11 ideas
| 15312 | We get the idea of power by abstracting from ropes, magnets and electric shocks [Priestley] |
| Full Idea: A rope sustains weight, a magnet attracts iron, a charged electrical jar gives a shock, and from these and other similar observations, we get the idea of power, universally and abstractly considered. | |
| From: Joseph Priestley (Theological and other works [1790], p.191), quoted by Harré,R./Madden,E.H. - Causal Powers 9.II.B | |
| A reaction: I agree with this, in that we appear to be observing powers directly, and are not observing something which can then be reduced to non-powers. Nature just can't be a set of inert structures, with forces 'imposed' on them. |
| 15127 | A categorical basis could hardly explain a disposition if it had no powers of its own [Hawthorne] |
| Full Idea: The categorical basis would be a poor explanans for the disposition as explanandum, if the categorical basis did not drag any causal powers along with it. | |
| From: John Hawthorne (Causal Structuralism [2001], 2.4) | |
| A reaction: The idea that the world is explained just by some basic stuff having qualities and relations always strikes me as wrong, because the view of nature is too passive. |
| 15124 | If properties are more than their powers, we could have two properties with the same power [Hawthorne] |
| Full Idea: If a property is something over and above its causal profile, we seem to have conceptual space for an electron to have negative charge 1 and negative charge 2, that have exactly the same causal powers. | |
| From: John Hawthorne (Causal Structuralism [2001], 1.3) |
| 15123 | Is the causal profile of a property its essence? [Hawthorne] |
| Full Idea: We might say that the causal profile of a property is its essence. | |
| From: John Hawthorne (Causal Structuralism [2001], Intro) | |
| A reaction: I associate this view with Shoemaker, and find it sympathetic. We always want to know more. What gives rise to these causal powers? Where does explanation end? He notes that you might say some of the powers are non-essential. |
| 15122 | Could two different properties have the same causal profile? [Hawthorne] |
| Full Idea: If there is more to the nature of a property than the causal powers that it confers, then two different internal natures of properties might necessitate the same causal profile. | |
| From: John Hawthorne (Causal Structuralism [2001], Intro) | |
| A reaction: If the causal profiles were identical, it is hard to see how we could even propose, let alone test, their intrinsic difference. ...Unless, perhaps, we knew that the properties arose from different substrata. |
| 15128 | We can treat the structure/form of the world differently from the nodes/matter of the world [Hawthorne] |
| Full Idea: It does not seem altogether arbitrary to treat the structure of the world (the 'form' of the world) in a different way to the nodes in the structure (the 'matter' of the world). | |
| From: John Hawthorne (Causal Structuralism [2001], 2.5) | |
| A reaction: An interesting contemporary spin put on Aristotle's original view. Hawthorne is presenting the Aristotle account as a sort of 'structuralism' about nature. |
| 15121 | An individual essence is a necessary and sufficient profile for a thing [Hawthorne] |
| Full Idea: An individual essence is a profile that is necessary and sufficient for some particular thing. | |
| From: John Hawthorne (Causal Structuralism [2001], Intro) | |
| A reaction: By 'for' he presumably means for the thing to have an existence and a distinct identity. If it retained its identity, but didn't function any more, would that be loss of essence? |
| 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'). |
| 15126 | Maybe scientific causation is just generalisation about the patterns [Hawthorne] |
| Full Idea: Perhaps science doesn't need a robust conception of causation, and can get by with thinking of causal laws in a Humean way, as the simplest generalization over the mosaic. | |
| From: John Hawthorne (Causal Structuralism [2001], 1.5) | |
| A reaction: The Humean view he is referring to is held by David Lewis. That seems a council of defeat. We observe from a distance, but make no attempt to explain. |
| 15125 | We only know the mathematical laws, but not much else [Hawthorne] |
| Full Idea: We know the laws of the physical world, in so far as they are mathematical, pretty well, but we know nothing else about it. | |
| From: John Hawthorne (Causal Structuralism [2001], Ch.25) | |
| A reaction: Lovely remark [spotted by Hawthorne]. This sums up exactly what I take to be the most pressing issue in philosophy of science - that we develop a view of science that has space for the next step in explanation. |
| 15311 | Attraction or repulsion are not imparted to matter, but actually constitute it [Priestley] |
| Full Idea: Attraction or repulsion appear to me not to be properly what is imparted to matter, but what really makes it what it is, in so much that, without it, it would be nothing at all. | |
| From: Joseph Priestley (Theological and other works [1790], p.237), quoted by Harré,R./Madden,E.H. - Causal Powers 9.II.B | |
| A reaction: This is music to the ears of anyone who thinks that powers are the fundamentals of nature (like me). |