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All the ideas for 'Syntagma', 'reports' and 'Letters'

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9 ideas

8. Modes of Existence / B. Properties / 8. Properties as Modes
16730 If matter is entirely atoms, anything else we notice in it can only be modes [Gassendi]
     Full Idea: Since these atoms are the whole of the corporeal matter or substance that exists in bodies, if we conceive or notice anything else to exist in these bodies, that is not a substance but only some kind of mode of the substance.
     From: Pierre Gassendi (Syntagma [1658], II.1.6.1), quoted by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 22.4
     A reaction: If the atoms have a few qualities of their own, are they just modes? If they are genuine powers, then there can be emergent powers, which are rather more than mere 'modes'.
14. Science / D. Explanation / 2. Types of Explanation / j. Explanations by reduction
16619 We observe qualities, and use 'induction' to refer to the substances lying under them [Gassendi]
     Full Idea: Nothing beyond qualities is perceived by the senses. …When we refer to the substance in which the qualities inhere, we do this through induction, by which we reason that some subject lies under the quality.
     From: Pierre Gassendi (Syntagma [1658], II.1.6.1), quoted by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 07.1
     A reaction: He talks of 'induction' (in an older usage), but he seems to mean abduction, since he never makes any observations of the substances being proposed.
22. Metaethics / B. Value / 1. Nature of Value / b. Fact and value
4581 Virtues and vices are like secondary qualities in perception, found in observers, not objects [Hume]
     Full Idea: Vice and virtue may be compared to sounds, colours, heat and cold, which, according to modern philosophy, are not qualities in objects but perceptions in the mind.
     From: David Hume (Letters [1739], to Hutcheson 1740)
     A reaction: Very revealing about the origin of the is/ought idea, but this is an assertion rather than an argument. Most Greeks treat value as a primary quality of things (e.g. life, harmony, beauty, health).
23. Ethics / B. Contract Ethics / 2. Golden Rule
7350 The Torah just says: do not do to your neighbour what is hateful to you [Hillel the Elder]
     Full Idea: What is hateful to you, do not unto your neighbour: this is the entire Torah. All the rest is commentary - go and study it.
     From: Hillel the Elder (reports [c.10]), quoted by Paul Johnson - The History of the Jews Pt II
     A reaction: Johnson suggests that this idea, of stripping everything from the Torah except its basic morality, was passed on to Jesus by Hillel. Suppose you hate Arsenal, but your neighbour supports them, and they just won the European Cup? What should you do?
23. Ethics / C. Virtue Theory / 2. Elements of Virtue Theory / c. Motivation for virtue
4580 All virtues benefit either the public, or the individual who possesses them [Hume]
     Full Idea: I desire you to consider if there be any quality that is virtuous, without having a tendency either to the public good or to the good of the person who possesses it.
     From: David Hume (Letters [1739], to Hutcheson 1739)
     A reaction: Obviously this is generally true. How, though, does it benefit the individual to secretly preserve their integrity? I go round to visit a friend to repay a debt; I am told they have died; I quietly leave some money on the table and leave. Why?
26. Natural Theory / A. Speculations on Nature / 6. Early Matter Theories / g. Atomism
16593 Atoms are not points, but hard indivisible things, which no force in nature can divide [Gassendi]
     Full Idea: The vulgar think atoms lack parts and are free of all magnitude, and hence nothing other than a mathematical point, but it is something solid and hard and compact, as to leave no room for division, separation and cutting. No force in nature can divide it.
     From: Pierre Gassendi (Syntagma [1658], II.1.3.5), quoted by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 03.2
     A reaction: If you gloatingly think the atom has now been split, ask whether electrons and quarks now fit his description. Pasnau notes that though atoms are indivisible, they are not incorruptible, and could go out of existence, or be squashed.
16729 How do mere atoms produce qualities like colour, flavour and odour? [Gassendi]
     Full Idea: If the only material principles of things are atoms, having only size, shape, and weight, or motion, then why are so many additional qualities created and existing within the things: color, heat, flavor, odor, and innumerable others?
     From: Pierre Gassendi (Syntagma [1658], II.1.5.7), quoted by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 22.4
     A reaction: This is pretty much the 'hard question' about the mind-body relation. Bacon said that heat was just motion of matter. I would say that this problem is gradually being solved in my lifetime.
26. Natural Theory / C. Causation / 3. Final causes
4579 The idea of a final cause is very uncertain and unphilosophical [Hume]
     Full Idea: Your sense of 'natural' is founded on final causes, which is a consideration that appears to me pretty uncertain and unphilosophical.
     From: David Hume (Letters [1739], to Hutcheson 1739)
     A reaction: This is the rejection of Aristotelian teleology by modern science. I agree that the notion of utterly ultimate final cause is worse than 'uncertain' - it is an impossible concept. Nevertheless, I prefer Aristotle to Hume. Nature can teach us lessons.
26. Natural Theory / C. Causation / 9. General Causation / d. Causal necessity
20705 That events could be uncaused is absurd; I only say intuition and demonstration don't show this [Hume]
     Full Idea: I never asserted so absurd a proposition as that anything might arise without a cause: I only maintained that our certainty of the falsehood of that proposition proceeded neither from intuition nor from demonstration, but from another source.
     From: David Hume (Letters [1739], 1754), quoted by Brian Davies - Introduction to the Philosophy of Religion 5 'God'
     A reaction: Since the other source is habit, he is being a bit disingenuous. While rational intuition and demonstration give a fairly secure basis for the universality of causation, mere human habits of expectation give very feeble grounds.