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15510
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Classes are a host of ethereal, platonic, pseudo entities [Goodman]
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Full Idea:
I will not willingly use apparatus that peoples the world with a host of ethereal, platonic, pseudo entities.
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From:
Nelson Goodman (The Structure of Appearance [1951], II.2), quoted by David Lewis - Parts of Classes 2.1
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A reaction:
This represents the big gap that opened up with Goodman's former comrade in arms, Quine. Lewis quotes it in order to ask whether he means ethereal or platonic, as they are very different. I sympathise with Goodman.
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9920
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Two objects can apparently make up quite distinct arrangements in sets [Goodman, by Burgess/Rosen]
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Full Idea:
Goodman argues that the set or class {{a}},{a,b}} is supposed to be distinct from the set or class {{b},{a,b}}, even though both are ultimately constituted from the same a and b.
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From:
report of Nelson Goodman (The Structure of Appearance [1951]) by JP Burgess / G Rosen - A Subject with No Object I.A.2.a
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A reaction:
I'm with Goodman all the way here, even though it is deeply unfashionable, particularly in the circles I move in. If there are trillion grains of sand on a beach, how many sets are we supposed to be committed to?
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10657
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The counties of Utah, and the state, and its acres, are in no way different [Goodman]
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Full Idea:
A class (counties of Utah) is different neither from the individual (state of Utah) that contains its members, nor from any other class (acres of Utah) whose members exhaust the whole. For nominalists, distinction of entity means distinction of content.
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From:
Nelson Goodman (The Structure of Appearance [1951], p.26), quoted by Achille Varzi - Mereology 3.1
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A reaction:
This is a nice credo for the nominalist version of mereology. You can still have a mereology that commits you to the wholes as well as the parts. Cf. Lewis in Idea 10660.
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7956
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If all and only red things were round things, we would need to specify the 'respect' of the resemblance [Goodman, by Macdonald,C]
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Full Idea:
According to Goodman's 'companionship difficulty', resemblance nominalism has a problem if, say, all and only the red things were the round things, because we cannot distinguish the two different respects in which the things resemble one another.
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From:
report of Nelson Goodman (The Structure of Appearance [1951]) by Cynthia Macdonald - Varieties of Things Ch.6
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A reaction:
Goodman opts for extreme linguististic nominalism in response to this (Idea 7952), whereas Russell opts for a sort of Platonism (4441). The current idea gives Russell a further problem, of needing a universal of the respect of the resemblance.
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7957
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Without respects of resemblance, we would collect blue book, blue pen, red pen, red clock together [Goodman, by Macdonald,C]
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Full Idea:
Goodman's 'imperfect community' problem for Resemblance Nominalism says that without mention of respects in which things resemble, we end up with a heterogeneous collection with nothing wholly in common (blue book, blue pen, red pen, red clock).
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From:
report of Nelson Goodman (The Structure of Appearance [1951]) by Cynthia Macdonald - Varieties of Things Ch.6
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A reaction:
This suggests Wittgenstein's 'family' resemblance as a way out (Idea 4141), but a blue book and a red clock seem totally unrelated. Nice objection! At this point we start to think that the tropes resemble, rather than the objects.
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16614
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Matter and form give true unity; subject and accident is just unity 'per accidens' [Duns Scotus]
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Full Idea:
From matter and form comes one thing per se. This is not so for subject and accident. Matter and form are instrinsic causes of a composite being, but whiteness and a human being are not. Humans can exist without whiteness, so it is one thing per accidens.
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From:
John Duns Scotus (Oxford Commentary on Sentences [1301], II.12.1.14), quoted by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671
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A reaction:
This isn't much of a theory, but at least it is focusing on an interesting question, and the distinction between genuinely unified, and unified by chance. Compare a loving couple with siblings who hate each other.
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9332
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Meaning is generated by a priori commitment to truth, not the other way around [Horwich]
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Full Idea:
Our a priori commitment to certain sentences is not really explained by our knowledge of a word's meaning. It is the other way around. We accept a priori that the sentences are true, and thereby provide it with meaning.
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From:
Paul Horwich (Stipulation, Meaning and Apriority [2000], §8)
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A reaction:
This sounds like a lovely trump card, but how on earth do you decide that a sentence is true if you don't know what it means? Personally I would take it that we are committed to the truth of a proposition, before we have a sentence for it.
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9341
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Meanings and concepts cannot give a priori knowledge, because they may be unacceptable [Horwich]
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Full Idea:
A priori knowledge of logic and mathematics cannot derive from meanings or concepts, because someone may possess such concepts, and yet disagree with us about them.
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From:
Paul Horwich (Stipulation, Meaning and Apriority [2000], §12)
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A reaction:
A good argument. The thing to focus on is not whether such ideas are a priori, but whether they are knowledge. I think we should employ the word 'intuition' for a priori candidates for knowledge, and demand further justification for actual knowledge.
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