27 ideas
9406 | A class is natural when everybody can spot further members of it [Quinton] |
15730 | Extreme nominalists say all classification is arbitrary convention [Quinton] |
15728 | The naturalness of a class depends as much on the observers as on the objects [Quinton] |
9407 | Properties imply natural classes which can be picked out by everybody [Quinton] |
8780 | Attributes are functions, not objects; this distinguishes 'square of 2' from 'double of 2' [Geach] |
15729 | Uninstantiated properties must be defined using the instantiated ones [Quinton] |
8520 | An individual is a union of a group of qualities and a position [Quinton, by Campbell,K] |
14759 | A thing is simply a long event, linked by qualities, and spatio-temporal unity [Broad] |
11842 | If short-lived happenings like car crashes are 'events', why not long-lived events like Dover Cliffs? [Broad] |
11910 | Being 'the same' is meaningless, unless we specify 'the same X' [Geach] |
8775 | A big flea is a small animal, so 'big' and 'small' cannot be acquired by abstraction [Geach] |
8776 | We cannot learn relations by abstraction, because their converse must be learned too [Geach] |
2567 | You can't define real mental states in terms of behaviour that never happens [Geach] |
2568 | Beliefs aren't tied to particular behaviours [Geach] |
8781 | The mind does not lift concepts from experience; it creates them, and then applies them [Geach] |
8769 | If someone has aphasia but can still play chess, they clearly have concepts [Geach] |
8770 | 'Abstractionism' is acquiring a concept by picking out one experience amongst a group [Geach] |
8771 | 'Or' and 'not' are not to be found in the sensible world, or even in the world of inner experience [Geach] |
8772 | We can't acquire number-concepts by extracting the number from the things being counted [Geach] |
8773 | Abstractionists can't explain counting, because it must precede experience of objects [Geach] |
8774 | The numbers don't exist in nature, so they cannot have been abstracted from there into our languages [Geach] |
8778 | Blind people can use colour words like 'red' perfectly intelligently [Geach] |
8777 | If 'black' and 'cat' can be used in the absence of such objects, how can such usage be abstracted? [Geach] |
8779 | We can form two different abstract concepts that apply to a single unified experience [Geach] |
8160 | The present and past exist, but the future does not [Broad, by Dummett] |
14609 | We could say present and past exist, but not future, so that each event adds to the total history [Broad] |
22933 | We imagine the present as a spotlight, moving across events from past to future [Broad] |