Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'works', 'On 'Physics'' and 'Reference and Contingency'

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6 ideas

7. Existence / A. Nature of Existence / 2. Types of Existence

16664	Everything that exists is either a substance or an accident [Albert of Saxony]
	Full Idea: Everything that exists is either a substance or an accident.
	From: Albert of Saxony (On 'Physics' [1357], I.18), quoted by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 13.2
	A reaction: This seems to be the view of those who base their ontology on first-order classical logic. The more austere reading of that makes the accidents into sets of substances, so it's just substances. All the non-substance stuff cries out for recognition.

9. Objects / E. Objects over Time / 6. Successive Things

16703	God could make a successive thing so that previous parts cease to exist [Albert of Saxony]
	Full Idea: Something can be conceived of as successive simpliciter, with respect to both its substance and its state. For example, if Socrates were continually made and made again by the First Cause, as the Seine flow, so nothing of what preexists remains.
	From: Albert of Saxony (On 'Physics' [1357], III.3), quoted by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 18.4
	A reaction: This is precisely the problem that modern stage theory faces, of knowing how to connect the stages together.

16699	Successive entities just need parts to succeed one another, without their existence [Albert of Saxony]
	Full Idea: For existence to hold of completely successive entities it is not required that their parts exist, but that one part succeed another, as a future part succeeds a past part.
	From: Albert of Saxony (On 'Physics' [1357], III.3 ad 2), quoted by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 18.3
	A reaction: A nice move, but it doesn't quite solve it. How can non-existent things 'succeed one another'? It is worrying for metaphysics that some things have entirely different concepts of persistence from other things.

10. Modality / B. Possibility / 5. Contingency

14895	'Superficial' contingency: false in some world; 'Deep' contingency: no obvious verification [Evans, by Macià/Garcia-Carpentiro]
	Full Idea: Evans says intuitively a sentence is 'superficially' contingent if the function from worlds to truth values assigns F to some world; it is 'deeply' contingent if understanding it does not guarantee that there is a verifying state of affairs.
	From: report of Gareth Evans (Reference and Contingency [1979]) by Macià/Garcia-Carpentiro - Introduction to 'Two-Dimensional Semantics' 2
	A reaction: This distinction is used by Davies and Humberstone (1980) to construct an early version of 2-D semantics (see under Language|Semantics). The point is that part comes from understanding it, and another part from assigning truth values.

10. Modality / E. Possible worlds / 3. Transworld Objects / b. Rigid designation

11881	Rigid designators can be meaningful even if empty [Evans, by Mackie,P]
	Full Idea: Evans argues that there can be rigid designators that are meaningful even if empty.
	From: report of Gareth Evans (Reference and Contingency [1979]) by Penelope Mackie - How Things Might Have Been 1.8

22. Metaethics / A. Ethics Foundations / 2. Source of Ethics / e. Human nature

7667	There are two sides to men - the pleasantly social, and the violent and creative [Diderot, by Berlin]
	Full Idea: Diderot is among the first to preach that there are two men: the artificial man, who belongs in society and seeks to please, and the violent, bold, criminal instinct of a man who wishes to break out (and, if controlled, is responsible for works of genius.
	From: report of Denis Diderot (works [1769], Ch.3) by Isaiah Berlin - The Roots of Romanticism
	A reaction: This has an obvious ancestor in Plato's picture (esp. in 'Phaedrus') of the two conflicting sides to the psuché, which seem to be reason and emotion. In Diderot, though, the suppressed man has virtues, which Plato would deny.