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All the ideas for 'Individuals without Sortals', 'What is an Idea?' and 'Concepts'

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39 ideas

1. Philosophy / F. Analytic Philosophy / 7. Limitations of Analysis
Naturalistic philosophers oppose analysis, preferring explanation to a priori intuition [Margolis/Laurence]
     Full Idea: Philosophers who oppose conceptual analysis identify their approach as being 'naturalistic'. Philosophy is supposed to be continuous with science, and philosophical theories are to be defended on explanatory grounds, not by a priori intuitions.
     From: E Margolis/S Laurence (Concepts [2009], 5.2)
     A reaction: [They cite Papineau 1993, Devitt 1996 aand Kornblith 2002] I think there is a happy compromise here. I agree that any philosophical knowledge should be continuous with science, but we shouldn't prejudge how the analytic branch of science is done.
6. Mathematics / A. Nature of Mathematics / 4. Using Numbers / d. Counting via concepts
Counting 'coin in this box' may have coin as the unit, with 'in this box' merely as the scope [Ayers]
     Full Idea: If we count the concept 'coin in this box', we could regard coin as the 'unit', while taking 'in this box' to limit the scope. Counting coins in two boxes would be not a difference in unit (kind of object), but in scope.
     From: M.R. Ayers (Individuals without Sortals [1974], 'Counting')
     A reaction: This is a very nice alternative to the Fregean view of counting, depending totally on the concept, and rests more on a natural concept of object. I prefer Ayers. Compare 'count coins till I tell you to stop'.
If counting needs a sortal, what of things which fall under two sortals? [Ayers]
     Full Idea: If we accepted that counting objects always presupposes some sortal, it is surely clear that the class of objects to be counted could be designated by two sortals rather than one.
     From: M.R. Ayers (Individuals without Sortals [1974], 'Realist' vii)
     A reaction: His nice example is an object which is both 'a single piece of wool' and a 'sweater', which had better not be counted twice. Wiggins struggles to argue that there is always one 'substance sortal' which predominates.
7. Existence / B. Change in Existence / 4. Events / a. Nature of events
Events do not have natural boundaries, and we have to set them [Ayers]
     Full Idea: In order to know which event has been ostensively identified by a speaker, the auditor must know the limits intended by the speaker. ...Events do not have natural boundaries.
     From: M.R. Ayers (Individuals without Sortals [1974], 'Concl')
     A reaction: He distinguishes events thus from natural objects, where the world, to a large extent, offers us the boundaries. Nice point.
9. Objects / A. Existence of Objects / 5. Individuation / a. Individuation
To express borderline cases of objects, you need the concept of an 'object' [Ayers]
     Full Idea: The only explanation of the power to produce borderline examples like 'Is this hazelnut one object or two?' is the possession of the concept of an object.
     From: M.R. Ayers (Individuals without Sortals [1974], 'Counting')
9. Objects / A. Existence of Objects / 5. Individuation / e. Individuation by kind
Speakers need the very general category of a thing, if they are to think about it [Ayers]
     Full Idea: If a speaker indicates something, then in order for others to catch his reference they must know, at some level of generality, what kind of thing is indicated. They must categorise it as event, object, or quality. Thinking about something needs that much.
     From: M.R. Ayers (Individuals without Sortals [1974], Intro)
     A reaction: Ayers defends the view that such general categories are required, but not the much narrower sortal terms defended by Geach and Wiggins. I'm with Ayers all the way. 'What the hell is that?'
We use sortals to classify physical objects by the nature and origin of their unity [Ayers]
     Full Idea: Sortals are the terms by which we intend to classify physical objects according to the nature and origin of their unity.
     From: M.R. Ayers (Individuals without Sortals [1974], 'Concl')
     A reaction: This is as opposed to using sortals for the initial individuation. I take the perception of the unity to come first, so resemblance must be mentioned, though it can be an underlying (essentialist) resemblance.
Seeing caterpillar and moth as the same needs continuity, not identity of sortal concepts [Ayers]
     Full Idea: It is unnecessary to call moths 'caterpillars' or caterpillars 'moths' to see that they can be the same individual. It may be that our sortal concepts reflect our beliefs about continuity, but our beliefs about continuity need not reflect our sortals.
     From: M.R. Ayers (Individuals without Sortals [1974], 'Realist' vi)
     A reaction: Something that metamorphosed through 15 different stages could hardly required 15 different sortals before we recognised the fact. Ayers is right.
Recognising continuity is separate from sortals, and must precede their use [Ayers]
     Full Idea: The recognition of the fact of continuity is logically independent of the possession of sortal concepts, whereas the formation of sortal concepts is at least psychologically dependent upon the recognition of continuity.
     From: M.R. Ayers (Individuals without Sortals [1974], Intro)
     A reaction: I take this to be entirely correct. I might add that unity must also be recognised.
9. Objects / B. Unity of Objects / 1. Unifying an Object / a. Intrinsic unification
Could the same matter have more than one form or principle of unity? [Ayers]
     Full Idea: The abstract question arises of whether the same matter could be subject to more than one principle of unity simultaneously, or unified by more than one 'form'.
     From: M.R. Ayers (Individuals without Sortals [1974], 'Realist' vii)
     A reaction: He suggests that the unity of the sweater is destroyed by unravelling, and the unity of the thread by cutting.
9. Objects / B. Unity of Objects / 3. Unity Problems / c. Statue and clay
If there are two objects, then 'that marble, man-shaped object' is ambiguous [Ayers]
     Full Idea: The statue is marble and man-shaped, but so is the piece of marble. So not only are the two objects in the same place, but two marble and man-shaped objects in the same place, so 'that marble, man-shaped object' must be ambiguous or indefinite.
     From: M.R. Ayers (Individuals without Sortals [1974], 'Prob')
     A reaction: It strikes me as basic that it can't be a piece of marble if you subtract its shape, and it can't be a statue if you subtract its matter. To treat a statue as an object, separately from its matter, is absurd.
9. Objects / D. Essence of Objects / 5. Essence as Kind
Sortals basically apply to individuals [Ayers]
     Full Idea: Sortals, in their primitive use, apply to the individual.
     From: M.R. Ayers (Individuals without Sortals [1974], 'Concl')
     A reaction: If the sortal applies to the individual, any essence must pertain to that individual, and not to the class it has been placed in.
9. Objects / E. Objects over Time / 5. Temporal Parts
You can't have the concept of a 'stage' if you lack the concept of an object [Ayers]
     Full Idea: It would be impossible for anyone to have the concept of a stage who did not already possess the concept of a physical object.
     From: M.R. Ayers (Individuals without Sortals [1974], 'Concl')
Temporal 'parts' cannot be separated or rearranged [Ayers]
     Full Idea: Temporally extended 'parts' are still mysteriously inseparable and not subject to rearrangement: a thing cannot be cut temporally in half.
     From: M.R. Ayers (Individuals without Sortals [1974], 'Prob')
     A reaction: A nice warning to anyone accepting a glib analogy between spatial parts and temporal parts.
9. Objects / F. Identity among Objects / 1. Concept of Identity
Some say a 'covering concept' completes identity; others place the concept in the reference [Ayers]
     Full Idea: Some hold that the 'covering concept' completes the incomplete concept of identity, determining the kind of sameness involved. Others strongly deny the identity itself is incomplete, and locate the covering concept within the necessary act of reference.
     From: M.R. Ayers (Individuals without Sortals [1974], Intro)
     A reaction: [a bit compressed; Geach is the first view, and Quine the second; Wiggins is somewhere between the two]
9. Objects / F. Identity among Objects / 3. Relative Identity
If diachronic identities need covering concepts, why not synchronic identities too? [Ayers]
     Full Idea: Why are covering concepts required for diachronic identities, when they must be supposed unnecessary for synchronic identities?
     From: M.R. Ayers (Individuals without Sortals [1974], 'Prob')
12. Knowledge Sources / D. Empiricism / 2. Associationism
Modern empiricism tends to emphasise psychological connections, not semantic relations [Margolis/Laurence]
     Full Idea: A growing number of philosophers are attracted to modified forms of empiricism, emphasizing psychological relations between the conceptual system and perceptual and motor states, not semantic relations.
     From: E Margolis/S Laurence (Concepts [2009], 3.2)
     A reaction: I suddenly spot that this is what I have been drifting towards for some time! The focus is concept formation, where the philosophers need to join forces with the cognitive scientists.
17. Mind and Body / E. Mind as Physical / 1. Physical Mind
Body-type seems to affect a mind's cognition and conceptual scheme [Margolis/Laurence]
     Full Idea: It is claimed, on the basis of empirical research, that the type of body that an organism has profoundly affects it cognitive operations and the way it conceptualises the world. We can't assume that human minds could inhere in wildly different body types.
     From: E Margolis/S Laurence (Concepts [2009], 3.2)
     A reaction: Sounds interesting. They cite Lawrence Shapiro 2004. It needs a large effort of imagination to think how a snake or whale or albatross might conceptualise the world, in relation to their bodies.
18. Thought / B. Mechanics of Thought / 4. Language of Thought
Language of thought has subject/predicate form and includes logical devices [Margolis/Laurence]
     Full Idea: The language of thought is taken to have subject/predicate form and include logical devices, such as quantifiers and variables.
     From: E Margolis/S Laurence (Concepts [2009], 1.1)
18. Thought / C. Content / 2. Ideas
By an 'idea' I mean not an actual thought, but the resources we can draw on to think [Leibniz]
     Full Idea: What I mean by an idea is not a certain act of thinking, but a power or faculty such that we have an idea of a thing even if we are not thinking about it but know that we can think it when the occasion arises.
     From: Gottfried Leibniz (What is an Idea? [1676], p.281)
     A reaction: 'Idea' tends to be used in the seventeenth century to mean an actual mental event. It is because Leibniz believes in the unconscious mind that he can offer this rather different, and probably superior, notion of an 'idea'.
18. Thought / D. Concepts / 1. Concepts / a. Nature of concepts
Concepts are either representations, or abilities, or Fregean senses [Margolis/Laurence]
     Full Idea: The three main options for the ontological status of concepts are to identify them with mental representations, or with abilities, or with Fregean senses.
     From: E Margolis/S Laurence (Concepts [2009], 1)
18. Thought / D. Concepts / 3. Ontology of Concepts / a. Concepts as representations
A computer may have propositional attitudes without representations [Margolis/Laurence]
     Full Idea: It may be possible to have propositional attitudes without having the mental representations tokened in one's head. ...We may say a chess-playing computer thinks it should develop its queen early, though we know it has no representation with that content.
     From: E Margolis/S Laurence (Concepts [2009], 1.1)
     A reaction: [Thye cite Dennett - who talks of the 'intentional stance'] It is, of course, a moot point whether we would attribute a propositional attitude (such as belief) to a machine once we knew that it wasn't representing the relevant concepts.
Do mental representations just lead to a vicious regress of explanations [Margolis/Laurence]
     Full Idea: A standard criticism is that the mental representation view of concepts creates just another item whose significance bears explaining. Either we have a vicious regress, or we might as well explain external language directly.
     From: E Margolis/S Laurence (Concepts [2009], 1.2)
     A reaction: [They cite Dummett, with Wittgenstein in the background] I don't agree, because I think that explanation of concepts only stops when it dovetails into biology.
18. Thought / D. Concepts / 3. Ontology of Concepts / b. Concepts as abilities
Maybe the concept CAT is just the ability to discriminate and infer about cats [Margolis/Laurence]
     Full Idea: The view that concepts are abilities (e.g. found in Brandom, Dummett and Millikan) would say that the concept CAT amounts to the ability to discriminate cats from non-cats and to draw certain inferences about cats.
     From: E Margolis/S Laurence (Concepts [2009], 1.2)
     A reaction: Feels wrong. The concept is what makes these abilities possible, but it seems rather behaviourist to identify the concept with what is enabled by the concept. You might understand 'cat', but fail to recognise your first cat (though you might suspect it).
The abilities view cannot explain the productivity of thought, or mental processes [Margolis/Laurence]
     Full Idea: The abilities view of concepts, by its rejection of mental representation, is ill-equipped to explain the productivity of thought; and it can say little about mental processes.
     From: E Margolis/S Laurence (Concepts [2009], 1.2)
     A reaction: The latter point arises from its behaviouristic character, which just gives us a black box with some output of abilities. In avoiding a possible regress, it offers no explanation at all.
18. Thought / D. Concepts / 4. Structure of Concepts / a. Conceptual structure
Concept-structure explains typicality, categories, development, reference and composition [Margolis/Laurence]
     Full Idea: The structures of concepts are invoked to explain typicality effects, reflective categorization, cognitive development, reference determination, and compositionality.
     From: E Margolis/S Laurence (Concepts [2009], 2.5)
18. Thought / D. Concepts / 4. Structure of Concepts / c. Classical concepts
Classically, concepts give necessary and sufficient conditions for falling under them [Margolis/Laurence]
     Full Idea: The classical theory is that a concept has a definitional structure in that it is composed of simpler concepts that express necessary and sufficient conditions for falling under the concept, the stock example being unmarried and a man for 'bachelor'.
     From: E Margolis/S Laurence (Concepts [2009], 2.1)
     A reaction: This is the background idea to philosophy as analysis, and it makes concepts essentially referential, in that they are defined by their ability to pick things out. There must be some degree of truth in the theory.
Typicality challenges the classical view; we see better fruit-prototypes in apples than in plums [Margolis/Laurence]
     Full Idea: The classical view is challenged by the discovery that certain categories are taken to be more typical, with typicality widely correlating with other data. Apples are judged to be more typical of (and have more common features with) fruit than plums are.
     From: E Margolis/S Laurence (Concepts [2009], 2.1)
     A reaction: This discovery that people use prototypes in thinking has been the biggest idea to ever hit the philosophy of concepts, and simply cannot be ignored (as long as the research keeps reinforcing it, which I believe it does). The classical view might adapt.
The classical theory explains acquisition, categorization and reference [Margolis/Laurence]
     Full Idea: The appeal of the classical theory of concepts is that it offers unified treatments of concept acquisition (assembling constituents), categorization (check constituents against target), and reference determination (whether they apply).
     From: E Margolis/S Laurence (Concepts [2009], 2.1)
     A reaction: [See Idea 11128 for the theory] As so often, I find myself in sympathy with the traditional view which has been relegated to ignominy by our wonderful modern philosophers.
It may be that our concepts (such as 'knowledge') have no definitional structure [Margolis/Laurence]
     Full Idea: In the light of problems such as the definition of knowledge, many philosophers now take seriously the possibility that our concepts lack definitional structure.
     From: E Margolis/S Laurence (Concepts [2009], 2.1)
     A reaction: This challenges the classical view, that there are precise conditions for each concept. That view would obviously be in difficulties with atomic concepts, so our account of those might be applied all the way up.
18. Thought / D. Concepts / 4. Structure of Concepts / d. Concepts as prototypes
The prototype theory is probabilistic, picking something out if it has sufficient of the properties [Margolis/Laurence]
     Full Idea: In the prototype theory of concepts, a lexical concept has probabilistic structure in that something falls under it if it satisfies a sufficient number of properties encoded by the constituents. It originates in Wittgenstein's 'family resemblance'.
     From: E Margolis/S Laurence (Concepts [2009], 2.2)
     A reaction: It would seem unlikely to be a matter of the 'number' of properties, and would have to involve some notion of what was essential to the prototype.
Prototype theory categorises by computing the number of shared constituents [Margolis/Laurence]
     Full Idea: On the prototype theory, categorization is to be understood as a similarity comparison process, where similarity is computed as a function of the number of constituents that two concepts hold in common.
     From: E Margolis/S Laurence (Concepts [2009], 2.2)
     A reaction: Again it strikes me that 'computing' similarity by mere 'number' of shared constituents won't do, as there is a prior judgement about which constituents really matter, or are essential. That may even be hard-wired.
People don't just categorise by apparent similarities [Margolis/Laurence]
     Full Idea: When it comes to more reflexive judgements, people go beyond the outcome of a similarity comparison. Even children say that a dog surgically altered to look like a raccoon is still a dog.
     From: E Margolis/S Laurence (Concepts [2009], 2.2)
     A reaction: We can defend the theory by not underestimating people so much. Most categorisation is done on superficial grounds, but even children know there may be hidden similarities (behind the mask, under the bonnet) which are more important.
Complex concepts have emergent properties not in the ingredient prototypes [Margolis/Laurence]
     Full Idea: An objection to the prototype view concerns compositionality. A complex concept often has emergent properties, as when it seems that 'pet fish' encodes for brightly coloured, which has no basis in the prototypes for 'pet' or 'fish'.
     From: E Margolis/S Laurence (Concepts [2009], 2.2)
     A reaction: I would take 'pet fish' to work like a database query. 'Fish' has a very vague prototype, and then 'pet fish' narrows the search to fish which are appropriate to be pets. We might say that the prototype is refined, or the Mk 2 prototype appears.
Many complex concepts obviously have no prototype [Margolis/Laurence]
     Full Idea: Many patently complex concepts don't even have a prototype structure, such as 'Chairs that were purchased on a Wednesday'.
     From: E Margolis/S Laurence (Concepts [2009], 2.2)
     A reaction: [The example seems to be from Fodor] I disagree. If we accept the notion of 'refining' the prototype (see Idea 11135), then the compositionality of the expression will produce a genuine but very unusual prototype.
18. Thought / D. Concepts / 4. Structure of Concepts / f. Theory theory of concepts
The theory theory of concepts says they are parts of theories, defined by their roles [Margolis/Laurence]
     Full Idea: The theory theory of concepts says that terms are related as in a scientific theory, and that categorization resembles theorising. It is generally assumed that scientific terms are interdefined so that content is determined by its role in the theory.
     From: E Margolis/S Laurence (Concepts [2009], 2.3)
     A reaction: I never like this sort of account. What are the characteristics of the thing which enable it to fulfil its role? You haven't defined a car when you've said it gets you from A to B.
The theory theory is holistic, so how can people have identical concepts? [Margolis/Laurence]
     Full Idea: A problem with the theory theory of concepts is that it is holistic, saying a concept is determined by its role, not by its constituents. It then seems difficult for different people to possess the same concepts (or even the same person, over time).
     From: E Margolis/S Laurence (Concepts [2009], 2.3)
     A reaction: This seems a good objection to any holistic account of concepts or meaning - spotted by Plato in motivating his theory of Forms, to give the necessary stability to communication.
18. Thought / D. Concepts / 4. Structure of Concepts / g. Conceptual atomism
Maybe concepts have no structure, and determined by relations to the world, not to other concepts [Margolis/Laurence]
     Full Idea: According to conceptual atomism, lexical concepts have no semantic structure, and the content of a concept isn't determined by its relation to other concepts but by its relations to the world.
     From: E Margolis/S Laurence (Concepts [2009], 2.4)
     A reaction: [They cite Fodor 1998 and Millikan 2000] I like the sound of that, because I take the creation of concepts to be (in the first instance) a response to the world, not a response to other concepts.
18. Thought / D. Concepts / 5. Concepts and Language / c. Concepts without language
People can formulate new concepts which are only named later [Margolis/Laurence]
     Full Idea: People seem to be able to formulate novel concepts which are left to be named later; the concept comes first, the name second.
     From: E Margolis/S Laurence (Concepts [2009], 4.2)
     A reaction: [This seems to have empirical support, and he cites Pinker 1994] I do not find this remotely surprising, since I presume that human concepts are a continuous kind with animal concepts, including non-conscious concepts (why not?).