13 ideas
| 18946 | Unreflectively, we all assume there are nonexistents, and we can refer to them [Reimer] |
| Full Idea: As speakers of the language, we unreflectively assume that there are nonexistents, and that reference to them is possible. | |
| From: Marga Reimer (The Problem of Empty Names [2001], p.499), quoted by Sarah Sawyer - Empty Names 4 | |
| A reaction: Sarah Swoyer quotes this as a good solution to the problem of empty names, and I like it. It introduces a two-tier picture of our understanding of the world, as 'unreflective' and 'reflective', but that seems good. We accept numbers 'unreflectively'. |
| 18914 | Davidson controversially proposed to quantify over events [Davidson, by Engelbretsen] |
| Full Idea: An alternative, and still controversial, extension of first-order logic is due to Donald Davidson, who allows for quantification over events. | |
| From: report of Donald Davidson (The Individuation of Events [1969]) by George Engelbretsen - Trees, Terms and Truth 3 | |
| A reaction: I'm suddenly thinking this is quite an attractive proposal. We need to quantify over facts, or states of affairs, or events, or some such thing, to talk about the world properly. Objects, predicates and sets/parts is too sparse. I like facts. |
| 9843 | You can't identify events by causes and effects, as the event needs to be known first [Dummett on Davidson] |
| Full Idea: Davidson's criterion for the identity of events is a mistake, because we cannot know the causes and effects of an event until we know what that event comprises. | |
| From: comment on Donald Davidson (The Individuation of Events [1969]) by Michael Dummett - Frege philosophy of mathematics Ch.10 | |
| A reaction: How many attempts by analytical philosophers to give necessary and sufficient conditions for things seem to founder in this way. Their predecessor is at the end of 'Theaetetus'; you have to know what the sun is before you can define it. |
| 14602 | Events can only be individuated causally [Davidson, by Schaffer,J] |
| Full Idea: Davidson claims that events can only be individuated causally. | |
| From: report of Donald Davidson (The Individuation of Events [1969], 3) by Jonathan Schaffer - Causation and Laws of Nature 3 | |
| A reaction: Schaffer rejects this in favour of individuating events by their spatiotemporal locations and intrinsic natures (which seem to be property instantiations, a la Kim). Schaffer was a pupil of David Lewis. |
| 14004 | We need events for action statements, causal statements, explanation, mind-and-body, and adverbs [Davidson, by Bourne] |
| Full Idea: Davidson claims that we require the existence of events in order to make sense of a) action statements, b) causal statements, c) explanation, d) the mind-body problem, and e) the logic of adverbial modification. | |
| From: report of Donald Davidson (The Individuation of Events [1969], Intro IIb) by Craig Bourne - A Future for Presentism | |
| A reaction: Events are a nice shorthand, but I don't like them in a serious ontology. Prior says there objects and what happens to them; Kim reduces events to other things. Processes are more clearly individuated than events. |
| 8278 | The claim that events are individuated by their causal relations to other events is circular [Lowe on Davidson] |
| Full Idea: Davidson has urged that events are individuated by the causal relations which they bear to one another, in accordance with the principle that events are identical just in case they have the same causes and effects. But the principle is viciously circular. | |
| From: comment on Donald Davidson (The Individuation of Events [1969]) by E.J. Lowe - The Possibility of Metaphysics 7.4 | |
| A reaction: You wouldn't want to identify a person just by their relationships, even though those will certainly be unique. Generally it is what I am (right now) naming as the Functional Fallacy: believing that specifying the function of x explains x. |
| 7127 | If men are good you should keep promises, but they aren't, so you needn't [Machiavelli] |
| Full Idea: If all men were good, promising-breaking would not be good, but because they are bad and do not keep their promises to you, you likewise do not have to keep yours to them. | |
| From: Niccolo Machiavelli (The Prince [1513], Ch.18) | |
| A reaction: A rather depressing proposal to get your promise-breaking in first, based on the pessimistic view that people cannot be improved. The subsequent history of ethics in Europe showed Machiavelli to be wrong. Gentlemen began to keep their word. |
| 6309 | The principle foundations of all states are good laws and good armies [Machiavelli] |
| Full Idea: The principle foundations of all states are good laws and good armies. | |
| From: Niccolo Machiavelli (The Prince [1513], Ch.11) | |
| A reaction: We may be wondering, since 1945, whether a good army is any longer essential, but it would be a foolish modern state which didn't at least form a strong alliance with a state which had a strong army. Fertile land is a huge benefit to a state. |
| 6305 | To retain a conquered state, wipe out the ruling family, and preserve everything else [Machiavelli] |
| Full Idea: If a ruler acquires a state and is determined to keep it, he observes two cautions: he wipes out the family of their long-established princes; and he does not change either their laws or their taxes; in a short time they will unite with his old princedom. | |
| From: Niccolo Machiavelli (The Prince [1513], Ch.3) | |
| A reaction: This nicely illustrates the firmness of purpose for which Machiavelli has become a byword. The question is whether Machiavelli had enough empirical evidence to support this induction. The British in India seem to have been successful without it. |
| 6306 | People are vengeful, so be generous to them, or destroy them [Machiavelli] |
| Full Idea: Men should be either treated generously or destroyed, because they take revenge for slight injuries. | |
| From: Niccolo Machiavelli (The Prince [1513], Ch.3) | |
| A reaction: This sounds like good advice, and works quite well in school teaching too. It seems like advice drawn from the growth of the Roman Empire, rather than from dealing with sophisticated and educated people. |
| 6308 | A sensible conqueror does all his harmful deeds immediately, because people soon forget [Machiavelli] |
| Full Idea: A prudent conqueror makes a list of all the harmful deeds he must do, and does them all at once, so that he need not repeat them every day, which then makes men feel secure, and gains their support by treating them well. | |
| From: Niccolo Machiavelli (The Prince [1513], Ch.8) | |
| A reaction: This might work for a new government in a democracy, or a new boss in a business. It sounds horribly true; dreadful deeds done a long time ago can be completely forgotten, as when reformed criminals become celebrities. |
| 6307 | A desire to conquer, and men who do it, are always praised, or not blamed [Machiavelli] |
| Full Idea: It is very natural and normal to wish to conquer, and when men do it who can, they always will be praised, or not blamed. | |
| From: Niccolo Machiavelli (The Prince [1513], Ch.3) | |
| A reaction: This view seems shocking to us, but it seems to me that this was a widely held view up until the time of Nietzsche, but came to a swift end with the invention of the machine gun in about 1885, followed by the heavy bomber and atomic bomb. |
| 7486 | Machiavelli emancipated politics from religion [Machiavelli, by Watson] |
| Full Idea: Machiavelli emancipated politics from religion. | |
| From: report of Niccolo Machiavelli (The Prince [1513]) by Peter Watson - Ideas Ch.24 | |
| A reaction: Interestingly, he seems to have done it by saying that ideals are irrelevant to politics, but gradually secular ideals crept back in (sometimes disastrously). A balance needs to be struck on idealism. |