44 ideas
| 3879 | Philosophy aims to provide a theory of everything [Scruton] |
| Full Idea: Philosophy studies everything: it tries to provide a theory of the whole of things. | |
| From: Roger Scruton (Modern Philosophy:introduction and survey [1994], 1.2) | |
| A reaction: Good, but you can't avoid value-judgements about which things are important; philosophers place more value on moral theories than on theories about glacier movement. There is a tension in philosophy between human and eternal concerns. |
| 3891 | If p entails q, then p is sufficient for q, and q is necessary for p [Scruton] |
| Full Idea: If p entails q, then p is sufficient for q, and q is necessary for p. | |
| From: Roger Scruton (Modern Philosophy:introduction and survey [1994], 15.7) |
| 17651 | Without words or other symbols, we have no world [Goodman] |
| Full Idea: We can have words without a world but no world without words or other symbols. | |
| From: Nelson Goodman (Ways of Worldmaking [1978], 1.3) | |
| A reaction: Goodman seems to have a particularly extreme version of the commitment to philosophy as linguistic. Non-human animals have no world, it seems. |
| 3894 | We may define 'good' correctly, but then ask whether the application of the definition is good [Scruton] |
| Full Idea: The 'open question' argument is clearly invalid. A question remains open just so long as our ignorance permits. …It may be an open question whether promoting happiness is good, even though this is what 'good' means. | |
| From: Roger Scruton (Modern Philosophy:introduction and survey [1994], 20.1) | |
| A reaction: A nice objection. Like small children, we can keep asking questions forever. Whether there is a question to be asked about a thing is not a property of that thing, but of us who ask it. |
| 3883 | A true proposition is consistent with every other true proposition [Scruton] |
| Full Idea: A true proposition is consistent with every other true proposition: no truth is contradicted by another. | |
| From: Roger Scruton (Modern Philosophy:introduction and survey [1994], 9.1) | |
| A reaction: Interesting. It resembles the rule that if you always tell the truth you don't need to remember what you said. Close to the heart of the concept of truth. Coherence and correspondence. |
| 17652 | Truth is irrelevant if no statements are involved [Goodman] |
| Full Idea: Truth pertains solely to what is said ...For nonverbal versions and even for verbal versions without statements, truth is irrelevant. | |
| From: Nelson Goodman (Ways of Worldmaking [1978], 1.5) | |
| A reaction: Goodman is a philosopher of language (like Dummett), but I am a philosopher of thought (like Evans). The test, for me, is whether truth is applicable to the thought of non-human animals. I take it to be obvious that it is applicable. |
| 3884 | The pragmatist does not really have a theory of truth [Scruton] |
| Full Idea: The pragmatist does not really have a theory of truth. | |
| From: Roger Scruton (Modern Philosophy:introduction and survey [1994], 9.4) |
| 3907 | Could you be intellectually acquainted with numbers, but unable to count objects? [Scruton] |
| Full Idea: Could someone have a perfect intellectual acquaintance with numbers, but be incapable of counting a flock of sheep? | |
| From: Roger Scruton (Modern Philosophy:introduction and survey [1994], 26.6) |
| 3908 | If maths contains unprovable truths, then maths cannot be reduced to a set of proofs [Scruton] |
| Full Idea: If there can be unprovable truths of mathematics, then mathematics cannot be reduced to the proofs whereby we construct it. | |
| From: Roger Scruton (Modern Philosophy:introduction and survey [1994], 26.7) |
| 17656 | Being primitive or prior always depends on a constructional system [Goodman] |
| Full Idea: Nothing is primitive or derivationally prior to anything apart from a constructional system. | |
| From: Nelson Goodman (Ways of Worldmaking [1978], 1.4c) | |
| A reaction: Something may be primitive not just because we can't be bothered to analyse it any further, but because even God couldn't analyse it. Maybe. |
| 17661 | We don't recognise patterns - we invent them [Goodman] |
| Full Idea: Recognising patterns is very much a matter of inventing or imposing them. | |
| From: Nelson Goodman (Ways of Worldmaking [1978], 1.7) | |
| A reaction: I take this to be false. |
| 17659 | Reality is largely a matter of habit [Goodman] |
| Full Idea: Reality in a world, like realism in a picture, is largely a matter of habit. | |
| From: Nelson Goodman (Ways of Worldmaking [1978], 1.6) | |
| A reaction: I'm a robust realist, me, but I sort of see what he means. We become steeped in unspoken conventions about how we take our world to be, and filter out anything that conflicts with it. |
| 17657 | We build our world, and ignore anything that won't fit [Goodman] |
| Full Idea: We dismiss as illusory or negligible what cannot be fitted into the architecture of the world we are building. | |
| From: Nelson Goodman (Ways of Worldmaking [1978], 1.4d) | |
| A reaction: I'm trying to think of an example of this, but can't. Maybe poor people are invisible to the rich? |
| 17654 | A world can be full of variety or not, depending on how we sort it [Goodman] |
| Full Idea: A world may be unmanageably heterogeneous or unbearably monotonous according to how events are sorted into kinds. | |
| From: Nelson Goodman (Ways of Worldmaking [1978], 1.4a) | |
| A reaction: We might expect this from the man who invented 'grue', which allows you to classify things that change colour with things that don't. Could you describe a bird as 'might have been a fish', and classify it with fish? ('Projectible'?) |
| 3906 | If possible worlds are needed to define properties, maybe we should abandon properties [Scruton] |
| Full Idea: If the only way of defining properties involves quantifying over possible worlds, this could be taken as another reason for abandoning properties altogether. | |
| From: Roger Scruton (Modern Philosophy:introduction and survey [1994], 26.4) |
| 17653 | Things can only be judged the 'same' by citing some respect of sameness [Goodman] |
| Full Idea: Identification rests upon organization into entities and kinds. The response to the question 'Same or not the same?' must always be 'Same what?'. ...Identity or constancy in a world is identity with respect to what is within that world as organised. | |
| From: Nelson Goodman (Ways of Worldmaking [1978], 1.4a) | |
| A reaction: And the gist of his book is that 'organised' is done by us, not by the world. He seems to be committed to the full Geachean relative identity, rather than the mere Wigginsian relative individuation. An unfashionable view! |
| 3888 | Hume assumes that necessity can only be de dicto, not de re [Scruton] |
| Full Idea: It was one of the assumptions of Hume's empiricism that all necessities are de dicto: i.e. they are artefacts of language. | |
| From: Roger Scruton (Modern Philosophy:introduction and survey [1994], 13.5) |
| 3903 | The conceivable can't be a test of the possible, if there are things which are possible but inconceivable [Scruton] |
| Full Idea: If there are things which are possible but inconceivable, we must abandon the view, which has had a considerable following since Descartes, that the conceivable is a test of the possible. | |
| From: Roger Scruton (Modern Philosophy:introduction and survey [1994], 25) |
| 3897 | Epistemology is about the justification of belief, not the definition of knowledge [Scruton] |
| Full Idea: In my view the concept of knowledge is of no very great interest in epistemology, which actually concerns the justification of belief. | |
| From: Roger Scruton (Modern Philosophy:introduction and survey [1994], 22) | |
| A reaction: I think this is an excellent thought. I see knowledge as slippery, and partially contextual, and I don't care whether someone precisely 'knows' something. I just want to know why they believe it. |
| 3881 | In the Cogito argument consciousness develops into self-consciousness [Scruton] |
| Full Idea: In the course of the argument the first person has acquired a character; he is not merely conscious, but self-conscious. | |
| From: Roger Scruton (Modern Philosophy:introduction and survey [1994], 4) |
| 3887 | Maybe our knowledge of truth and causation is synthetic a priori [Scruton] |
| Full Idea: 'Every event has a cause' and 'truth is correspondence to facts' are candidates for being synthetic a priori knowledge. | |
| From: Roger Scruton (Modern Philosophy:introduction and survey [1994], 13.2) |
| 3901 | Touch only seems to reveal primary qualities [Scruton] |
| Full Idea: Touch seems to deliver a purely primary-quality account of the world. | |
| From: Roger Scruton (Modern Philosophy:introduction and survey [1994], 24) | |
| A reaction: Interesting, though a little over-confident. It seems occasionally possible for touch to be an illusion. |
| 3885 | We only conceive of primary qualities as attached to secondary qualities [Scruton] |
| Full Idea: Bradley argued that we cannot conceive of primary qualities except as attached to secondary qualities. | |
| From: Roger Scruton (Modern Philosophy:introduction and survey [1994], 10.1) |
| 3910 | If primary and secondary qualities are distinct, what has the secondary qualities? [Scruton] |
| Full Idea: If primary and secondary qualities are distinct, what do secondary qualities inhere in? | |
| From: Roger Scruton (Modern Philosophy:introduction and survey [1994], Ch.10 n) | |
| A reaction: What is the problem? A pin causes me pain, but I know the pain isn't in the pin. It is the same with colour. It is a mental property, if you like, triggered by a wavelength of radiation. |
| 3899 | The representational theory says perceptual states are intentional states [Scruton] |
| Full Idea: The representational theory is the unsurprising view that perceptual states are intentional, like beliefs, emotions and desires. | |
| From: Roger Scruton (Modern Philosophy:introduction and survey [1994], 23.3) |
| 17660 | Discovery is often just finding a fit, like a jigsaw puzzle [Goodman] |
| Full Idea: Discovery often amounts, as when I place a piece in a jigsaw puzzle, not to arrival at a proposition for declaration or defense, but to finding a fit. | |
| From: Nelson Goodman (Ways of Worldmaking [1978], 1.7) | |
| A reaction: I find Goodman's views here pretty alien, but I like this bit. Coherence really rocks. |
| 3898 | My belief that it will rain tomorrow can't be caused by its raining tomorrow [Scruton] |
| Full Idea: It is impossible that my present belief that it will rain tomorrow is caused by its raining tomorrow. | |
| From: Roger Scruton (Modern Philosophy:introduction and survey [1994], 22.4) | |
| A reaction: This doesn't demolish a causal account of belief. It would be very surprising if I were to believe it was going to rain tomorrow for no cause whatsoever. That would be irrational. |
| 3880 | Logical positivism avoids scepticism, by closing the gap between evidence and conclusion [Scruton] |
| Full Idea: If the evidence for p is q, and that is the only evidence there is or can be, then 'p' means q. Hence there is no gap between evidence and conclusion, and the sceptical problem does not arise. | |
| From: Roger Scruton (Modern Philosophy:introduction and survey [1994], 3.2) |
| 3878 | Why should you believe someone who says there are no truths? [Scruton] |
| Full Idea: A writer who says that there are no truths, or that all truth is 'merely relative', is asking you not to believe him. So don't. | |
| From: Roger Scruton (Modern Philosophy:introduction and survey [1994], 1.1) |
| 17658 | Users of digital thermometers recognise no temperatures in the gaps [Goodman] |
| Full Idea: To use a digital thermometer with readings in tenths of a degree is to recognise no temperature as lying between 90 and 90.1 degrees. | |
| From: Nelson Goodman (Ways of Worldmaking [1978], 1.4d) | |
| A reaction: This appears to be nonsense, treating users of digital thermometers as if they were stupid. No one thinks temperatures go up and down in quantum leaps. We all know there is a gap between instrument and world. (Very American, I'm thinking!) |
| 17650 | We lack frames of reference to transform physics, biology and psychology into one another [Goodman] |
| Full Idea: We have no neat frames of reference, no ready rules for transforming physics, biology and psychology into one another. | |
| From: Nelson Goodman (Ways of Worldmaking [1978], 1.2) |
| 17655 | Grue and green won't be in the same world, as that would block induction entirely [Goodman] |
| Full Idea: Grue cannot be a relevant kind for induction in the same world as green, for that would preclude some of the decisions, right or wrong, that constitute inductive inference. | |
| From: Nelson Goodman (Ways of Worldmaking [1978], 1.4b) | |
| A reaction: This may make 'grue' less mad than I thought it was. I always assume we are slicing the world as 'green, blue and grue'. I still say 'green' is a basic predicate of experience, but 'grue' is amenable to analysis. |
| 16736 | Explanation is generally to deduce it from something better known, which comes in degrees [Boyle] |
| Full Idea: Generally speaking, to render a reason of an effect or phenomenon is to deduce it from something else in nature more known than itself, and consequently there may be diverse kinds of degrees of explication of the same thing. | |
| From: Robert Boyle (Certain Physical Essays [1672], II:21), quoted by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 23.4 | |
| A reaction: There is a picture of a real explanatory structure to nature, from which we pick bits that interest us for entirely pragmatic reasons. Boyle and I are as one on this matter. |
| 16737 | The best explanations get down to primary basics, but others go less deep [Boyle] |
| Full Idea: Explications be most satisfactory that show how the effect is produced by the more primitive affects of matter (bulk, shape and motion) but are not to be despised that deduce them from more familiar qualities such as heat, weight, fluidity, fermentation. | |
| From: Robert Boyle (Certain Physical Essays [1672], II:22), quoted by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 23.4 | |
| A reaction: [Compressed, and continued from Idea 16736] So there is a causal structure, and the best explanations go to the bottom of it, but lesser explanations only go half way down. So a very skimpy explanation ('dormative power') is still an explanation. |
| 3892 | Every event having a cause, and every event being determined by its cause, are not the same [Scruton] |
| Full Idea: To say that every event has a cause is one thing; to say that every event is determined by its cause is quite another thing. | |
| From: Roger Scruton (Modern Philosophy:introduction and survey [1994], 17.1) |
| 3911 | The very concept of a substance denies the possibility of mutual interaction and dependence [Scruton] |
| Full Idea: It is often held to be a consequence of the rationalist conception of substance, that separate substances cannot interact (since causal interaction is a form of mutual dependence). | |
| From: Roger Scruton (Modern Philosophy:introduction and survey [1994], Ch.16 n) | |
| A reaction: Yes, substances seem incapable of interaction, just as Leibniz argues that perfections could never interact. They are too pure. |
| 3882 | Wittgenstein makes it impossible to build foundations from something that is totally private [Scruton] |
| Full Idea: Wittgenstein's point is that if I search for foundations in what can only be known to me, then the belief that I have discovered those foundations will also fall victim to Descartes' demon. | |
| From: Roger Scruton (Modern Philosophy:introduction and survey [1994], 5.3) | |
| A reaction: Why should foundations based in wider society or a language community fare any better? Getting a lot of people to agree won't trouble the demon too much. Flat earthers. |
| 3896 | Any social theory of morality has the problem of the 'free rider', who only pretends to join in [Scruton] |
| Full Idea: Any attempt to provide a social justification of morality runs the risk of the 'free rider' - one who pretends to play the game in order to enjoy the fruits of it. | |
| From: Roger Scruton (Modern Philosophy:introduction and survey [1994], 20.6) |
| 3886 | Membership is the greatest source of obligation [Scruton] |
| Full Idea: Membership is the greatest source of obligation. | |
| From: Roger Scruton (Modern Philosophy:introduction and survey [1994], 11.2) | |
| A reaction: An interesting and rather Aristotelian idea. The alternative is individual debt or obligation. |
| 3895 | The categorical imperative is not just individual, but can be used for negotiations between strangers [Scruton] |
| Full Idea: The categorical imperative is also an instrument of negotiation and compromise between strangers, through which they can rise out of enmity and confront each other as equals. | |
| From: Roger Scruton (Modern Philosophy:introduction and survey [1994], 20.6) |
| 17649 | If the world is one it has many aspects, and if there are many worlds they will collect into one [Goodman] |
| Full Idea: If there is but one world, it embraces a multiplicity of contrasting aspects; if there are many worlds, the collection of them all is one. One world may be taken as many, or many worlds taken as one; whether one or many depends on the way of taking. | |
| From: Nelson Goodman (Ways of Worldmaking [1978], 1.2) | |
| A reaction: He cites 'The Pluralistic Universe' by William James for this idea. The idea is that the distinction 'evaporates under analysis'. Parmenides seems to have thought that no features could be distinguished in the true One. |
| 3890 | 'Cause' used to just mean any valid explanation [Scruton] |
| Full Idea: Traditionally (before Leibniz and Spinoza) the world 'cause' signified any valid explanation. | |
| From: Roger Scruton (Modern Philosophy:introduction and survey [1994], 14) |
| 3904 | Measuring space requires no movement while I do it [Scruton] |
| Full Idea: I can measure the length of something only if I know that it has not moved between the moment when I locate one end of it and the moment when I locate the other. | |
| From: Roger Scruton (Modern Philosophy:introduction and survey [1994], 25.3) | |
| A reaction: A nice example of how even simple propositions have many presuppositions. |
| 3905 | 'Existence' is not a predicate of 'man', but of the concept of man, saying it has at least one instance [Scruton] |
| Full Idea: When I say that a man exists, Frege argues, I do not predicate existence of a man, but rather of the concept man: I say the concept has at least one instance (and existence is a predicate of predicates). | |
| From: Roger Scruton (Modern Philosophy:introduction and survey [1994], 26.2) |