50 ideas
| 17663 | If you know what it is, investigation is pointless. If you don't, investigation is impossible [Armstrong] |
| 22358 | Scientific objectivity lies in inter-subjective testing [Popper] |
| 9406 | A class is natural when everybody can spot further members of it [Quinton] |
| 17688 | Negative facts are supervenient on positive facts, suggesting they are positive facts [Armstrong] |
| 15730 | Extreme nominalists say all classification is arbitrary convention [Quinton] |
| 17691 | Nothing is genuinely related to itself [Armstrong] |
| 17679 | All instances of some property are strictly identical [Armstrong] |
| 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] |
| 12677 | Armstrong holds that all basic properties are categorical [Armstrong, by Ellis] |
| 17666 | Actualism means that ontology cannot contain what is merely physically possible [Armstrong] |
| 17667 | Dispositions exist, but their truth-makers are actual or categorical properties [Armstrong] |
| 17687 | If everything is powers there is a vicious regress, as powers are defined by more powers [Armstrong] |
| 17678 | Universals are just the repeatable features of a world [Armstrong] |
| 17669 | Realist regularity theories of laws need universals, to pick out the same phenomena [Armstrong] |
| 17677 | Past, present and future must be equally real if universals are instantiated [Armstrong] |
| 17686 | Universals are abstractions from states of affairs [Armstrong] |
| 15442 | Universals are abstractions from their particular instances [Armstrong, by Lewis] |
| 15729 | Uninstantiated properties must be defined using the instantiated ones [Quinton] |
| 17668 | It is likely that particulars can be individuated by unique conjunctions of properties [Armstrong] |
| 8520 | An individual is a union of a group of qualities and a position [Quinton, by Campbell,K] |
| 17680 | The identity of a thing with itself can be ruled out as a pseudo-property [Armstrong] |
| 17693 | The necessary/contingent distinction may need to recognise possibilities as real [Armstrong] |
| 22188 | Give Nobel Prizes for really good refutations? [Gorham on Popper] |
| 7780 | Falsification is the criterion of demarcation between science and non-science [Popper, by Magee] |
| 16830 | We don't only reject hypotheses because we have falsified them [Lipton on Popper] |
| 6794 | If falsification requires logical inconsistency, then probabilistic statements can't be falsified [Bird on Popper] |
| 6795 | When Popper gets in difficulties, he quietly uses induction to help out [Bird on Popper] |
| 3856 | Good theories have empirical content, explain a lot, and are not falsified [Popper, by Newton-Smith] |
| 7779 | There is no such thing as induction [Popper, by Magee] |
| 17685 | Induction aims at 'all Fs', but abduction aims at hidden or theoretical entities [Armstrong] |
| 3860 | Science cannot be shown to be rational if induction is rejected [Newton-Smith on Popper] |
| 17683 | Science suggests that the predicate 'grue' is not a genuine single universal [Armstrong] |
| 17675 | Unlike 'green', the 'grue' predicate involves a time and a change [Armstrong] |
| 17674 | The raven paradox has three disjuncts, confirmed by confirming any one of them [Armstrong] |
| 17672 | A good reason for something (the smoke) is not an explanation of it (the fire) [Armstrong] |
| 17684 | To explain observations by a regular law is to explain the observations by the observations [Armstrong] |
| 17676 | Best explanations explain the most by means of the least [Armstrong] |
| 17664 | Each subject has an appropriate level of abstraction [Armstrong] |
| 17692 | We can't deduce the phenomena from the One [Armstrong] |
| 17689 | Absences might be effects, but surely not causes? [Armstrong] |
| 17662 | Science depends on laws of nature to study unobserved times and spaces [Armstrong] |
| 17682 | A universe couldn't consist of mere laws [Armstrong] |
| 17690 | Oaken conditional laws, Iron universal laws, and Steel necessary laws [Armstrong, by PG] |
| 17670 | Newton's First Law refers to bodies not acted upon by a force, but there may be no such body [Armstrong] |
| 8582 | Regularities are lawful if a second-order universal unites two first-order universals [Armstrong, by Lewis] |
| 17671 | A naive regularity view says if it never occurs then it is impossible [Armstrong] |
| 17681 | The laws of nature link properties with properties [Armstrong] |
| 16246 | Rather than take necessitation between universals as primitive, just make laws primitive [Maudlin on Armstrong] |
| 9480 | Armstrong has an unclear notion of contingent necessitation, which can't necessitate anything [Bird on Armstrong] |