69 ideas
| 5988 | Anaximander produced the first philosophy book (and maybe the first book) [Anaximander, by Bodnár] |
| Full Idea: Anaximander was the first to produce a philosophical book (later conventionally titled 'On Nature'), if not the first to produce a book at all. | |
| From: report of Anaximander (fragments/reports [c.570 BCE]) by István Bodnár - Anaximander | |
| A reaction: Wow! Presumably there were Egyptian 'books', but this still sounds like a stupendous claim to fame. |
| 21360 | Unobservant thinkers tend to dogmatise using insufficient facts [Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: Those whom devotion to abstract discussions has rendered unobservant of the facts are too ready to dogmatise on the basis of a few observations. | |
| From: Aristotle (Coming-to-be and Passing-away (Gen/Corr) [c.335 BCE], 316a09) | |
| A reaction: I totally approve of the idea that a good philosopher should be 'observant'. Prestige in modern analytic philosophy comes from logical ability. There should be some rival criterion for attentiveness to facts, with equal prestige. |
| 224 | When questions are doubtful we should concentrate not on objects but on ideas of the intellect [Plato] |
| Full Idea: Doubtful questions should not be discussed in terms of visible objects or in relation to them, but only with reference to ideas conceived by the intellect. | |
| From: Plato (Parmenides [c.364 BCE], 135e) |
| 1496 | The earth is stationary, because it is in the centre, and has no more reason to move one way than another [Anaximander, by Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: Something which is established in the centre and has equality in relation to the extremes has no more reason to move up than it has down or to the sides (so the earth is stationary) | |
| From: report of Anaximander (fragments/reports [c.570 BCE], A26) by Aristotle - On the Heavens 295b11 |
| 232 | Opposites are as unlike as possible [Plato] |
| Full Idea: Opposites are as unlike as possible. | |
| From: Plato (Parmenides [c.364 BCE], 159a) |
| 8937 | Plato's 'Parmenides' is the greatest artistic achievement of the ancient dialectic [Hegel on Plato] |
| Full Idea: Plato's 'Parmenides' is the greatest artistic achievement of the ancient dialectic. | |
| From: comment on Plato (Parmenides [c.364 BCE]) by Georg W.F.Hegel - Phenomenology of Spirit Pref 71 | |
| A reaction: It is a long way from the analytic tradition of philosophy to be singling out a classic text for its 'artistic' achievement. Eventually we may even look back on, say, Kripke's 'Naming and Necessity' and see it in that light. |
| 13986 | Plato found antinomies in ideas, Kant in space and time, and Bradley in relations [Plato, by Ryle] |
| Full Idea: Plato (in 'Parmenides') shows that the theory that 'Eide' are substances, and Kant that space and time are substances, and Bradley that relations are substances, all lead to aninomies. | |
| From: report of Plato (Parmenides [c.364 BCE]) by Gilbert Ryle - Are there propositions? 'Objections' |
| 14150 | Plato's 'Parmenides' is perhaps the best collection of antinomies ever made [Russell on Plato] |
| Full Idea: Plato's 'Parmenides' is perhaps the best collection of antinomies ever made. | |
| From: comment on Plato (Parmenides [c.364 BCE]) by Bertrand Russell - The Principles of Mathematics §337 |
| 13212 | Infinity is only potential, never actual [Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: Nothing is actually infinite. A thing is infinite only potentially. | |
| From: Aristotle (Coming-to-be and Passing-away (Gen/Corr) [c.335 BCE], 318a21) | |
| A reaction: Aristotle is the famous spokesman for this view, though it reappeared somewhat in early twentieth century discussions (e.g. Hilbert). I sympathise with this unfashionable view. Multiple infinites are good fun, but no one knows what they really are. |
| 16150 | One is, so numbers exist, so endless numbers exist, and each one must partake of being [Plato] |
| Full Idea: If one is, there must also necessarily be number - Necessarily - But if there is number, there would be many, and an unlimited multitude of beings. ..So if all partakes of being, each part of number would also partake of it. | |
| From: Plato (Parmenides [c.364 BCE], 144a) | |
| A reaction: This seems to commit to numbers having being, then to too many numbers, and hence to too much being - but without backing down and wondering whether numbers had being after all. Aristotle disagreed. |
| 14874 | Anaximander saw the contradiction in the world - that its own qualities destroy it [Anaximander, by Nietzsche] |
| Full Idea: Anaximander discovers the contradictory character of our world: it perishes from its own qualities. | |
| From: report of Anaximander (fragments/reports [c.570 BCE]) by Friedrich Nietzsche - Unpublished Notebooks 1872-74 19 [239] | |
| A reaction: A lovely gloss on Anaximander, though I am not sure that I understand what Nietzsche means. |
| 13221 | Existence is either potential or actual [Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: Some things are-potentially while others are-actually. | |
| From: Aristotle (Coming-to-be and Passing-away (Gen/Corr) [c.335 BCE], 327b24) | |
| A reaction: I've read a lot of Aristotle, but am still not quite clear what this distinction means. I like the distinction between a thing's actual being and its 'modal profile', but the latter may extend well beyond what Aristotle means by potential being. |
| 229 | The one was and is and will be and was becoming and is becoming and will become [Plato] |
| Full Idea: The one was and is and will be and was becoming and is becoming and will become. | |
| From: Plato (Parmenides [c.364 BCE], 155d) |
| 21821 | Plato's Parmenides has a three-part theory, of Primal One, a One-Many, and a One-and-Many [Plato, by Plotinus] |
| Full Idea: The Platonic Parmenides is more exact [than Parmenides himself]; the distinction is made between the Primal One, a strictly pure Unity, and a secondary One which is a One-Many, and a third which is a One-and-Many. | |
| From: report of Plato (Parmenides [c.364 BCE]) by Plotinus - The Enneads 5.1.08 | |
| A reaction: Plotinus approves of this three-part theory. Parmenides has the problem that the highest Being contains no movement. By placing the One outside Being you can give it powers which an existent thing cannot have. Cf the concept of God. |
| 16100 | True change is in a thing's logos or its matter, not in its qualities [Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: In that which underlies a change there is a factor corresponding to the definition [logon] and there is a material factor. When a change is in these constitutive factors there is coming to be or passing away, but in a thing's qualities it is alteration. | |
| From: Aristotle (Coming-to-be and Passing-away (Gen/Corr) [c.335 BCE], 317a24) | |
| A reaction: This seems to be a key summary of Aristotle's account of change, in the context of his hylomorphism (form-plus-matter). The logos is the account of the thing, which seems to be the definition, which seems to give the form (principle or structure). |
| 16101 | A change in qualities is mere alteration, not true change [Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: When a change occurs in the qualities [pathesi] and is accidental [sumbebekos], there is alteration (rather than true change). | |
| From: Aristotle (Coming-to-be and Passing-away (Gen/Corr) [c.335 BCE], 317a27) | |
| A reaction: [tr. partly Gill] Aristotle doesn't seem to have a notion of 'properties' in quite our sense. 'Pathe' seems to mean experienced qualities, rather than genuine causal powers. Gill says 'pathe' are always accidental. |
| 12133 | If the substratum persists, it is 'alteration'; if it doesn't, it is 'coming-to-be' or 'passing-away' [Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: Since we must distinguish the substratum and the property whose nature is to be predicated of the substratum,..there is alteration when the substratum persists...but when nothing perceptible persists as a substratum, this is coming-to-be and passing-away. | |
| From: Aristotle (Coming-to-be and Passing-away (Gen/Corr) [c.335 BCE], 319b08-16) | |
| A reaction: As usual, Aristotle clarifies the basis of the problem, by distinguishing two different types of change. Notice the empirical character of his approach, resting on whether or not the substratum is 'perceptible'. |
| 13213 | All comings-to-be are passings-away, and vice versa [Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: Every coming-to-be is a passing away of something else and every passing-away some other thing's coming-to-be. | |
| From: Aristotle (Coming-to-be and Passing-away (Gen/Corr) [c.335 BCE], 319a07) | |
| A reaction: This seems to be the closest that Aristotle gets to sympathy with the Heraclitus view that all is flux. When a sparrow dies and disappears, I am not at all clear what comes to be, except some ex-sparrow material. |
| 221 | Absolute ideas, such as the Good and the Beautiful, cannot be known by us [Plato] |
| Full Idea: The absolute good and the beautiful and all which we conceive to be absolute ideas are unknown to us. | |
| From: Plato (Parmenides [c.364 BCE], 134c) |
| 227 | You must always mean the same thing when you utter the same name [Plato] |
| Full Idea: You must always mean the same thing when you utter the same name. | |
| From: Plato (Parmenides [c.364 BCE], 147d) |
| 223 | If you deny that each thing always stays the same, you destroy the possibility of discussion [Plato] |
| Full Idea: If a person denies that the idea of each thing is always the same, he will utterly destroy the power of carrying on discussion. | |
| From: Plato (Parmenides [c.364 BCE], 135c) |
| 210 | It would be absurd to think there were abstract Forms for vile things like hair, mud and dirt [Plato] |
| Full Idea: Are there abstract ideas for such things as hair, mud and dirt, which are particularly vile and worthless? That would be quite absurd. | |
| From: Plato (Parmenides [c.364 BCE], 130d) |
| 220 | The concept of a master includes the concept of a slave [Plato] |
| Full Idea: Mastership in the abstract is mastership of slavery in the abstract. | |
| From: Plato (Parmenides [c.364 BCE], 133e) |
| 211 | If admirable things have Forms, maybe everything else does as well [Plato] |
| Full Idea: It is troubling that if admirable things have abstract ideas, then perhaps everything else must have ideas as well. | |
| From: Plato (Parmenides [c.364 BCE], 130d) |
| 219 | If absolute ideas existed in us, they would cease to be absolute [Plato] |
| Full Idea: None of the absolute ideas exists in us, because then it would no longer be absolute. | |
| From: Plato (Parmenides [c.364 BCE], 133c) |
| 228 | Greatness and smallness must exist, to be opposed to one another, and come into being in things [Plato] |
| Full Idea: These two ideas, greatness and smallness, exist, do they not? For if they did not exist, they could not be opposites of one another, and could not come into being in things. | |
| From: Plato (Parmenides [c.364 BCE], 149e) |
| 16151 | Plato moves from Forms to a theory of genera and principles in his later work [Plato, by Frede,M] |
| Full Idea: It seems to me that Plato in the later dialogues, beginning with the second half of 'Parmenides', wants to substitute a theory of genera and theory of principles that constitute these genera for the earlier theory of forms. | |
| From: report of Plato (Parmenides [c.364 BCE]) by Michael Frede - Title, Unity, Authenticity of the 'Categories' V | |
| A reaction: My theory is that the later Plato came under the influence of the brilliant young Aristotle, and this idea is a symptom of it. The theory of 'principles' sounds like hylomorphism to me. |
| 212 | The whole idea of each Form must be found in each thing which participates in it [Plato] |
| Full Idea: The whole idea of each form (of beauty, justice etc) must be found in each thing which participates in it. | |
| From: Plato (Parmenides [c.364 BCE], 131a) |
| 213 | Each idea is in all its participants at once, just as daytime is a unity but in many separate places at once [Plato] |
| Full Idea: Just as day is in many places at once, but not separated from itself, so each idea might be in all its participants at once. | |
| From: Plato (Parmenides [c.364 BCE], 131b) |
| 216 | If things are made alike by participating in something, that thing will be the absolute idea [Plato] |
| Full Idea: That by participation in which like things are made like, will be the absolute idea, will it not? | |
| From: Plato (Parmenides [c.364 BCE], 132e) |
| 218 | Participation is not by means of similarity, so we are looking for some other method of participation [Plato] |
| Full Idea: Participation is not by means of likeness, so we must seek some other method of participation. | |
| From: Plato (Parmenides [c.364 BCE], 133a) |
| 215 | If things partake of ideas, this implies either that everything thinks, or that everything actually is thought [Plato] |
| Full Idea: If all things partake of ideas, must either everything be made of thoughts and everything thinks, or everything is thought, and so can't think? | |
| From: Plato (Parmenides [c.364 BCE], 132c) |
| 217 | Nothing can be like an absolute idea, because a third idea intervenes to make them alike (leading to a regress) [Plato] |
| Full Idea: It is impossible for anything to be like an absolute idea, because a third idea will appear to make them alike, and if that is like anything, it will lead to another idea, and so on. | |
| From: Plato (Parmenides [c.364 BCE], 133a) |
| 214 | If absolute greatness and great things are seen as the same, another thing appears which makes them seem great [Plato] |
| Full Idea: If you regard the absolute great and the many great things in the same way, will not another appear beyond, by which all these must appear to be great? | |
| From: Plato (Parmenides [c.364 BCE], 132a) |
| 15851 | Parts must belong to a created thing with a distinct form [Plato] |
| Full Idea: The part would not be the part of many things or all, but of some one character ['ideas'] and of some one thing, which we call a 'whole', since it has come to be one complete [perfected] thing composed [created] of all. | |
| From: Plato (Parmenides [c.364 BCE], 157d) | |
| A reaction: A serious shot by Plato at what identity is. Harte quotes it (125) and shows that 'character' is Gk 'idea', and 'composed' will translate as 'created'. 'Form' links this Platonic passage to Aristotle's hylomorphism. |
| 12134 | Matter is the substratum, which supports both coming-to-be and alteration [Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: Matter, in the proper sense of the term, is to be identified with the substratum which is receptive of coming-to-be and passing-away; but the substratum of the remaining kinds of change is also matter, because these substrata receive contraries. | |
| From: Aristotle (Coming-to-be and Passing-away (Gen/Corr) [c.335 BCE], 320a03) | |
| A reaction: This must be compared with his complex discussion of the role of matter in his Metaphysics, where he has introduced 'form' as the essence of things. I don't think the two texts are inconsistent, but it's tricky... See Idea 12133 on types of change. |
| 15846 | In Parmenides, if composition is identity, a whole is nothing more than its parts [Plato, by Harte,V] |
| Full Idea: At the heart of the 'Parmenides' puzzles about composition is the thesis that composition is identity. Considered thus, a whole adds nothing to an ontology that already includes its parts | |
| From: report of Plato (Parmenides [c.364 BCE]) by Verity Harte - Plato on Parts and Wholes 2.5 | |
| A reaction: There has to be more to a unified identity that mere proximity of the parts. When do parts come together, and when do they actually 'compose' something? |
| 15849 | Plato says only a one has parts, and a many does not [Plato, by Harte,V] |
| Full Idea: In 'Parmenides' it is argued that a part cannot be part of a many, but must be part of something one. | |
| From: report of Plato (Parmenides [c.364 BCE], 157c) by Verity Harte - Plato on Parts and Wholes 3.2 | |
| A reaction: This looks like the right way to go with the term 'part'. We presuppose a unity before we even talk of its parts, so we can't get into contradictions and paradoxes about their relationships. |
| 15850 | Anything which has parts must be one thing, and parts are of a one, not of a many [Plato] |
| Full Idea: The whole of which the parts are parts must be one thing composed of many; for each of the parts must be part, not of a many, but of a whole. | |
| From: Plato (Parmenides [c.364 BCE], 157c) | |
| A reaction: This is a key move of metaphysics, and we should hang on to it. The other way madness lies. |
| 13259 | It seems that the One must be composed of parts, which contradicts its being one [Plato] |
| Full Idea: The One must be composed of parts, both being a whole and having parts. So on both grounds the One would thus be many and not one. But it must be not many, but one. So if the One will be one, it will neither be a whole, nor have parts. | |
| From: Plato (Parmenides [c.364 BCE], 137c09), quoted by Kathrin Koslicki - The Structure of Objects 5.2 | |
| A reaction: This is the starting point for Plato's metaphysical discussion of objects. It seems to begin a line of thought which is completed by Aristotle, surmising that only an essential structure can bestow identity on a bunch of parts. |
| 16572 | Does the pure 'this' come to be, or the 'this-such', or 'so-great', or 'somewhere'? [Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: The question might be raised whether substance (i.e. the 'this') comes-to-be at all. Is it not rather the 'such', the 'so-great', or the 'somewhere', which comes-to-be? | |
| From: Aristotle (Coming-to-be and Passing-away (Gen/Corr) [c.335 BCE], 317b21) | |
| A reaction: This is interesting because it pulls the 'tode ti', the 'this-such', apart, showing that he does have a concept of a pure 'this', which seems to constitute the basis of being ('ousia'). We can say 'this thing', or 'one of these things'. |
| 16573 | Philosophers have worried about coming-to-be from nothing pre-existing [Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: In addition, coming-to-be may proceed out of nothing pre-existing - a thesis which, more than any other, preoccupied and alarmed the earliest philosophers. | |
| From: Aristotle (Coming-to-be and Passing-away (Gen/Corr) [c.335 BCE], 317b29) | |
| A reaction: This is the origin of the worry about 'ex nihilo' coming-to-be. Christians tended to say that only God could create in this way. |
| 13214 | The substratum changing to a contrary is the material cause of coming-to-be [Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: The substratum [hupokeimenon?] is the material cause of the continuous occurrence of coming-to-be, because it is such as to change from contrary to contrary. | |
| From: Aristotle (Coming-to-be and Passing-away (Gen/Corr) [c.335 BCE], 319a19) | |
| A reaction: Presumably Aristotle will also be seeking the 'formal' cause as well as the 'material' cause (not to mention the 'efficient' and 'final' causes). |
| 13215 | If a perceptible substratum persists, it is 'alteration'; coming-to-be is a complete change [Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: There is 'alteration' when the substratum is perceptible and persists, but changes in its own properties. ...But when nothing perceptible persists in its identity as a substratum, and the thing changes as a whole, it is coming-to-be of a substance. | |
| From: Aristotle (Coming-to-be and Passing-away (Gen/Corr) [c.335 BCE], 319b11-17) | |
| A reaction: [compressed] Note that a substratum can be perceptible - it isn't just some hidden mystical I-know-not-what (as Locke calls it). This whole text is a wonderful source on the subject of physical change. Note too the reliance on what is perceptible. |
| 15847 | Two things relate either as same or different, or part of a whole, or the whole of the part [Plato] |
| Full Idea: Everything is surely related to everything as follows: either it is the same or different; or, if it is not the same or different, it would be related as part to whole or as whole to part. | |
| From: Plato (Parmenides [c.364 BCE], 146b) | |
| A reaction: This strikes me as a really helpful first step in trying to analyse the nature of identity. Two things are either two or (actually) one, or related mereologically. |
| 16717 | Which of the contrary features of a body are basic to it? [Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: What sorts of contrarities, and how many of them, are to be accounted 'originative sources' of body? | |
| From: Aristotle (Coming-to-be and Passing-away (Gen/Corr) [c.335 BCE], 329b04) | |
| A reaction: Pasnau says these pages of Aristotle are the source of the doctrine of primary and secondary qualities. Essentially, hot, cold, wet and dry are his four primary qualities. |
| 222 | Only a great person can understand the essence of things, and an even greater person can teach it [Plato] |
| Full Idea: Only a man of very great natural gifts will be able to understand that everything has a class and absolute essence, and an even more wonderful man can teach this. | |
| From: Plato (Parmenides [c.364 BCE], 135a) |
| 13216 | Matter is the limit of points and lines, and must always have quality and form [Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: The matter is that of which points and lines are limits, and it is something that can never exist without quality and without form. | |
| From: Aristotle (Coming-to-be and Passing-away (Gen/Corr) [c.335 BCE], 320b16) | |
| A reaction: There seems to be a contradiction here somewhere. Matter has to be substantial enough to have a form, and yet seems to be the collective 'limit' of the points and lines. I wonder what 'limit' is translating? Sounds a bit too modern. |
| 17994 | The primary matter is the substratum for the contraries like hot and cold [Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: We must reckon as an 'orginal source' and as 'primary' the matter which underlies, though it is inseparable from the contrary qualities: for 'the hot' is not matter for 'the cold' nor 'cold' for 'hot', but the substratum is matter for them both. | |
| From: Aristotle (Coming-to-be and Passing-away (Gen/Corr) [c.335 BCE], 329a30) | |
| A reaction: A much discussed passage. |
| 13224 | There couldn't be just one element, which was both water and air at the same time [Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: No one supposes a single 'element' to persist, as the basis of all, in such a way that it is Water as well as Air (or any other element) at the same time. | |
| From: Aristotle (Coming-to-be and Passing-away (Gen/Corr) [c.335 BCE], 332a09) | |
| A reaction: Of course, we now think that oxygen is a key part of both water and of air, but Aristotle's basic argument still seems right. How could multiplicity be explained by a simply unity? The One is cool, but explains nothing. |
| 13222 | The Boundless cannot exist on its own, and must have something contrary to it [Aristotle on Anaximander] |
| Full Idea: Those thinkers are in error who postulate ...a single matter, for this cannot exist without some 'perceptible contrariety': this Boundless, which they identify with the 'original real', must be either light or heavy, either hot or cold. | |
| From: comment on Anaximander (fragments/reports [c.570 BCE]) by Aristotle - Coming-to-be and Passing-away (Gen/Corr) 329a10 | |
| A reaction: A dubious objection, I would say. If there has to be a contrasting cold thing to any hot thing, what happens when the cold thing is removed? |
| 404 | Things begin and end in the Unlimited, and are balanced over time according to justice [Anaximander] |
| Full Idea: The non-limited is the original material of existing things; their source is also that to which they return after destruction, according to necessity; they give justice and make reparation to each other for injustice, according to the arrangement of Time. | |
| From: Anaximander (fragments/reports [c.570 BCE], B1), quoted by Simplicius - On Aristotle's 'Physics' 24.13- | |
| A reaction: Simplicius is quoting Theophrastus |
| 405 | The essential nature, whatever it is, of the non-limited is everlasting and ageless [Anaximander] |
| Full Idea: The essential nature, whatever it is, of the non-limited is everlasting and ageless. | |
| From: Anaximander (fragments/reports [c.570 BCE], B2), quoted by (who?) - where? |
| 1495 | Anaximander introduced the idea that the first principle and element of things was the Boundless [Anaximander, by Simplicius] |
| Full Idea: Anaximander said that the first principle and element of existing things was the boundless; it was he who originally introduced this name for the first principle. | |
| From: report of Anaximander (fragments/reports [c.570 BCE], A09) by Simplicius - On Aristotle's 'Physics' 9.24.14- | |
| A reaction: Simplicius is quoting Theophrastus |
| 225 | The unlimited has no shape and is endless [Plato] |
| Full Idea: The unlimited partakes neither of the round nor of the straight, because it has no ends nor edges. | |
| From: Plato (Parmenides [c.364 BCE], 137e) |
| 2062 | The only movement possible for the One is in space or in alteration [Plato] |
| Full Idea: If the One moves it either moves spatially or it is altered, since these are the only motions. | |
| From: Plato (Parmenides [c.364 BCE], 138b) |
| 231 | Everything partakes of the One in some way [Plato] |
| Full Idea: The others are not altogether deprived of the one, for they partake of it in some way. | |
| From: Plato (Parmenides [c.364 BCE], 157c) | |
| A reaction: Compare Idea 233. |
| 233 | Some things do not partake of the One [Plato] |
| Full Idea: The others cannot partake of the one in any way; they can neither partake of it nor of the whole. | |
| From: Plato (Parmenides [c.364 BCE], 159d) | |
| A reaction: Compare Idea 231 |
| 16594 | The Four Elements must change into one another, or else alteration is impossible [Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: These bodies (Fire, Water and the like) change into one another (and are not immutable as Empedocles and other thinkers assert, since 'alteration' would then have been impossible). | |
| From: Aristotle (Coming-to-be and Passing-away (Gen/Corr) [c.335 BCE], 329b1) | |
| A reaction: This is why Aristotle proposes that matter [hule] underlies the four elements. Gill argues that by matter Aristotle means the elements. |
| 13223 | Fire is hot and dry; Air is hot and moist; Water is cold and moist; Earth is cold and dry [Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: The four couples of elementary qualities attach themselves to the apparently 'simple' bodies (Fire, Air, Earth, Water). Fire is hot and dry, whereas Air is hot and moist (being a sort of aqueous vapour); Water is cold and moist, and Earth is cold and dry. | |
| From: Aristotle (Coming-to-be and Passing-away (Gen/Corr) [c.335 BCE], 330b02) | |
| A reaction: This is the traditional framework accepted throughout the middle ages, and which had a huge influence on medicine. It all looks rather implausible now. Aristotle was a genius, but not critical enough about evidence. |
| 13220 | Bodies are endlessly divisible [Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: Bodies are divisible through and through. | |
| From: Aristotle (Coming-to-be and Passing-away (Gen/Corr) [c.335 BCE], 326b27) | |
| A reaction: This is Aristotle's flat rejection of atomism, arrived at after several sustained discussions, in this text and elsewhere. I don't think we are in a position to say that Aristotle is wrong. |
| 13210 | Wood is potentially divided through and through, so what is there in the wood besides the division? [Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: If having divided a piece of wood I put it together, it is equal to what it was and is one. This is so whatever the point at which I cut the wood. The wood is therefore divided potentially through and through. So what is in the wood besides the division? | |
| From: Aristotle (Coming-to-be and Passing-away (Gen/Corr) [c.335 BCE], 316b11) | |
| A reaction: Part of a very nice discussion of the implications of the thought experiment of cutting something 'through and through'. It seems to me that the arguments are still relevant, in the age of quarks, electrons and strings. |
| 13211 | If a body is endlessly divided, is it reduced to nothing - then reassembled from nothing? [Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: Dividing a body at all points might actually occur, so the body will be both actually indivisible and potentially divided. Then nothing will remain and the body passes into what is incorporeal. So it might be reassembled out of points, or out of nothing. | |
| From: Aristotle (Coming-to-be and Passing-away (Gen/Corr) [c.335 BCE], 316b24) | |
| A reaction: [a bit compressed] This sounds like an argument in favour of atomism, but Aristotle was opposed to that view. He is aware of the contradictions that seem to emerge with infinite division. Graham Priest is interesting on the topic. |
| 13228 | There is no time without movement [Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: There can be no time without movement. | |
| From: Aristotle (Coming-to-be and Passing-away (Gen/Corr) [c.335 BCE], 337a24) | |
| A reaction: See Shoemaker's nice thought experiment as a challenge to this. Intuition seems to cry out that if movement stopped for a moment, that would not stop time, even though there was no way to measure its passing. |
| 16595 | If each thing can cease to be, why hasn't absolutely everything ceased to be long ago? [Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: If some one of the things 'which are' is constantly disappearing, why has not the whole of 'what is' been used up long ago and vanished away - assuming of course that the material of all the several comings-to-be was infinite? | |
| From: Aristotle (Coming-to-be and Passing-away (Gen/Corr) [c.335 BCE], 318a17) | |
| A reaction: This thought is the basis of Aquinas's Third Way for proving the existence of God (as the force which prevents the vicissitudes of nature from sliding into oblivion). |
| 1746 | The parts of all things are susceptible to change, but the whole is unchangeable [Anaximander, by Diog. Laertius] |
| Full Idea: The parts of all things are susceptible to change, but the whole is unchangeable. | |
| From: report of Anaximander (fragments/reports [c.570 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 02.An.2 |
| 234 | We couldn't discuss the non-existence of the One without knowledge of it [Plato] |
| Full Idea: There must be knowledge of the one, or else not even the meaning of the words 'if the one does not exist' would be known. | |
| From: Plato (Parmenides [c.364 BCE], 160d) |
| 13227 | Being is better than not-being [Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: Being is better than not-being. | |
| From: Aristotle (Coming-to-be and Passing-away (Gen/Corr) [c.335 BCE], 336b29) | |
| A reaction: [see also Metaphysics 1017a07 ff, says the note] This peculiar assumption is at the heart of the ontological argument. Is the existence of the plague bacterium, or of Satan, or of mass-murderers, superior? |
| 13226 | An Order controls all things [Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: There is an Order controlling all things. | |
| From: Aristotle (Coming-to-be and Passing-away (Gen/Corr) [c.335 BCE], 336b13) | |
| A reaction: Presumably the translator provides the capital letter. How do we get from 'there is an order in all things' to 'there is an order which controls all things'? |