6 ideas
| 4038 | Properties are sets of their possible instances (which separates 'renate' from 'cordate') [Lewis, by Mellor/Oliver] |
| Full Idea: Lewis agrees that properties cannot be sets of their actual instances, but claims they can be sets of their possible instances. This would distinguish coextensive properties like being cordate and renate, since they might be separated. | |
| From: report of David Lewis (Modal Realism at Work: Properties [1986]) by DH Mellor / A Oliver - Introduction to 'Properties' §10 | |
| A reaction: Sounds wrong. Two properties could be obviously different even if they could never be separated. In this world a creature might briefly survive without kidneys. |
| 490 | Everything happens by reason and necessity [Leucippus] |
| Full Idea: Nothing happens at random; everything happens out of reason and by necessity. | |
| From: Leucippus (fragments/reports [c.435 BCE], B002), quoted by (who?) - where? |
| 6451 | Visual sense data are an inner picture show which represents the world [Blackburn] |
| Full Idea: In the case of vision, sense data are a kind of inner picture show which itself only indirectly represents aspects of the external world. | |
| From: Simon Blackburn (Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy [1994], p.347) | |
| A reaction: I'm unsure whether this is correct. Russell says the 'roughness' of the table is the sense datum. If it is even a possibility that there are unsensed sense-data, then they cannot be an aspect of the mind, as Blackburn is suggesting they are. |
| 2866 | A true belief might be based on a generally reliable process that failed on this occasion [Blackburn] |
| Full Idea: Reliabilism is open to the counterexample that a belief may be the result of some generally reliable process (a pressure gauge) which was in fact malfunctioning on this occasion, when we would be reluctant to attribute knowledge to the subject. | |
| From: Simon Blackburn (Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy [1994], p.327) | |
| A reaction: Russell's stopped clock that tells the right time twice a day. A good objection. Coming from a reliable source is very good criterion for good justification, but it needs critical assessment. |
| 2864 | The main objection to intuitionism in ethics is that intuition is a disguise for prejudice or emotion [Blackburn] |
| Full Idea: Critics say that intuitionism in ethics explains nothing, but may merely function as a disguise for prejudice or passion. | |
| From: Simon Blackburn (Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy [1994], p.198) | |
| A reaction: If someone claims to have an important moral intuition about something, you should carefully assess the person who has the intuition. I would trust some people a lot. |
| 2865 | Critics of prescriptivism observe that it is consistent to accept an ethical verdict but refuse to be bound by it [Blackburn] |
| Full Idea: Critics of prescriptivism have noted the problem that whilst accepting a command seems tantamount to setting oneself to obey it, accepting an ethical verdict is, unfortunately, consistent with refusing to be bound by it. | |
| From: Simon Blackburn (Oxford Dictionary of Philosophy [1994], p.300) | |
| A reaction: We nearly all of us accept that our behaviour should be better than it actually is, so we accept the oughts but fail to act. Actually 'refusing', though, sounds a bit contradictory. |