5 ideas
| 12712 | Substance is that which can act [Leibniz] |
| Full Idea: I define substance as that which can act. | |
| From: Gottfried Leibniz (Definitiones cogitationesque metaphysicae [1678], A6.4.1398), quoted by Daniel Garber - Leibniz:Body,Substance,Monad 3 | |
| A reaction: This is in tune with the notion that to exist is to have causal powers. I find the view congenial, and the middle period of Leibniz's thought, before monads became too spiritual, chimes in with my view. |
| 14380 | The distinction between necessary and essential properties can be ignored [Rocca] |
| Full Idea: Some philosophers distinguish between necessary properties and essential properties. This distinction is irrelevant to my purposes. Following Yablo, I shall ignore this distinction in what follows. | |
| From: Michael della Rocca (Essentialists and Essentialism [1996], I n1) | |
| A reaction: This is two years after Kit Fine's seminal paper suggesting the distinction is real. The first step towards a good metaphysics is to realise that Della Rocca and Yablo have made a horrible mistake. |
| 12737 | Nature can be fully explained by final causes alone, or by efficient causes alone [Leibniz] |
| Full Idea: All the phenomena of nature can be explained solely by final causes, exactly as if there were no efficient causes; and all the phenomena of nature can be explained solely by efficient causes, as if there were no final causes. | |
| From: Gottfried Leibniz (Definitiones cogitationesque metaphysicae [1678], A6.4.1403), quoted by Daniel Garber - Leibniz:Body,Substance,Monad 6 | |
| A reaction: Somewhat speculative (a virtue!), but it is interesting to see him suggesting that there might be two complete and satisfactory explanations, which never touched one another. I can't see Aristotle agreeing with that. |
| 12156 | Aesthetics has risen and fallen with Romanticism [Scruton] |
| Full Idea: The rise and fall (as we presently perceive them) of aesthetics have been contemporaneous with the rise and fall of Romanticism. | |
| From: Roger Scruton (Recent Aesthetics in England and America [1980], p.3) | |
| A reaction: Maybe it started a little before Romanticism, as part of the Englightenment aim of being rational about everything, and maybe it survives Romanticism because we want to be scientific about everything. |
| 12158 | Aesthetic experience informs the world with the values of the observer [Scruton] |
| Full Idea: It is possible to conclude that aesthetic experience has a peculiar practical significance: it represents the world as informed by the values of the observer. | |
| From: Roger Scruton (Recent Aesthetics in England and America [1980], p.13) | |
| A reaction: An excellent remark. If you look at, or listen to, anything, you can make a conscious effort to drain away your personal values (objectivity; science?), or you can consciously flood them with values. But moral and aesthetic vision must differ... |