|
5893
|
A wise man has integrity, firmness of will, nobility, consistency, sobriety, patience [Cicero]
|
|
Full Idea:
The wise man does nothing of which he can repent, nothing against his will, does everything nobly, consistently, soberly, rightly, not looking forward to anything as bound to come, is not astonished at any novel occurrence, abides by his own decisions.
|
|
From:
M. Tullius Cicero (Tusculan Disputations [c.44 BCE], V.xxviii)
|
|
A reaction:
Notice that the wise man never exhibits weakness of will (an Aristotelian virtue), and is consistent (as Kant proposed), and is patient (as the Stoics proposed). But Cicero doesn't think he should busy himself maximising happiness.
|
|
15209
|
Like disastrous small errors in navigation, small misunderstandings can wreck intellectual life [Harré/Madden]
|
|
Full Idea:
Just as the tiniest error in navigation may lead to a landfall even on the wrong continent, so the acceptance of apparently innocuous principles can lead to doctrines which, if accepted, would render intellectual life impossible.
|
|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 1.I.A)
|
|
A reaction:
If one lived life by an axiom system, and one of the axioms was a bit off kilter, then this idea would be a powerful one. Note that it is only 'intellectual' life that is screwed up, but even there a plurality of ideas keep correcting one another.
|
|
15212
|
Analysis of concepts based neither on formalism nor psychology can arise from examining what we know [Harré/Madden]
|
|
Full Idea:
Adequate accounts of those concepts which are neither purely formal nor simply psychological can be achieved by attention to ....the content of our knowledge, content which goes beyond the reports of immediate experience.
|
|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 1.I.A)
|
|
A reaction:
I like this one. Most proponents of analysis are either bogged down in trying to reduce all of our talk to formal logic, or else they think that they are just analysing how we think. It's neither, because the concepts arise from the world.
|
|
15210
|
Humeans see analysis in terms of formal logic, because necessities are fundamentally logical relations [Harré/Madden]
|
|
Full Idea:
The Humean view has led philosophers to suppose that their task is to provide an analysis of key concepts and relations wholly in terms drawn from formal logic, since relations of necessity are, in their view, fundamentally logical relations
|
|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 1.I.A)
|
|
A reaction:
A very sharp observation about why logic has become central to contemporary philosophy. As far as I can see, logic steadily increases its dominance, to the point where ordinary metaphysical thought is being squeezed out.
|
|
10170
|
While true-in-a-model seems relative, true-in-all-models seems not to be [Reck/Price]
|
|
Full Idea:
While truth can be defined in a relative way, as truth in one particular model, a non-relative notion of truth is implied, as truth in all models.
|
|
From:
E Reck / M Price (Structures and Structuralism in Phil of Maths [2000], §4)
|
|
A reaction:
[The article is actually discussing arithmetic] This idea strikes me as extremely important. True-in-all-models is usually taken to be tautological, but it does seem to give a more universal notion of truth. See semantic truth, Tarski, Davidson etc etc.
|
|
10175
|
Three types of variable in second-order logic, for objects, functions, and predicates/sets [Reck/Price]
|
|
Full Idea:
In second-order logic there are three kinds of variables, for objects, for functions, and for predicates or sets.
|
|
From:
E Reck / M Price (Structures and Structuralism in Phil of Maths [2000], §5)
|
|
A reaction:
It is interesting that a predicate seems to be the same as a set, which begs rather a lot of questions. For those who dislike second-order logic, there seems nothing instrinsically wicked in having variables ranging over innumerable multi-order types.
|
|
15273
|
Points can be 'dense' by unending division, but must meet a tougher criterion to be 'continuous' [Harré/Madden]
|
|
Full Idea:
Points can be 'dense' by indefinitely prolonged division. To be 'continuous' is more stringent; the points must be cut into two sets, and meet the condition laid down by Boscovich and Dedekind.
|
|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 6.IV)
|
|
A reaction:
This idea goes with Idea 15274, which lays down the specification of the Dedekind Cut, which is the criterion for the real (and continuous) numbers. Harré and Madden are interested in whether time can support continuity of objects.
|
|
10164
|
Peano Arithmetic can have three second-order axioms, plus '1' and 'successor' [Reck/Price]
|
|
Full Idea:
A common formulation of Peano Arithmetic uses 2nd-order logic, the constant '1', and a one-place function 's' ('successor'). Three axioms then give '1 is not a successor', 'different numbers have different successors', and induction.
|
|
From:
E Reck / M Price (Structures and Structuralism in Phil of Maths [2000], §2)
|
|
A reaction:
This is 'second-order' Peano Arithmetic, though it is at least as common to formulate in first-order terms (only quantifying over objects, not over properties - as is done here in the induction axiom). I like the use of '1' as basic instead of '0'!
|
|
10167
|
Structuralism emerged from abstract algebra, axioms, and set theory and its structures [Reck/Price]
|
|
Full Idea:
Structuralism has emerged from the development of abstract algebra (such as group theory), the creation of axiom systems, the introduction of set theory, and Bourbaki's encyclopaedic survey of set theoretic structures.
|
|
From:
E Reck / M Price (Structures and Structuralism in Phil of Maths [2000], §2)
|
|
A reaction:
In other words, mathematics has gradually risen from one level of abstraction to the next, so that mathematical entities like points and numbers receive less and less attention, with relationships becoming more prominent.
|
|
10169
|
Relativist Structuralism just stipulates one successful model as its arithmetic [Reck/Price]
|
|
Full Idea:
Relativist Structuralism simply picks one particular model of axiomatised arithmetic (i.e. one particular interpretation that satisfies the axioms), and then stipulates what the elements, functions and quantifiers refer to.
|
|
From:
E Reck / M Price (Structures and Structuralism in Phil of Maths [2000], §4)
|
|
A reaction:
The point is that a successful model can be offered, and it doesn't matter which one, like having any sort of aeroplane, as long as it flies. I don't find this approach congenial, though having a model is good. What is the essence of flight?
|
|
10179
|
There are 'particular' structures, and 'universal' structures (what the former have in common) [Reck/Price]
|
|
Full Idea:
The term 'structure' has two uses in the literature, what can be called 'particular structures' (which are particular relational systems), but also what can be called 'universal structures' - what particular systems share, or what they instantiate.
|
|
From:
E Reck / M Price (Structures and Structuralism in Phil of Maths [2000], §6)
|
|
A reaction:
This is a very helpful distinction, because it clarifies why (rather to my surprise) some structuralists turn out to be platonists in a new guise. Personal my interest in structuralism has been anti-platonist from the start.
|
|
10182
|
There are Formalist, Relativist, Universalist and Pattern structuralism [Reck/Price]
|
|
Full Idea:
There are four main variants of structuralism in the philosophy of mathematics - formalist structuralism, relativist structuralism, universalist structuralism (with modal variants), and pattern structuralism.
|
|
From:
E Reck / M Price (Structures and Structuralism in Phil of Maths [2000], §9)
|
|
A reaction:
I'm not sure where Chihara's later book fits into this, though it is at the nominalist end of the spectrum. Shapiro and Resnik do patterns (the latter more loosely); Hellman does modal universalism; Quine does the relativist version. Dedekind?
|
|
10168
|
Formalist Structuralism says the ontology is vacuous, or formal, or inference relations [Reck/Price]
|
|
Full Idea:
Formalist Structuralism endorses structural methodology in mathematics, but rejects semantic and metaphysical problems as either meaningless, or purely formal, or as inference relations.
|
|
From:
E Reck / M Price (Structures and Structuralism in Phil of Maths [2000], §3)
|
|
A reaction:
[very compressed] I find the third option fairly congenial, certainly in preference to rather platonist accounts of structuralism. One still needs to distinguish the mathematical from the non-mathematical in the inference relations.
|
|
10178
|
Maybe we should talk of an infinity of 'possible' objects, to avoid arithmetic being vacuous [Reck/Price]
|
|
Full Idea:
It is tempting to take a modal turn, and quantify over all possible objects, because if there are only a finite number of actual objects, then there are no models (of the right sort) for Peano Arithmetic, and arithmetic is vacuously true.
|
|
From:
E Reck / M Price (Structures and Structuralism in Phil of Maths [2000], §5)
|
|
A reaction:
[compressed; Geoffrey Hellman is the chief champion of this view] The article asks whether we are not still left with the puzzle of whether infinitely many objects are possible, instead of existent.
|
|
10177
|
Universalist Structuralism eliminates the base element, as a variable, which is then quantified out [Reck/Price]
|
|
Full Idea:
Universalist Structuralism is eliminativist about abstract objects, in a distinctive form. Instead of treating the base element (say '1') as an ambiguous referring expression (the Relativist approach), it is a variable which is quantified out.
|
|
From:
E Reck / M Price (Structures and Structuralism in Phil of Maths [2000], §5)
|
|
A reaction:
I am a temperamental eliminativist on this front (and most others) so this is tempting. I am also in love with the concept of a 'variable', which I take to be utterly fundamental to all conceptual thought, even in animals, and not just a trick of algebra.
|
|
15211
|
There is not an exclusive dichotomy between the formal and the logical [Harré/Madden]
|
|
Full Idea:
The assumption that there is an exclusive dichotomy between the formal and the psychological is, in our view, an error of enormous consequence.
|
|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 1.I.A)
|
|
A reaction:
I agree entirely with this, and am opposed to the Fregean view of the matter. The psychology is the bridge between the physical world and the logic. Frege had to be a platonist, so that the formalism could latch onto something.
|
|
15268
|
Humeans construct their objects from events, but we construct events from objects [Harré/Madden]
|
|
Full Idea:
On our view, 'event' is to be understood in terms of the ontology of enduring things, while on the Humean view enduring things are conceived to be constructions of events.
|
|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 6.IV)
|
|
A reaction:
It has quite hard to take either objects or events, given that they seem to be amenable to analysis. I am tempted to take essences as primitive. They fix identity, endure change, bear accidental properties (including temporary intrinsics).
|
|
15319
|
Hard individual blocks don't fix what 'things' are; fluids are no less material things [Harré/Madden]
|
|
Full Idea:
There is no metaphysical justification whatever for treating the solid, bounded, material object as the determiner of all thing concepts. Fluids are no less material things than are hard solid blocks.
|
|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 9.IV)
|
|
A reaction:
We don't tend to talk of a fluid as 'a' thing, and without distinct objects there would be virtually no structure, or interest, in nature, so what gives identity to the blocks must interest the metaphysician.
|
|
15318
|
Gravitational and electrical fields are, for a materialist, distressingly empty of material [Harré/Madden]
|
|
Full Idea:
The region around a magnetic body, the space between earth and moon, and the vicinity of an electric cable remain obstinately and, for a materialist, distressingly empty of material.
|
|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 9.III)
|
|
A reaction:
Ouch, if you are a strict 'materialist'! I call myself a 'naturalist', in a hand-wavy sort of way. On materialism and determinism I remain vague.
|
|
15267
|
Events are changes in states of affairs (which consist of structured particulars, with powers and relations) [Harré/Madden]
|
|
Full Idea:
A state of affairs consists of structures of particulars that endure (of which physical objects would be one type), the properties and powers of those particulars, and the relations obtaining among them. A common 'event' is a change in state of affairs.
|
|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 6.IV)
|
|
A reaction:
I find 'event' to be so vague, and so dependent on pragmatic interests, that it has hard to find a place for it in an ontological system. Ditto with state of affairs. They overlap. States of affairs can survive change (like a political majority).
|
|
15276
|
Some powers need a stimulus, but others are just released [Harré/Madden]
|
|
Full Idea:
Some powerful particulars require to be stimulated before their powers are manifested. Others will manifest their powers whenever the impediments to action, the constraints, are removed.
|
|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 6.V)
|
|
A reaction:
Sounds nice and clear, but if gunpowder explodes at a certain temperature, how can you distinguish temperatures as the 'stimulus' ones and the 'release' ones? We just remove the constraint of low temperature.
|
|
15218
|
Scientists define copper almost entirely (bar atomic number) in terms of its dispositions [Harré/Madden]
|
|
Full Idea:
For scientists 'copper' refers to something having the properties of malleability, fusibility, ductility, electric conductivity, density 8.92, atomic weight 63.54, and atomic number 19. All but the last of these are dispositional.
|
|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 1.II.C)
|
|
A reaction:
This is important because it is tempting to pick the atomic number as the essence of copper, but it is the only one on the list which is structural rather than dispositional. The deep question is why that substance has those dispositions.
|
|
15315
|
What is a field of potentials, if it only consists of possible events? [Harré/Madden]
|
|
Full Idea:
How are we to conceive of a field of potentials when the very point of the notion is that it serves to describe what would happen at various places, and is not a description of what did or is happening?
|
|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 9.III)
|
|
A reaction:
I suppose the answer is induction. If there were no events, the field would be beyond us. We infer the field from observed events, and infer possible events from the patterns of behaviour in the field, and its nature.
|
|
15264
|
The notorious substratum results from substance-with-qualities; individuals-with-powers solves this [Harré/Madden]
|
|
Full Idea:
Chemical analysis either arrives at a qualityless substance, the notorious substratum, or is obliged to declare certain qualities primary and inexplicable. Substituting individuals-with-powers for substance-with-qualities removes these difficulties.
|
|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 6.II)
|
|
A reaction:
Any account gives you something as basic, and that something is always going to seem inherently and deeply mysterious. I prefer powers to substrata, but what has the powers? They like 'fields'.
|
|
15262
|
In logic the nature of a kind, substance or individual is the essence which is inseparable from what it is [Harré/Madden]
|
|
Full Idea:
From the point of view of philosophical logic, the nature of a kind, or a material substance or an individual is its essence, that is, those of its qualities which are inseparable from its being that kind, that material or that individual.
|
|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 6.I)
|
|
A reaction:
This might be where the logical and the naturalistic notions of essence come apart. Could something retain its 'natural' essence while losing its identity, or lose its essence while retaining its identity?
|
|
15297
|
We can infer a new property of a thing from its other properties, via its essential nature [Harré/Madden]
|
|
Full Idea:
If we know the nature of a particular that explains its properties, powers and capacities and relates them into intelligible clusters, then we can indeed infer from some of the powers and properties to others via its essential nature.
|
|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 8.III)
|
|
A reaction:
This is an optimistic assertion of precisely the possibility which Locke denied in Idea 12547. This optimism is the main reason for the revival of scientific essentialism in recent years. It just seems to be true of modern science.
|
|
15266
|
We say the essence of particles is energy, but only so we can tell a story about the nature of things [Harré/Madden]
|
|
Full Idea:
The essential nature of matter and radiation is energy, so it is maintained, but the point of maintaining this is precisely to allow one to make use of a notion of the nature of things.
|
|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 6.III)
|
|
A reaction:
They are defending essentialism, but this seems to be a counterexample, of our need to postulate essences where there are none. It makes our explanations work better, but at the cost of commitment to a 'quasi-substance' (Idea 15265).
|
|
15222
|
Some individuals can gain or lose capacities or powers, without losing their identity [Harré/Madden]
|
|
Full Idea:
Some individuals to gain or lose certain capacities or powers, but do not thereby lose their identity. They still have the same nature. A drug, or photographic paper, may lose effectiveness over time.
|
|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 1.II.C)
|
|
A reaction:
Damn! I thought I was the first to spot this problem! I, however, take it to be much more metaphysically significant than Harré and Madden do. The question is whether those properties were essential, since they can be lost. Essential but not necessary!
|
|
15296
|
A particular might change all of its characteristics, retaining mere numerical identity [Harré/Madden]
|
|
Full Idea:
Change might mean that a particular lost some or perhaps all of its previous characteristics and retained at worst only a dubious numerical identity derived from temporal continuity of the occupation of a place or continuous sequence of places.
|
|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 8.II)
|
|
A reaction:
If all that is left is its location, that seems like passing-away rather than change. A dead leaf retains mere numerical identity while losing its essence. A burnt-up leaf might have a location, but it hardly qualifies as a 'leaf'.
|
|
15275
|
'Dense' time raises doubts about continuous objects, so they need 'continuous' time [Harré/Madden]
|
|
Full Idea:
Since discontinuities in a dense set of temporal points lead to doubts about the existential integrity of a thing, the thing-ontology demands that a dense time be continuous.
|
|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 6.IV)
|
|
A reaction:
This seems to be a rather unequivocal assertion about a rather uncertain topic. If quanta can move in 'leaps', which appear to abolish the notion of what happens 'between' two states, who can say what objects might manage to do?
|
|
15271
|
If things are successive instantaneous events, nothing requires those events to resemble one another [Harré/Madden]
|
|
Full Idea:
If events are instantaneous time-slices of a physical thing, the persistence of the pattern is an inexplicable fact in that there is no requirement for the successive time-slices to bear any resemblance to the event previously occurring at that place.
|
|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 6.IV)
|
|
A reaction:
The Humean four-dimensional view doesn't seem to require an explanation of this (or of much else), and takes it as a brute fact that slices resemble. Something has to be a brute fact, I suppose.
|
|
15256
|
Humeans cannot step in the same river twice, because they cannot strictly form the concept of 'river' [Harré/Madden]
|
|
Full Idea:
A Humean cannot step in the same river twice, not because the river is always a different river, but because he can strictly have no such concept as 'river'.
|
|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 4.II)
|
|
A reaction:
This arises from a discussion of induction. What is a Humean to make of an object which keeps changing? They only have connected impressions, and no underlying essence to hold the impressions together.
|
|
15214
|
Natural necessity is not logical necessity or empirical contingency in disguise [Harré/Madden]
|
|
Full Idea:
Natural necessity is neither a mere reflection of logical necessity nor a roundabout way of referring to empirical contingency.
|
|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 1.I.B)
|
|
A reaction:
They offer a strong defence of natural necessity, which is basic to their scientific essentialism. The key point is that they, unlike some others, are not defending metaphysical necessity about nature, but finding a different type of necessity. Good.
|
|
15232
|
Natural necessity is when powerful particulars must produce certain results in a situation [Harré/Madden]
|
|
Full Idea:
When the natures of the operative powerful particulars, the constraining or stimulating effect of conditions and so on are offered as the grounds for the judgement that a certain effect cannot but happen (or fail), we have natural necessity.
|
|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 1.V.B)
|
|
A reaction:
This is the view I subscribe to, the really right bit of scientific essentialism. Can this view be proved? Hm. I take the opposite view to be the misguided Humean idea that if you can imagine it not happening, then it might not happen. Firey furnace.
|
|
15289
|
Property or event relations are naturally necessary if generated by essential mechanisms [Harré/Madden]
|
|
Full Idea:
The relationship between co-existing properties or successive events or states is naturally necessary when understood by scientists to be related by generative mechanisms, whose structure and components constitute the essential natures of the world.
|
|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 7.III)
|
|
A reaction:
Does that mean that the relationship between an actual state and a possible state is metaphysically necessary, rather than naturally necessary? I think we need dispositions to be part of actuality, and hence replace 'co-existing' with 'possible'.
|
|
15260
|
Counterfactuals are just right for analysing statements about the powers which things have [Harré/Madden]
|
|
Full Idea:
We understand subjunctive conditionals as statements about possibilities, excluding those actualised. So that form is just right for part of the analysis of a power statement, since to say a thing has a power is to say what behaviour is possible for it.
|
|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 5.VII)
|
|
A reaction:
They seem unaware of the famous work of Stalnaker and Lewis on this type of analysis, but as a fan of powers I find this interesting, and it offers a nice extra piece for my big jigsaw.
|
|
15233
|
If natural necessity is used to include or exclude some predicate, the predicate is conceptually necessary [Harré/Madden]
|
|
Full Idea:
When a natural necessity is used as the basis for the inclusion or exclusion of the appropriate predicate in the meaning of a concept of a kind of particular, then it is conceptually necessary that that kind of particular has that property or power.
|
|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 1.V.B)
|
|
A reaction:
This is one of the bolder views of Harré and Madden, since many philosophers would say that conceptual necessity rests entirely on convention rather than on nature. We could cut them out by just saying that most of our conventions rest on nature.
|
|
15252
|
If Goldbach's Conjecture is true (and logically necessary), we may be able to conceive its opposite [Harré/Madden]
|
|
Full Idea:
Even in cases (such as Goldbach's Conjecture) which, if true, are logically necessary, we may be able to conceive the opposite. We can conceive of there being a number which is not the sum of two primes.
|
|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 3.II)
|
|
A reaction:
[attributed to Kneale] Ah, but can we conceive this (as Descartes would say) 'clearly and distinctly'? I can conceive circular squares, as long as I don't concentrate too hard.
|
|
15245
|
It is silly to say that direct experience must be justified, either by reason, or by more experience [Harré/Madden]
|
|
Full Idea:
It would be silly to suggest that what is a matter of experience must be justified by reason, and it makes no sense to say that what we are insisting upon as a matter of direct experience must itself be established by experience.
|
|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 3.II)
|
|
A reaction:
The first half is now known as the 'Moorean' view (Idea 6349). It does make sense, when faced with a weird experience, to assess and establish it by means of a combination of reason and other experiences. It's called 'coherence'!
|
|
15248
|
Inference in perception is unconvincingly defended as non-conscious and almost instantaneous [Harré/Madden]
|
|
Full Idea:
To the objection that one is never aware of inferences in sensation, the unconvincing reply comes that such inferences are automatic, telescoped, non-discursive and unconscious.
|
|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 3.II)
|
|
A reaction:
I think the 'unconvincing' reply is a bit more convincing in the light of modern research on the brain, which presents everything it does in a far less conscious light than the traditional view. Even reason seems barely conscious.
|
|
15269
|
Humean impressions are too instantaneous and simple to have structure or relations [Harré/Madden]
|
|
Full Idea:
The Humean event, the impression, basic to his epistemology, is, as we have seen, instantaneous in nature, punctiform and elemenentary, and from this characterisation follows its atomicity, its lack of internal connections with anything else.
|
|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 6.IV)
|
|
A reaction:
This simple point about Humean associationism is the key to grasping the whole hideous worldview that has gripped twentieth century philosophy. How many impressions make up an apple? And why do they sum to make something?
|
|
15286
|
Clavius's Paradox: purely syntactic entailment theories won't explain, because they are too profuse [Harré/Madden]
|
|
Full Idea:
Clavius' Paradox shows that a theorem-like structure organised by entailments cannot be identified as a scientific explanation by reference to syntactical criteria, since it shares its syntactic criteria with many other theorem-like structures.
|
|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 7.3)
|
|
A reaction:
I think I was pretty convinced that a scientific theory had to meet more than mere syntactic criteria, before I encountered this idea. Lewis's account of laws may have to face this objection.
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15283
|
Simplicity can sort theories out, but still leaves an infinity of possibilities [Harré/Madden]
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Full Idea:
Whatever simplicity criterion is chosen for theories, it can at best sort out strata of explanations of equal simplicity, each stratum containing infinitely many items.
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From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 7.I)
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A reaction:
[They cite Katz 1962 for this] This sounds to me like a purely technical result, where pragmatics would narrow the plausible theories right down. The 'Paradox of Clavius' is behind the idea (with an infinity of possible middle terms).
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15316
|
The powers/natures approach has been so successful (for electricity, magnetism, gravity) it may be universal [Harré/Madden]
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Full Idea:
The marvellous success in science of the powers/natures formula as a guide to research naturally leads to an attempt at a universal application of such a powerful schema. The electric and magnetic and gravitational fields are known by their powers.
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From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 9.III)
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A reaction:
This is a wonderfully heroic, and accurate, opposition to the prevailing accounts of science when they wrote. The laws, processes and equations of science and just part of a description of the natures and basic powers of what exists.
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15298
|
We prefer the theory which explains and predicts the powers and capacities of particulars [Harré/Madden]
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Full Idea:
There are competitive models of the nature of things and materials, and that one is chosen which is successful in explaining the most powers and capacities of particulars and in leading to the discovery of hitherto unsuspected powers and capacities.
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From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 8.III)
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A reaction:
If the powers and capacities are what get explained, what exactly does the explaining? If you says 'essences', you then have to characterise essences in some other way. I vote for basic powers as primitive. - but Idea 15302.
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15255
|
Conjunctions explain nothing, and so do not give a reason for confidence in inductions [Harré/Madden]
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Full Idea:
'Going together' is irrelevant as an explanation, and that is precisely why it is useless as a reason for having confidence in inductive inferences.
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From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 4.I)
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A reaction:
I suspect that the deep underlying question is whether the actual world has modal features - that is, are dispositions, rather than mere categorical properties, a feature of the actual. Is this room full of possibilities? Yes, say I.
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15284
|
Contraposition may be equivalent in truth, but not true in nature, because of irrelevant predicates [Harré/Madden]
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Full Idea:
The question about Hempel's Paradox is whether contraposition is not only equivalent in truth, but equivalent tout court. It forcibly inserts new predicates into a context of properties known to be connected by nature.
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|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 7.I)
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A reaction:
[compressed] This seems to capture quite nicely the intuition most people have (which makes it a 'paradox') that the equivalent predicate is irrelevant to the immediate enquiry. The paradox is good because it forces the present explanation.
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15285
|
The items put forward by the contraposition belong within different natural clusters [Harré/Madden]
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Full Idea:
If empirical predicates are linked in clusters, contraposition of (black, raven) would carry one via such pairs as (shoe, white) into a different empirical cluster, or no cluster at all.
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|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 7.I)
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A reaction:
This is, of course, addressed to Hempel's Raven Paradox. Those paradoxes now strike me as relics of a time when Humean empiricism and logic were thought to be the best approaches to scientific theory. Harré and Madden pioneered a better view.
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15293
|
If explanation is by entailment, that lacks a causal direction, unlike natural necessity [Harré/Madden]
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Full Idea:
Natural necessity involves causal directionality as an essential element, while entailment as a purely logical relation does not.
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From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 7.V)
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A reaction:
If there is a naturally necessary relation between an eclipse and its cause, the directionality of that doesn't seem to arise from the mutual relation between the two. You have to add time's arrow, or causation's arrow.
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|
15294
|
Powers can explain the direction of causality, and make it a natural necessity [Harré/Madden]
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Full Idea:
The concept of power can be used to explain the temporal directionality of the concept of causality, and, at the same time, makes that causality a genuine case of natural necessity.
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|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 7.V)
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A reaction:
I'm not sure that powers actually 'explain' causal direction. It seems more like transferring the directionality from the process to its source. You are still left with brute directionality.
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15254
|
If the nature of particulars explains their powers, it also explains their relations and behaviour [Harré/Madden]
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Full Idea:
If we see that certain powers and capacities are explained by the nature of certain particulars and are necessarily attendant upon them, then we have an explanation of why certain things must go together and happen as they do.
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|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 4.I)
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|
A reaction:
They are offering this as an account of induction, as well as of explanation, and it is a nice summary of the account which I take to be correct.
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|
15310
|
Solidity comes from the power of repulsion, and shape from the power of attraction [Harré/Madden]
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Full Idea:
Solidity is the effect of a power of repulsion between whole things, and shape is the effect of a power of attraction between parts of whole things.
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|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 9.II.B)
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|
A reaction:
This sounds a bit too neat in its division, but it shows nicely how a metaphysics with powers can deal with categorical properties. The question, remains, though of what is doing the repelling and attracting. Fields, they say.
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|
5884
|
How can one mind perceive so many dissimilar sensations? [Cicero]
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|
Full Idea:
Why is it that, using the same mind, we have perception of things so utterly unlike as colour, taste, heat, smell and sound?
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|
From:
M. Tullius Cicero (Tusculan Disputations [c.44 BCE], I.xx.47)
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|
A reaction:
This leaves us with the 'binding problem', of how the dissimilar sensations are pulled together into one field of experience. It is a nice simple objection, though, to anyone who simplistically claims that the mind is self-evidently unified.
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|
5887
|
The soul has a single nature, so it cannot be divided, and hence it cannot perish [Cicero]
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|
Full Idea:
In souls there is no mingling of ingredients, nothing of two-fold nature, so it is impossible for the soul to be divided; impossible, therefore, for it to perish either; for perishing is like the separation of parts which were maintained in union.
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|
From:
M. Tullius Cicero (Tusculan Disputations [c.44 BCE], I.xxix.71)
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|
A reaction:
Cicero knows he is pushing his luck in asserting that perishing is a sort of division. Why can't something be there one moment and gone the next? He appears to be in close agreement with Descartes about being a 'thinking thing'.
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|
5886
|
Like the eye, the soul has no power to see itself, but sees other things [Cicero]
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|
Full Idea:
The soul has not the power of itself to see itself, but, like the eye, the soul, though it does not see itself, yet discerns other things.
|
|
From:
M. Tullius Cicero (Tusculan Disputations [c.44 BCE], I.xxvii)
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|
A reaction:
The soul is a complex item which contributes many layers of interpretation to what it sees, so there is scope for parts of the soul seeing other parts. Somewhere in the middle Cicero seems to be right - there is an elusive something we can't get at.
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|
5885
|
Souls contain no properties of elements, and elements contain no properties of souls [Cicero]
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|
Full Idea:
No beginnings of souls can be found on earth; there is no combination in souls that could be born from earth, nothing that partakes of moist or airy or fiery; for in those elements there is nothing to possess the power of memory, thought, or reflection.
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|
From:
M. Tullius Cicero (Tusculan Disputations [c.44 BCE], I.xxvi.66)
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|
A reaction:
Interesting, but I think magnetism is an instructive analogy, which has weird properties which we never perceive in elements (though it is there, buried deep - suggesting panpsychism). Cicero would be disconcerted to find that fire isn't an element.
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|
15229
|
We say there is 'no alternative' in all sorts of contexts, and there are many different grounds for it [Harré/Madden]
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|
Full Idea:
To attribute necessity to a condition, an outcome or effect, the truth of a statement, or a conclusion, is to indicate within the relevant context that no alternative is possible. In each context there are appropriate grounds for such judgements.
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|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 1.V)
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|
A reaction:
This anticipipates Kit Fine's account of necessity by 25 years, and seems to be the right way to understand it. In ordinary usage, 'there is no alternative' is obvious a quite different claim in very different contexts.
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|
15253
|
If the concept of a cause includes its usual effects, we call it a 'power' [Harré/Madden]
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|
Full Idea:
The concept of cause may come to include the concepts of its usual effects. Concepts of this character are used in science, and in common language, to ascribe powers.
|
|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 3.II)
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|
A reaction:
See Theme 8|c|3 in Theme/Structure for more ideas about powers. It's hard to see how you could specify a cause at all if you weren't allowed to say what it does. I love powers, and want to make them the key idea in all of metaphysics.
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|
15278
|
Humean accounts of causal direction by time fail, because cause and effect can occur together [Harré/Madden]
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|
Full Idea:
The Humean effort to ground the intuition of causal directionality on temporal priority of cause alone fails, because in fact some causes and effects are simultaneous. The moving of the knife and separation of the orange occur together.
|
|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 6.IV)
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|
A reaction:
Since I take causation to be largely concerned with movements of 'energy', this idea that cause and effect might be simultaneous sounds more like a matter of pragmatics and convention. Moving the knife and moving the orange are different.
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|
15217
|
Efficient causes combine stimulus to individuals, absence of contraints on activity [Harré/Madden]
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|
Full Idea:
Efficient causes comprise both the presence of stimuli which activate a quiescent individual, and the absence or removal of constraints upon an individual already in a state of activity.
|
|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 1.II.B)
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|
A reaction:
This is part of an account of causation in term of 'powers', with which I agree. Before you object, there is always going to be something about causation which is mind boggling weird, and probably leaves even God bewildered.
|
|
15237
|
Originally Humeans based lawlike statements on pure qualities, without particulars [Harré/Madden]
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|
Full Idea:
The original Humean suggestion was that lawlike statements must contain only purely qualitative predicates - that is, predicates which do not require in a statement of their meaning a reference to any particular object or spatio-temporal location.
|
|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 2.II)
|
|
A reaction:
Harré and Madden are keen to promote particulars (with powers) as the foundation of scientific theory, and I agree with them. It strikes me as quite elementary that generalisations arise from particulars, so can't fundamentally explain them.
|
|
15241
|
Humeans say there is no necessity in causation, because denying an effect is never self-contradictory [Harré/Madden]
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|
Full Idea:
Humeans say there can be no element of necessity in the causal relation because the conjunction of a description of a cause with the negation of a description of its usual effect is never self-contradictory.
|
|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 3.I)
|
|
A reaction:
We might say there actually is a contradiction, because you assert the existence of something, and then deny that existence by denying that the effect could occur. If the object is inert this is wrong, but if it is defined by its powers it is right.
|
|
15239
|
We could call any generalisation a law, if it had reasonable support and no counter-evidence [Harré/Madden]
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|
Full Idea:
There is a case for calling a generalisation a law when its only confirmation is the multiplication of instances, if they don't conflict with other criteria. In fact any supported generalisation could count as a law if there is no counter-evidence.
|
|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 2.II)
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|
A reaction:
This is the beginning of the modern doubts about laws of nature, fully articulated in Mumford 2004. It seems to me inescapable that laws drop out if our ontology is based on powerful particulars. They are just patterns of outcome.
|
|
15243
|
We perceive motion, and not just successive occupations of different positions [Harré/Madden]
|
|
Full Idea:
A moving thing is perceptually distinct from a motionless thing, but takes on no new quality. The perception of its motion is a genuine perception. Its motion is not inferred from observation of its successive occupations of different relative positions.
|
|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 3.II)
|
|
A reaction:
This seems to be a response to Russell's reductive 'at-at' account of motion, which always struck me as wrong. It doesn't prove Russell wrong, of course, and they are trying to demonstrate that we perceive causation directly.
|
|
15263
|
Chemistry is not purely structural; CO2 is not the same as SO2 [Harré/Madden]
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|
Full Idea:
Modern chemistry is not, as chemistry, purely structural. ...Thus CO2 is a different substance from SO2.
|
|
From:
Harré,R./Madden,E.H. (Causal Powers [1975], 6.II)
|
|
A reaction:
I don't think I ever thought the chemistry was purely structural, but if you go in for the idea that reality is essentially geometrical (inspired by physics, presumably, like Ladyman) then you might make this mistake.
|