15 ideas
| 5300 | Philosophers have interpreted the world, but the point is to change it [Marx] |
| Full Idea: The philosophers have only interpreted the world, in various ways; the point is to change it. | |
| From: Karl Marx (Theses on Feuerbach [1846], §XI) | |
| A reaction: The 'point' of what? Personally I am more with Aristotle - that the aim is to create a society in which we can all aspire to contemplate like gods. As an interim statement of aim, though, one must respect Marx. But was he a philosopher? |
| 5297 | Whether human thinking can be 'true' must be decided in practice, not theory [Marx] |
| Full Idea: The question whether objective truth can be attributed to human thinking is not a question of theory but is a practical question; man must prove the truth of his thinking in practice. | |
| From: Karl Marx (Theses on Feuerbach [1846], §II) | |
| A reaction: This would appear to be an assertion of the pragmatic view of truth well before Peirce. The obvious objections arise, such as whether falsehood (Plato's 'noble lie') might not have equal practical success, and whether truth might be disastrous. |
| 6299 | Axioms are often affirmed simply because they produce results which have been accepted [Resnik] |
| Full Idea: Many axioms have been proposed, not on the grounds that they can be directly known, but rather because they produce a desired body of previously recognised results. | |
| From: Michael D. Resnik (Maths as a Science of Patterns [1997], One.5.1) | |
| A reaction: This is the perennial problem with axioms - whether we start from them, or whether we deduce them after the event. There is nothing wrong with that, just as we might infer the existence of quarks because of their results. |
| 6304 | Mathematical realism says that maths exists, is largely true, and is independent of proofs [Resnik] |
| Full Idea: Mathematical realism is the doctrine that mathematical objects exist, that much contemporary mathematics is true, and that the existence and truth in question is independent of our constructions, beliefs and proofs. | |
| From: Michael D. Resnik (Maths as a Science of Patterns [1997], Three.12.9) | |
| A reaction: As thus defined, I would call myself a mathematical realist, but everyone must hesitate a little at the word 'exist' and ask, how does it exist? What is it 'made of'? To say that it exists in the way that patterns exist strikes me as very helpful. |
| 6300 | Mathematical constants and quantifiers only exist as locations within structures or patterns [Resnik] |
| Full Idea: In maths the primary subject-matter is not mathematical objects but structures in which they are arranged; our constants and quantifiers denote atoms, structureless points, or positions in structures; they have no identity outside a structure or pattern. | |
| From: Michael D. Resnik (Maths as a Science of Patterns [1997], Three.10.1) | |
| A reaction: This seems to me a very promising idea for the understanding of mathematics. All mathematicians acknowledge that the recognition of patterns is basic to the subject. Even animals recognise patterns. It is natural to invent a language of patterns. |
| 6303 | Sets are positions in patterns [Resnik] |
| Full Idea: On my view, sets are positions in certain patterns. | |
| From: Michael D. Resnik (Maths as a Science of Patterns [1997], Three.10.5) | |
| A reaction: I have always found the ontology of a 'set' puzzling, because they seem to depend on prior reasons why something is a member of a given set, which cannot always be random. It is hard to explain sets without mentioning properties. |
| 6302 | Structuralism must explain why a triangle is a whole, and not a random set of points [Resnik] |
| Full Idea: An objection is that structuralism fails to explain why certain mathematical patterns are unified wholes while others are not; for instance, some think that an ontological account of mathematics must explain why a triangle is not a 'random' set of points. | |
| From: Michael D. Resnik (Maths as a Science of Patterns [1997], Three.10.4) | |
| A reaction: This is an indication that we are not just saying that we recognise patterns in nature, but that we also 'see' various underlying characteristics of the patterns. The obvious suggestion is that we see meta-patterns. |
| 6295 | There are too many mathematical objects for them all to be mental or physical [Resnik] |
| Full Idea: If we take mathematics at its word, there are too many mathematical objects for it to be plausible that they are all mental or physical objects. | |
| From: Michael D. Resnik (Maths as a Science of Patterns [1997], One.1) | |
| A reaction: No one, of course, has ever claimed that they are, but this is a good starting point for assessing the ontology of mathematics. We are going to need 'rules', which can deduce the multitudinous mathematical objects from a small ontology. |
| 6296 | Maths is pattern recognition and representation, and its truth and proofs are based on these [Resnik] |
| Full Idea: I argue that mathematical knowledge has its roots in pattern recognition and representation, and that manipulating representations of patterns provides the connection between the mathematical proof and mathematical truth. | |
| From: Michael D. Resnik (Maths as a Science of Patterns [1997], One.1) | |
| A reaction: The suggestion that patterns are at the basis of the ontology of mathematics is the most illuminating thought I have encountered in the area. It immediately opens up the possibility of maths being an entirely empirical subject. |
| 6301 | Congruence is the strongest relationship of patterns, equivalence comes next, and mutual occurrence is the weakest [Resnik] |
| Full Idea: Of the equivalence relationships which occur between patterns, congruence is the strongest, equivalence the next, and mutual occurrence the weakest. None of these is identity, which would require the same position. | |
| From: Michael D. Resnik (Maths as a Science of Patterns [1997], Three.10.3) | |
| A reaction: This gives some indication of how an account of mathematics as a science of patterns might be built up. Presumably the recognition of these 'degrees of strength' cannot be straightforward observation, but will need an a priori component? |
| 22598 | The authentic self exists at the level of class, rather than the individual [Marx, by Dunt] |
| Full Idea: Instead of focusing on the individual, Marxism suggested that the authentic self was at the social level in the form of class. | |
| From: report of Karl Marx (Theses on Feuerbach [1846]) by Ian Dunt - How to be a Liberal 6 | |
| A reaction: [not sure of the best source in Marx] This idea is expressed here by a defender of liberal individualism. Dunt persuasively attacks any concept of the self as part of some group, rather than as being an individual. |
| 7861 | Libet says the processes initiated in the cortex can still be consciously changed [Libet, by Papineau] |
| Full Idea: Libet himself points out that the conscious decisions still have the power to 'endorse' or 'cancel', so to speak, the processes initiated by the earlier cortical activity: no action will result if the action's execution is consciously countermanded. | |
| From: report of Benjamin Libet (Unconscious Cerebral Initiative [1985]) by David Papineau - Thinking about Consciousness 1.4 | |
| A reaction: This is why Libet's findings do not imply 'epiphenomenalism'. It seems that part of a decisive action is non-conscious, undermining the all-or-nothing view of consciousness. Searle tries to smuggle in free will at this point (Idea 3817). |
| 6660 | Libet found conscious choice 0.2 secs before movement, well after unconscious 'readiness potential' [Libet, by Lowe] |
| Full Idea: Libet found that a subject's conscious choice to move was about a fifth of a second before movement, and thus later than the onset of the brain's so-called 'readiness potential', which seems to imply that unconscious processes initiates action. | |
| From: report of Benjamin Libet (Unconscious Cerebral Initiative [1985]) by E.J. Lowe - Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind Ch.9 | |
| A reaction: Of great interest to philosophers! It seems to make conscious choices epiphenomenal. The key move, I think, is to give up the idea of consciousness as being all-or-nothing. My actions are still initiated by 'me', but 'me' shades off into unconsciousness. |
| 5298 | The human essence is not found in individuals but in social relations [Marx] |
| Full Idea: The human essence is no abstraction inherent in each single individual; in its reality it is the ensemble of the social relations. | |
| From: Karl Marx (Theses on Feuerbach [1846], §VI) | |
| A reaction: This is a key Marxist doctrine, and the central difference from Aristotle. Personally I am more with Aristotle, but the truth obviously lies somewhere in between. Man must be a 'social being', or there wouldn't be any social relations. |
| 5299 | Religious feeling is social in origin [Marx] |
| Full Idea: The "religious sentiment" (discussed by Feuerbach) is itself a social product. | |
| From: Karl Marx (Theses on Feuerbach [1846], §VII) | |
| A reaction: Recent brain research has identified a part of the brain which is only active during religious thought and experience. It is easy to produce cynical political accounts of religion, but in its time it was also quite a good scientific account of nature. |