Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'poems', 'On the Frame of Reference' and 'On Mental Entities'

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4 ideas

5. Theory of Logic / G. Quantification / 4. Substitutional Quantification
10009 Substitutional quantification is just a variant of Tarski's account [Wallace, by Baldwin]
     Full Idea: In a famous paper, Wallace argued that all interpretations of quantifiers (including the substitutional interpretation) are, in the end, variants of that proposed by Tarski (in 1936).
     From: report of Wallace, J (On the Frame of Reference [1970]) by Thomas Baldwin - Interpretations of Quantifiers
     A reaction: A significant-looking pointer. We must look elsewhere for Tarski's account, which will presumably subsume the objectual interpretation as well. The ontology of Tarski's account of truth is an enduring controversy.
12. Knowledge Sources / B. Perception / 4. Sense Data / d. Sense-data problems
21686 Sense-data are dubious abstractions, with none of the plausibility of tables [Quine]
     Full Idea: The notion of pure sense datum is a pretty tenuous abstraction, a good deal more conjectural than the notion of an external object, a table or a sheep.
     From: Willard Quine (On Mental Entities [1952], p.225)
     A reaction: This seems to sum up the view of sense-data held by the generation after Russell and Moore. Ayer still talks about them, but Russell had already given them up. The simple challenge is - what is the evidence for their existence? Cf innate ideas.
12. Knowledge Sources / D. Empiricism / 4. Pro-Empiricism
21685 Empiricism says evidence rests on the senses, but that insight is derived from science [Quine]
     Full Idea: The crucial insight of empiricism is that any evidence for science has its end points in the senses. This insight remains valid, but it is an insight which comes after physics, physiology, and psychology, not before.
     From: Willard Quine (On Mental Entities [1952], p.225)
     A reaction: Interesting. I think Hume and co. were probably outlining essential presuppositions and contraints which must be accepted by science. Quine offers empiricism as more like a description of science (with success as its authority?).
22. Metaethics / A. Ethics Foundations / 2. Source of Ethics / j. Ethics by convention
6017 Nomos is king [Pindar]
     Full Idea: Nomos is king.
     From: Pindar (poems [c.478 BCE], S 169), quoted by Thomas Nagel - The Philosophical Culture
     A reaction: This seems to be the earliest recorded shot in the nomos-physis wars (the debate among sophists about moral relativism). It sounds as if it carries the full relativist burden - that all that matters is what has been locally decreed.