Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'Philosophical Fragments', 'Categories' and 'Posthumous notes'

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4 ideas

2. Reason / F. Fallacies / 8. Category Mistake / a. Category mistakes
18004 We can't do philosophy without knowledge of types and categories [Ryle]
     Full Idea: We are in the dark about the nature of philosophical problems and methods if we are in the dark about types and categories.
     From: Gilbert Ryle (Categories [1938], p.189), quoted by Ofra Magidor - Category Mistakes 1.2
     A reaction: Magidor and others take this to be an assertion about language and logic, but I take it to be an assertion about reality. It is an early assertion of Schaffer's claim that ontology concerns the structure of existence, and not just what exists.
7. Existence / A. Nature of Existence / 5. Reason for Existence
16007 I assume existence, rather than reasoning towards it [Kierkegaard]
     Full Idea: I always reason from existence, not towards existence.
     From: Søren Kierkegaard (Philosophical Fragments [1844], p.40)
     A reaction: Kierkegaard's important premise to help show that theistic proofs for God's existence don't actually prove existence, but develop the content of a conception. [SY]
10. Modality / A. Necessity / 2. Nature of Necessity
16013 Nothing necessary can come into existence, since it already 'is' [Kierkegaard]
     Full Idea: Can the necessary come into existence? That is a change, and everything that comes into existence demonstrates that it is not necessary. The necessary already 'is'.
     From: Søren Kierkegaard (Philosophical Fragments [1844], p.74)
     A reaction: [SY]
11. Knowledge Aims / C. Knowing Reality / 3. Idealism / d. Absolute idealism
21971 Transcendental philosophy is the subject becoming the originator of unified reality [Kant]
     Full Idea: Transcendental philosophy is the act of consciousness whereby the subject becomes the originator of itself and, thereby, of the whole object of technical-practical and moral-practical reason in one system - ordering all things in God
     From: Immanuel Kant (Posthumous notes [1799], 21:78, p.245), quoted by A.W. Moore - The Evolution of Modern Metaphysics 06 App
     A reaction: This is evidently Kant's last word on the matter (c.1799), and Moore says he was drifting close to Fichte's idealism, in which reality is actually (sort of) created by our own minds. Disappointing! God's role here is unclear.