16 ideas
| 18859 | Metaphysics is a quest for truthmakers [Tallant] |
| Full Idea: In this book I will treat metaphysics as a quest for truthmakers. | |
| From: Jonathan Tallant (Metaphysics: an introduction [2011], 01) | |
| A reaction: I find this appealing, though obviously you have to say what sort of truthmakers generate 'metaphysical' truths, as opposed to physics or biology. I take it that would involve truthmakers that had a high level of generality, idealisation and abstraction. |
| 18861 | Maybe number statements can be paraphrased into quantifications plus identities [Tallant] |
| Full Idea: One strategy is whenever we are presented with a sentence that might appear to entail the existence of numbers, all that we have to do is paraphrase it using a quantified logic, plus identity. | |
| From: Jonathan Tallant (Metaphysics: an introduction [2011], 03.5) | |
| A reaction: This nominalist strategy seems fine for manageable numbers, but gets in trouble with numbers too big to count (e.g. grains of sand in the world) , or genuine infinities. |
| 18866 | Maybe only 'positive' truths need truth-makers [Tallant] |
| Full Idea: We might say that those truths that do not need truth-makers are those that are negative. Those that do need truth-makers are those that are positive. | |
| From: Jonathan Tallant (Metaphysics: an introduction [2011], 10.8) | |
| A reaction: If you deny the existence of something, there is always an implicit domain for the denial, such as 'on the table', or 'in this building', or 'in the cosmos'. So why can't that domain be the truthmaker for a negative existential? |
| 18860 | A truthmaker is the minimal portion of reality that will do the job [Tallant] |
| Full Idea: A 'minimal' truth-maker is the 'smallest' portion of reality required to make a given proposition true. | |
| From: Jonathan Tallant (Metaphysics: an introduction [2011], 01.2) | |
| A reaction: A nice suggestion. This seems to make Ockham's Razor an integral part of the theory of truth-makers. I would apply the same principle to explanations. An Ockhamist explanation is what explains the puzzling thing - and nothing else. |
| 18863 | What is the truthmaker for a possible new power? [Tallant] |
| Full Idea: What power will make true 'there could be a power that does not in fact exist'? | |
| From: Jonathan Tallant (Metaphysics: an introduction [2011], 04.13) | |
| A reaction: Nice question. We can't know whether it is true that a new power could exist, so we can't expect an actual truthmaker for it. Though we might predict new powers (such as for a new transuranic element), on the basis of the known ones. |
| 18864 | The wisdom of Plato and of Socrates are not the same property [Tallant] |
| Full Idea: It is not the case that Plato's wisdom = Socrates's wisdom. Platonic-wisdom and Socratic-wisdom are not the same property. | |
| From: Jonathan Tallant (Metaphysics: an introduction [2011], 05.4) | |
| A reaction: This seems reasonable in the case of wisdom, but not so clear in the case of indistinguishable properties of redness or squareness or mass. Nevertheless it gives nice support for trope theory. |
| 18865 | Substance must have two properties: individuation, and property-bearing [Tallant] |
| Full Idea: It appears that substance has essential properties: it is of the essence of substance that it individuates, and it is of the essence of substance that it bears properties. | |
| From: Jonathan Tallant (Metaphysics: an introduction [2011], 06.2) | |
| A reaction: The point being that substances are not 'bear', because they have a role to perform, and a complete blank can't fulfil a role. We can't take substance, though, seriously in ontology. It is just a label for distinct individuals. |
| 18862 | Are propositions all the thoughts and sentences that are possible? [Tallant] |
| Full Idea: One might be tempted to the view that there are as many different propositions as there are thoughts that could be thought and sentences that could be uttered. | |
| From: Jonathan Tallant (Metaphysics: an introduction [2011], 04.5.3) | |
| A reaction: A fairly orthodox view I take to be crazy. I think it is a view designed for logic, rather than for how the world is. Why tie propositions to what can be thought, and then introduce unthought propositions? Why no unthinkable propositions? |
| 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'). |
| 20937 | The state should produce higher civilisations for all, in tune with the economic apparatus [Gramsci] |
| Full Idea: The role of the State is always that of creating new and higher types of civilisation; of adapting the 'civilisation' and the morality of the broades popular masses to the necessities of the continuous development of the economic apparatus of production. | |
| From: Antonio Gramsci (Selections from Prison Notebooks [1971], 2 'Collective') | |
| A reaction: This makes education virtually the prime role of the state. Reminiscent of Sir John Reith's original dream, in the 1930s, for the BBC. Many marxists feel that the economy is in direct conflict with morality and civilisation. |
| 20935 | Eventually political parties lose touch with the class they represent, which is dangerous [Gramsci] |
| Full Idea: At a certain point in their lives, social classes become detached from their traditional parties. In that particular form ...the parties are no longer recognised by their class as its exopression. ...The field is then open for violent solutions. | |
| From: Antonio Gramsci (Selections from Prison Notebooks [1971], 2 'Parties') | |
| A reaction: Left wing parties pursue ideologies that don't connect with the actual current interests of the working class, and righ wing parties are taken over by rich elites who don't value safe traditonal communities. (This thought is resonant in the 2018 UK). |
| 20936 | Caesarism emerges when two forces in society are paralysed in conflict [Gramsci] |
| Full Idea: Caesarism (as the emergence of a 'heroic' personality) expresses a situation in which the forces in conflict balance each other in a catastrophic manner ...which can only terminate in their reciprocal destruction. | |
| From: Antonio Gramsci (Selections from Prison Notebooks [1971], 2 'Caesarism') | |
| A reaction: He goes on to distinguish progressive and reactionary versions of Caesarism. Gramsci's interest is in the circumstances that throw up such people. Marx had identified 'Bonapartism'. |
| 20941 | Totalitarian parties cut their members off from other cultural organisations [Gramsci] |
| Full Idea: A totalitarian party ensures that members find in that particular party all the satisfactions that they formerly found in a multiplicity of organisations. They break the threads that bind them to extraneous cultural organisms. | |
| From: Antonio Gramsci (Selections from Prison Notebooks [1971], 2 'Organisation') | |
| A reaction: British parties traditionally had a 'club house', where you could do most of your socialising. Presumably Nazis left the church, and various interest groups. |
| 20939 | What is the function of a parliament? Does it even constitute a part of the State structure? [Gramsci] |
| Full Idea: The question has to be asked: do parliaments, even in fact constitute a part of the State structure? In other words, what is the real function? | |
| From: Antonio Gramsci (Selections from Prison Notebooks [1971], 2 'Parliament') | |
| A reaction: Nice question. In the UK it is only the cabinet which has active power. Backbench MPs are usually very frustrated, especially if their party has a comfortable majority, and their vote is not precious. They are privileged lobbyists. |
| 20938 | Liberalism's weakness is its powerful rigid bureaucracy [Gramsci] |
| Full Idea: Liberalism's weakness is the bureacracy - the crystallisation of the leading personnel - which exercises power, and at a certain point it becomes a caste. | |
| From: Antonio Gramsci (Selections from Prison Notebooks [1971], 2 'Hegemony') | |
| A reaction: This sounds more like what is called 'the Establishment' in Britain, which is the hidden controllers of power, rather than the administrators (whose role is only despised by right-wingers). |
| 20940 | Perfect political equality requires economic equality [Gramsci] |
| Full Idea: The idea that complete and perfect political equality cannot exist without economic equality ...remains correct. | |
| From: Antonio Gramsci (Selections from Prison Notebooks [1971], 2 'The State') | |
| A reaction: In the west we are living in a period (2018) when the top 0.1% of the wealthy are racing away, creating huge inequality. Their wealth controls the media, and it seems unrestrainable. The belief that we live in a 'democracy' is an illusion. |