12 ideas
15127 | A categorical basis could hardly explain a disposition if it had no powers of its own [Hawthorne] |
Full Idea: The categorical basis would be a poor explanans for the disposition as explanandum, if the categorical basis did not drag any causal powers along with it. | |
From: John Hawthorne (Causal Structuralism [2001], 2.4) | |
A reaction: The idea that the world is explained just by some basic stuff having qualities and relations always strikes me as wrong, because the view of nature is too passive. |
15123 | Is the causal profile of a property its essence? [Hawthorne] |
Full Idea: We might say that the causal profile of a property is its essence. | |
From: John Hawthorne (Causal Structuralism [2001], Intro) | |
A reaction: I associate this view with Shoemaker, and find it sympathetic. We always want to know more. What gives rise to these causal powers? Where does explanation end? He notes that you might say some of the powers are non-essential. |
15122 | Could two different properties have the same causal profile? [Hawthorne] |
Full Idea: If there is more to the nature of a property than the causal powers that it confers, then two different internal natures of properties might necessitate the same causal profile. | |
From: John Hawthorne (Causal Structuralism [2001], Intro) | |
A reaction: If the causal profiles were identical, it is hard to see how we could even propose, let alone test, their intrinsic difference. ...Unless, perhaps, we knew that the properties arose from different substrata. |
15124 | If properties are more than their powers, we could have two properties with the same power [Hawthorne] |
Full Idea: If a property is something over and above its causal profile, we seem to have conceptual space for an electron to have negative charge 1 and negative charge 2, that have exactly the same causal powers. | |
From: John Hawthorne (Causal Structuralism [2001], 1.3) |
15128 | We can treat the structure/form of the world differently from the nodes/matter of the world [Hawthorne] |
Full Idea: It does not seem altogether arbitrary to treat the structure of the world (the 'form' of the world) in a different way to the nodes in the structure (the 'matter' of the world). | |
From: John Hawthorne (Causal Structuralism [2001], 2.5) | |
A reaction: An interesting contemporary spin put on Aristotle's original view. Hawthorne is presenting the Aristotle account as a sort of 'structuralism' about nature. |
15121 | An individual essence is a necessary and sufficient profile for a thing [Hawthorne] |
Full Idea: An individual essence is a profile that is necessary and sufficient for some particular thing. | |
From: John Hawthorne (Causal Structuralism [2001], Intro) | |
A reaction: By 'for' he presumably means for the thing to have an existence and a distinct identity. If it retained its identity, but didn't function any more, would that be loss of essence? |
3157 | T.H.Huxley gave the earliest clear statement of epiphenomenalism [Huxley, by Rey] |
Full Idea: T.H.Huxley gave the earliest clear statement of epiphenomenalism. | |
From: report of T.H. Huxley (Method and Results [1893]) by Georges Rey - Contemporary Philosophy of Mind 3.1.1 | |
A reaction: This is, of course, impossible, because there can't be a clear statement of epiphenomenalism. |
3154 | Brain causes mind, but it doesn't seem that mind causes actions [Huxley] |
Full Idea: All states of consciousness are caused by molecular changes of brain substance. It seems to me there is no proof that any state of consciousness is the cause of change in the motion of the matter of the organism. | |
From: T.H. Huxley (Method and Results [1893], p.244), quoted by Georges Rey - Contemporary Philosophy of Mind 3.1.1 | |
A reaction: This sounds odd. Most people would say there is nothing more obvious than mental events causing actions. It certainly seems undeniable that actions are cause by the contents of thoughts, so a molecular account of intentional states is needed. |
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. |
15126 | Maybe scientific causation is just generalisation about the patterns [Hawthorne] |
Full Idea: Perhaps science doesn't need a robust conception of causation, and can get by with thinking of causal laws in a Humean way, as the simplest generalization over the mosaic. | |
From: John Hawthorne (Causal Structuralism [2001], 1.5) | |
A reaction: The Humean view he is referring to is held by David Lewis. That seems a council of defeat. We observe from a distance, but make no attempt to explain. |
15125 | We only know the mathematical laws, but not much else [Hawthorne] |
Full Idea: We know the laws of the physical world, in so far as they are mathematical, pretty well, but we know nothing else about it. | |
From: John Hawthorne (Causal Structuralism [2001], Ch.25) | |
A reaction: Lovely remark [spotted by Hawthorne]. This sums up exactly what I take to be the most pressing issue in philosophy of science - that we develop a view of science that has space for the next step in explanation. |
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. |