5 ideas
22104 | Truth is the conformity of being to intellect [Aquinas] |
Full Idea: The word 'true' expresses the conformity of a being to intellect. | |
From: Thomas Aquinas (Disputed questions about truth [1267], I.1c), quoted by Kretzmann/Stump - Aquinas, Thomas 09 | |
A reaction: I believe in a 'robust' theory of truth, but accept that the concept of 'correspondence' has major problems. So I embrace with delight the word 'conformity'. I offer the world The Conformity Theory of Truth! 'Conform' is suitably vague. |
22103 | Being is basic to thought, and all other concepts are additions to being [Aquinas] |
Full Idea: Being is inherently intellect's most intelligible object, in which it finds the basis of all conceptions. ...All of intellect's other conceptions must be arrived at by adding to being, insofar as they express what is not expressed by 'being' itself. | |
From: Thomas Aquinas (Disputed questions about truth [1267], I.1c), quoted by Kretzmann/Stump - Aquinas, Thomas 09 | |
A reaction: I like the word 'intelligible' here. We might know reality, or be aware of appearances, but what is intelligible lies nicely in between. What would Berkeley make of that? I presume 'intelligible' means 'makes good sense'. |
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. |
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. |
6011 | There is a remote first god (the Good), and a second god who organises the material world [Numenius, by O'Meara] |
Full Idea: Numenius argues that material reality depends on intelligible being, which depends on a first god - the Good - which is difficult to grasp, but which inspires a second god to imitate it, turning to matter and organizing it as the world. | |
From: report of Numenius (fragments/reports [c.160]) by Dominic J. O'Meara - Numenius | |
A reaction: The interaction problem comes either between the two gods, or between the second god and the world. The argument may have failed to catch on for long when people scented an infinite regress lurking in the middle of it. |