Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'fragments/reports', 'The Origin of Forms and Qualities' and 'Prolegomena to Ethics'

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15 ideas

2. Reason / D. Definition / 4. Real Definition
15957 Essential definitions show the differences that discriminate things, and make them what they are [Boyle]
     Full Idea: Essential definitions are such as are taken from the essential differences of things, which constitute them in such a sort of natural bodies, and discriminate them from all those of any other sort.
     From: Robert Boyle (The Origin of Forms and Qualities [1666], p.41?), quoted by Peter Alexander - Ideas, Qualities and Corpuscles
     A reaction: I don't think this goes as far as the aim Aristotle had in definitions, which was more than merely to 'discriminate' each thing. A full definition explains the thing as well.
8. Modes of Existence / C. Powers and Dispositions / 1. Powers
15965 Boyle attacked a contemporary belief that powers were occult things [Boyle, by Alexander,P]
     Full Idea: Boyle attacks an idea of powers, held by some modern schoolmen and chemists, that makes powers occult.
     From: report of Robert Boyle (The Origin of Forms and Qualities [1666]) by Peter Alexander - Ideas, Qualities and Corpuscles 03.3
     A reaction: [This involves Boyle's famous example of a key having the power to turn a lock] On p.86 Alexander says the 'occult' belief is in affinities, antipathies, attractions and repulsions. How did Boyle explain magnetism?
8. Modes of Existence / C. Powers and Dispositions / 6. Dispositions / a. Dispositions
16735 In the 17th century, 'disposition' usually just means the spatial arrangement of parts [Boyle, by Pasnau]
     Full Idea: In Locke and Boyle, 'disposition' and its various cognates are standardly used to refer to the corpuscular structure of a body - the spatial arrangement of its parts - without reflecting any commitment to a dispositional property.
     From: report of Robert Boyle (The Origin of Forms and Qualities [1666]) by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 23.2
     A reaction: Here as a warning against enthusiasts for dispositional properties misreadigmg 17th century texts to their supposed advantage. Pasnau says none of them believe in dispositional properties or real powers.
9. Objects / C. Structure of Objects / 2. Hylomorphism / a. Hylomorphism
16034 Form is not a separate substance, but just the manner, modification or 'stamp' of matter [Boyle]
     Full Idea: I understand the word 'form' to mean, not a real substance distinct from matter, but only the matter itself of a natural body, with its peculiar manner of existence [corpuscular structure], which may be called its 'essential modification' or 'stamp'.
     From: Robert Boyle (The Origin of Forms and Qualities [1666], p.324), quoted by Jan-Erik Jones - Real Essence §3
     A reaction: I don't think Aristotle ever thought that a form was separate from its matter, let alone qualifying as a substance. On the whole, Boyle attacks scholastic philosophy, rather than Aristotle.
15953 To cite a substantial form tells us what produced the effect, but not how it did it [Boyle]
     Full Idea: If it be demanded why rhubarb purges choler, snow dazzles the eyes rather than grass etc., that these effects are performed by substantial forms of the respective bodies is at best but to tell me what is the agent, not how the effect is wrought.
     From: Robert Boyle (The Origin of Forms and Qualities [1666], p.47?), quoted by Peter Alexander - Ideas, Qualities and Corpuscles 01.2
     A reaction: This is the problem of the 'virtus dormitiva' of opium (which at least tells you it was the opium what done it). I take Aristotle to have aspired to a lot more than this. He wanted a full definition, which would contain lots of information about the form.
12. Knowledge Sources / B. Perception / 2. Qualities in Perception / d. Secondary qualities
15964 Boyle's secondary qualities are not illusory, or 'in the mind' [Boyle, by Alexander,P]
     Full Idea: There is no suggestion in Boyle that secondary qualities are, unlike primary qualities, somehow illusory, subjective or 'in the mind'.
     From: report of Robert Boyle (The Origin of Forms and Qualities [1666]) by Peter Alexander - Ideas, Qualities and Corpuscles 03.3
     A reaction: [Alexander goes on to say that his also applied to Locke]
15962 Boyle's term 'texture' is not something you feel, but is unobservable structures of particles [Boyle, by Alexander,P]
     Full Idea: Perhaps Boyle's most important technical terms is 'texture'. ...It must not be confused with the way we feel the texture of a surface like sandpaper or velvet; it is rather a structure of unobservable particles and so it is not directly observable.
     From: report of Robert Boyle (The Origin of Forms and Qualities [1666]) by Peter Alexander - Ideas, Qualities and Corpuscles 03.2
     A reaction: This is the basis for Alexander's reassessment of what Boyle and Locke meant by a 'secondary quality', which, he says, is a physical feature of objects, not a mental experience.
14. Science / D. Explanation / 2. Types of Explanation / i. Explanations by mechanism
15960 Explanation is deducing a phenomenon from some nature better known to us [Boyle]
     Full Idea: Explicating a phenomenon is to deduce it from something else in nature more known to us than the thing to be explained by it.
     From: Robert Boyle (The Origin of Forms and Qualities [1666], p.46?), quoted by Peter Alexander - Ideas, Qualities and Corpuscles
     A reaction: Interesting that the word 'deduce' is here, beloved of the 'covering law' view. But this may be deduced from the behaviour of other substances, as the iron filing behaviour may be explained by the magnet itself (or perhaps 'laws' of magnetism).
22. Metaethics / A. Ethics Foundations / 2. Source of Ethics / a. Idealistic ethics
23035 The good life aims at perfections, or absolute laws, or what is absolutely desirable [Green,TH]
     Full Idea: The differentia of the good life …is controlled by the consciousness of there being some perfection which has to be fulfilled, some law which has to be obeyed, something absolutely desirable whatever the individual may for the time desire.
     From: T.H. Green (Prolegomena to Ethics [1882], p.134), quoted by John H. Muirhead - The Service of the State II
     A reaction: The 'perfection' suggests Plato, and the 'law' suggests Kant. The idea that something is 'absolutely desirable' is, I suspect, aimed at the utilitarians, who don't care what is desired. I'm no idealist, but have some sympathy with this idea.
24. Political Theory / D. Ideologies / 6. Liberalism / c. Liberal equality
23037 People are improved by egalitarian institutions and habits [Green,TH]
     Full Idea: Man has bettered himself through institutions and habits which tend to make the welfare of all the welfare of each.
     From: T.H. Green (Prolegomena to Ethics [1882], p.180), quoted by John H. Muirhead - The Service of the State II
     A reaction: I like this a lot. We underestimate how the best social values are promoted by the existence of enlightened institutions, rather than by preaching and teaching. Schools, law courts and churche embody their values.
24. Political Theory / D. Ideologies / 6. Liberalism / e. Liberal community
23043 All talk of the progress of a nation must reduce to the progress of its individual members [Green,TH]
     Full Idea: Our ultimate standard of worth is an ideal of personal worth. All other values are relative to personal values. To speak of any progress of a nation or society or mankind except as relative to some greater worth of persons is to use words without meaning.
     From: T.H. Green (Prolegomena to Ethics [1882], p.193), quoted by John H. Muirhead - The Service of the State II
     A reaction: Note that, pre-verificationism, a Victorian talks of plausible words actually being meaningless. This is a good statement of the core doctrine of liberalism.
25. Social Practice / E. Policies / 5. Education / b. Education principles
13304 Learned men gain more in one day than others do in a lifetime [Posidonius]
     Full Idea: In a single day there lies open to men of learning more than there ever does to the unenlightened in the longest of lifetimes.
     From: Posidonius (fragments/reports [c.95 BCE]), quoted by Seneca the Younger - Letters from a Stoic 078
     A reaction: These remarks endorsing the infinite superiority of the educated to the uneducated seem to have been popular in late antiquity. It tends to be the religions which discourage great learning, especially in their emphasis on a single book.
26. Natural Theory / A. Speculations on Nature / 6. Early Matter Theories / g. Atomism
15952 The corpuscles just have shape, size and motion, which explains things without 'sympathies' or 'forces' [Boyle, by Alexander,P]
     Full Idea: In Boyle's corpuscular philosophy, all material substances are composed of minute particles or corpuscles, with ordinary properties such as shape, size and motion. There was no need for occult relations between them, such as sympathies, or even forces.
     From: report of Robert Boyle (The Origin of Forms and Qualities [1666]) by Peter Alexander - Ideas, Qualities and Corpuscles 01.1
26. Natural Theory / A. Speculations on Nature / 7. Later Matter Theories / b. Corpuscles
15972 The corpuscular theory allows motion, but does not include forces between the particles [Boyle, by Alexander,P]
     Full Idea: Though there is motion, the corpuscles will not be dynamic because the idea of forces between the particles or groups of them does not figure in the theory.
     From: report of Robert Boyle (The Origin of Forms and Qualities [1666]) by Peter Alexander - Ideas, Qualities and Corpuscles 5.2
     A reaction: This is the view of Locke, as well as of Boyle. I quote this because I take to it be a particular target of Leibniz's disagreement.
27. Natural Reality / D. Time / 1. Nature of Time / d. Time as measure
20820 Time is an interval of motion, or the measure of speed [Posidonius, by Stobaeus]
     Full Idea: Posidonius defined time thus: it is an interval of motion, or the measure of speed and slowness.
     From: report of Posidonius (fragments/reports [c.95 BCE]) by John Stobaeus - Anthology 1.08.42
     A reaction: Hm. Can we define motion or speed without alluding to time? Looks like we have to define them as a conjoined pair, which means we cannot fully understand either of them.