9576
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Multiplicity in general is just one and one and one, etc. [Husserl]
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Full Idea:
Multiplicity in general is no more than something and something and something, etc.; ..or more briefly, one and one and one, etc.
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From:
Edmund Husserl (Philosophy of Arithmetic [1894], p.85), quoted by Gottlob Frege - Review of Husserl's 'Phil of Arithmetic'
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A reaction:
Frege goes on to attack this idea fairly convincingly. It seems obvious that it is hard to say that you have seventeen items, if the only numberical concept in your possession is 'one'. How would you distinguish 17 from 16? What makes the ones 'multiple'?
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12714
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The substantial form is the principle of action or the primitive force of acting [Leibniz]
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Full Idea:
The substantial form is the principle of action or the primitive force of acting.
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From:
Gottfried Leibniz (De Mundo Praesenti [1686], A6.4.1507-8), quoted by Daniel Garber - Leibniz:Body,Substance,Monad 3
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A reaction:
The clearest statement of the modification of Aristotle's hylomorphism which Leibniz preferred in his middle period, and which strikes me as an improvement, and about right. Shame that monads got too much of a grip on him, but he was trying to dig deeper.
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12743
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A true being must (unlike a chain) have united parts, with a substantial form as its subject [Leibniz]
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Full Idea:
In a Being one per se a real union is required consisting not in the situation or motion of parts, as in a chain or a house, but in a unique individual principle and subject of attributes and operations, in us a soul and in a body a substantial form.
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From:
Gottfried Leibniz (De Mundo Praesenti [1686], A6.4.1506), quoted by Daniel Garber - Leibniz:Body,Substance,Monad 7
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A reaction:
Leibniz is said not to be an essentialist, by making all properties essential, but he is certainly committed to substance, and it sounds like essence here (or one view of essence), when it makes identity possible. This idea is pure Aristotle.
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9575
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Husserl identifies a positive mental act of unification, and a negative mental act for differences [Husserl, by Frege]
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Full Idea:
Husserl identifies a 'unitary mental act' where several contents are connected or related to one another, and also a difference-relation where two contents are related to one another by a negative judgement.
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From:
report of Edmund Husserl (Philosophy of Arithmetic [1894], p.73-74) by Gottlob Frege - Review of Husserl's 'Phil of Arithmetic' p.322
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A reaction:
Frege is setting this up ready for a fairly vicious attack. Where Hume has a faculty for spotting resemblances, it is not implausible that we should also be hard-wired to spot differences. 'You look different; have you changed your hair style?'
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9851
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Husserl wanted to keep a shadowy remnant of abstracted objects, to correlate them [Dummett on Husserl]
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Full Idea:
Husserl saw that abstracted units, though featureless, must in some way retain their distinctness, some shadowy remnant of their objects. So he wanted to correlate like-numbered sets, not just register their identity, but then abstractionism fails.
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From:
comment on Edmund Husserl (Philosophy of Arithmetic [1894]) by Michael Dummett - Frege philosophy of mathematics Ch.12
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A reaction:
Abstractionism is held to be between the devil and the deep blue sea, of depending on units which are identifiable, when they are defined as devoid of all individuality. We seem forced to say that the only distinction between them is countability.
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7903
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The six perfections are giving, morality, patience, vigour, meditation, and wisdom [Nagarjuna]
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Full Idea:
The six perfections are of giving, morality, patience, vigour, meditation, and wisdom.
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From:
Nagarjuna (Mahaprajnaparamitashastra [c.120], 88)
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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').
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