4 ideas
| 15453 | The main rivals to universals are resemblance or natural-class nominalism, or sparse trope theory [Lewis] |
| Full Idea: The leading rivals to a theory of universals are resemblance or natural-class nominalism, or sparse trope theory. | |
| From: David Lewis (Comment on Armstrong and Forrest [1986], p.110) | |
| A reaction: If that is the complete menu, I choose resemblance nominalism. All discussion of properties in terms of classes is wildly misguided (because properties come first). Why not 'natural' tropes? |
| 15452 | We could not uphold a truthmaker for 'Fa' without structures [Lewis] |
| Full Idea: We could not, without structures, uphold the principle that every truth has a truthmaker. If Fa is true, the truthmaker is not F, not a, nor both together; not their mereological sum; not a set-theoretic construction. These would exist just the same. | |
| From: David Lewis (Comment on Armstrong and Forrest [1986], p.109) | |
| A reaction: This point ought to trouble Lewis, as well as Armstrong and Forrest. If we assert 'Fa', we must (in any theory) have some idea of what unites them, as well as of their separate existence. It must a fact about 'a', not a fact about 'F'. |
| 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'). |
| 14409 | I am a presentist, and all language and common sense supports my view [Bigelow] |
| Full Idea: I am a presentist: nothing exists which is not present. Everyone believed this until the nineteenth century; it is writing into the grammar of natural languages; it is still assumed in everyday life, even by philosophers who deny it. | |
| From: John Bigelow (Presentism and Properties [1996], p.36), quoted by Trenton Merricks - Truth and Ontology | |
| A reaction: The most likely deniers of presentism seem to be physicists and cosmologists who have overdosed on Einstein. On the whole I vote for presentism, but what justifies truths about the past and future. Traces existing in the present? |