5 ideas
| 2945 | Most philosophers start with reality and then examine knowledge; Descartes put the study of knowledge first [Lehrer] |
| Full Idea: Some philosophers (e.g Plato) begin with an account of reality, and then appended an account of how we can know it, ..but Descartes turned the tables, insisting that we must first decide what we can know. | |
| From: Keith Lehrer (Theory of Knowledge (2nd edn) [2000], I p.2) |
| 2946 | You cannot demand an analysis of a concept without knowing the purpose of the analysis [Lehrer] |
| Full Idea: An analysis is always relative to some objective. It makes no sense to simply demand an analysis of goodness, knowledge, beauty or truth, without some indication of the purpose of the analysis. | |
| From: Keith Lehrer (Theory of Knowledge (2nd edn) [2000], I p.7) | |
| A reaction: Your dismantling of a car will go better if you know what a car is for, but you can still take it apart in ignorance. |
| 19323 | 'Snow is white' depends on meaning; whether snow is white depends on snow [Etchemendy] |
| Full Idea: The difference between (a) snow is white, and (b) 'snow is white' true is that the first makes a claim that only depends on the colour of snow, while the second depends both on the colour of snow and the meaning of the sentence 'snow is white'. | |
| From: John Etchemendy (Tarski on Truth and Logical Consequence [1988], p.61), quoted by Richard L. Kirkham - Theories of Truth: a Critical Introduction 5.7 | |
| A reaction: This is a helpful first step for those who have reached screaming point by being continually offered this apparently vacuous equivalence. This sentence works well if that stuff is a particular colour. |
| 19137 | We can get a substantive account of Tarski's truth by adding primitive 'true' to the object language [Etchemendy] |
| Full Idea: Getting from a Tarskian definition of truth to a substantive account of the semantic properties of the object language may involve as little as the reintroduction of a primitive notion of truth. | |
| From: John Etchemendy (Tarski on Truth and Logical Consequence [1988], p.60), quoted by Donald Davidson - Truth and Predication 1 | |
| A reaction: This is, I think, the first stage in modern developments of axiomatic truth theories. The first problem would be to make sure you haven't reintroduced the Liar Paradox. You need axioms to give behaviour to the 'true' predicate. |
| 15313 | By 'force' I mean the sources of all actions - sometimes called 'powers' by their outcomes [Breheny] |
| Full Idea: I mean by the word 'force' the source or sources of all possible actions of the particles or materials of the universe: these being often called the powers of nature when spoken of in relation to the different manners in which their effects are shown. | |
| From: Richard Breheny (Letter to Clerk Maxwell [1855]), quoted by Harré,R./Madden,E.H. - Causal Powers 9.II.B | |
| A reaction: He uses 'force' for what is fundamental, and 'powers' for their results. I am inclining to talk of 'fundamental powers' and 'complex powers', leaving the word 'force' to the physicists. |