Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'Classical Cosmology (frags)', 'Letters to Leibniz' and 'Law and Causality'

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7 ideas

8. Modes of Existence / C. Powers and Dispositions / 4. Powers as Essence

12750	The question is whether force is self-sufficient in bodies, and essential, or dependent on something [Lenfant]
	Full Idea: The whole question is to know if the force to act in bodies is in matter something distinct and independent of everything else that one conceives there. Without that, this force cannot be its essence, and will remain the result of some primitive quality.
	From: Jacques Lenfant (Letters to Leibniz [1693], 1693.11.07), quoted by Daniel Garber - Leibniz:Body,Substance,Monad 8
	A reaction: This challenge to Leibniz highlights the drama of trying to simultaneously arrive at explanations of things, and to decide the nature of essence. Leibniz replied that force is primitive, because it is the 'principle' of behaviour and dispositions.

10. Modality / B. Possibility / 8. Conditionals / d. Non-truthfunction conditionals

10993	Ramsey's Test: believe the consequent if you believe the antecedent [Ramsey, by Read]
	Full Idea: Ramsey's Test for conditionals is that a conditional should be believed if a belief in its antecedent would commit one to believing its consequent.
	From: report of Frank P. Ramsey (Law and Causality [1928]) by Stephen Read - Thinking About Logic Ch.3
	A reaction: A rather pragmatic approach to conditionals

10. Modality / B. Possibility / 8. Conditionals / e. Supposition conditionals

14279	Asking 'If p, will q?' when p is uncertain, then first add p hypothetically to your knowledge [Ramsey]
	Full Idea: If two people are arguing 'If p, will q?' and are both in doubt as to p, they are adding p hypothetically to their stock of knowledge, and arguing on that basis about q; ...they are fixing their degrees of belief in q given p.
	From: Frank P. Ramsey (Law and Causality [1928], B 155 n)
	A reaction: This has become famous as the 'Ramsey Test'. Bennett emphasises that he is not saying that you should actually believe p - you are just trying it for size. The presupposition approach to conditionals seems attractive. Edgington likes 'degrees'.

14. Science / B. Scientific Theories / 8. Ramsey Sentences

6894	Mental terms can be replaced in a sentence by a variable and an existential quantifier [Ramsey]
	Full Idea: Ramsey Sentences are his technique for eliminating theoretical terms in science (and can be applied to mental terms, or to social rights); a term in a sentence is replaced by a variable and an existential quantifier.
	From: Frank P. Ramsey (Law and Causality [1928]), quoted by Thomas Mautner - Penguin Dictionary of Philosophy p.469
	A reaction: The technique is used by functionalists and results in a sort of eliminativism. The intrinsic nature of mental states is eliminated, because everything worth saying can be expressed in terms of functional/causal role. Sounds wrong to me.

26. Natural Theory / D. Laws of Nature / 4. Regularities / b. Best system theory

9418	All knowledge needs systematizing, and the axioms would be the laws of nature [Ramsey]
	Full Idea: Even if we knew everything, we should still want to systematize our knowledge as a deductive system, and the general axioms in that system would be the fundamental laws of nature.
	From: Frank P. Ramsey (Law and Causality [1928], §A)
	A reaction: This is the Mill-Ramsey-Lewis view. Cf. Idea 9420.

9420	Causal laws result from the simplest axioms of a complete deductive system [Ramsey]
	Full Idea: Causal laws are consequences of those propositions which we should take as axioms if we knew everything and organized it as simply as possible in a deductive system.
	From: Frank P. Ramsey (Law and Causality [1928], §B)
	A reaction: Cf. Idea 9418.

27. Natural Reality / E. Cosmology / 1. Cosmology

5994	Is the cosmos open or closed, mechanical or teleological, alive or inanimate, and created or eternal? [Robinson,TM, by PG]
	Full Idea: The four major disputes in classical cosmology were whether the cosmos is 'open' or 'closed', whether it is explained mechanistically or teleologically, whether it is alive or mere matter, and whether or not it has a beginning.
	From: report of T.M. Robinson (Classical Cosmology (frags) [1997]) by PG - Db (ideas)
	A reaction: A nice summary. The standard modern view is closed, mechanistic, inanimate and non-eternal. But philosophers can ask deeper questions than physicists, and I say we are entitled to speculate when the evidence runs out.