Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'fragments/reports', 'Whitehead and the Rise of Modern Logic' and 'On Note L to Bayle's 'Rorarius''

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6 ideas

5. Theory of Logic / A. Overview of Logic / 7. Second-Order Logic
Quine says higher-order items are intensional, and lack a clearly defined identity relation [Quine, by Shapiro]
     Full Idea: Quine (in 1941) attacked 'Principia Mathematica' because the items in the range of higher-order variables (attributes etc) are intensional and thus do not have a clearly defined identity relation.
     From: report of Willard Quine (Whitehead and the Rise of Modern Logic [1941]) by Stewart Shapiro - Foundations without Foundationalism 1.3
6. Mathematics / C. Sources of Mathematics / 6. Logicism / b. Type theory
Russell confused use and mention, and reduced classes to properties, not to language [Quine, by Lackey]
     Full Idea: Quine (1941) said that Russell had confused use and mention, and thus thought he had reduced classes to linguistic entities, while in fact he reduced them only to Platonic properties.
     From: report of Willard Quine (Whitehead and the Rise of Modern Logic [1941]) by Douglas Lackey - Intros to Russell's 'Essays in Analysis' p.133
     A reaction: This is cited as the 'orthodox critical interpretation' of Russell and Whitehead. Confusion of use and mention was a favourite charge of Quine's.
15. Nature of Minds / B. Features of Minds / 2. Unconscious Mind
The soul doesn't understand many of its own actions, if perceptions are confused and desires buried [Leibniz]
     Full Idea: The soul does many things without knowing how it does them - when it does them by means of confused perceptions and unconscious inclinations or appetites.
     From: Gottfried Leibniz (On Note L to Bayle's 'Rorarius' [1705], [L])
     A reaction: This increasingly strikes me as a wonderful and important insight for its time. He's really paid attention to his own mind, and given up the simplistic view that derives from Descartes. Are birds conscious? Yes or no! Silly.
17. Mind and Body / A. Mind-Body Dualism / 5. Parallelism
We should say that body is mechanism and soul is immaterial, asserting their independence [Leibniz]
     Full Idea: I think we should keep both sides: we should be more Democritean and make all actions of bodies mechanical and independent of souls, and we should also be more than Platonic and hold that all actions of souls are immaterial and independent of mechanism.
     From: Gottfried Leibniz (On Note L to Bayle's 'Rorarius' [1705], [C])
     A reaction: This is about as dualist as it is possible to get. It certainly looks as if many of Leibniz's doctrines are rebellions against Spinoza (in this case his 'dual aspect monism'). I take Leibniz to be utterly but heroically wrong.
21. Aesthetics / C. Artistic Issues / 7. Art and Morality
Musical performance can reveal a range of virtues [Damon of Ath.]
     Full Idea: In singing and playing the lyre, a boy will be likely to reveal not only courage and moderation, but also justice.
     From: Damon (fragments/reports [c.460 BCE], B4), quoted by (who?) - where?
26. Natural Theory / A. Speculations on Nature / 4. Mathematical Nature
Minds unconsciously count vibration beats in music, and enjoy it when they coincide [Leibniz]
     Full Idea: In music, the soul counts the beats of the vibrating object which makes the sound, and when these beats regularly coincide at short intervals, it finds them pleasing. Thus it counts without knowing it.
     From: Gottfried Leibniz (On Note L to Bayle's 'Rorarius' [1705], [L])
     A reaction: Only a mathematician would see music this way! He is defending his account of the unconscious mind. The proposal that we unconsciously count sounds highly implausible. He needs to recognise the patterns that ground mathematics.