5 ideas
16608 | Ockham was an anti-realist about the categories [William of Ockham, by Pasnau] |
Full Idea: Ockham is the scholastic paradigm of anti-realism with respect to the categories. | |
From: report of William of Ockham (Summula philosophiae naturalis [1320]) by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 05.3 | |
A reaction: These are the ten categories mentioned in Aristotle's book 'Categories'. |
16599 | Ockham says matter must be extended, so we don't need Quantity [William of Ockham, by Pasnau] |
Full Idea: Ockham regards Quantity as an entirely superfluous ontological category, …because matter is intrinsically extended. | |
From: report of William of Ockham (Summula philosophiae naturalis [1320]) by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 04.4 |
16681 | Matter gets its quantity from condensation and rarefaction, which is just local motion [William of Ockham] |
Full Idea: Matter is made to have a greater or lesser quantity not through its receiving any absolute accident, but through condensation and rarefaction alone. Parts come more or less close together, which can happen with local motion. | |
From: William of Ockham (Summula philosophiae naturalis [1320], I.13), quoted by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 15.1 | |
A reaction: This is Ockham at his most modern, rejecting the odd idea of Quantity in favour of a modern corpuscular view of the mere motions of matter. |
19387 | Hypotheses come from induction, which is comparison of experiences [Leibniz] |
Full Idea: We construct a hypothesis on the basis of an induction, that is on the basis of a comparison of experiences. | |
From: Gottfried Leibniz (Elements of Law and Justice [1669], p.2) | |
A reaction: This fits the traditional positivist picture of science (observe-hypothesise-predict-observe). I like the definition of induction as 'comparison of experiences', because it doesn't reduce it to sequences of objects, and points to coherence. |
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'). |