Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'fragments/reports', 'fragments/reports' and 'Resemblance Nominalism: a solution to universals'

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4 ideas

1. Philosophy / C. History of Philosophy / 2. Ancient Philosophy / c. Classical philosophy
21336 Crates lived in poverty, and treated his whole life as a joke [Crates of Thebes, by Plutarch]
     Full Idea: Crates, with his bag and threadbare cloak, spent his whole life laughing and joking as though he were on holiday.
     From: report of Crates (Theb) (fragments/reports [c.325 BCE]) by Plutarch - 30: Quiet of Mind 266e
     A reaction: Crates sounds a little less alarming than Diogenes, while living a similar life. Was Crates the first ancestor of post-modernism?
1. Philosophy / D. Nature of Philosophy / 3. Philosophy Defined
23367 Even pointing a finger should only be done for a reason [Epictetus]
     Full Idea: Philosophy says it is not right even to stretch out a finger without some reason.
     From: Epictetus (fragments/reports [c.57], 15)
     A reaction: The key point here is that philosophy concerns action, an idea on which Epictetus is very keen. He rather despise theory. This idea perfectly sums up the concept of the wholly rational life (which no rational person would actually want to live!).
1. Philosophy / D. Nature of Philosophy / 5. Aims of Philosophy / a. Philosophy as worldly
1767 Everyone should study philosophy until they see all people in the same light [Crates of Thebes, by Diog. Laertius]
     Full Idea: A man should study philosophy up to the point of looking on generals and donkey-drivers in the same light.
     From: report of Crates (Theb) (fragments/reports [c.325 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 06.Cr.9
     A reaction: This seems to reject Aristote's idea that some people are clearly superior to others.
8. Modes of Existence / E. Nominalism / 2. Resemblance Nominalism
18436 Entities are truthmakers for their resemblances, so no extra entities or 'resemblances' are needed [Rodriquez-Pereyra]
     Full Idea: A and B are the sole truthmakers for 'A and B resemble each other'. There is no need to postulate extra entities - the resembling entities suffice to account for them. There is no regress of resemblances, ...since there are no resemblances at all.
     From: Gonzalo Rodriguez-Pereyra (Resemblance Nominalism: a solution to universals [2002], p.115), quoted by Douglas Edwards - Properties 5.5.2
     A reaction: This seems to flatly reject the ordinary conversational move of asking in what 'respect' the two things resemble, which may be a genuine puzzle which gets an illuminating answer. We can't fully explain resemblance, but we can do better than this!