15 ideas
| 12124 | Metaphysics is the best knowledge, because it is the simplest [Bacon] |
| Full Idea: That knowledge is worthiest which is charged with least multiplicity, which appeareth to be metaphysic | |
| From: Francis Bacon (The Advancement of Learning [1605], II.VII.6) | |
| A reaction: A surprising view, coming from the father of modern science, but essentially correct. Obviously metaphysics aspires to avoid multiplicity, but it is riddled not only with complexity in its researches, but massive uncertainties. |
| 12123 | Natural history supports physical knowledge, which supports metaphysical knowledge [Bacon] |
| Full Idea: Knowledges are as pyramides, whereof history is the basis. So of natural philosophy, the basis is natural history, the stage next the basis is physic; the stage next the vertical point is metaphysic. | |
| From: Francis Bacon (The Advancement of Learning [1605], II.VII.6) | |
| A reaction: The father of modern science keeps a place for metaphysics, as the most abstract level above the physical sciences. I would say he is right. It leads to my own slogan: science is the servant of philosophy. |
| 12119 | Physics studies transitory matter; metaphysics what is abstracted and necessary [Bacon] |
| Full Idea: Physic should contemplate that which is inherent in matter, and therefore transitory; and metaphysic that which is abstracted and fixed | |
| From: Francis Bacon (The Advancement of Learning [1605], II.VII.3) | |
| A reaction: He cites the ancients for this view, with which he agrees. One could do worse than hang onto metaphysics as the study of necessities, but must then face the attacks of the Quineans - that knowledge of necessities is beyond us. |
| 12120 | Physics is of material and efficient causes, metaphysics of formal and final causes [Bacon] |
| Full Idea: Physic inquireth and handleth the material and efficient causes; and metaphysic handleth the formal and final causes. | |
| From: Francis Bacon (The Advancement of Learning [1605], II.VII.3) | |
| A reaction: Compare Idea 12119. This divides up Aristotle's famous Four Causes (or Explanations), outlined in 'Physics' II.3. The concept of 'matter', and the nature of 'cause' seem to me to fall with the purview of metaphysics. Interesting, though. |
| 15382 | Paraconsistent reasoning can just mean responding sensibly to inconsistencies [Jago] |
| Full Idea: A practical application of paraconsistent reasoning is in large databases. It does not mean that contradictions could be true, but only that we sometimes need to draw sensible conclusions from inconsistent data. 'Dialethists' believe some contradictions. | |
| From: Mark Jago (Paraconsistent Logic [2010]) | |
| A reaction: Interesting as a more cautious and sensible attitude to the scandal of paraconsistency. |
| 8447 | In 'Etna is higher than Vesuvius' the whole of Etna, including all the lava, can't be the reference [Frege] |
| Full Idea: The reference of 'Etna' cannot be Mount Etna itself, because each piece of frozen lava which is part of Mount Etna would then also be part of the thought that Etna is higher than Vesuvius. | |
| From: Gottlob Frege (Letters to Jourdain [1910], p.43) | |
| A reaction: This seems to be a straight challenge to Kripke's baptismal account of reference. I think I side with Kripke. Frege is allergic to psychological accounts, but the mind only has the capacity to think of the aspect of Etna that is relevant. |
| 8448 | Any object can have many different names, each with a distinct sense [Frege] |
| Full Idea: An object can be determined in different ways, and every one of these ways of determining it can give rise to a special name, and these different names then have different senses. | |
| From: Gottlob Frege (Letters to Jourdain [1910], p.44) | |
| A reaction: This seems right. No name is an entirely neutral designator. Imagine asking a death-camp survivor their name, and they give you their prison number. Sense clearly intrudes into names. But picking out the object is what really matters. |
| 12121 | We don't assume there is no land, because we can only see sea [Bacon] |
| Full Idea: They are ill discoverers that think there is no land, when they can see nothing but sea. | |
| From: Francis Bacon (The Advancement of Learning [1605], II.VII.5) | |
| A reaction: Just the sort of pithy remark for which Bacon is famous. It is an obvious point, but a nice corrective to anyone who wants to apply empirical principles in a rather gormless way. |
| 12117 | Science moves up and down between inventions of causes, and experiments [Bacon] |
| Full Idea: All true and fruitful natural philosophy hath a double scale or ladder, ascendent and descendent, ascending from experiments to the invention of causes, and descending from causes to the invention of new experiments. | |
| From: Francis Bacon (The Advancement of Learning [1605], II.VII.1) | |
| A reaction: After several hundred years, I doubt whether anyone can come up with a better account of scientific method than Bacon's. |
| 12127 | Many different theories will fit the observed facts [Bacon] |
| Full Idea: The ordinary face and view of experience is many times satisfied by several theories and philosophies. | |
| From: Francis Bacon (The Advancement of Learning [1605], II.VIII.5) | |
| A reaction: He gives as his example that the Copernican system and the Ptolemaic system both seem to satisfy all the facts. He wrote in 1605, just before Galileo's telescope. His point is regularly made in modern discussions. In this case, he was wrong! |
| 12126 | People love (unfortunately) extreme generality, rather than particular knowledge [Bacon] |
| Full Idea: It is the nature of the mind of man (to the extreme prejudice of knowledge) to delight in the spacious liberty of generalities, as in a champaign region, and not in the inclosures of particularity. | |
| From: Francis Bacon (The Advancement of Learning [1605], II.VIII.1) | |
| A reaction: I have to plead guilty to this myself. He may have pinpointed the key motivation behind philosophy. We all want to know things, as Aristotle said, but some of us want the broad brush, and others want the fine detail. |
| 8446 | We understand new propositions by constructing their sense from the words [Frege] |
| Full Idea: The possibility of our understanding propositions which we have never heard before rests on the fact that we construct the sense of a proposition out of parts that correspond to words. | |
| From: Gottlob Frege (Letters to Jourdain [1910], p.43) | |
| A reaction: This is the classic statement of the principle of compositionality, which seems to me so obviously correct that I cannot understand anyone opposing it. Which comes first, the thought or the word, may be a futile debate. |
| 8449 | Senses can't be subjective, because propositions would be private, and disagreement impossible [Frege] |
| Full Idea: If the sense of a name was subjective, then the proposition and the thought would be subjective; the thought one man connects with this proposition would be different from that of another man. One man could not then contradict another. | |
| From: Gottlob Frege (Letters to Jourdain [1910], p.44) | |
| A reaction: This is an implicit argument for the identity of 'proposition' and 'thought'. This argument resembles Plato's argument for universals (Idea 223). See also Kant on existence as a predicate (Idea 4475). But people do misunderstand one another. |
| 12125 | Teleological accounts are fine in metaphysics, but they stop us from searching for the causes [Bacon] |
| Full Idea: To say 'leaves are for protecting of fruit', or that 'clouds are for watering the earth', is well inquired and collected in metaphysic, but in physic they are impertinent. They are hindrances, and the search of the physical causes hath been neglected. | |
| From: Francis Bacon (The Advancement of Learning [1605], II.VII.7) | |
| A reaction: This is the standard rebellion against Aristotle which gave rise to the birth of modern science. The story has been complicated by natural selection, which bestows a sort of purpose on living things. Nowadays we pursue both paths. |
| 12118 | Essences are part of first philosophy, but as part of nature, not part of logic [Bacon] |
| Full Idea: I assign to summary philosophy the operation of essences (as quantity, similitude, diversity, possibility), with this distinction - that they be handled as they have efficacy in nature, and not logically. | |
| From: Francis Bacon (The Advancement of Learning [1605], II.VII.3) | |
| A reaction: I take this to be a splendid motto for scientific essentialism, in a climate where modal logicians appear to have taken over the driving seat in our understanding of essences. |