|
18933
|
Not-Being obviously doesn't exist, and the five modes of Being are all impossible [Gorgias, by Diog. Laertius]
|
|
Full Idea:
I. Nothing exists. a) Not-Being does not exist. b) Being does not exist as everlasting, as created, as both, as One, or as Many. II. If anything does exist, it is incomprehensible. III. If existence is comprehensible, it is incommunicable.
|
|
From:
report of Gorgias (fragments/reports [c.443 BCE], B03) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 09
|
|
A reaction:
[Also Sextus Empiricus, Against Logicians I.65-] For Part I he works through all the possible modes of being he can think of, and explains why none of them are possible. It is worth remembering that Gorgias loved rhetoric, not philosophy!
|
|
16756
|
Substantial forms must exist, to explain the stability of metals like silver and tin [Albertus Magnus]
|
|
Full Idea:
There is no reason why the matter in any natural thing should be stable in its nature, if it is not completed by a substantial form. But we see that silver is stable, and tin and other metals. Therefore they will seem to be perfected by substantial forms.
|
|
From:
Albertus Magnus (On Minerals [1260], III.1.7), quoted by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 24.2
|
|
A reaction:
Illuminating. This may be the best reason for proposing substantial forms. Once materialism arrives, the so-called 'laws' of nature have to be imposed on the material to do the job - but what the hell is a law supposed to be?
|
|
9354
|
Why should necessities only be knowable a priori? That Hesperus is Phosporus is known empirically [Devitt]
|
|
Full Idea:
Why should we accept that necessities can only be known a priori? Prima facie, some necessities are known empirically; for example, that water is necessarily H2O, and that Hesperus is necessarily Phosphorus.
|
|
From:
Michael Devitt (There is no a Priori [2005], §2)
|
|
A reaction:
An important question, whatever your view. If the only thing we can know a priori is necessities, it doesn't follow that necessities can only be known a priori. It gets interesting if we say that some necessities can never be known a priori.
|
|
9353
|
We explain away a priori knowledge, not as directly empirical, but as indirectly holistically empirical [Devitt]
|
|
Full Idea:
We have no need to turn to an a priori explanation of our knowledge of mathematics and logic. Our intuitions that this knowledge is not justified in some direct empirical way is preserved. It is justified in an indirect holistic way.
|
|
From:
Michael Devitt (There is no a Priori [2005], §2)
|
|
A reaction:
I think this is roughly the right story, but the only way it will work is if we have some sort of theory of abstraction, which gets us up the ladder of generalisations to the ones which, it appears, are necessarily true.
|
|
9866
|
Gorgias says rhetoric is the best of arts, because it enslaves without using force [Gorgias, by Plato]
|
|
Full Idea:
Gorgias insists that the art of persuasion is superior to all others because it enslaves all the rest, with their own consent, not by force, and is therefore by far the best of all the arts.
|
|
From:
report of Gorgias (fragments/reports [c.443 BCE]) by Plato - Philebus 58a
|
|
A reaction:
A nice point, and it is not unreasonable to rank the arts in order of their power. To enchant, without achieving agreement, and to speak truth without persuading, are both very fine, but there is something about success that cannot be gainsaid.
|