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16648
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Accidents must have formal being, if they are principles of real action, and of mental action and thought [Duns Scotus]
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Full Idea:
Accidents are principles of acting and principles of cognizing substance, and are the per se objects of the senses. But it is ridiculous to say that something is a principle of acting (either real or intentional) and yet does not have any formal being.
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From:
John Duns Scotus (Ordinatio [1302], IV.12.1), quoted by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 10.5
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A reaction:
Pasnau cites this as the key scholastic argument for accidental properties having some independent and real existence (as required for Transubstantiation). Rival views say accidents are just 'modes' of a thing's existence. Aquinas compromised.
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15386
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If only the singular exists, science is impossible, as that relies on true generalities [Duns Scotus, by Panaccio]
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Full Idea:
Scotus argued that if everything is singular, with no objective common feature, science would be impossible, as it proceeds from general concepts. General is the opposite of singular, so it would be inadequate to understand a singular reality.
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From:
report of John Duns Scotus (Ordinatio [1302]) by Claude Panaccio - Medieval Problem of Universals 'John Duns'
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A reaction:
[compressed] It is a fact that if you generalise about 'tigers', you are glossing over the individuality of each singular tiger. That is OK for 'electron', if they really are identical, but our general predicates may be imposing identity on electrons.
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16632
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We distinguish one thing from another by contradiction, because this is, and that is not [Duns Scotus]
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Full Idea:
What is it [that establishes distinctness of things]? It is, to be sure, that which is universally the reason for distinguishing one thing from another: namely, a contradiction…..If this is, and that is not, then they are not the same entity in being.
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From:
John Duns Scotus (Ordinatio [1302], IV.11.3), quoted by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 08.2
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A reaction:
This is a remarkably intellectualist view of such things. John Wycliff, apparently, enquired about how animals were going to manage all this sort of thing. It should appeal to the modern logical approach to metaphysics.
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13094
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The haecceity is the featureless thing which gives ultimate individuality to a substance [Duns Scotus, by Cover/O'Leary-Hawthorne]
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Full Idea:
For Scotus, the haecceity of an individual was a positive non-quidditative entity which, together with a common nature from which it was formally distinct, played the role of the ultimate differentia, thus individuating the substance.
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From:
report of John Duns Scotus (Ordinatio [1302]) by Cover,J/O'Leary-Hawthorne,J - Substance and Individuation in Leibniz 6.1.3
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A reaction:
Most thinkers seem to agree (with me) that this is a non-starter, an implausible postulate designed to fill a gap in a metaphysic that hasn't been properly worked out. Leibniz is the hero who faces the problem and works around it.
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16770
|
It is absurd that there is no difference between a genuinely unified thing, and a mere aggregate [Duns Scotus]
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Full Idea:
It seems absurd …that there should be no difference between a whole that is one thing per se, and a whole that is one thing by aggregation, like a cloud or a heap.
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From:
John Duns Scotus (Ordinatio [1302], III.2.2), quoted by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 25.5
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A reaction:
Leibniz invented monads because he was driven crazy by the quest for 'true unity' in things. Objective unity may be bogus, but I suspect that imposing plausible unity on things is the only way we can grasp the world.
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5845
|
Niceratus learnt the whole of Homer by heart, as a guide to goodness [Xenophon]
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Full Idea:
Niceratus said that his father, because he was concerned to make him a good man, made him learn the whole works of Homer, and he could still repeat by heart the entire 'Iliad' and 'Odyssey'.
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From:
Xenophon (Symposium [c.391 BCE], 3.5)
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A reaction:
This clearly shows the status which Homer had in the teaching of morality in the time of Socrates, and it is precisely this acceptance of authority which he was challenging, in his attempts to analyse the true basis of virtue
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13222
|
The Boundless cannot exist on its own, and must have something contrary to it [Aristotle on Anaximander]
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Full Idea:
Those thinkers are in error who postulate ...a single matter, for this cannot exist without some 'perceptible contrariety': this Boundless, which they identify with the 'original real', must be either light or heavy, either hot or cold.
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From:
comment on Anaximander (fragments/reports [c.570 BCE]) by Aristotle - Coming-to-be and Passing-away (Gen/Corr) 329a10
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A reaction:
A dubious objection, I would say. If there has to be a contrasting cold thing to any hot thing, what happens when the cold thing is removed?
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