7 ideas
21697 | The Struthionic Fallacy is that of burying one's head in the sand [Quine] |
Full Idea: The Struthionic Fallacy is that of burying one's head in the sand [which I name from the Greek for 'ostrich'] | |
From: Willard Quine (Lecture on Nominalism [1946], §4) | |
A reaction: David Armstrong said this is the the fallacy involved in a denial of universals. Quine is accusing Carnap and co. of the fallacy. |
21698 | All relations, apart from ancestrals, can be reduced to simpler logic [Quine] |
Full Idea: Much of the theory of relations can be developed as a virtual theory, in which we seem to talk of relations, but can explain our notation in terms {finally] of just the logic of truth-functions, quantification and identity. The exception is ancestrals. | |
From: Willard Quine (Lecture on Nominalism [1946], §8) | |
A reaction: The irreducibility of ancestrals is offered as a reason for treating sets as universals. |
21696 | Nominalism rejects both attributes and classes (where extensionalism accepts the classes) [Quine] |
Full Idea: 'Nominalism' is distinct from 'extensionalism'. The main point of the latter doctrine is rejection of properties or attributes in favour of classes. But class are universals equally with attributes, and nominalism in the defined sense rejects both. | |
From: Willard Quine (Lecture on Nominalism [1946], §3) | |
A reaction: Hence Quine soon settled on labelling himself as an 'extensionalist', leaving proper nominalism to Nelson Goodman. It is commonly observed that science massively refers to attributes, so they can't just be eliminated. |
21686 | Sense-data are dubious abstractions, with none of the plausibility of tables [Quine] |
Full Idea: The notion of pure sense datum is a pretty tenuous abstraction, a good deal more conjectural than the notion of an external object, a table or a sheep. | |
From: Willard Quine (On Mental Entities [1952], p.225) | |
A reaction: This seems to sum up the view of sense-data held by the generation after Russell and Moore. Ayer still talks about them, but Russell had already given them up. The simple challenge is - what is the evidence for their existence? Cf innate ideas. |
21685 | Empiricism says evidence rests on the senses, but that insight is derived from science [Quine] |
Full Idea: The crucial insight of empiricism is that any evidence for science has its end points in the senses. This insight remains valid, but it is an insight which comes after physics, physiology, and psychology, not before. | |
From: Willard Quine (On Mental Entities [1952], p.225) | |
A reaction: Interesting. I think Hume and co. were probably outlining essential presuppositions and contraints which must be accepted by science. Quine offers empiricism as more like a description of science (with success as its authority?). |
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. |