19 ideas
17325 | Truth-maker theory can't cope with non-causal dependence [Liggins] |
Full Idea: My charge is that truth-maker theory cannot be integrated into an attractive general account of non-causal dependence. | |
From: David Liggins (Truth-makers and dependence [2012], 10.6) | |
A reaction: [You'll have to read Liggins to see why] |
17318 | Truthmakers for existence is fine; otherwise maybe restrict it to synthetic truths? [Liggins] |
Full Idea: Many philosophers agree that true existential propositions have a truth-maker, but some go further, claiming that every true proposition has a truth-maker. More cautious theorists specify a class of truths, such as synthetic propositions. | |
From: David Liggins (Truth-makers and dependence [2012], 10.1) | |
A reaction: [compressed; Armstrong is the ambitious one, and Rodriguez-Pereyra proposes the synthetic propositions] Presumably synthetic propositions can make negative assertions, which are problematic for truth-makers. |
11211 | If a sound conclusion comes from two errors that cancel out, the path of the argument must matter [Rumfitt] |
Full Idea: If a designated conclusion follows from the premisses, but the argument involves two howlers which cancel each other out, then the moral is that the path an argument takes from premisses to conclusion does matter to its logical evaluation. | |
From: Ian Rumfitt ("Yes" and "No" [2000], II) | |
A reaction: The drift of this is that our view of logic should be a little closer to the reasoning of ordinary language, and we should rely a little less on purely formal accounts. |
11210 | Standardly 'and' and 'but' are held to have the same sense by having the same truth table [Rumfitt] |
Full Idea: If 'and' and 'but' really are alike in sense, in what might that likeness consist? Some philosophers of classical logic will reply that they share a sense by virtue of sharing a truth table. | |
From: Ian Rumfitt ("Yes" and "No" [2000]) | |
A reaction: This is the standard view which Rumfitt sets out to challenge. |
11212 | The sense of a connective comes from primitively obvious rules of inference [Rumfitt] |
Full Idea: A connective will possess the sense that it has by virtue of its competent users' finding certain rules of inference involving it to be primitively obvious. | |
From: Ian Rumfitt ("Yes" and "No" [2000], III) | |
A reaction: Rumfitt cites Peacocke as endorsing this view, which characterises the logical connectives by their rules of usage rather than by their pure semantic value. |
17320 | Either p is true or not-p is true, so something is true, so something exists [Liggins] |
Full Idea: Either p or not-p. If p, then the proposition 'p' is true. If not p, then the proposition 'not p' is true. Either way, something is true. Thus something exists. | |
From: David Liggins (Truth-makers and dependence [2012], 10.3 n5) | |
A reaction: Liggins offers this dodgy argument as an objection to conceptual truths having truth-makers. |
17326 | The dependence of {Socrates} on Socrates involves a set and a philosopher, not facts [Liggins] |
Full Idea: The dependence of {Socrates} on Socrates appears to involve a set and a philosopher, neither of which is a fact. | |
From: David Liggins (Truth-makers and dependence [2012], 10.6) | |
A reaction: He points out that defenders of facts as the basis of dependence could find a suitable factual paraphrase here. Socrates is just Socrates, but the singleton has to be understood in a particular way to generate the dependence. |
17327 | Non-causal dependence is at present only dimly understood [Liggins] |
Full Idea: Non-causal dependence is at present only dimly understood. | |
From: David Liggins (Truth-makers and dependence [2012], 10.8) | |
A reaction: Not very helpful, you may be thinking, but it is always helpful to know where we have got to in the enquiry. |
17322 | Necessities supervene on everything, but don't depend on everything [Liggins] |
Full Idea: Necessities supervene upon everything, but they do not depend on everything. | |
From: David Liggins (Truth-makers and dependence [2012], 10.4) | |
A reaction: I'm not sure if merely existing together counts as sufficiently close to be 'supervenience'. If 2+2 necessitates 4, that hardly seems to 'supervene' on the Eiffel Tower. If so, how close must things be to qualify for supervenience? |
22868 | The value and truth of knowledge are measured by success in activity [Dewey] |
Full Idea: What measures knowledge's value, its correctness and truth, is the degree of its availability for conducting to a successful issue the activities of living beings. | |
From: John Dewey (The Middle Works (15 vols, ed Boydston) [1910], 4:180), quoted by David Hildebrand - Dewey 2 'Critique' | |
A reaction: Note that this is the measure of truth, not the nature of truth (which James seemed to believe). Dewey gives us a clear and perfect statement of the pragmatic view of knowledge. I don't agree with it. |
17324 | 'Because' can signal an inference rather than an explanation [Liggins] |
Full Idea: 'Because' can signal an inference rather than an explanation. | |
From: David Liggins (Truth-makers and dependence [2012], 10.5) | |
A reaction: Aristotle starts from words like 'why?', but it can be a deceptive approach to explanation. |
17321 | Value, constitution and realisation are non-causal dependences that explain [Liggins] |
Full Idea: 'It is wrong because it produces pain for fun', and 'these constitute a table because they are arranged tablewise', and 'tea is poisonous because it contains arsenic' are clearly non-causal uses of 'because', and neither are they conceptual. | |
From: David Liggins (Truth-makers and dependence [2012], 10.4) | |
A reaction: The general line seems to be that any form of determination will underwrite an explanation. He talks later of the 'wrongmaker' and 'poisonmaker' relationships to add to the 'truthmaker'. The table example is the 'object-maker' dependence relation. |
17323 | If explanations track dependence, then 'determinative' explanations seem to exist [Liggins] |
Full Idea: If explanation often tracks dependence, then we have a theoretical reason to expect such explanations to exist. Let us call such explanations 'determinative'. | |
From: David Liggins (Truth-makers and dependence [2012], 10.4) | |
A reaction: There seems to be an emerging understanding that this 'determination' relation is central to all of explanation - with causal explanations, for example, being a particular instance of it. I like it. These are real, not conventional, explanations. |
22865 | Habits constitute the self [Dewey] |
Full Idea: All habits are demands for certain kinds of activity; and they constitute the self. | |
From: John Dewey (The Middle Works (15 vols, ed Boydston) [1910], 14:22), quoted by David Hildebrand - Dewey 1 'Acts' | |
A reaction: Not an idea I have encountered elsewhere. He emphasises that habits are not repeated actions, but are dispositions. I'm not clear whether these habits must be conscious. |
11214 | We learn 'not' along with affirmation, by learning to either affirm or deny a sentence [Rumfitt] |
Full Idea: The standard view is that affirming not-A is more complex than affirming the atomic sentence A itself, with the latter determining its sense. But we could learn 'not' directly, by learning at once how to either affirm A or reject A. | |
From: Ian Rumfitt ("Yes" and "No" [2000], IV) | |
A reaction: [compressed] This seems fairly anti-Fregean in spirit, because it looks at the psychology of how we learn 'not' as a way of clarifying what we mean by it, rather than just looking at its logical behaviour (and thus giving it a secondary role). |
22871 | The good people are those who improve; the bad are those who deteriorate [Dewey] |
Full Idea: The bad man is the man who no matter how good he has been is beginning to deteriorate, to grow less good. The good man is the man who no matter how morally unworthy he has been is moving to become better. | |
From: John Dewey (The Middle Works (15 vols, ed Boydston) [1910], 12:181), quoted by David Hildebrand - Dewey 3 'Reconstruct' | |
A reaction: Although a slightly improving rat doesn't sound as good as a slightly deteriorating saint, I have some sympathy with this thought. The desire to improve seems to be right at the heart of what makes good character. |
22876 | Democracy is the development of human nature when it shares in the running of communal activities [Dewey] |
Full Idea: Democracy is but a name for the fact that human nature is developed only when its elements take part in directing things which are common, things for the sake of which men and women form groups. | |
From: John Dewey (The Middle Works (15 vols, ed Boydston) [1910], 12:199), quoted by David Hildebrand - Dewey 4 'Democracy' | |
A reaction: It is hard to prove that human nature develops when it particpates in groups. If people are excluded from power, their loyalty tends to switch to sub-groups, such as friends in a pub, or a football team. Powerless nationalists baffle me. |
22875 | Democracy is not just a form of government; it is a mode of shared living [Dewey] |
Full Idea: A democracy is more than a form of government; it is primarily a mode of associated living, of conjoint communicated experience | |
From: John Dewey (The Middle Works (15 vols, ed Boydston) [1910], 9:93), quoted by David Hildebrand - Dewey 4 'Democracy' | |
A reaction: This precisely pinpoints the heart of the culture wars in 2021. A huge swathe of western populations believe in Dewey's idea, but a core of wealthy right-wingers and their servants only see democracy as the mechanism for obtaining power. |
22874 | Individuality is only developed within groups [Dewey] |
Full Idea: Only in social groups does a person have a chance to develop individuality. | |
From: John Dewey (The Middle Works (15 vols, ed Boydston) [1910], 15:176), quoted by David Hildebrand - Dewey 4 'Individuals' | |
A reaction: This is a criticism of both Rawls and Nozick. Rawls's initial choosers don't consult, or have much social background. Nozick's property owners ignore everything except contracts. |