic to ontology. |
| 23786 | The status quo is part of what exists, and so needs metaphysical explanation [Williams,NE] |
| Full Idea: The status quo is part of what exists, and thus it is a proper topic of concern for the metaphysician, and so it warrants explanation. | |
| From: Neil E. Williams (The Powers Metaphysics [2019], 07.2) | |
| A reaction: His point is that ontology as a mere inventory of things gives no account of why they remain unchanged, as well as their processes and connections. |
| 23768 | A metaphysic is a set of wider explanations derived from a basic ontology [Williams,NE] |
| Full Idea: A metaphysic is what you get when you embed a fundamental ontology within a larger metaphysical framework by repeatedly appealing to elements of that ontology in explaining metaphysical phenomena. …Only then do you see what the ontology is worth. | |
| From: Neil E. Williams (The Powers Metaphysics [2019], 01.1) | |
| A reaction: Confirming my mantra that metaphysics is an explanatory activity. I think it is important that the ontology includes relations (such as 'determinations'), and is not just an inventory of types of entity. |
| 23773 | Humeans say properties are passive, possibility is vast, laws are descriptions, causation is weak [Williams,NE] |
| Full Idea: The main components of neo-Humean metaphysics are that properties are inherently non-modal and passive, that what is possible is restricted only by imagination and coherence, that laws are non-governing descriptions, and causation is weak and extrinsic. | |
| From: Neil E. Williams (The Powers Metaphysics [2019], 02.1) | |
| A reaction: This is Williams identifying the enemy, prior to offering the much more active and restictive powers ontology. I'm with Williams. |
| 23779 | We shouldn't posit the existence of anything we have a word for [Williams,NE] |
| Full Idea: There seems to be a mysterious desire to posit entities simply because certain terms pop up in our vocabulary. But we should not be so indiscriminate about our posits, even if our talk is properly vetted. | |
| From: Neil E. Williams (The Powers Metaphysics [2019], 04.1) | |
| A reaction: This should hardly need saying, and the familiar example is 'for the sake of' entailing sakes, but it seems to be a vice that is still found in metaphysical philosophy. The word 'nothingness' comes to mind. |
| 23775 | Powers are 'multi-track' if they can produce a variety of manifestations [Williams,NE] |
| Full Idea: Powers are 'multi-track', meaning that they are capable of producing a variety of different manifestations when me with diverse stimuli. | |
| From: Neil E. Williams (The Powers Metaphysics [2019], 03.1) | |
| A reaction: He later mentions magnetism. Not convinced of this. Powers probably never exist in isolation, so a different manifestation could be because a different power becomes involved. (Bird is a single-tracker). |
| 23780 | Every possible state of affairs is written into its originating powers [Williams,NE] |
| Full Idea: On the model of powers I prefer, every possible state of affairs that can arise is written into the powers that would constitute them. | |
| From: Neil E. Williams (The Powers Metaphysics [2019], 04.3) | |
| A reaction: I can't make any sense of 'written into', any more than I could when Leibniz proposed roughly the same thing about monads. I presume he means that any state of affairs which ever arises is the expression of the intrinsic nature of powers. |
| 23789 | Naming powers is unwise, because that it usually done by a single manifestation [Williams,NE] |
| Full Idea: Naming powers is unwise; the main reason is that there is a long tradition of naming powers according to the manifestations they can produce, and that does not square well with multi-track powers. | |
| From: Neil E. Williams (The Powers Metaphysics [2019], 08.4) | |
| A reaction: On the other hand there must be some attempt to individuate powers (by scientists, if not by philosophers), and that can only rely on the manifestations. Describe them, rather than name them? Just assign them a number! |
| 9476 | If dispositions are more fundamental than causes, then they won't conceptually reduce to them [Bird on Lewis] |
| Full Idea: Maybe a disposition is a more fundamental notion than a cause, in which case Lewis has from the very start erred in seeking a causal analysis, in a traditional, conceptual sense, of disposition terms. | |
| From: comment on David Lewis (Causation [1973]) by Alexander Bird - Nature's Metaphysics 2.2.8 | |
| A reaction: Is this right about Lewis? I see him as reducing both dispositions and causes to a set of bald facts, which exist in possible and actual worlds. Conditionals and counterfactuals also suffer the same fate. |
| 23771 | Fundamental physics describes everything in terms of powers [Williams,NE] |
| Full Idea: Physics describes fundamental entities exclusively in terms of what sound like powers. 'Charge' names the power to produce electromagnetic fields; 'spin' the power to contribute to the angular momentum of of system; 'mass' to produce gravitational force. | |
| From: Neil E. Williams (The Powers Metaphysics [2019], 01.4) | |
| A reaction: These are the three basic properties of an electron, which is fundamental in the standard model. You can say that their field is more fundamental than the particles, but the field is also only known as a set of powers. Powers rule! |
| 23776 | Rather than pure powers or pure categoricals, I favour basics which are both at once [Williams,NE] |
| Full Idea: Power Monism: all properties are powers. Categoricalism: all fundamentals are categorical. Dualism allows both types. I defend Mixed Monism - that there is a single class of fundamental properties that are at once powerful and categorical. | |
| From: Neil E. Williams (The Powers Metaphysics [2019], 03.3) | |
| A reaction: This is the main dilemma for the powers ontology - of how powers can be basic, if there needs to be some entity which possesses the power. But what possesses the powers of an electron? I like Williams's idea, without being clear about it. |
| 23777 | Powers are more complicated than properties which are always on display [Williams,NE] |
| Full Idea: The mode in which a power presents itself is more complicated than those properties that have (strictly) nothing more to them than that which is always on display. | |
| From: Neil E. Williams (The Powers Metaphysics [2019], 03.3) | |
| A reaction: This is the key idea that nature is dynamic, and so must consist of potentials as well as actuals. Interesting distinction. A basic division between those properties 'always on display', and those that are not? |
| 23774 | There are basic powers, which underlie dispositions, potentialities, capacities etc [Williams,NE] |
| Full Idea: It is no surprise that talk of dispositions, capacities, abilities, tendencies, powers, and potentialities are part of our everyday interactions. …I have in mind a basic set of powers, the sort which underlie all of these. | |
| From: Neil E. Williams (The Powers Metaphysics [2019], 03.1) | |
| A reaction: This strikes me as the correct picture. It is misleading say that a ball has a 'power' to roll smoothly. The powers are inside the ball. |
| 23791 | Dispositions are just useful descriptions, which are explained by underlying powers [Williams,NE] |
| Full Idea: Powers are the properties at the core of the powers ontology, and dispositions are more like useful talk. …Dispositions are the phenomena to be explained by the power metaphysic. | |
| From: Neil E. Williams (The Powers Metaphysics [2019], 10.2) | |
| A reaction: The picture I subscribe to. The first step is to see nature as dynamic (as Aristotle does with his 'potentialities'), and the next step to understand what must ground these dynamic dispositional properties. He calls dispositions 'process initiators'. |
| 23772 | If objects are property bundles, the properties need combining powers [Williams,NE] |
| Full Idea: If objects are bundles of properties …they must be robust enough to enter into building relations with one another such that they can form objects. | |
| From: Neil E. Williams (The Powers Metaphysics [2019], 01.5) | |
| A reaction: A very nice point. The Humean bundle view of objects just seems to take properties to be 'impressions' or verbal predicates, but they must have causal powers to be a grounding for ontology. |
| 23788 | Four-Dimensional is Perdurantism (temporal parts), plus Eternalism [Williams,NE] |
| Full Idea: 'Perdurantism' is the view that objects persist by being composed of temporal parts. When it is commonly combined with the eternalist account of the ontology of time, the result is known as 'four-dimensionalism'. | |
| From: Neil E. Williams (The Powers Metaphysics [2019], 08.1) | |
| A reaction: At last, a clear account of the distinction between these two! They're both wrong. He says the result is the spatiotemporal 'worm' view (i.e. one temporal extended thing, rather than a collection of parts). |
| 8425 | For true counterfactuals, both antecedent and consequent true is closest to actuality [Lewis] |
| Full Idea: A counterfactual is non-vacuously true iff it takes less of a departure from actuality to make the consequent true along with the antecedent than it does to make the antecedent true without the consequent. | |
| From: David Lewis (Causation [1973], p.197) | |
| A reaction: Almost every theory proposed by Lewis hangs on the meaning of the word 'close', as used here. If you visited twenty Earth-like worlds (watch Startrek?), it would be a struggle to decide their closeness to ours in rank order. |
| 8424 | Determinism says there can't be two identical worlds up to a time, with identical laws, which then differ [Lewis] |
| Full Idea: By determinism I mean that the prevailing laws of nature are such that there do not exist any two possible worlds which are exactly alike up to that time, which differ thereafter, and in which those laws are never violated. | |
| From: David Lewis (Causation [1973], p.196) | |
| A reaction: This would mean that the only way an action of free will could creep in would be if it accepted being a 'violation' of the laws of nature. Fans of free will would probably prefer to call it a 'natural' phenomenon. I'm with Lewis. |
| 8420 | A proposition is a set of possible worlds where it is true [Lewis] |
| Full Idea: I identify a proposition with the set of possible worlds where it is true. | |
| From: David Lewis (Causation [1973], p.193) | |
| A reaction: As it stands, I'm baffled by this. How can 'it is raining' be a set of possible worlds? I assume it expands to refer to the truth-conditions, among possibilities as well as actualities. 'It is raining' fits all worlds where it is raining. |
| 3049 | The chief good is indifference to what lies midway between virtue and vice [Ariston, by Diog. Laertius] |
| Full Idea: The chief good is to live in perfect indifference to all those things which are of an intermediate character between virtue and vice. | |
| From: report of Ariston (fragments/reports [c.250 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 07.2.1 |
| 3549 | Ariston says rules are useless for the virtuous and the non-virtuous [Ariston, by Annas] |
| Full Idea: Ariston says that rules are useless if you are virtuous, and useless if you are not. | |
| From: report of Ariston (fragments/reports [c.250 BCE]) by Julia Annas - The Morality of Happiness 2.4 |
| 23785 | Causation needs to explain stasis, as well as change [Williams,NE] |
| Full Idea: I believe that it is also the job of a theory of causation to explain non-change | |
| From: Neil E. Williams (The Powers Metaphysics [2019], 07.2) | |
| A reaction: Good point. Most attempts to pin down causation refer only to changes and differences. Two playing cards propping one another up is his example. |
| 23782 | Causation is the exercise of powers [Williams,NE] |
| Full Idea: Causation is the exercising of powers. | |
| From: Neil E. Williams (The Powers Metaphysics [2019], 06.1) | |
| A reaction: Job done. Get over it. This is the view I prefer. |
| 8405 | A theory of causation should explain why cause precedes effect, not take it for granted [Lewis, by Field,H] |
| Full Idea: Lewis thinks it is a major defect in a theory of causation that it builds in the condition that the time of the cause precede that of the effect: that cause precedes effect is something we ought to explain (which his counterfactual theory claims to do). | |
| From: report of David Lewis (Causation [1973]) by Hartry Field - Causation in a Physical World | |
| A reaction: My immediate reaction is that the chances of explaining such a thing are probably nil, and that we might as well just accept the direction of causation as a given. Even philosophers balk at the question 'why doesn't time go backwards?' |
| 8427 | I reject making the direction of causation axiomatic, since that takes too much for granted [Lewis] |
| Full Idea: One might stipulate that a cause must always precede its effect, but I reject this solution. It won't solve the problem of epiphenomena, it rejects a priori any backwards causation, and it trivializes defining time-direction through causation. | |
| From: David Lewis (Causation [1973], p.203) | |
| A reaction: [compressed] Not strong arguments, I would say. Maybe apparent causes are never epiphenomenal. Maybe backwards causation is impossible. Maybe we must use time to define causal direction, and not vice versa. |
| 23787 | If causes and effects overlap, that makes changes impossible [Williams,NE] |
| Full Idea: It would be shocking if an account of causation ruled out the possibility of change. But if a cause perfectly overlaps its effect in time, then the rejection of change is precisely what follows. | |
| From: Neil E. Williams (The Powers Metaphysics [2019], 07.6) | |
| A reaction: He cites Kant, Martin, Heil and Mumford/Anjum for this view. The latter seem to see causation as a 'process' (allowing change), which Williams as ruled out. The Williams point must be correct. |
| 10392 | It is just individious discrimination to pick out one cause and label it as 'the' cause [Lewis] |
| Full Idea: We sometimes single out one among all the causes of some event and call it 'the' cause. ..We may select the abnormal causes, or those under human control, or those we deem good or bad, or those we want to talk about. This is invidious discrimination. | |
| From: David Lewis (Causation [1973]) | |
| A reaction: This is the standard view expressed by Mill - presumably the obvious empiricist line. But if we specify 'the pre-conditions' for an event, we can't just mention ANY fact prior to the effect - there is obvious relevance. So why not for 'the' cause as well? |
| 8419 | The modern regularity view says a cause is a member of a minimal set of sufficient conditions [Lewis] |
| Full Idea: In present-day regularity analyses, a cause is defined (roughly) as any member of any minimal set of actual conditions that are jointly sufficient, given the laws, for the existence of the effect. | |
| From: David Lewis (Causation [1973], p.193) | |
| A reaction: This is the view Lewis is about to reject. It seem to summarise the essence of the Mackie INUS theory. This account would make the presence of oxygen a cause of almost every human event. |
| 8421 | Regularity analyses could make c an effect of e, or an epiphenomenon, or inefficacious, or pre-empted [Lewis] |
| Full Idea: In the regularity analysis of causes, instead of c causing e, c might turn out to be an effect of e, or an epiphenomenon, or an inefficacious effect of a genuine cause, or a pre-empted cause (by some other cause) of e. | |
| From: David Lewis (Causation [1973], p.194) | |
| A reaction: These are Lewis's reasons for rejecting the general regularity account, in favour of his own particular counterfactual account. It is unlikely that c would be regularly pre-empted or epiphenomenal. If we build time's direction in, it won't be an effect. |
| 17525 | The counterfactual view says causes are necessary (rather than sufficient) for their effects [Lewis, by Bird] |
| Full Idea: The Humean idea, developed by Lewis, is that rather than being sufficient for their effects, causes are (counterfactual) necessary for their effects. | |
| From: report of David Lewis (Causation [1973]) by Alexander Bird - Causation and the Manifestation of Powers p.162 |
| 17524 | Lewis has basic causation, counterfactuals, and a general ancestral (thus handling pre-emption) [Lewis, by Bird] |
| Full Idea: Lewis's basic account has a basic causal relation, counterfactual dependence, and the general causal relation is the ancestral of this basic one. ...This is motivated by counterfactual dependence failing to be general because of the pre-emption problem. | |
| From: report of David Lewis (Causation [1973]) by Alexander Bird - Causation and the Manifestation of Powers p.161 | |
| A reaction: It is so nice when you struggle for ages with a topic, and then some clever person summarises it clearly for you. |
| 8397 | Counterfactual causation implies all laws are causal, which they aren't [Tooley on Lewis] |
| Full Idea: Some counterfactuals are based on non-causal laws, such as Newton's Third Law of Motion. 'If no force one way, then no force the other'. Lewis's counterfactual analysis implies that one force causes the other, which is not the case. | |
| From: comment on David Lewis (Causation [1973]) by Michael Tooley - Causation and Supervenience 5.2 | |
| A reaction: So what exactly does 'cause' my punt to move forwards? Basing causal laws on counterfactual claims looks to me like putting the cart before the horse. |
| 8423 | My counterfactual analysis applies to particular cases, not generalisations [Lewis] |
| Full Idea: My (counterfactual) analysis is meant to apply to causation in particular cases; it is not an analysis of causal generalizations. Those presumably quantify over particulars, but it is hard to match natural language to the quantifiers. | |
| From: David Lewis (Causation [1973], p.195) | |
| A reaction: What authority could you have for asserting a counterfactual claim, if you only had one observation? Isn't the counterfactual claim the hallmark of a generalisation? For one case, 'if not-c, then not-e' is just a speculation. |
| 8426 | One event causes another iff there is a causal chain from first to second [Lewis] |
| Full Idea: One event is the cause of another iff there exists a causal chain leading from the first to the second. | |
| From: David Lewis (Causation [1973], p.200) | |
| A reaction: It will be necessary to both explain and identify a 'chain'. Some chains are extremely tenuous (Alexander could stop a barrel of beer). Go back a hundred years, and the cause of any present event is everything back then. |
| 23778 | Powers contain lawlike features, pointing to possible future states [Williams,NE] |
| Full Idea: Powers carry their lawlike features within them: it is part of their essence, qua power. Their pointing at future states just is their internal law-like nature; it is what gets expressed in such and such conditions. | |
| From: Neil E. Williams (The Powers Metaphysics [2019], 03.3) | |
| A reaction: Modern writers on powers seem unaware that Leibniz got there first. This seems to me the correct account of the ontology of laws. The formulation of laws is probably the best descriptive system for nature's patterns (over time as well as space). |
| 4795 | Lewis's account of counterfactuals is fine if we know what a law of nature is, but it won't explain the latter [Cohen,LJ on Lewis] |
| Full Idea: Lewis can elucidate the logic of counterfactuals on the assumption that you are not at all puzzled about what a law of nature is. But if you are puzzled about this, it cannot contribute anything towards resolving your puzzlement. | |
| From: comment on David Lewis (Causation [1973]) by L. Jonathan Cohen - The Problem of Natural Laws p.219 | |
| A reaction: This seems like a penetrating remark. The counterfactual theory is wrong, partly because it is epistemological instead of ontological, and partly because it refuses to face the really difficult problem, of what is going on out there. |