63 ideas
23890 | For Plato true wisdom is supernatural [Plato, by Weil] |
Full Idea: It is evident that Plato regards true wisdom as something supernatural. | |
From: report of Plato (works [c.375 BCE]) by Simone Weil - God in Plato p.61 | |
A reaction: Taken literally, I assume this is wrong, but we can empathise with the thought. Wisdom has the feeling of rising above the level of mere knowledge, to achieve the overview I associate with philosophy. |
3060 | Plato never mentions Democritus, and wished to burn his books [Plato, by Diog. Laertius] |
Full Idea: Plato, who mentions nearly all the ancient philosophers, nowhere speaks of Democritus; he wished to burn all of his books, but was persuaded that it was futile. | |
From: report of Plato (works [c.375 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 09.7.8 |
22611 | Metaphysics can criticise interpretations of science theories, and give good feedback [Ingthorsson] |
Full Idea: Metaphysics is capable of critical scrutiny of the way the empirical sciences make sense of their own theories, and can provide them with very useful feedback. | |
From: R.D. Ingthorsson (A Powerful Particulars View of Causation [2021], 1.9) | |
A reaction: I agree with this, but I don't think it is the main job of metaphysics, which has its own agenda, using science as some of its raw material. |
23891 | Two contradictories force us to find a relation which will correlate them [Plato, by Weil] |
Full Idea: Where contradictions appear there is a correlation of contraries, which is relation. If a contradiction is imposed on the intelligence, it is forced to think of a relation to transform the contradiction into a correlation, which draws the soul higher. | |
From: report of Plato (works [c.375 BCE]) by Simone Weil - God in Plato p.70 | |
A reaction: A much better account of the dialectic than anything I have yet seen in Hegel. For the first time I see some sense in it. A contradiction is not a falsehood, and it must be addressed rather than side-stepped. A kink in the system, that needs ironing. |
22609 | Philosophers accepted first-order logic, because they took science to be descriptive, not explanatory [Ingthorsson] |
Full Idea: First-order predicate logic was accepted so easily by the philosophical community …because philosophy was already geared toward a neo-Humean view of both science and philosophy as primarily descriptive rather than explanatory. | |
From: R.D. Ingthorsson (A Powerful Particulars View of Causation [2021], 1.8) | |
A reaction: The point, I think, is that explanatory thinking needs second-order logic, where the properties (or powers) are players in the game, and not just adjuncts of the catalogue of objects. I find this idea mind-expanding. (That's a good thing). |
22629 | Basic processes are said to be either physical, or organic, or psychological [Ingthorsson] |
Full Idea: Process philosophy is considered to include ideas of process as basically physical (Whitehead 1929), as basically organic (Bergson 1910), and as basically psychological (James 1890). | |
From: R.D. Ingthorsson (A Powerful Particulars View of Causation [2021], 7.4) | |
A reaction: I take Whitehead to be the only serious contender here. |
22633 | Indirect realists are cautious about the manifest image, and prefer the scientific image [Ingthorsson] |
Full Idea: The indirect realist regards the manifest image with scepticism and contrasts it to the scientific image. | |
From: R.D. Ingthorsson (A Powerful Particulars View of Causation [2021], 8.13) | |
A reaction: This is why indirect realism is the best view for a realist who largely accepts the authority of science, Philosophers can wallow in the manifest image all they like (and most of them seem to love it), but truth is in the scientific image. |
22606 | Neo-Humeans say there are no substantial connections between anything [Ingthorsson] |
Full Idea: Neo-Humean metaphysics holds the view that there are no substantial connections between anything in this world. | |
From: R.D. Ingthorsson (A Powerful Particulars View of Causation [2021], 1) | |
A reaction: A very illuminating comment. This exactly fits Lewis's great 'mosaic' of facts. The challenge is to say what 'substantial' relations there might be, but I'm quite happy to have a go at that. |
14502 | Plato's idea of 'structure' tends to be mathematically expressed [Plato, by Koslicki] |
Full Idea: 'Structure' tends to be characterized by Plato as something that is mathematically expressed. | |
From: report of Plato (works [c.375 BCE]) by Kathrin Koslicki - The Structure of Objects V.3 iv | |
A reaction: [Koslicki is drawing on Verity Harte here] |
22631 | Properties are said to be categorical qualities or non-qualitative dispositions [Ingthorsson] |
Full Idea: It is said that that properties divide into two mutually exclusive types—non-dispositional qualities (sometimes called 'categorical properties’) vs. non-qualitative dispositions—of which the qualities are more fundamental than dispositions. | |
From: R.D. Ingthorsson (A Powerful Particulars View of Causation [2021], 8) | |
A reaction: It is standardly understood that the qualitative categorical properties are more fundamental. Fans of powers (such as Ingthorsson and myself) either favour the dispositional properties, or reject the distinction. |
22632 | Physics understands the charge of an electron as a power, not as a quality [Ingthorsson] |
Full Idea: Is the negative charge of an electron a quality or power? It is clear that physics describes the nature of charge only in terms of what its bearer can do. | |
From: R.D. Ingthorsson (A Powerful Particulars View of Causation [2021], 8.06) | |
A reaction: The point is that an electron has properties, even though it has no observable qualities. Ingthorsson says the scientific concept of qualities is entirely about what something can do, and ot how it is perceived. |
20906 | Platonists argue for the indivisible triangle-in-itself [Plato, by Aristotle] |
Full Idea: The Platonists, on the basis of purely logical arguments, posit the existence of an indivisible 'triangle in itself'. | |
From: report of Plato (works [c.375 BCE]) by Aristotle - Coming-to-be and Passing-away (Gen/Corr) 316a15 | |
A reaction: A helpful confirmation that geometrical figures really are among the Forms (bearing in mind that numbers are not, because they contain one another). What shape is the Form of the triangle? |
3039 | When Diogenes said he could only see objects but not their forms, Plato said it was because he had eyes but no intellect [Plato, by Diog. Laertius] |
Full Idea: When Diogenes told Plato he saw tables and cups, but not 'tableness' and 'cupness', Plato replied that this was because Diogenes had eyes but no intellect. | |
From: report of Plato (works [c.375 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 06.2.6 |
17948 | Plato's Forms meant that the sophists only taught the appearance of wisdom and virtue [Plato, by Nehamas] |
Full Idea: Plato's theory of Forms allowed him to claim that the sophists and other opponents were trapped in the world of appearance. What they therefore taught was only apparent wisdom and virtue. | |
From: report of Plato (works [c.375 BCE]) by Alexander Nehamas - Eristic,Antilogic,Sophistic,Dialectic p.118 |
556 | If there is one Form for both the Form and its participants, they must have something in common [Aristotle on Plato] |
Full Idea: If there is the same Form for the Forms and for their participants, then they must have something in common. | |
From: comment on Plato (works [c.375 BCE]) by Aristotle - Metaphysics 991a |
563 | If gods are like men, they are just eternal men; similarly, Forms must differ from particulars [Aristotle on Plato] |
Full Idea: We say there is the form of man, horse and health, but nothing else, making the same mistake as those who say that there are gods but that they are in the form of men. They just posit eternal men, and here we are not positing forms but eternal sensibles. | |
From: comment on Plato (works [c.375 BCE]) by Aristotle - Metaphysics 997b |
557 | A Form is a cause of things only in the way that white mixed with white is a cause [Aristotle on Plato] |
Full Idea: A Form is a cause of things only in the way that white mixed with white is a cause. | |
From: comment on Plato (works [c.375 BCE]) by Aristotle - Metaphysics 991a |
565 | The Forms cannot be changeless if they are in changing things [Aristotle on Plato] |
Full Idea: The Forms could not be changeless if they were in changing things. | |
From: comment on Plato (works [c.375 BCE]) by Aristotle - Metaphysics 998a |
22627 | Compound objects are processes, insofar as change is essential to them [Ingthorsson] |
Full Idea: Compound objects are to be considered processes, if by ‘process’ we mean any entity for which change is essential for its continued existence. | |
From: R.D. Ingthorsson (A Powerful Particulars View of Causation [2021], 7) | |
A reaction: This doesn't seem to matter much, except to challenge those who say that reality consists of processes, and therefore not of substances. |
9607 | The greatest discovery in human thought is Plato's discovery of abstract objects [Brown,JR on Plato] |
Full Idea: The greatest discovery in the history of human thought is Plato's discovery of abstract objects. | |
From: comment on Plato (works [c.375 BCE]) by James Robert Brown - Philosophy of Mathematics Ch. 2 | |
A reaction: Compare Idea 2860! Given the diametrically opposed views, it is clearly likely that Plato's central view is the most important idea in the history of human thought, even if it is wrong. |
22613 | Most materialist views postulate smallest indivisible components which are permanent [Ingthorsson] |
Full Idea: Most materialist ontologies of the past postulate that the world ultimately consists of smallest indivisible component parts that persist because they must; they are permanent. | |
From: R.D. Ingthorsson (A Powerful Particulars View of Causation [2021], 2.1) | |
A reaction: Van Inwagen is notable for this view. Ingthorsson says the theory is to explain medium-sized change, while denying that anything comes to be out of nothing. Theology may lurk in the background. Simple persistance won't explain compound persistance. |
13263 | We can grasp whole things in science, because they have a mathematics and a teleology [Plato, by Koslicki] |
Full Idea: Due to the mathematical nature of structure and the teleological cause underlying the creation of Platonic wholes, these wholes are intelligible, and are in fact the proper objects of science. | |
From: report of Plato (works [c.375 BCE]) by Kathrin Koslicki - The Structure of Objects 5.3 | |
A reaction: I like this idea, because it pays attention to the connection between how we conceive objects to be, and how we are able to think about objects. Only examining these two together enables us to grasp metaphysics. |
13261 | Plato sees an object's structure as expressible in mathematics [Plato, by Koslicki] |
Full Idea: The 'structure' of an object tends to be characterised by Plato as something that is mathematically expressible. | |
From: report of Plato (works [c.375 BCE]) by Kathrin Koslicki - The Structure of Objects 5.3 | |
A reaction: This seems to be pure Pythagoreanism (see Idea 644). Plato is pursuing Pythagoras's research programme, of trying to find mathematics buried in every aspect of reality. |
13265 | Plato was less concerned than Aristotle with the source of unity in a complex object [Plato, by Koslicki] |
Full Idea: Plato was less concerned than Aristotle with the project of how to account, in completely general terms, for the source of unity within a mereologically complex object. | |
From: report of Plato (works [c.375 BCE]) by Kathrin Koslicki - The Structure of Objects 5.5 | |
A reaction: Plato seems to have simply asserted that some sort of harmony held things together. Aristotles puts the forms [eidos] within objects, rather than external, so he has to give a fuller account of what is going on in an object. He never managed it! |
593 | Plato's holds that there are three substances: Forms, mathematical entities, and perceptible bodies [Plato, by Aristotle] |
Full Idea: Plato's doctrine was that the Forms and mathematicals are two substances and that the third substance is that of perceptible bodies. | |
From: report of Plato (works [c.375 BCE]) by Aristotle - Metaphysics 1028b |
13260 | Plato says wholes are either containers, or they're atomic, or they don't exist [Plato, by Koslicki] |
Full Idea: Plato considers a 'container' model for wholes (which are disjoint from their parts) [Parm 144e3-], and a 'nihilist' model, in which only wholes are mereological atoms, and a 'bare pluralities' view, in which wholes are not really one at all. | |
From: report of Plato (works [c.375 BCE]) by Kathrin Koslicki - The Structure of Objects 5.2 | |
A reaction: [She cites Verity Harte for this analysis of Plato] The fourth, and best, seems to be that wholes are parts which fall under some unifying force or structure or principle. |
11237 | Only universals have essence [Plato, by Politis] |
Full Idea: Plato argues that only universals have essence. | |
From: report of Plato (works [c.375 BCE]) by Vassilis Politis - Aristotle and the Metaphysics 1.4 |
11238 | Plato and Aristotle take essence to make a thing what it is [Plato, by Politis] |
Full Idea: Plato and Aristotle have a shared general conception of essence: the essence of a thing is what that thing is simply in virtue of itself and in virtue of being the very thing it is. It answers the question 'What is this very thing?' | |
From: report of Plato (works [c.375 BCE]) by Vassilis Politis - Aristotle and the Metaphysics 1.4 |
22612 | Endurance and perdurance just show the consequences of A or B series time [Ingthorsson] |
Full Idea: Endurance and perdurance are not explanations, but are merely characterisations of persistance with the constraints imposed by either an A or a B view of time. | |
From: R.D. Ingthorsson (A Powerful Particulars View of Causation [2021], 2.1) | |
A reaction: This is 3-D asnd 4-D objects. A simple and illuminating observation. I love reading broad brush books that make all these simple connections between what seem isolated theories in philosophy. These links are the heart of the subject. |
22625 | Science suggests causal aspects of the constitution and persistance of objects [Ingthorsson] |
Full Idea: There are very obvious causal aspects to the constitution and continued existence of compound entities, especially in light of the scientific image of the world. | |
From: R.D. Ingthorsson (A Powerful Particulars View of Causation [2021], 6) | |
A reaction: I like this a lot. He aims to explain constitution and persistance, rather than just describing or characterising them, and causal binding seems the obvious thought. There are still intermittent and distributed objects, like a dismantled clock. |
22620 | If causation involves production, that needs persisting objects [Ingthorsson] |
Full Idea: If causation involves production, then things must endure rather than perdure, because perdurance is incompatible with production, if creation ex nihilo is ruled out. | |
From: R.D. Ingthorsson (A Powerful Particulars View of Causation [2021], 4.10) | |
A reaction: That is, objects must persist over time. Cannot an account of production be given in terms of time-sliceS (or whatever)? 3-D perdurantists obviously have an account of change. He says it also needs the A-series view of time. |
22636 | Every philosophical theory must be true in some possible world, so the ontology is hopeless [Ingthorsson] |
Full Idea: Possible worlds ontology appears to be plentiful enough to allow every philosophical theory to be true in some world or other, and that is why I cannot consider it an ontologically serious theory. It admits everything and forbids nothing | |
From: R.D. Ingthorsson (A Powerful Particulars View of Causation [2021], 9.6) | |
A reaction: Nice. Be careful what you wish for. The theory would have to be consistent (unless we also accept impossible worlds). |
22638 | Worlds may differ in various respects, but no overall similarity of worlds is implied [Ingthorsson] |
Full Idea: Even if possible worlds could differ in many different respects, there is no useful way to combine these different respects into one measure of overall comparative similarity. | |
From: R.D. Ingthorsson (A Powerful Particulars View of Causation [2021], 9.7) | |
A reaction: [idea of Michael Moreau 2010] This is an objection to the use of 'close' possible worlds in causation theories. The idea is true in general of the concept of similarity. It makes sense of specific 'respects', but not really of two whole objects. |
17085 | A good explanation totally rules out the opposite explanation (so Forms are required) [Plato, by Ruben] |
Full Idea: For Plato, an acceptable explanation is one such that there is no possibility of there being the opposite explanation at all, and he thought that only explanations in terms of the Forms, but never physical explanations, could meet this requirement. | |
From: report of Plato (works [c.375 BCE]) by David-Hillel Ruben - Explaining Explanation Ch 2 | |
A reaction: [Republic 436c is cited] |
1651 | Plato wanted to somehow control and purify the passions [Vlastos on Plato] |
Full Idea: Plato put high on his agenda a project which did not figure in Socrates' programme at all: the hygienic conditioning of the passions. This cannot be an intellectual process, as argument cannot touch them. | |
From: comment on Plato (works [c.375 BCE]) by Gregory Vlastos - Socrates: Ironist and Moral Philosopher p.88 | |
A reaction: This is the standard traditional view of any thinker who exaggerates the importance and potential of reason in our lives. |
3324 | Plato's whole philosophy may be based on being duped by reification - a figure of speech [Benardete,JA on Plato] |
Full Idea: Plato is liable to the charge of having been duped by a figure of speech, albeit the most profound of all, the trope of reification. | |
From: comment on Plato (works [c.375 BCE]) by José A. Benardete - Metaphysics: the logical approach Ch.12 | |
A reaction: That might be a plausible account if his view was ridiculous, but given how many powerful friends Plato has, especially in the philosophy of mathematics, we should assume he was cleverer than that. |
7503 | Plato never refers to examining the conscience [Plato, by Foucault] |
Full Idea: Plato never speaks of the examination of conscience - never! | |
From: report of Plato (works [c.375 BCE]) by Michel Foucault - On the Genealogy of Ethics p.276 | |
A reaction: Plato does imply some sort of self-evident direct knowledge about that nature of a healthy soul. Presumably the full-blown concept of conscience is something given from outside, from God. In 'Euthyphro', Plato asserts the primacy of morality (Idea 337). |
2173 | As religion and convention collapsed, Plato sought morals not just in knowledge, but in the soul [Williams,B on Plato] |
Full Idea: Once gods and fate and social expectation were no longer there, Plato felt it necessary to discover ethics inside human nature, not just as ethical knowledge (Socrates' view), but in the structure of the soul. | |
From: comment on Plato (works [c.375 BCE]) by Bernard Williams - Shame and Necessity II - p.43 | |
A reaction: anti Charles Taylor |
9274 | Plato's legacy to European thought was the Good, the Beautiful and the True [Plato, by Gray] |
Full Idea: Plato's legacy to European thought was a trio of capital letters - the Good, the Beautiful and the True. | |
From: report of Plato (works [c.375 BCE]) by John Gray - Straw Dogs 2.8 | |
A reaction: It seems to have been Baumgarten who turned this into a slogan (Idea 8117). Gray says these ideals are lethal, but I identify with them very strongly, and am quite happy to see the good life as an attempt to find the right balance between them. |
94 | Pleasure is better with the addition of intelligence, so pleasure is not the good [Plato, by Aristotle] |
Full Idea: Plato says the life of pleasure is more desirable with the addition of intelligence, and if the combination is better, pleasure is not the good. | |
From: report of Plato (works [c.375 BCE]) by Aristotle - Nicomachean Ethics 1172b27 | |
A reaction: It is obvious why we like pleasure, but not why intelligence makes it 'better'. Maybe it is just because we enjoy intelligence? |
17947 | Plato decided that the virtuous and happy life was the philosophical life [Plato, by Nehamas] |
Full Idea: Plato came to the conclusion that virtue and happiness consist in the life of philosophy itself. | |
From: report of Plato (works [c.375 BCE]) by Alexander Nehamas - Eristic,Antilogic,Sophistic,Dialectic p.117 | |
A reaction: This view is obviously ridiculous, because it largely excludes almost the entire human race, which sees philosophy as a cul-de-sac, even if it is good. But virtue and happiness need some serious thought. |
6015 | Plato, unusually, said that theoretical and practical wisdom are inseparable [Plato, by Kraut] |
Full Idea: Two virtues that are ordinarily kept distinct - theoretical and practical wisdom - are joined by Plato; he thinks that neither one can be fully possessed unless it is combined with the other. | |
From: report of Plato (works [c.375 BCE]) by Richard Kraut - Plato | |
A reaction: I get the impression that this doctrine comes from Socrates, whose position is widely reported as 'intellectualist'. Aristotle certainly held the opposite view. |
2912 | Plato is boring [Nietzsche on Plato] |
Full Idea: Plato is boring. | |
From: comment on Plato (works [c.375 BCE]) by Friedrich Nietzsche - Twilight of the Idols 9.2 |
22605 | Humeans describe the surface of causation, while powers accounts aim at deeper explanations [Ingthorsson] |
Full Idea: Humeans attempt to describe causation without any deeper ontological commitments, while powers based accounts attempt to explain why causation occurs in the way it is described. | |
From: R.D. Ingthorsson (A Powerful Particulars View of Causation [2021], 1) | |
A reaction: Exactly the view I have reached. The Humean view is correct but superficial. A perfect example of my allegiance to Explanatory Empiricism. |
22607 | Time and space are not causal, but they determine natural phenomena [Ingthorsson] |
Full Idea: Time and space are significant determinants of natural phenomena, and yet are not (typically) regarded as causal determinants | |
From: R.D. Ingthorsson (A Powerful Particulars View of Causation [2021], 1.4) | |
A reaction: I like the word 'determinants'. Metaphysics largely concerns what determines what. I'm struggling to think of examples of this (which he does not give). Decay takes time, but isn't determined by time. Is a light cone a determinant? |
22608 | Casuation is the transmission of conserved quantities between causal processes [Ingthorsson] |
Full Idea: Causal process theories state that causation needs to be understood in terms of causal processes and their interactions, in which conserved quantities are transmitted between causal processes. | |
From: R.D. Ingthorsson (A Powerful Particulars View of Causation [2021], 1.5) | |
A reaction: Sounds a bit circular, but the idea of transmission of something is obviously the main point. I like this idea a lot (because it is so naturalistic), but rarely find it taken seriously. Energy is usually the quantity picked out. |
22621 | Causation as transfer only works for asymmetric interactions [Ingthorsson] |
Full Idea: The transference model of causation only works for asymmetric interactions. | |
From: R.D. Ingthorsson (A Powerful Particulars View of Causation [2021], 4.11) | |
A reaction: This is usually the transfer of energy. I liked the theory until I read this. |
22614 | Interventionist causal theory says it gets a reliable result whenever you manipulate it [Ingthorsson] |
Full Idea: The core of agency and interventionist theories of causation is that c counts as the cause of e iff E reliably appears and disappears when you manipulate C. | |
From: R.D. Ingthorsson (A Powerful Particulars View of Causation [2021], 2.1) | |
A reaction: [C is the type of c; E is the type of e] James Woodward champions this view. Ingthorsson objects that the theory offers no explanation of the appearances and disappearances. You can't manipulate black holes… |
22639 | Causal events are always reciprocal, and there is no distinction of action and reaction [Ingthorsson] |
Full Idea: I accept the reciprocity of interactions, and abandon the Agent vs.Patient distinction, so we can no longer talk of the contribution of each as ontologically different types of cause. In interactions, neither action nor reaction can be separated. | |
From: R.D. Ingthorsson (A Powerful Particulars View of Causation [2021], 10.3) | |
A reaction: His point is that we are misled by real world happenings, where one component is usually more powerful than the other (such as ball dropped onto a pillow). Modern science endorses his view. Mumford and Anjum seem to agree, and so do I. |
22615 | One effect cannot act on a second effect in causation, because the second doesn't yet exist [Ingthorsson] |
Full Idea: Hobbes implies that a Kim-style event e1 existing at t1 cannot possibly act on an effect e2 at t2, because that effect does not exist until the Agent has worked its effect on the Patient to provoke a change, thus bringing the effect into existence. | |
From: R.D. Ingthorsson (A Powerful Particulars View of Causation [2021], 3.08) | |
A reaction: [Hobbes Elements of Phil 1656 II.IX.1] Ingthorsson says that the Hobbes view is the traditional 'standard' view, that objects (and not events) are the causal relata. A strong objection to events as the causal relata. Realists need objects. |
22616 | Empiricists preferred events to objects as the relata, because they have observable motions [Ingthorsson] |
Full Idea: It is the empiricists' refusal to deal with anything other than observable events that motivated the shift in conception of efficient causation …to influence by an event on another event (one motion on another) rather than by an object on an object. | |
From: R.D. Ingthorsson (A Powerful Particulars View of Causation [2021], 3.10) | |
A reaction: I suppose events supply the necessary activity, whereas objects seem to be too passive for the job - because that's how they look. Ingthorsson persuades that objects are the correct causal relata, for those of us who believe in powers. |
22617 | Science now says all actions are reciprocal, not unidirectional [Ingthorsson] |
Full Idea: It is now accepted as a fact of modern science that unidirectional actions do not exist, and that all interactions are instead thoroughly reciprocal. | |
From: R.D. Ingthorsson (A Powerful Particulars View of Causation [2021], 3.10) | |
A reaction: Ingthorsson says this undermines the standard traditional view (Hobbes etc) of Agent and Patient, with A having active powers and P having passive powers. All influences are mutual, it seems. Passive powers are active structures? |
22619 | Causes are not agents; the whole interaction is the cause, and the changed compound is the effect [Ingthorsson] |
Full Idea: By abandoning the standard view that causes are ‘extrinsic motive Agents’, an idea from pre-Newtonian physics, we are free to conceive of the interaction as a whole as the cause, and the change in the compound whole of interacting things as the effect. | |
From: R.D. Ingthorsson (A Powerful Particulars View of Causation [2021], 4.06) | |
A reaction: Ingthorsson persuasively presents this as the correct account, as understood by modern science. It is not cause-then-effect. It is kerfuffle, then aftermath. |
22635 | People only accept the counterfactual when they know the underlying cause [Ingthorsson] |
Full Idea: I doubt that anyone will accept any counterfactual as true unless they believe they know the underlying causality. | |
From: R.D. Ingthorsson (A Powerful Particulars View of Causation [2021], 9.3) | |
A reaction: Correct. Almost any example will support it. Compare coincidences and true causes. |
22634 | Counterfactuals don't explain causation, but causation can explain counterfactuals [Ingthorsson] |
Full Idea: I cannot identify any prima facie reason to think that causation can be explained in counterfactual terms, but plenty to think that causation can explain counterfactuals. | |
From: R.D. Ingthorsson (A Powerful Particulars View of Causation [2021], 9.1) | |
A reaction: Love it. Treating causation as counterfactual dependency is hopelessly superficial. What is the reality that is involved? He cites the second law of motion. |
22637 | Counterfactual theories are false in possible worlds where causation is actual [Ingthorsson] |
Full Idea: if there are worlds where there are causal powers and/or lawful connections, then they are worlds in which the counterfactual theory of causation is false, because there causes produce the effects, regardless of any possible world. | |
From: R.D. Ingthorsson (A Powerful Particulars View of Causation [2021], 9.6) | |
A reaction: A nice modern instance of turning the tables. Come to think of it, possible worlds theories are just asking for that. Are there possible worlds in which there are no other possible worlds? Or the possible worlds are inaccessible? |
22624 | A cause can fail to produce its normal effect, by prevention, pre-emption, finks or antidotes [Ingthorsson] |
Full Idea: Counterexamples involving prevention and/or interference have come to be roughly divided into four main categories: (i) prevention, (ii) pre-emption, (iii) finks and (iv) antidotes. | |
From: R.D. Ingthorsson (A Powerful Particulars View of Causation [2021], 5.3) | |
A reaction: These are the reasons why necessity is denied in causation. i) is in the initial circumstances, ii) is another cause getting there first, iii) is a defusing action in the agent, iv) is a defusing action in the patient. No necessity if one is possible. |
22622 | Any process can go backwards or forwards in time without violating the basic laws of physics [Ingthorsson] |
Full Idea: Because it makes no difference to exchange the time variable t with its contrary -t, in the fundamental laws of physics, any process can be described as going either backwards or forwards in time, without violating those laws. | |
From: R.D. Ingthorsson (A Powerful Particulars View of Causation [2021], 4.13) | |
A reaction: A few philosophers read a lot into this, but I don't. The inverse scenario may not breach the laws of physics, but it does involve time going backwards, which I think we can skip for now. Entropy would be interesting. Can information flow backwards? |
22618 | In modern physics the first and second laws of motion (unlike the third) fail at extremes [Ingthorsson] |
Full Idea: While the first and second laws of motion are known to fail in the domain of very fast-moving and massive objects (i.e. where relativity deviates from classical mechanics) as well as in the quantum realm, the third law is still assumed to hold good. | |
From: R.D. Ingthorsson (A Powerful Particulars View of Causation [2021], 4.04) | |
A reaction: This implies a universal status for the third law (equal and opposite reactions), which the other two lack. Ingthorsson sees this as crucial for our understanding of causation. |
22630 | If particles have decay rates, they can't really be elementary, in the sense of indivisible [Ingthorsson] |
Full Idea: We may wonder whether the fact that physics has calculated (and for some, confirmed) the decay rate of elementary particles can be a reason to think that they cannot really be ‘elementary’ in the philosophical sense of ‘indivisible’. | |
From: R.D. Ingthorsson (A Powerful Particulars View of Causation [2021], 7.6) | |
A reaction: I don't think anything can ever conclusively be labelled as 'elementary', but this idea offers a reason for doubting whether a candidate particle is so basic. Does decay imply having parts? |
22610 | It is difficult to handle presentism in first-order logic [Ingthorsson] |
Full Idea: Contemporary philosophers are not comfortable with presentism, because it is difficult to deal with presentism in the language of first-order predicate logic. | |
From: R.D. Ingthorsson (A Powerful Particulars View of Causation [2021], 1.8) | |
A reaction: Presumable that logic relies on objects which endure through time, or at least have a past. Second-order logic is better able to deal with processes, which only exist in the present, but nevertheless have an integral past and future. ? |
1526 | Almost everyone except Plato thinks that time could not have been generated [Plato, by Aristotle] |
Full Idea: With a single exception (Plato) everyone agrees about time - that it is not generated. Democritus says time is an obvious example of something not generated. | |
From: report of Plato (works [c.375 BCE]) by Aristotle - Physics 251b14 |
7902 | The Buddha made flowers float in the air, to impress people, and make them listen [Mahavastu] |
Full Idea: When the young Brahmin threw her two lotuses, they stood suspended in the air. This was one of the miracles by which the Buddhas impress people, to make them listen to the truth. | |
From: Mahavastu (The Great Event [c.200], I.231-9) | |
A reaction: Presumably this is the reason that Jesus did miracles. It is hard to spot the truth among the myriad of lies, if there is no supporting miracle to give authority to the speaker. |