8 ideas
| 12219 | Whether a modal claim is true depends on how the object is described [Quine, by Fine,K] |
| Full Idea: Quine says if ∃x□(x>7) makes sense, then for which object x is the condition rendered true? Specify it as '9' and it is apparently rendered true, specify it as 'the number of planets' and it is apparently rendered false. | |
| From: report of Willard Quine (Three Grades of Modal Involvement [1953]) by Kit Fine - Quine on Quantifying In p.105 | |
| A reaction: This is normally characterised as Quine saying that only de dicto involvement is possible, and not de re involvement. Or that that all essences are nominal, and cannot be real. |
| 10922 | Objects are the values of variables, so a referentially opaque context cannot be quantified into [Quine] |
| Full Idea: The objects of a theory are not properly describable as the things named by the singular terms; they are the values, rather, of the variables of quantification. ..So a referentially opaque context is one that cannot properly be quantified into. | |
| From: Willard Quine (Three Grades of Modal Involvement [1953], p.174) | |
| A reaction: The point being that you cannot accurately pick out the objects in the domain |
| 10923 | Aristotelian essentialism says a thing has some necessary and some non-necessary properties [Quine] |
| Full Idea: What Aristotelian essentialism says is that you can have open sentences Fx and Gx, such that ∃x(nec Fx.Gx.¬nec Gx). For example, ∃x(nec(x>5). there are just x planets. ¬nec(there are just x planets)). | |
| From: Willard Quine (Three Grades of Modal Involvement [1953], p.176) | |
| A reaction: This is a denial of 'maximal essentialism', that all of a things properties might be essential. Quine is thus denying necessity, except under a description. He may be equivocating over the reference of 'there are just 9 planets'. |
| 10921 | Necessity can attach to statement-names, to statements, and to open sentences [Quine] |
| Full Idea: Three degrees necessity in logic or semantics: first and least is attaching a semantical predicate to the names of statements (as Nec '9>5'); second and more drastic attaches to statements themselves; third and gravest attaches to open sentences. | |
| From: Willard Quine (Three Grades of Modal Involvement [1953], p.158) |
| 10924 | Necessity is in the way in which we say things, and not things themselves [Quine] |
| Full Idea: Necessity resides in the way in which we say things, and not in the things we talk about. | |
| From: Willard Quine (Three Grades of Modal Involvement [1953], p.176) | |
| A reaction: This is a culminating idea of Quine's thoroughgoing empiricism, as filtered through logical positivism. I would hardly dare to accuse Quine of a use/mention confusion (his own bęte noir), but one seems to me to be lurking here. |
| 21058 | Enlightenment requires the free use of reason in the public realm [Kant] |
| Full Idea: The public use of man's reason must always be free, and it alone can bring about enlightenment among men; the private use of reason may quite often be very narrowly restricted (…in a particular civil post or office). | |
| From: Immanuel Kant (Answer to 'What is Enlightenment?' [1784], p.55) | |
| A reaction: The private aspect seems to be the common restriction on speech by employees of the state. Does free speech have only instrumental value? Is the life of virtue possible without it? |
| 16713 | Philosophers are the forefathers of heretics [Tertullian] |
| Full Idea: Philosophers are the forefathers of heretics. | |
| From: Tertullian (works [c.200]), quoted by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 20.2 |
| 6610 | I believe because it is absurd [Tertullian] |
| Full Idea: I believe because it is absurd ('Credo quia absurdum est'). | |
| From: Tertullian (works [c.200]), quoted by Robert Fogelin - Walking the Tightrope of Reason n4.2 | |
| A reaction: This seems to be a rather desperate remark, in response to what must have been rather good hostile arguments. No one would abandon the support of reason if it was easy to acquire. You can't deny its engaging romantic defiance, though. |