19 ideas
| 13734 | Modern Quinean metaphysics is about what exists, but Aristotelian metaphysics asks about grounding [Schaffer,J] |
| Full Idea: On the now dominant Quinean view, metaphysics is about what there is (such as properties, meanings and numbers). I will argue for the revival of a more traditional Aristotelian view, on which metaphysics is about what grounds what. | |
| From: Jonathan Schaffer (On What Grounds What [2009], Intro) | |
| A reaction: I find that an enormously helpful distinction, and support the Aristotelian view. Schaffer's general line is that what exists is fairly uncontroversial and dull, but the interesting truths about the world emerge when we grasp its structure. |
| 13751 | If you tore the metaphysics out of philosophy, the whole enterprise would collapse [Schaffer,J] |
| Full Idea: Traditional metaphysics is so tightly woven into the fabric of philosophy that it cannot be torn out without the whole tapestry unravelling. | |
| From: Jonathan Schaffer (On What Grounds What [2009], 2.3) | |
| A reaction: I often wonder why the opponents of metaphysics still continue to do philosophy. I don't see how you address questions of ethics, or philosophy of mathematics (etc) without coming up against highly general and abstract over-questions. |
| 13743 | We should not multiply basic entities, but we can have as many derivative entities as we like [Schaffer,J] |
| Full Idea: Occam's Razor should only be understood to concern substances: do not multiply basic entities without necessity. There is no problem with the multiplication of derivative entities - they are an 'ontological free lunch'. | |
| From: Jonathan Schaffer (On What Grounds What [2009], 2.1) | |
| A reaction: The phrase 'ontological free lunch' comes from Armstrong. This is probably what Occam meant. A few extra specks of dust, or even a few more numbers (thank you, Cantor!) don't seem to challenge the principle. |
| 13741 | If 'there are red roses' implies 'there are roses', then 'there are prime numbers' implies 'there are numbers' [Schaffer,J] |
| Full Idea: We can automatically infer 'there are roses' from 'there are red roses' (with no shift in the meaning of 'roses'). Likewise one can automatically infer 'there are numbers' from 'there are prime numbers'. | |
| From: Jonathan Schaffer (On What Grounds What [2009], 2.1) | |
| A reaction: He similarly observes that the atheist's 'God is a fictional character' implies 'there are fictional characters'. Schaffer is not committing to a strong platonism with his claim - merely that the existence of numbers is hardly worth disputing. |
| 13748 | Grounding is unanalysable and primitive, and is the basic structuring concept in metaphysics [Schaffer,J] |
| Full Idea: Grounding should be taken as primitive, as per the neo-Aristotelian approach. Grounding is an unanalyzable but needed notion - it is the primitive structuring conception of metaphysics. | |
| From: Jonathan Schaffer (On What Grounds What [2009], 2.2) | |
| A reaction: [he cites K.Fine 1991] I find that this simple claim clarifies the discussions of Kit Fine, where you are not always quite sure what the game is. I agree fully with it. It makes metaphysics interesting, where cataloguing entities is boring. |
| 13747 | Supervenience is just modal correlation [Schaffer,J] |
| Full Idea: Supervenience is mere modal correlation. | |
| From: Jonathan Schaffer (On What Grounds What [2009], 2.2) |
| 13744 | The cosmos is the only fundamental entity, from which all else exists by abstraction [Schaffer,J] |
| Full Idea: My preferred view is that there is only one fundamental entity - the whole concrete cosmos - from which all else exists by abstraction. | |
| From: Jonathan Schaffer (On What Grounds What [2009], 2.1) | |
| A reaction: This looks to me like weak anti-realism - that there are no natural 'joints' in nature - but I don't think Schaffer intends that. I take the joints to be fundamentals, which necessitates that the cosmos has parts. His 'abstraction' is clearly a process. |
| 16657 | Substance, Quantity and Quality are real; other categories depend on those three [Henry of Ghent] |
| Full Idea: Among creatures there are only three 'res' belong to the three first categories: Substance, Quantity and Quality. All other are aspects [rationes] and intellectual concepts with respect to them, with reality only as grounded on the res of those three. | |
| From: Henry of Ghent (Quodlibeta [1284], VII:1-2), quoted by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 12.3 | |
| A reaction: Pasnau connects with the 'arrangement of being', giving an 'ontologically innocent' structure to reality. That seems to be what we all want, if only we could work out the ontologically guilty bit. |
| 13739 | Maybe categories are just the different ways that things depend on basic substances [Schaffer,J] |
| Full Idea: Maybe the categories are determined by the different grounding relations, ..so that categories just are the ways things depend on substances. ...Categories are places in the dependence ordering. | |
| From: Jonathan Schaffer (On What Grounds What [2009], 1.3) |
| 16658 | The only reality in the category of Relation is things from another category [Henry of Ghent] |
| Full Idea: There is beyond a doubt nothing real in the category of Relation, except what is a thing from another category. | |
| From: Henry of Ghent (Quodlibeta [1284], VII:1-2), quoted by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 12.3 | |
| A reaction: This seems to have been the fairly orthodox scholastic view of relations. |
| 16645 | Accidents are diminished beings, because they are dispositions of substance (unqualified being) [Henry of Ghent] |
| Full Idea: Accidents are beings only in a qualified and diminished sense, because they are not called beings, nor are they beings, except because they are dispositions of an unqualified being, a substance. | |
| From: Henry of Ghent (Quodlibeta [1284], XV.5), quoted by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 10.4 | |
| A reaction: This is aimed to 'half' detach the accidents (as the Eucharist requires). Later scholastics detached them completely. Late scholastics seem to have drifted back to Henry's view. The equivocal use of 'being' here was challenged later. |
| 13742 | There exist heaps with no integral unity, so we should accept arbitrary composites in the same way [Schaffer,J] |
| Full Idea: I am happy to accept universal composition, on the grounds that there are heaps, piles etc with no integral unity, and that arbitrary composites are no less unified than heaps. | |
| From: Jonathan Schaffer (On What Grounds What [2009], 2.1 n11) | |
| A reaction: The metaphysical focus is then placed on what constitutes 'integral unity', which is precisely the question which most interested Aristotle. Clearly if there is nothing more to an entity than its components, scattering them isn't destruction. |
| 13752 | The notion of 'grounding' can explain integrated wholes in a way that mere aggregates can't [Schaffer,J] |
| Full Idea: The notion of grounding my capture a crucial mereological distinction (missing from classical mereology) between an integrated whole with genuine unity, and a mere aggregate. x is an integrated whole if it grounds its proper parts. | |
| From: Jonathan Schaffer (On What Grounds What [2009], 3.1) | |
| A reaction: That gives a nice theoretical notion, but if you remove each of the proper parts, does x remain? Is it a bare particular? I take it that it will have to be an abstract principle, the one Aristotle was aiming at with his notion of 'form'. Schaffer agrees. |
| 13749 | Belief in impossible worlds may require dialetheism [Schaffer,J] |
| Full Idea: One motivation for dialetheism is the view that there are impossible worlds. | |
| From: Jonathan Schaffer (On What Grounds What [2009], 2.3) |
| 13740 | 'Moorean certainties' are more credible than any sceptical argument [Schaffer,J] |
| Full Idea: A 'Moorean certainty' is when something is more credible than any philosopher's argument to the contrary. | |
| From: Jonathan Schaffer (On What Grounds What [2009], 2.1) | |
| A reaction: The reference is to G.E. Moore's famous claim that the existence of his hand is more certain than standard sceptical arguments. It sounds empiricist, but they might be parallel rational truths, of basic logic or arithmetic. |
| 22012 | Kant says things-in-themselves cause sensations, but then makes causation transcendental! [Henry of Ghent, by Pinkard] |
| Full Idea: Kant claimed that things-in-themselves caused our sensations; but causality was a transcendental condition of experience, not a property of things-in-themselves, so the great Kant had contradicted himself. | |
| From: report of Henry of Ghent (Quodlibeta [1284], Supplement) by Terry Pinkard - German Philosophy 1760-1860 04 | |
| A reaction: This early objection by the conservative Jacobi (who disliked Enlightenment rational religion) is the key to the dispute over whether Kant is an idealist. Kant denied being an idealist, but how can he be, if this idea is correct? |
| 23104 | Dworkin believed we should promote equality, to increase autonomy [Dworkin, by Kekes] |
| Full Idea: Egalitarians believe that most often it is by promoting equality that autonomy is increased; this is the egalitarianism of such liberals as Ronald Dworkin. | |
| From: report of Ronald Dworkin (Taking Rights Seriously [1977]) by John Kekes - Against Liberalism 05.1 | |
| A reaction: Not my idea of equality. The whole point is to ascribe reasonable equality to everyone, including those with a limited capacity for autonomy. Equality is a consequence of universal respect. |
| 23257 | We can treat people as equals, or actually treat them equally [Dworkin, by Grayling] |
| Full Idea: Dworkin distinguishes between treating people as equals, that is, 'with equal concern and respect', and treating them equally. This latter can be unjust. | |
| From: report of Ronald Dworkin (Taking Rights Seriously [1977]) by A.C. Grayling - The Good State 2 | |
| A reaction: The big difference I see between them is that the first is mere words, and the second is actions. Cf. 'thoughts and prayers' after US school shootings. How about equal entitlements, all things being equal? |
| 18621 | Treating people as equals is the one basic value of all plausible political theories [Dworkin, by Kymlicka] |
| Full Idea: Dworkin suggests that every plausible political theory has the same ultimate value, which is equality - in the more abstract and fundamental sense of treating people 'as equals'. | |
| From: report of Ronald Dworkin (Taking Rights Seriously [1977], 179-83) by Will Kymlicka - Contemporary Political Philosophy (1st edn) | |
| A reaction: I associate this idea with Kant (who says they are equal by virtue of their rationality), so that's a pretty influential idea. I would associate the main challenge to this with Nietzsche. |