Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'General Facts,Phys Necessity, and Metaph of Time', 'Disquisitions' and 'Protrepticus (frags)'

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3 ideas

1. Philosophy / D. Nature of Philosophy / 5. Aims of Philosophy / d. Philosophy as puzzles
Inquiry is the cause of philosophy [Aristotle]
     Full Idea: Inquiry is the cause of philosophy.
     From: Aristotle (Protrepticus (frags) [c.334 BCE]), quoted by Alexander Nehamas - Eristic,Antilogic,Sophistic,Dialectic p.120
     A reaction: The earlier part of the quote says philosophical thinking is inescapable (even if philosophy is impossible). I suppose we would call it 'curiosity'.
3. Truth / B. Truthmakers / 3. Truthmaker Maximalism
The truth-maker principle is that every truth has a sufficient truth-maker [Forrest]
     Full Idea: Item x is said to be a sufficient truth-maker for truth-bearer p just in case necessarily if x exists then p is true. ...Every truth has a sufficient truth-maker. Hence, I take it, the sum of all sufficient truth-makers is a universal truth-maker.
     From: Peter Forrest (General Facts,Phys Necessity, and Metaph of Time [2006], 1)
     A reaction: Note that it is not 'necessary', because something else might make p true instead.
8. Modes of Existence / B. Properties / 8. Properties as Modes
Modes of things exist in some way, without being full-blown substances [Gassendi]
     Full Idea: Modes are not nothing but something more than mere nothing; they are therefore 'res' of some kind, not substantial of course, but at least modal.
     From: Pierre Gassendi (Disquisitions [1644], II.3.4), quoted by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 260
     A reaction: This is the great modern atomist talking pure scholastic metaphysics. He's been reading Suárez. Gassendi seems to accept more than one type of existence.