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9291
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The dating, in 1614, of the Hermetic writings as post-Christian is the end of the Renaissance [Yates]
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Full Idea:
The dating by Isaac Casaubon in 1614 of the Hermetic writings as not the work of a very ancient Egyptian priest but written in post-Christian times, is a watershed separating the Renaissance world from the modern world.
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From:
Frances A. Yates (Giordano Bruno and Hermetic Tradition [1964], Ch.21)
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A reaction:
I tend to place the end of the Renaissance with the arrival of the telescope in 1610, so the two dates coincide. Simply, magic was replaced by science. Religion ran alongside, gasping for breath. Mathematics was freed from numerology.
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9288
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The magic of Asclepius enters Renaissance thought mixed into Ficino's neo-platonism [Yates]
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Full Idea:
The magic of Asclepius, reinterpreted through Plotinus, enters with Ficino's De Vita into the neo-platonic philosophy of the Renaissance, and, moreover, into Ficino's Christian Platonism.
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From:
Frances A. Yates (Giordano Bruno and Hermetic Tradition [1964], Ch.4)
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A reaction:
Asclepius is the source of 'Hermetic' philosophy. This move seems to be what gives the Renaissance period its rather quirky and distinctive character. Montaigne was not a typical figure. Most of them wanted to become gods and control the stars!
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18946
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Unreflectively, we all assume there are nonexistents, and we can refer to them [Reimer]
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Full Idea:
As speakers of the language, we unreflectively assume that there are nonexistents, and that reference to them is possible.
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From:
Marga Reimer (The Problem of Empty Names [2001], p.499), quoted by Sarah Sawyer - Empty Names 4
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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'.
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4800
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Natural laws result from eliminative induction, where enumerative induction gives generalisations [Cohen,LJ, by Psillos]
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Full Idea:
Cohen contends that statements that express laws of nature are the products of eliminative induction, where accidentally true generalisations are the products of enumerative induction.
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From:
report of L. Jonathan Cohen (The Problem of Natural Laws [1980], p.222) by Stathis Psillos - Causation and Explanation §7.1
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A reaction:
The idea is that enumerative induction only offers the support of positive instances, where eliminative induction involves attempts to falsify a range of hypotheses. This still bases laws on observed regularities, rather than essences or mechanisms.
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