14 ideas
21642 | If quantification is all substitutional, there is no ontology [Quine] |
1633 | Absolute ontological questions are meaningless, because the answers are circular definitions [Quine] |
18964 | Ontology is relative to both a background theory and a translation manual [Quine] |
11993 | Jones may cease to exist without some simple property, but that doesn't make it essential [Kung] |
11997 | A property may belong essentially to one thing and contingently to another [Kung] |
11992 | Aristotelian essences underlie a thing's existence, explain it, and must belong to it [Kung] |
18965 | We know what things are by distinguishing them, so identity is part of ontology [Quine] |
1634 | Two things are relative - the background theory, and translating the object theory into the background theory [Quine] |
11995 | Some peripheral properties are explained by essential ones, but don't themselves explain properties [Kung] |
11996 | Some non-essential properties may explain more than essential-but-peripheral ones do [Kung] |
8470 | Reference is inscrutable, because we cannot choose between theories of numbers [Quine, by Orenstein] |
18963 | Indeterminacy translating 'rabbit' depends on translating individuation terms [Quine] |
1748 | Archelaus was the first person to say that the universe is boundless [Archelaus, by Diog. Laertius] |
5989 | Archelaus said life began in a primeval slime [Archelaus, by Schofield] |