18 ideas
| 13734 | Modern Quinean metaphysics is about what exists, but Aristotelian metaphysics asks about grounding [Schaffer,J] |
| Full Idea: On the now dominant Quinean view, metaphysics is about what there is (such as properties, meanings and numbers). I will argue for the revival of a more traditional Aristotelian view, on which metaphysics is about what grounds what. | |
| From: Jonathan Schaffer (On What Grounds What [2009], Intro) | |
| A reaction: I find that an enormously helpful distinction, and support the Aristotelian view. Schaffer's general line is that what exists is fairly uncontroversial and dull, but the interesting truths about the world emerge when we grasp its structure. |
| 13751 | If you tore the metaphysics out of philosophy, the whole enterprise would collapse [Schaffer,J] |
| Full Idea: Traditional metaphysics is so tightly woven into the fabric of philosophy that it cannot be torn out without the whole tapestry unravelling. | |
| From: Jonathan Schaffer (On What Grounds What [2009], 2.3) | |
| A reaction: I often wonder why the opponents of metaphysics still continue to do philosophy. I don't see how you address questions of ethics, or philosophy of mathematics (etc) without coming up against highly general and abstract over-questions. |
| 13743 | We should not multiply basic entities, but we can have as many derivative entities as we like [Schaffer,J] |
| Full Idea: Occam's Razor should only be understood to concern substances: do not multiply basic entities without necessity. There is no problem with the multiplication of derivative entities - they are an 'ontological free lunch'. | |
| From: Jonathan Schaffer (On What Grounds What [2009], 2.1) | |
| A reaction: The phrase 'ontological free lunch' comes from Armstrong. This is probably what Occam meant. A few extra specks of dust, or even a few more numbers (thank you, Cantor!) don't seem to challenge the principle. |
| 13741 | If 'there are red roses' implies 'there are roses', then 'there are prime numbers' implies 'there are numbers' [Schaffer,J] |
| Full Idea: We can automatically infer 'there are roses' from 'there are red roses' (with no shift in the meaning of 'roses'). Likewise one can automatically infer 'there are numbers' from 'there are prime numbers'. | |
| From: Jonathan Schaffer (On What Grounds What [2009], 2.1) | |
| A reaction: He similarly observes that the atheist's 'God is a fictional character' implies 'there are fictional characters'. Schaffer is not committing to a strong platonism with his claim - merely that the existence of numbers is hardly worth disputing. |
| 13748 | Grounding is unanalysable and primitive, and is the basic structuring concept in metaphysics [Schaffer,J] |
| Full Idea: Grounding should be taken as primitive, as per the neo-Aristotelian approach. Grounding is an unanalyzable but needed notion - it is the primitive structuring conception of metaphysics. | |
| From: Jonathan Schaffer (On What Grounds What [2009], 2.2) | |
| A reaction: [he cites K.Fine 1991] I find that this simple claim clarifies the discussions of Kit Fine, where you are not always quite sure what the game is. I agree fully with it. It makes metaphysics interesting, where cataloguing entities is boring. |
| 13747 | Supervenience is just modal correlation [Schaffer,J] |
| Full Idea: Supervenience is mere modal correlation. | |
| From: Jonathan Schaffer (On What Grounds What [2009], 2.2) |
| 13744 | The cosmos is the only fundamental entity, from which all else exists by abstraction [Schaffer,J] |
| Full Idea: My preferred view is that there is only one fundamental entity - the whole concrete cosmos - from which all else exists by abstraction. | |
| From: Jonathan Schaffer (On What Grounds What [2009], 2.1) | |
| A reaction: This looks to me like weak anti-realism - that there are no natural 'joints' in nature - but I don't think Schaffer intends that. I take the joints to be fundamentals, which necessitates that the cosmos has parts. His 'abstraction' is clearly a process. |
| 13739 | Maybe categories are just the different ways that things depend on basic substances [Schaffer,J] |
| Full Idea: Maybe the categories are determined by the different grounding relations, ..so that categories just are the ways things depend on substances. ...Categories are places in the dependence ordering. | |
| From: Jonathan Schaffer (On What Grounds What [2009], 1.3) |
| 13742 | There exist heaps with no integral unity, so we should accept arbitrary composites in the same way [Schaffer,J] |
| Full Idea: I am happy to accept universal composition, on the grounds that there are heaps, piles etc with no integral unity, and that arbitrary composites are no less unified than heaps. | |
| From: Jonathan Schaffer (On What Grounds What [2009], 2.1 n11) | |
| A reaction: The metaphysical focus is then placed on what constitutes 'integral unity', which is precisely the question which most interested Aristotle. Clearly if there is nothing more to an entity than its components, scattering them isn't destruction. |
| 13752 | The notion of 'grounding' can explain integrated wholes in a way that mere aggregates can't [Schaffer,J] |
| Full Idea: The notion of grounding my capture a crucial mereological distinction (missing from classical mereology) between an integrated whole with genuine unity, and a mere aggregate. x is an integrated whole if it grounds its proper parts. | |
| From: Jonathan Schaffer (On What Grounds What [2009], 3.1) | |
| A reaction: That gives a nice theoretical notion, but if you remove each of the proper parts, does x remain? Is it a bare particular? I take it that it will have to be an abstract principle, the one Aristotle was aiming at with his notion of 'form'. Schaffer agrees. |
| 13749 | Belief in impossible worlds may require dialetheism [Schaffer,J] |
| Full Idea: One motivation for dialetheism is the view that there are impossible worlds. | |
| From: Jonathan Schaffer (On What Grounds What [2009], 2.3) |
| 13740 | 'Moorean certainties' are more credible than any sceptical argument [Schaffer,J] |
| Full Idea: A 'Moorean certainty' is when something is more credible than any philosopher's argument to the contrary. | |
| From: Jonathan Schaffer (On What Grounds What [2009], 2.1) | |
| A reaction: The reference is to G.E. Moore's famous claim that the existence of his hand is more certain than standard sceptical arguments. It sounds empiricist, but they might be parallel rational truths, of basic logic or arithmetic. |
| 16718 | Primary qualities are the cause of all the other sensible qualities [Albertus Magnus] |
| Full Idea: The primary qualities of tangible things are the cause of all the other sensible qualities. | |
| From: Albertus Magnus (On 'Generation and Corruption' [1261], II.1.1), quoted by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 21.2 | |
| A reaction: This makes the primary qualities sound suspiciously like the essence. |
| 4125 | Hare says I acquire an agglomeration of preferences by role-reversal, leading to utilitarianism [Hare, by Williams,B] |
| Full Idea: In Hare's theory I apply a "role-reversal test", and then acquire an actual agglomeration of preferences that apply to the hypothetical situation. The result is utilitarianism. | |
| From: report of Richard M. Hare (Moral Thinking: Its Levels,Method and Point [1981]) by Bernard Williams - Ethics and the Limits of Philosophy Ch.5 | |
| A reaction: It hits that traditional stumbling block, of why I should care about the preferences of others. Pure reason and empathy are the options (Kant or Hume). I may, however, lack both. |
| 4126 | If we have to want the preferences of the many, we have to abandon our own deeply-held views [Williams,B on Hare] |
| Full Idea: Hare's version of utilitarianism requires an agent to abandon any deeply held principle or conviction if a large enough aggregate of contrary preferences, of whatever kind, favours a contrary action. | |
| From: comment on Richard M. Hare (Moral Thinking: Its Levels,Method and Point [1981]) by Bernard Williams - Ethics and the Limits of Philosophy Ch.5 | |
| A reaction: This nicely attacks any impersonal moral theory, whether it is based on reason or preferences. But where did my personal ideals come from? |
| 4127 | If morality is to be built on identification with the preferences of others, I must agree with their errors [Williams,B on Hare] |
| Full Idea: If there is to be total identification with others, then if another's preferences are mistaken, the preferences I imagine myself into are equally mistaken, and if 'identification' is the point, they should remain mistaken. | |
| From: comment on Richard M. Hare (Moral Thinking: Its Levels,Method and Point [1981]) by Bernard Williams - Ethics and the Limits of Philosophy Ch.5 | |
| A reaction: Yes. The core of morality must be judgement. Robots can implement universal utilitarian rules, but they could end up promoting persecutions of minorities. |
| 22483 | A judgement is presciptive if we expect it to be acted on [Hare] |
| Full Idea: We say something prescriptive if and only if, for some act A, some situation S and some person R, if P were to assent (orally) to what we say, and not, in S, do A, he logically must be assenting insincerely. | |
| From: Richard M. Hare (Moral Thinking: Its Levels,Method and Point [1981], p.21), quoted by Philippa Foot - Does Moral Subjectivism Rest on a Mistake? p.190 | |
| A reaction: Foot offers this as Hare's most explicit definition. The use of algebra strikes me as ludicrous. In logic letters have the virtue of not shifting their meaning during an argument, but that is not required here. |
| 4360 | By far the easiest way of seeming upright is to be upright [Hare] |
| Full Idea: By far the easiest way of seeming upright is to be upright. | |
| From: Richard M. Hare (Moral Thinking: Its Levels,Method and Point [1981], Ch.11) | |
| A reaction: Yes. This is the route which takes us from enlightened self-interest to a vision of true morality. Virtue is found to be its own reward, thought that is not how we became virtuous to begin with. |