Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'Events and Their Names', 'fragments/reports' and 'Repetition'

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5 ideas

3. Truth / A. Truth Problems / 8. Subjective Truth
Subjective truth can only be sustained by repetition [Kierkegaard, by Carlisle]
     Full Idea: If subjective truth is to be more than momentary, it has to be repeated continually.
     From: report of Søren Kierkegaard (Repetition [1843]) by Clare Carlisle - Kierkegaard: a guide for the perplexed 4
     A reaction: This might apply to more traditional concepts of truth, if they are to be part of life, rather than remaining in books.
7. Existence / B. Change in Existence / 4. Events / c. Reduction of events
Events are made of other things, and are not fundamental to ontology [Bennett]
     Full Idea: Events are not basic items in the universe; they should not be included in any fundamental ontology...all the truths about them are entailed by and explained and made true by truths that do not involve the event concept.
     From: Jonathan Bennett (Events and Their Names [1988], p.12), quoted by Peter Simons - Events 3.1
     A reaction: Given the variable time spans of events, their ability to coincide, their ability to contain no motion, their blatantly conventional component, and their recalcitrance to individuation, I say Bennett is right.
23. Ethics / F. Existentialism / 8. Eternal Recurrence
Life is a repetition when what has been now becomes [Kierkegaard]
     Full Idea: When one says that life is a repetition one affirms that existence which has been now becomes.
     From: Søren Kierkegaard (Repetition [1843], p.49), quoted by Clare Carlisle - Kierkegaard: a guide for the perplexed 4
     A reaction: Not sure I understand this, but it seems very close to Nietzsche's Eternal Recurrence.
26. Natural Theory / C. Causation / 8. Particular Causation / b. Causal relata
Facts are about the world, not in it, so they can't cause anything [Bennett]
     Full Idea: Facts are not the sort of item that can cause anything. A fact is a true proposition (they say); it is not something in the world but is rather something about the world.
     From: Jonathan Bennett (Events and Their Names [1988], p.22), quoted by Jonathan Schaffer - The Metaphysics of Causation 1.1
     A reaction: Compare 10361. Good argument, but maybe 'fact' is ambiguous. See Idea 10365. Events are said to be more concrete, and so can do the job, but their individuation also seems to depend on a description (as Davidson has pointed out).
28. God / C. Attitudes to God / 5. Atheism
Stilpo said if Athena is a daughter of Zeus, then a statue is only the child of a sculptor, and so is not a god [Stilpo, by Diog. Laertius]
     Full Idea: Stilpo asked a man whether Athena is the daughter of Zeus, and when he said yes, said,"But this statue of Athena by Phidias is the child of Phidias, so it is not a god."
     From: report of Stilpo (fragments/reports [c.330 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 02.10.5