19 ideas
| 8507 | Some think of reality as made of things; I prefer facts or states of affairs [Armstrong] |
| Full Idea: Some philosophers (like Devitt) think of reality as made up of things. Others, like me, think of it as made up of facts or states of affairs. | |
| From: David M. Armstrong (Against 'Ostrich Nominalism' [1980], §3) | |
| A reaction: Devitt is a follower of Quine on this. Personally I rather like 'processes'. Unanalysed things with predication (Quine) don't look promising. I currently favour things with active powers, which give rise to properties. See Shoemaker and Ellis. |
| 8506 | Particulars and properties are distinguishable, but too close to speak of a relation [Armstrong] |
| Full Idea: I favour the Realist view that while we can distinguish the particularity of a particular from its properties, but the two 'factors' are too intimately together to speak of a relation between them. | |
| From: David M. Armstrong (Against 'Ostrich Nominalism' [1980], §3) | |
| A reaction: Is Armstrong being a bit of an ostrich here? We could talk of part-whole relationships, or internal relations, or set membership, or coinciding objects, or bundles. We certainly ought to have a go. Armstrong approaches Quine here! |
| 8505 | Refusal to explain why different tokens are of the same type is to be an ostrich [Armstrong] |
| Full Idea: A philosophical account of a general sort is required of what it is for different tokens to be of the same type. To refuse to give such an account is to be a metaphysical ostrich. | |
| From: David M. Armstrong (Against 'Ostrich Nominalism' [1980], §1) | |
| A reaction: This defines Ostrich Nominalism (a label Armstrong aims at Quine). I certainly sympathise with Armstrong. If there is no more to a class (a type) than just having members (tokens), nothing is explain. What is natural, essential, intensional etc.? |
| 7440 | Secondary qualities are microscopic primary qualities of physical things [Armstrong] |
| Full Idea: I argue for the direct identification of the secondary qualities with microscopic primary qualities of physical things. | |
| From: David M. Armstrong (Pref to new 'Materialist Theory' [1992], p.xxii) | |
| A reaction: This sounds a bit like the eliminativism which Armstrong rejects. This seems in danger of mixing questions about the nature of mental events with questions about the nature of externally perceived objects. |
| 7437 | Consciousness and experience of qualities are not the same [Armstrong] |
| Full Idea: Consciousness and experience of qualities are often run together - a serious mistake, I think. | |
| From: David M. Armstrong (Pref to new 'Materialist Theory' [1992], p.xvii) | |
| A reaction: A difficult claim to evaluate. Can we experience redness without being conscious of it? Could there be consciousness (e.g. of concepts) which didn't involve any qualities? I suspect that qualities are more basic than intentionality or consciousness. |
| 7434 | Behaviourism is false, but mind is definable as the cause of behaviour [Armstrong] |
| Full Idea: Behaviourism is false, but one is not far from the truth if one defines the mind as the cause of behaviour. | |
| From: David M. Armstrong (Pref to new 'Materialist Theory' [1992], p.xvi) | |
| A reaction: As Putnam says, if you cut all the efferent (outgoing) nerves, you would have a mind with no behaviour at all. I would say my mind is full of stuff that never affects my behaviour. However, influencing behaviour is certainly the main function of a mind. |
| 7436 | The manifestations of a disposition need never actually exist [Armstrong] |
| Full Idea: The manifestations of a disposition have the particularly mysterious property (metaphysically speaking) that they need not exist - which makes them rather like intentional objects. | |
| From: David M. Armstrong (Pref to new 'Materialist Theory' [1992], p.xvii) | |
| A reaction: His example is a brittle glass which never shatters. This problem seems to require the mention of conditional and counterfactual statements in the description of the actual world, which rather increases the workload for philosophers. |
| 7429 | Causal Functionalism says mental states are apt for producing behaviour [Armstrong] |
| Full Idea: I speak of my view as the Causal version of functionalism, which asserts that mental states are states apt for the production of certain ranges of behaviour and, in some cases, apt for being produced by certain ranges of stimuli. | |
| From: David M. Armstrong (Pref to new 'Materialist Theory' [1992], p.xiv) | |
| A reaction: This effectively makes a mental state a place in a flowdiagram (and hence the mind is software). It says nothing about what qualities the mental states have which make them apt for this role. Full explanations need more than the function. |
| 7438 | A causal theory of mentality would be improved by a teleological element [Armstrong] |
| Full Idea: I now think, following Lycan, that my Causal theory of mentality would be strengthened (perhaps eliminating some potential counter-examples) by the addition of a teleological element. | |
| From: David M. Armstrong (Pref to new 'Materialist Theory' [1992], p.xviii) | |
| A reaction: For Lycan, see Idea 6533. Armstrong has begun to realise that merely specifying the causal role of a mental state is too thin as an explanation. Teleology widens the notion of function. I also want to know about the properties that make it possible. |
| 7431 | The identity of mental states with physical properties is contingent, because the laws of nature are contingent [Armstrong] |
| Full Idea: Granted the contingency of the laws of nature, the identification of dispositions with their categorical bases can be contingent only. | |
| From: David M. Armstrong (Pref to new 'Materialist Theory' [1992], p.xvi) | |
| A reaction: Personally I am not willing to grant the contingency of the laws of nature, but I suppose Armstrong is right about identity if he is right about laws. Presumably an identity could happen to be invariant across possible worlds, without being necessary. |
| 7432 | One mental role might be filled by a variety of physical types [Armstrong] |
| Full Idea: If the mental is just that which plays a causal role then there is the possibility, which may even be an empirical possibility, that the causal role of tokens of the same mental type should be filled by tokens of significantly different physical types. | |
| From: David M. Armstrong (Pref to new 'Materialist Theory' [1992], p.xiv) | |
| A reaction: This allows for multiple realisability in a physicalist framework. Fear has the same role in all animals, but may be realised in physically different ways. I go further, and say that two mental states could differ, while playing the same role. |
| 3282 | The general form of moral reasoning is putting yourself in other people's shoes [Nagel] |
| Full Idea: I believe the general form of moral reasoning is to put yourself in other people's shoes. | |
| From: Thomas Nagel (Equality [1977], §9) |
| 3278 | An egalitarian system must give priority to those with the worst prospects in life [Nagel] |
| Full Idea: What makes a system egalitarian is the priority it gives to the claims of those whose overall life prospects put them at the bottom. | |
| From: Thomas Nagel (Equality [1977], §6) |
| 3275 | Equality was once opposed to aristocracy, but now it opposes public utility and individual rights [Nagel] |
| Full Idea: Egalitarianism was once opposed to aristocratic values, but now it is opposed by adherents of two non-aristocratic values: utility (increase benefit, even if unequally) and individual rights (which redistribution violates). | |
| From: Thomas Nagel (Equality [1977], §2) |
| 3281 | The ideal of acceptability to each individual underlies the appeal to equality [Nagel] |
| Full Idea: The ideal of acceptability to each individual underlies the appeal to equality. | |
| From: Thomas Nagel (Equality [1977], §8) |
| 3277 | In judging disputes, should we use one standard, or those of each individual? [Nagel] |
| Full Idea: In assessing equality of claims, it must be decided whether to use a single, objective standard, or whether interests should be ranked by the person's own estimation. Also should they balance momentary or long-term needs? | |
| From: Thomas Nagel (Equality [1977], §6) |
| 3274 | Equality can either be defended as good for society, or as good for individual rights [Nagel] |
| Full Idea: The communitarian defence of equality says it is good for society as a whole, whereas the individualistic defence defends equality as a correct distributive principle. | |
| From: Thomas Nagel (Equality [1977], §2) |
| 3273 | Equality nowadays is seen as political, social, legal and economic [Nagel] |
| Full Idea: Contemporary political debate recognises four types of equality: political, social, legal and economic. | |
| From: Thomas Nagel (Equality [1977], §1) | |
| A reaction: Meaning equality of 1) power and influence, 2) status and respect, 3) rights and justice, 4) wealth. |
| 3276 | A morality of rights is very minimal, leaving a lot of human life without restrictions or duties [Nagel] |
| Full Idea: The morality of rights tends to be a limited, even minimal, morality. It leaves a great deal of human life ungoverned by moral restrictions or requirements. | |
| From: Thomas Nagel (Equality [1977], §5) |