13190
|
I don't admit infinite numbers, and consider infinitesimals to be useful fictions [Leibniz]
|
|
Full Idea:
Notwithstanding my infinitesimal calculus, I do not admit any real infinite numbers, even though I confess that the multitude of things surpasses any finite number, or rather any number. ..I consider infinitesimal quantities to be useful fictions.
|
|
From:
Gottfried Leibniz (Letters to Samuel Masson [1716], 1716)
|
|
A reaction:
With the phrase 'useful fictions' we seem to have jumped straight into Harty Field. I'm with Leibniz on this one. The history of mathematics is a series of ingenious inventions, whenever they seem to make further exciting proofs possible.
|
7657
|
Intelligent agents are composed of nested homunculi, of decreasing intelligence, ending in machines [Dennett]
|
|
Full Idea:
As long as your homunculi are more stupid and ignorant than the intelligent agent they compose, the nesting of homunculi within homunculi can be finite, bottoming out, eventually, with agents so unimpressive they can be replaced by machines.
|
|
From:
Daniel C. Dennett (Sweet Dreams [2005], Ch.6)
|
|
A reaction:
[Dennett first proposed this in 'Brainstorms' 1978]. This view was developed well by Lycan. I rate it as one of the most illuminating ideas in the modern philosophy of mind. All complex systems (like aeroplanes) have this structure.
|
7656
|
I don't deny consciousness; it just isn't what people think it is [Dennett]
|
|
Full Idea:
I don't maintain, of course, that human consciousness does not exist; I maintain that it is not what people often think it is.
|
|
From:
Daniel C. Dennett (Sweet Dreams [2005], Ch.3)
|
|
A reaction:
I consider Dennett to be as near as you can get to an eliminativist, but he is not stupid. As far as I can see, the modern philosopher's bogey-man, the true total eliminativist, simply doesn't exist. Eliminativists usually deny propositional attitudes.
|
16709
|
Some people return to scholastic mysterious qualities, disguising them as 'forces' [Leibniz]
|
|
Full Idea:
It pleases others to return to occult qualities or scholastic faculties, but since these crude philosophers and physicians see that those terms are in bad repute they change their name, calling them 'forces'.
|
|
From:
Gottfried Leibniz (Against Barbaric physics [1716], A&G:313), quoted by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 19.7
|
|
A reaction:
Deceptive, because Leibniz embraced forces in his revised Aristotelian essentialism. Leibniz placed forces within essences, and he is worried about forces as separate entities, unsupported by any substance.
|