Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'Locke on Essences and Kinds', 'Five Milestones of Empiricism' and 'Reply to Sixth Objections'

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12 ideas

2. Reason / D. Definition / 7. Contextual Definition
Contextual definition shifted the emphasis from words to whole sentences [Quine]
Bentham's contextual definitions preserved terms after their denotation became doubtful [Quine]
7. Existence / C. Structure of Existence / 5. Supervenience / c. Significance of supervenience
Two things being joined together doesn't prove they are the same [Descartes]
9. Objects / D. Essence of Objects / 13. Nominal Essence
If kinds depend only on what can be observed, many underlying essences might produce the same kind [Eagle]
Nominal essence are the observable properties of things [Eagle]
Nominal essence mistakenly gives equal weight to all underlying properties that produce appearances [Eagle]
12. Knowledge Sources / D. Empiricism / 1. Empiricism
In scientific theories sentences are too brief to be independent vehicles of empirical meaning [Quine]
Empiricism improvements: words for ideas, then sentences, then systems, then no analytic, then naturalism [Quine]
13. Knowledge Criteria / D. Scepticism / 3. Illusion Scepticism
Only judgement decides which of our senses are reliable [Descartes]
19. Language / E. Analyticity / 4. Analytic/Synthetic Critique
Holism in language blurs empirical synthetic and empty analytic sentences [Quine]
26. Natural Theory / B. Natural Kinds / 4. Source of Kinds
Kinds are fixed by the essential properties of things - the properties that make it that kind of thing [Eagle]
28. God / A. Divine Nature / 6. Divine Morality / d. God decrees morality
Ideas in God's mind only have value if he makes it so [Descartes]