13 ideas
| 18859 | Metaphysics is a quest for truthmakers [Tallant] |
| Full Idea: In this book I will treat metaphysics as a quest for truthmakers. | |
| From: Jonathan Tallant (Metaphysics: an introduction [2011], 01) | |
| A reaction: I find this appealing, though obviously you have to say what sort of truthmakers generate 'metaphysical' truths, as opposed to physics or biology. I take it that would involve truthmakers that had a high level of generality, idealisation and abstraction. |
| 18861 | Maybe number statements can be paraphrased into quantifications plus identities [Tallant] |
| Full Idea: One strategy is whenever we are presented with a sentence that might appear to entail the existence of numbers, all that we have to do is paraphrase it using a quantified logic, plus identity. | |
| From: Jonathan Tallant (Metaphysics: an introduction [2011], 03.5) | |
| A reaction: This nominalist strategy seems fine for manageable numbers, but gets in trouble with numbers too big to count (e.g. grains of sand in the world) , or genuine infinities. |
| 18866 | Maybe only 'positive' truths need truth-makers [Tallant] |
| Full Idea: We might say that those truths that do not need truth-makers are those that are negative. Those that do need truth-makers are those that are positive. | |
| From: Jonathan Tallant (Metaphysics: an introduction [2011], 10.8) | |
| A reaction: If you deny the existence of something, there is always an implicit domain for the denial, such as 'on the table', or 'in this building', or 'in the cosmos'. So why can't that domain be the truthmaker for a negative existential? |
| 18860 | A truthmaker is the minimal portion of reality that will do the job [Tallant] |
| Full Idea: A 'minimal' truth-maker is the 'smallest' portion of reality required to make a given proposition true. | |
| From: Jonathan Tallant (Metaphysics: an introduction [2011], 01.2) | |
| A reaction: A nice suggestion. This seems to make Ockham's Razor an integral part of the theory of truth-makers. I would apply the same principle to explanations. An Ockhamist explanation is what explains the puzzling thing - and nothing else. |
| 18863 | What is the truthmaker for a possible new power? [Tallant] |
| Full Idea: What power will make true 'there could be a power that does not in fact exist'? | |
| From: Jonathan Tallant (Metaphysics: an introduction [2011], 04.13) | |
| A reaction: Nice question. We can't know whether it is true that a new power could exist, so we can't expect an actual truthmaker for it. Though we might predict new powers (such as for a new transuranic element), on the basis of the known ones. |
| 16641 | Whiteness does not exist, but by it something can exist-as-white [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: Whiteness is said to exist not because it subsists in itself, but because by it something has existence-as-white. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Quodlibeta [1267], IX.2.2), quoted by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 10.2 | |
| A reaction: It seems unavoidable to refer to the whiteness as 'it'. It might be called the 'adverbial' theory of properties, as ways of doing something. |
| 18864 | The wisdom of Plato and of Socrates are not the same property [Tallant] |
| Full Idea: It is not the case that Plato's wisdom = Socrates's wisdom. Platonic-wisdom and Socratic-wisdom are not the same property. | |
| From: Jonathan Tallant (Metaphysics: an introduction [2011], 05.4) | |
| A reaction: This seems reasonable in the case of wisdom, but not so clear in the case of indistinguishable properties of redness or squareness or mass. Nevertheless it gives nice support for trope theory. |
| 13128 | 'Ultimate sortals' cannot explain ontological categories [Westerhoff on Wiggins] |
| Full Idea: 'Ultimate sortals' are said to be non-subordinated, disjoint from one another, and uniquely paired with each object. Because of this, the ultimate sortal cannot be a satisfactory explication of the notion of an ontological category. | |
| From: comment on David Wiggins (Identity and Spatio-Temporal Continuity [1971], p.75) by Jan Westerhoff - Ontological Categories §26 | |
| A reaction: My strong intuitions are that Wiggins is plain wrong, and Westerhoff gives the most promising reasons for my intuition. The simplest point is that objects can obviously belong to more than one category. |
| 18865 | Substance must have two properties: individuation, and property-bearing [Tallant] |
| Full Idea: It appears that substance has essential properties: it is of the essence of substance that it individuates, and it is of the essence of substance that it bears properties. | |
| From: Jonathan Tallant (Metaphysics: an introduction [2011], 06.2) | |
| A reaction: The point being that substances are not 'bear', because they have a role to perform, and a complete blank can't fulfil a role. We can't take substance, though, seriously in ontology. It is just a label for distinct individuals. |
| 22170 | Senses grasp external properties, but the understanding grasps the essential natures of things [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: Our imagination and senses grasp only the outer properties of things, not their natures. ...Understanding, however, grasps the very substance and nature of things, so that what is represented in understanding is a likeness of thing's very essence. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Quodlibeta [1267], 8.2.2) | |
| A reaction: This is exactly the picture I endorse for modern science. Explanation is the path to understanding, and that must venture beyond immediate experience. |
| 22169 | Initial universal truths are present within us as potential, to be drawn out by reason [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: For present in us by nature are certain initial truths everyone knows, in which lie potentially known conclusions our reasons can draw out and make actually known. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Quodlibeta [1267], 8.2.2) | |
| A reaction: Note that these are truths rather than concepts, but that they have to be 'drawn out' by reason. This is Descartes' view of the matter, where the 'natural light' of reason is needed to articulate what is innate, such as geometry. |
| 22168 | Minds take in a likeness of things, which activates an awaiting potential [Aquinas] |
| Full Idea: What the mind takes in is not some material element of the agent, but a likeness of the agent actualising some potential the patient already has. This, for example, is the way our seeing takes in the colour of a coloured body. | |
| From: Thomas Aquinas (Quodlibeta [1267], 8.2.1) | |
| A reaction: This is exactly right. Descartes agreed. It works for colour, but not (obviously) for cheese graters. |
| 18862 | Are propositions all the thoughts and sentences that are possible? [Tallant] |
| Full Idea: One might be tempted to the view that there are as many different propositions as there are thoughts that could be thought and sentences that could be uttered. | |
| From: Jonathan Tallant (Metaphysics: an introduction [2011], 04.5.3) | |
| A reaction: A fairly orthodox view I take to be crazy. I think it is a view designed for logic, rather than for how the world is. Why tie propositions to what can be thought, and then introduce unthought propositions? Why no unthinkable propositions? |