5 ideas
| 16051 | Life has a new supervenient relation, which alters its underlying physical events [Morgan,L] |
| Full Idea: When some new kind of relatedness is supervenient (say at the level of life), the way in which the physical events which are involved run their course is different in virtue of its presence. | |
| From: Lloyd Morgan (Emergent Evolution [1923], pp.15-16), quoted by Terence Horgan - From Supervenience to Superdupervenience 1 | |
| A reaction: This is a clear assertion of 'downward causation' at the first introduction of 'supervenience', supporting 'emergentism' about life and mind. That is, the newly-emerged feature has new causal powers that affect the physical system from outside. Wrong! |
| 4422 | The end need not be the goal, as in the playing of a melody (and yet it must be completed) [Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: Not every end is the goal; the end of a melody is not its goal; and yet: as long as the melody has not reached its end, it also hasn't reached its goal. A parable. | |
| From: Friedrich Nietzsche (The Wanderer and his Shadow [1880], §204) | |
| A reaction: A nice message for Aristotle, that there is no simple separation of ends and means. |
| 17371 | Some kinds are very explanatory, but others less so, and some not at all [Devitt] |
| Full Idea: Explanatory significance, hence naturalness, comes in degrees: positing some kinds may be very explanatory, positing others, only a little bit explanatory, positing others still, not explanatory at all. | |
| From: Michael Devitt (Natural Kinds and Biological Realism [2009], 4) | |
| A reaction: He mentions 'cousin' as a natural kind that is not very explanatory of anything. It interests us as humans, but not at all in other animals, it seems. ...Nice thought, though, that two squirrels might be cousins... |
| 17372 | The higher categories are not natural kinds, so the Linnaean hierarchy should be given up [Devitt] |
| Full Idea: The signs are that the higher categories are not natural kinds and so the Linnaean hierarchy must be abandoned. ...This is not abandoning a hierarchy altogether, it is not abandoning a tree of life. | |
| From: Michael Devitt (Natural Kinds and Biological Realism [2009], 6) | |
| A reaction: Devitt's underlying point is that the higher and more general kinds do not have an essence (a specific nature), which is the qualification to be a natural kind. They explain nothing. Essence is the hallmark of natural kinds. Hmmm. |
| 17373 | Species pluralism says there are several good accounts of what a species is [Devitt] |
| Full Idea: Species pluralism is the view that there are several equally good accounts of what it is to be a species. | |
| From: Michael Devitt (Natural Kinds and Biological Realism [2009], 7) | |
| A reaction: Devitt votes for it, and cites Dupré, among many other. Given the existence of rival accounts, all making good points, it is hard to resist this view. |