3 ideas
| 21507 | Scientific explanation aims at a unifying account of underlying structures and processes [Hempel] |
| Full Idea: What theoretical scientific explanation aims at is an objective kind of insight that is achieved by a systematic unification, by exhibiting the phenomena as manifestations of common underlying structures and processes that conform to testable principles. | |
| From: Carl Hempel (Philosophy of Natural Science [1967], p.83), quoted by Laurence Bonjour - The Structure of Empirical Knowledge 5.3 | |
| A reaction: This is a pretty good statement of scientific essentialism, and structures and processes are what I take Aristotle to have had in mind when he sought 'what it is to be that thing'. Structures and processes give stability and powers. |
| 7903 | The six perfections are giving, morality, patience, vigour, meditation, and wisdom [Nagarjuna] |
| Full Idea: The six perfections are of giving, morality, patience, vigour, meditation, and wisdom. | |
| From: Nagarjuna (Mahaprajnaparamitashastra [c.120], 88) | |
| A reaction: What is 'morality', if giving is not part of it? I like patience and vigour being two of the virtues, which immediately implies an Aristotelian mean (which is always what is 'appropriate'). |
| 7469 | There is no hereafter in the Book of Job [Anon (Job), by Watson] |
| Full Idea: The entire Book of Job is concerned with faith and suffering and inequality in a life where there is no hereafter (all the rewards promised to the Jews by their God are worldly). | |
| From: report of Anon (Job) (18: Book of Job [c.535 BCE]) by Peter Watson - Ideas Ch.5 | |
| A reaction: It is extraordinary how such ideas can creep into the great religions, and then become taken for granted, as if no one had ever doubted them. |