20769
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Sphaerus he was not assenting to the presence of pomegranates, but that it was 'reasonable' [Sphaerus, by Diog. Laertius]
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Full Idea:
When Sphaerus accepted pomegranates from the king, he was accused of assenting to a false presentation, to which Sphaerus replied that what he had assented to was not that they were pomegranates, but that it was reasonable that they were pomegranates.
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From:
report of Sphaerus (fragments/reports [c.240 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 07.177
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A reaction:
He then cited the stoic distinction between a 'graspable' presentation and a 'reasonable' one. This seems a rather helpful response to Dretske's zebra problem. I like the word 'sensible' in epistemology, because animals can be sensible.
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7946
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The memory criterion has a problem when one thing branches into two things [Williams,B, by Macdonald,C]
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Full Idea:
The memory criterion for personal identity permits 'branching' (where two things can later meet the criteria of persistence of a single earlier thing), which presents it with serious problems.
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From:
report of Bernard Williams (Personal Identity and Individuation [1956]) by Cynthia Macdonald - Varieties of Things Ch.4
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A reaction:
Of course, any notion of personal identity would have serious problem if people could branch into two, like fissioning amoeba. If that happened, we probably wouldn't have had a strong notion of personal identity in the first place. See Parfit.
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