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15510
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Classes are a host of ethereal, platonic, pseudo entities [Goodman]
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Full Idea:
I will not willingly use apparatus that peoples the world with a host of ethereal, platonic, pseudo entities.
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From:
Nelson Goodman (The Structure of Appearance [1951], II.2), quoted by David Lewis - Parts of Classes 2.1
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A reaction:
This represents the big gap that opened up with Goodman's former comrade in arms, Quine. Lewis quotes it in order to ask whether he means ethereal or platonic, as they are very different. I sympathise with Goodman.
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9920
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Two objects can apparently make up quite distinct arrangements in sets [Goodman, by Burgess/Rosen]
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Full Idea:
Goodman argues that the set or class {{a}},{a,b}} is supposed to be distinct from the set or class {{b},{a,b}}, even though both are ultimately constituted from the same a and b.
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From:
report of Nelson Goodman (The Structure of Appearance [1951]) by JP Burgess / G Rosen - A Subject with No Object I.A.2.a
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A reaction:
I'm with Goodman all the way here, even though it is deeply unfashionable, particularly in the circles I move in. If there are trillion grains of sand on a beach, how many sets are we supposed to be committed to?
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10657
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The counties of Utah, and the state, and its acres, are in no way different [Goodman]
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Full Idea:
A class (counties of Utah) is different neither from the individual (state of Utah) that contains its members, nor from any other class (acres of Utah) whose members exhaust the whole. For nominalists, distinction of entity means distinction of content.
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From:
Nelson Goodman (The Structure of Appearance [1951], p.26), quoted by Achille Varzi - Mereology 3.1
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A reaction:
This is a nice credo for the nominalist version of mereology. You can still have a mereology that commits you to the wholes as well as the parts. Cf. Lewis in Idea 10660.
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18933
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Not-Being obviously doesn't exist, and the five modes of Being are all impossible [Gorgias, by Diog. Laertius]
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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.
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From:
report of Gorgias (fragments/reports [c.443 BCE], B03) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 09
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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!
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5500
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Biologists see many organic levels, 'abstract' if seen from below, 'structural' if seen from above [Lycan]
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Full Idea:
Biologists don't split living things into a 'structural' level and an 'abstract' level; ..rather, they are organised at many levels, each level 'abstract' with respect to those beneath it, but 'structural' as it realises those levels above it.
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From:
William Lycan (Introduction - Ontology [1999], p.9)
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A reaction:
This is a very helpful distinction. Compare Idea 4601. It seems to fit well with the 'homuncular' picture of a hierarchical mind, and explains why there are so many levels of description available for mental life.
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7956
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If all and only red things were round things, we would need to specify the 'respect' of the resemblance [Goodman, by Macdonald,C]
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Full Idea:
According to Goodman's 'companionship difficulty', resemblance nominalism has a problem if, say, all and only the red things were the round things, because we cannot distinguish the two different respects in which the things resemble one another.
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From:
report of Nelson Goodman (The Structure of Appearance [1951]) by Cynthia Macdonald - Varieties of Things Ch.6
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A reaction:
Goodman opts for extreme linguististic nominalism in response to this (Idea 7952), whereas Russell opts for a sort of Platonism (4441). The current idea gives Russell a further problem, of needing a universal of the respect of the resemblance.
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7957
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Without respects of resemblance, we would collect blue book, blue pen, red pen, red clock together [Goodman, by Macdonald,C]
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Full Idea:
Goodman's 'imperfect community' problem for Resemblance Nominalism says that without mention of respects in which things resemble, we end up with a heterogeneous collection with nothing wholly in common (blue book, blue pen, red pen, red clock).
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From:
report of Nelson Goodman (The Structure of Appearance [1951]) by Cynthia Macdonald - Varieties of Things Ch.6
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A reaction:
This suggests Wittgenstein's 'family' resemblance as a way out (Idea 4141), but a blue book and a red clock seem totally unrelated. Nice objection! At this point we start to think that the tropes resemble, rather than the objects.
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5496
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Functionalism has three linked levels: physical, functional, and mental [Lycan]
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Full Idea:
Functionalism has three distinct levels of description: a neurophysiological description, a functional description (relative to a program which the brain is realising), and it may have a further mental description.
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From:
William Lycan (Introduction - Ontology [1999], p.6)
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A reaction:
I have always thought that the 'levels of description' idea was very helpful in describing the mind/brain. I feel certain that we are dealing with a single thing, so this is the only way we can account for the diverse ways in which we discuss it.
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9866
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Gorgias says rhetoric is the best of arts, because it enslaves without using force [Gorgias, by Plato]
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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.
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From:
report of Gorgias (fragments/reports [c.443 BCE]) by Plato - Philebus 58a
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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.
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