Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'Lectures on the History of Philosophy', 'Morals and Modals' and 'Reals by Abstraction'

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4 ideas

1. Philosophy / D. Nature of Philosophy / 3. Philosophy Defined

21757	Philosophy is the conceptual essence of the shape of history [Hegel]
	Full Idea: Philosophy is the supreme blossom - the concept - of the entire shape of history, the consciousness and the spiritual essence of the whole situation, the spirit of the age as the spirit present and aware of itself in thought.
	From: Georg W.F.Hegel (Lectures on the History of Philosophy [1830], p.25), quoted by Stephen Houlgate - An Introduction to Hegel 01
	A reaction: This sees philosophy as intrinsically historical, which is a founding idea for 'continental' philosophy. Analysis is tied to science, in which the history of the subject is seen as irrelevant to its truth. Does this mean we can't go back to Aristotle?

6. Mathematics / A. Nature of Mathematics / 3. Nature of Numbers / g. Real numbers

10632	The real numbers may be introduced by abstraction as ratios of quantities [Hale, by Hale/Wright]
	Full Idea: The real numbers may be introduced by abstraction as ratios of quantities. ..They are not defined by Dedekind cuts; rather, the cuts constitute a domain with the properties that are a necessary precondition.
	From: report of Bob Hale (Reals by Abstraction [1998]) by B Hale / C Wright - Intro to 'The Reason's Proper Study' 3.3
	A reaction: This is Hale's neo-logicist attempt to derive the real numbers from Hume's Principle.

10. Modality / C. Sources of Modality / 1. Sources of Necessity

14629	If we are told the source of necessity, this seems to be a regress if the source is not already necessary [Blackburn]
	Full Idea: If we ask why A must be the case, and A is then proved from B, that explains it if B must be so. If the eventual source cites some truth F, then if F just is so, there is strong pressure to feel that the original necessity has not been explained.
	From: Simon Blackburn (Morals and Modals [1987], 1)
	A reaction: [compressed] Ross Cameron wrote a reply to this which I like. I'm fishing for the idea that essence is the source of necessity (as Kit Fine says), but that essence itself is not necessary (as only I say, apparently!).

14529	If something underlies a necessity, is that underlying thing necessary or contingent? [Blackburn, by Hale/Hoffmann,A]
	Full Idea: Blackburn asks of what theorists propose as underlying the necessity of a proposition, the question whether they themselves are conceived as obtaining of necessity or merely contingently.
	From: report of Simon Blackburn (Morals and Modals [1987], p.120-1) by Bob Hale/ Aviv Hoffmann - Introduction to 'Modality' 1
	A reaction: I've seen a reply to this somewhere: I think the thought was that a necessity wouldn't be any less necessary if it had a contingent source, any more than the father of a world champion boxer has to be a world champion boxer.