54 ideas
| 13310 | Wisdom does not lie in books, and unread people can also become wise [Seneca] |
| 13295 | Wise people escape necessity by willing it [Seneca] |
| 13317 | Philosophy aims at happiness [Seneca] |
| 13293 | What philosophy offers humanity is guidance [Seneca] |
| 13309 | That something is a necessary condition of something else doesn't mean it caused it [Seneca] |
| 13313 | Even philosophers have got bogged down in analysing tiny bits of language [Seneca] |
| 4643 | The Principle of Sufficient Reason does not presuppose that all explanations will be causal explanations [Baggini /Fosl] |
| 4633 | You cannot rationally deny the principle of non-contradiction, because all reasoning requires it [Baggini /Fosl] |
| 4635 | Dialectic aims at unified truth, unlike analysis, which divides into parts [Baggini /Fosl] |
| 4632 | 'Natural' systems of deduction are based on normal rational practice, rather than on axioms [Baggini /Fosl] |
| 4631 | In ideal circumstances, an axiom should be such that no rational agent could possibly object to its use [Baggini /Fosl] |
| 4638 | The principle of bivalence distorts reality, as when claiming that a person is or is not 'thin' [Baggini /Fosl] |
| 15642 | If kinds depend only on what can be observed, many underlying essences might produce the same kind [Eagle] |
| 15645 | Nominal essence are the observable properties of things [Eagle] |
| 15643 | Nominal essence mistakenly gives equal weight to all underlying properties that produce appearances [Eagle] |
| 4640 | If identity is based on 'true of X' instead of 'property of X' we get the Masked Man fallacy ('I know X but not Y') [Baggini /Fosl, by PG] |
| 4647 | 'I have the same car as you' is fine; 'I have the same fiancée as you' is not so good [Baggini /Fosl] |
| 4639 | Leibniz's Law is about the properties of objects; the Identity of Indiscernibles is about perception of objects [Baggini /Fosl] |
| 4646 | Is 'events have causes' analytic a priori, synthetic a posteriori, or synthetic a priori? [Baggini /Fosl] |
| 4645 | 'A priori' does not concern how you learn a proposition, but how you show whether it is true or false [Baggini /Fosl] |
| 4582 | Basic beliefs are self-evident, or sensual, or intuitive, or revealed, or guaranteed [Baggini /Fosl] |
| 4644 | A proposition such as 'some swans are purple' cannot be falsified, only verified [Baggini /Fosl] |
| 4584 | The problem of induction is how to justify our belief in the uniformity of nature [Baggini /Fosl] |
| 4583 | How can an argument be good induction, but poor deduction? [Baggini /Fosl] |
| 13297 | To the four causes Plato adds a fifth, the idea which guided the event [Seneca] |
| 4634 | Abduction aims at simplicity, testability, coherence and comprehensiveness [Baggini /Fosl] |
| 4637 | To see if an explanation is the best, it is necessary to investigate the alternative explanations [Baggini /Fosl] |
| 13307 | If everything can be measured, try measuring the size of a man's soul [Seneca] |
| 4629 | Consistency is the cornerstone of rationality [Baggini /Fosl] |
| 21399 | Referring to a person, and speaking about him, are very different [Seneca] |
| 13325 | Trouble in life comes from copying other people, which is following convention instead of reason [Seneca] |
| 22239 | Humans acquired the concept of virtue from an analogy with bodily health and strength [Seneca, by Allen] |
| 13294 | We know death, which is like before birth; ceasing to be and never beginning are the same [Seneca] |
| 13299 | Living is nothing wonderful; what matters is to die well [Seneca] |
| 13300 | It is as silly to lament ceasing to be as to lament not having lived in the remote past [Seneca] |
| 13321 | Is anything sweeter than valuing yourself more when you find you are loved? [Seneca] |
| 13292 | Selfishness does not produce happiness; to live for yourself, live for others [Seneca] |
| 13303 | A man is as unhappy as he has convinced himself he is [Seneca] |
| 13302 | Life is like a play - it is the quality that matters, not the length [Seneca] |
| 13301 | We are scared of death - except when we are immersed in pleasure! [Seneca] |
| 13323 | The whole point of pleasure-seeking is novelty, and abandoning established ways [Seneca] |
| 13318 | Nature doesn't give us virtue; we must unremittingly pursue it, as a training and an art [Seneca] |
| 13324 | Living contrary to nature is like rowing against the stream [Seneca] |
| 13305 | Character is ruined by not looking back over our pasts, since the future rests on the past [Seneca] |
| 13308 | It's no good winning lots of fights, if you are then conquered by your own temper [Seneca] |
| 13312 | Excessive curiosity is a form of intemperance [Seneca] |
| 13315 | To govern used to mean to serve, not to rule; rulers did not test their powers over those who bestowed it [Seneca] |
| 13290 | One joy of learning is making teaching possible [Seneca] |
| 13322 | Both teachers and pupils should aim at one thing - the improvement of the pupil [Seneca] |
| 13298 | Suicide may be appropriate even when it is not urgent, if there are few reasons against it [Seneca] |
| 13319 | If we control our own death, no one has power over us [Seneca] |
| 13320 | Sometimes we have a duty not to commit suicide, for those we love [Seneca] |
| 15641 | Kinds are fixed by the essential properties of things - the properties that make it that kind of thing [Eagle] |
| 13311 | Does time exist on its own? Did anything precede it? Did it pre-exist the cosmos? [Seneca] |