5 ideas
| 6782 | Realism is the only philosophy of science that doesn't make the success of science a miracle [Putnam] |
| Full Idea: Realism….is the only philosophy science which does not make the success of science a miracle. | |
| From: Hilary Putnam (works [1980]), quoted by Alexander Bird - Philosophy of Science Ch.4 | |
| A reaction: This was from his earlier work; he became more pragmatist and anti-realist later. Personally I approve of the remark. The philosophy of science must certainly offer an explanation for its success. Truth seems the obvious explanation. |
| 2764 | Full coherence might involve consistency and mutual entailment of all propositions [Blanshard, by Dancy,J] |
| Full Idea: Blanshard says that in a fully coherent system there would not only be consistency, but every proposition would be entailed by the others, and no proposition would stand outside the system. | |
| From: report of Brand Blanshard (The Nature of Thought [1939], 2:265) by Jonathan Dancy - Intro to Contemporary Epistemology 8.1 | |
| A reaction: Hm. If a proposition is entailed by the others, then it is a necessary truth (given the others) which sounds deterministic. You could predict all the truths you had never encountered. See 1578:178 for quote. |
| 19080 | Coherence tests for truth without implying correspondence, so truth is not correspondence [Blanshard, by Young,JO] |
| Full Idea: Blanshard said that coherent justification leads to coherence truth. It might be said that coherence is a test for truth, but truth is correspondence. But coherence doesn't guarantee correspondence, and coherence is a test, so truth is not correspondence. | |
| From: report of Brand Blanshard (The Nature of Thought [1939], Ch.26) by James O. Young - The Coherence Theory of Truth §2.2 | |
| A reaction: [compression of Young's summary] Rescher (1973) says that Blanshard's argument depends on coherence being an infallible test for truth, which it isn't. |
| 22181 | Putnam says anti-realism is a bad explanation of accurate predictions [Putnam, by Okasha] |
| Full Idea: Putnam's 'no miracle' argument says that being an anti-realist is akin to believing in miracles (because of the accurate predictons). …It is a plausibility argument - an inference to the best explanation. | |
| From: report of Hilary Putnam (works [1980]) by Samir Okasha - Philosophy of Science: Very Short Intro (2nd ed) 4 | |
| A reaction: [not sure of ref] Putnam later backs off from this argument, but my personal realism rests on best explanation. Does anyone want to prefer an inferior explanation? The objection is that successful theories can turn out to be false. Phlogiston, ether. |
| 16463 | Adams says actual things have haecceities, but not things that only might exist [Adams,RM, by Stalnaker] |
| Full Idea: Adams favours haecceitism about actual things but no haecceities for things that might exist but don't. | |
| From: report of Robert Merrihew Adams (Actualism and Thisness [1981]) by Robert C. Stalnaker - Mere Possibilities 4.2 | |
| A reaction: This contrasts with Plantinga, who proposes necessary essences for everything, even for what might exist. Plantinga sounds crazy to me, Adams merely interesting but not too plausible. |