28 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. |
16185 | Causality indicates which properties are real [Cartwright,N] |
Full Idea: Causality is a clue to what properties are real. | |
From: Nancy Cartwright (How the Laws of Physics Lie [1983], 9.3) | |
A reaction: An interesting variant on the Shoemaker proposal that properties actually are causal. I'm not sure that there is anything more to causality that the expression in action of properties, which I take to be powers. Structures are not properties. |
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. |
16182 | Two main types of explanation are by causes, or by citing a theoretical framework [Cartwright,N] |
Full Idea: In explaining a phenomenon one can cite the causes of that phenomenon; or one can set the phenomenon in a general theoretical framework. | |
From: Nancy Cartwright (How the Laws of Physics Lie [1983], 4.1) | |
A reaction: The thing is, you need to root an explanation in something taken as basic, and theoretical frameworks need further explanation, whereas causes seem to be basic. |
16184 | An explanation is a model that fits a theory and predicts the phenomenological laws [Cartwright,N] |
Full Idea: To explain a phenomenon is to find a model that fits it into the basic framework of the theory and that thus allows us to derive analogues for the messy and complicated phenomenological laws that are true of it. | |
From: Nancy Cartwright (How the Laws of Physics Lie [1983], 8.3) | |
A reaction: This summarises the core of her view in this book. She is after models rather than laws, and the models are based on causes. |
16171 | The covering law view assumes that each phenomenon has a 'right' explanation [Cartwright,N] |
Full Idea: The covering-law account supposes that there is, in principle, one 'right' explanation for each phenomenon. | |
From: Nancy Cartwright (How the Laws of Physics Lie [1983], Intro) | |
A reaction: Presumably the law is held to be 'right', but there must be a bit of flexibility in describing the initial conditions, and the explanandum itself. |
16167 | Laws get the facts wrong, and explanation rests on improvements and qualifications of laws [Cartwright,N] |
Full Idea: We explain by ceteris paribus laws, by composition of causes, and by approximations that improve on what the fundamental laws dictate. In all of these cases the fundamental laws patently do not get the facts right. | |
From: Nancy Cartwright (How the Laws of Physics Lie [1983], Intro) | |
A reaction: It is rather headline-grabbing to say in this case that laws do not get the facts right. If they were actually 'wrong' and 'lied', there wouldn't be much point in building explanations on them. |
16169 | Laws apply to separate domains, but real explanations apply to intersecting domains [Cartwright,N] |
Full Idea: When different kinds of causes compose, we want to explain what happens in the intersection of different domains. But the laws we use are designed only to tell truly what happens in each domain separately. | |
From: Nancy Cartwright (How the Laws of Physics Lie [1983], Intro) | |
A reaction: Since presumably the laws are discovered through experiments which try to separate out a single domain, in those circumstances they actually are true, so they don't 'lie'. |
16176 | Covering-law explanation lets us explain storms by falling barometers [Cartwright,N] |
Full Idea: Much criticism of the original covering-law model objects that it lets in too much. It seems we can explain Henry's failure to get pregnant by his taking birth control pills, and we can explain the storm by the falling barometer. | |
From: Nancy Cartwright (How the Laws of Physics Lie [1983], 2.0) | |
A reaction: I take these examples to show that true explanations must be largely causal in character. The physicality of causation is what matters, not 'laws'. I'd say the same of attempts to account for causation through counterfactuals. |
16177 | I disagree with the covering-law view that there is a law to cover every single case [Cartwright,N] |
Full Idea: Covering-law theorists tend to think that nature is well-regulated; in the extreme, that there is a law to cover every case. I do not. | |
From: Nancy Cartwright (How the Laws of Physics Lie [1983], 2.2) | |
A reaction: The problem of coincidence is somewhere at the back of this thought. Innumerable events have their own explanations, but it is hard to explain their coincidence (see Aristotle's case of bumping into a friend in the market). |
16180 | You can't explain one quail's behaviour by just saying that all quails do it [Cartwright,N] |
Full Idea: 'Why does that quail in the garden bob its head up and down in that funny way whenever it walks?' …'Because they all do'. | |
From: Nancy Cartwright (How the Laws of Physics Lie [1983], 3.5) | |
A reaction: She cites this as an old complaint against the covering-law model of explanation. It captures beautifully the basic error of the approach. We want to know 'why', rather than just have a description of the pattern. 'They all do' is useful information. |
16183 | In science, best explanations have regularly turned out to be false [Cartwright,N] |
Full Idea: There are a huge number of cases in the history of science where we now know our best explanations were false. | |
From: Nancy Cartwright (How the Laws of Physics Lie [1983], 5.3) | |
A reaction: [She cites Laudan 1981 for this] The Ptolemaic system and aether are the standard example cited for this. I believe strongly in the importance of best explanation. Only a fool would just accept the best explanation available. Coherence is needed. |
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? |
16175 | A cause won't increase the effect frequency if other causes keep interfering [Cartwright,N] |
Full Idea: A cause ought to increase the frequency of the effect, but this fact may not show up in the probabilities if other causes are at work. | |
From: Nancy Cartwright (How the Laws of Physics Lie [1983], 1.1) | |
A reaction: [She cites Patrick Suppes for this one] Presumably in experimental situations you can weed out the interference, but that threatens to eliminate mere 'probability' entirely. |
6781 | There are fundamental explanatory laws (false!), and phenomenological laws (regularities) [Cartwright,N, by Bird] |
Full Idea: Nancy Cartwright distinguishes between 'fundamental explanatory laws', which we should not believe, and 'phenomenological laws', which are regularities established on the basis of observation. | |
From: report of Nancy Cartwright (How the Laws of Physics Lie [1983]) by Alexander Bird - Philosophy of Science Ch.4 | |
A reaction: The distinction is helpful, so that we can be clearer about what everyone is claiming. We can probably all agree on the phenomenological laws, which are epistemological. Personally I claim truth for the best fundamental explanatory laws. |
16166 | Laws of appearances are 'phenomenological'; laws of reality are 'theoretical' [Cartwright,N] |
Full Idea: Philosophers distinguish phenomenological from theoretical laws. Phenomenological laws are about appearances; theoretical ones are about the reality behind the appearances. | |
From: Nancy Cartwright (How the Laws of Physics Lie [1983], Intro) | |
A reaction: I'm suspecting that Humeans only really believe in the phenomenological kind. I'm only interested in the theoretical kind, and I take inference to the best explanation to be the bridge between the two. Cartwright rejects the theoretical laws. |
16179 | Good organisation may not be true, and the truth may not organise very much [Cartwright,N] |
Full Idea: There is no reason to think that the principles that best organise will be true, nor that the principles that are true will organise much. | |
From: Nancy Cartwright (How the Laws of Physics Lie [1983], 2.5) | |
A reaction: This is aimed at the Mill-Ramsey-Lewis account of laws, as axiomatisations of the observed patterns in nature. |
16178 | There are few laws for when one theory meets another [Cartwright,N] |
Full Idea: Where theories intersect, laws are usually hard to come by. | |
From: Nancy Cartwright (How the Laws of Physics Lie [1983], 2.3) | |
A reaction: There are attempts at so-called 'bridge laws', to get from complex theories to simple ones, but her point is well made about theories on the same 'level'. |
16170 | To get from facts to equations, we need a prepared descriptions suited to mathematics [Cartwright,N] |
Full Idea: To get from a detailed factual knowledge of a situation to an equation, we must prepare the description of the situation to meet the mathematical needs of the theory. | |
From: Nancy Cartwright (How the Laws of Physics Lie [1983], Intro) | |
A reaction: She is clearly on to something here, as Galileo is blatantly wrong in his claim that the book of nature is written in mathematics. Mathematics is the best we can manage in getting a grip on the chaos. |
16181 | Simple laws have quite different outcomes when they act in combinations [Cartwright,N] |
Full Idea: For explanation simple laws must have the same form when they act together as when they act singly. ..But then what the law states cannot literally be true, for the consequences that occur if it acts alone are not what occurs when they act in combination. | |
From: Nancy Cartwright (How the Laws of Physics Lie [1983], 3.6) | |
A reaction: This is Cartwright's basic thesis. Her point is that the laws 'lie', because they claim to predict a particular outcome which never ever actually occurs. She says we could know all the laws, and still not be able to explain anything. |
22974 | Presentists lack the materials for a realist view of change [Price,H] |
Full Idea: The presentist view seems to have lost the materials for a realist view of passage, change or temporal transition. | |
From: Huw Price (The Flow of Time [2011], 2) | |
A reaction: It is a nice point. How can a presentist talk of change if the only component that exists is the present time slice? Price says change can only be a kind of fiction for the presentist. Change in existence and in properties are distinct concepts. |
22973 | The present moment, time's direction, and time's dynamic quality seem to be objective facts [Price,H] |
Full Idea: The flow of time seems to be an objective feature of reality because of 1) the present moment can be objectively distinguished, 2) time has an objective direction, of earlier and later, and 3) there is something objectively dynamic about time. | |
From: Huw Price (The Flow of Time [2011], 1.1) | |
A reaction: Price sets out to undermine all three of these claims, in implicit defence of a psychological view. I disagree with him. |
22975 | We must explain either the existence of a time direction, or our psychological sense of it [Price,H] |
Full Idea: If the world comes equipped with a time orientation, where does it come from? If it doesn't, what explains our psychological feeling of a direction for time? | |
From: Huw Price (The Flow of Time [2011], 3.5) | |
A reaction: The chances of 'explaining' either one look slim to me. That is, the fact would explain our experience, but the experience without the fact looks ridiculous, and I cannot conceive of any time-free entity which could explain the fact. |