46 ideas
| 13567 | Ontology should give insight into or an explanation of the world revealed by science [Ellis] |
| 13604 | Real possibility and necessity has the logic of S5, which links equivalence classes of worlds of the same kind [Ellis] |
| 16489 | Is it possible to state every possible truth about the whole course of nature without using 'not'? [Russell] |
| 13606 | Humean conceptions of reality drive the adoption of extensional logic [Ellis] |
| 10502 | We can rise by degrees through abstraction, with higher levels representing more things [Arnauld,A/Nicole,P] |
| 13584 | The extension of a property is a contingent fact, so cannot be the essence of the property [Ellis] |
| 13587 | There is no property of 'fragility', as things are each fragile in a distinctive way [Ellis] |
| 13577 | Typical 'categorical' properties are spatio-temporal, such as shape [Ellis] |
| 9436 | The property of 'being an electron' is not of anything, and only electrons could have it [Ellis] |
| 13582 | 'Being a methane molecule' is not a property - it is just a predicate [Ellis] |
| 13580 | Causal powers must necessarily act the way they do [Ellis] |
| 13598 | Causal powers are often directional (e.g. centripetal, centrifugal, circulatory) [Ellis] |
| 13568 | Basic powers may not be explained by structure, if at the bottom level there is no structure [Ellis] |
| 13586 | Maybe dispositions can be explained by intrinsic properties or structures [Ellis] |
| 13585 | The most fundamental properties of nature (mass, charge, spin ...) all seem to be dispositions [Ellis] |
| 13596 | A causal power is a disposition to produce forces [Ellis] |
| 13599 | Powers are dispositions of the essences of kinds that involve them in causation [Ellis] |
| 13572 | There are 'substantive' (objects of some kind), 'dynamic' (events of some kind) and 'property' universals [Ellis] |
| 13573 | Universals are all types of natural kind [Ellis] |
| 13571 | Scientific essentialism doesn't really need Kripkean individual essences [Ellis] |
| 13578 | The old idea that identity depends on essence and behaviour is rejected by the empiricists [Ellis] |
| 13576 | Necessities are distinguished by their grounds, not their different modalities [Ellis] |
| 16490 | Some facts about experience feel like logical necessities [Russell] |
| 13570 | Individual essences necessitate that individual; natural kind essences necessitate kind membership [Ellis] |
| 18258 | We can only know the exterior world via our ideas [Arnauld,A/Nicole,P] |
| 16488 | It is hard to explain how a sentence like 'it is not raining' can be found true by observation [Russell] |
| 13607 | If events are unconnected, then induction cannot be solved [Ellis] |
| 13597 | Good explanations unify [Ellis] |
| 13601 | Explanations of particular events are not essentialist, as they don't reveal essential structures [Ellis] |
| 16784 | Forms make things distinct and explain the properties, by pure form, or arrangement of parts [Arnauld,A/Nicole,P] |
| 13569 | To give essentialist explanations there have to be natural kinds [Ellis] |
| 10499 | We know by abstraction because we only understand composite things a part at a time [Arnauld,A/Nicole,P] |
| 10501 | A triangle diagram is about all triangles, if some features are ignored [Arnauld,A/Nicole,P] |
| 10500 | No one denies that a line has width, but we can just attend to its length [Arnauld,A/Nicole,P] |
| 13600 | The point of models in theories is not to idealise, but to focus on what is essential [Ellis] |
| 16491 | If we define 'this is not blue' as disbelief in 'this is blue', we eliminate 'not' as an ingredient of facts [Russell] |
| 13583 | There might be uninstantiated natural kinds, such as transuranic elements which have never occurred [Ellis] |
| 13574 | Natural kinds are distinguished by resting on essences [Ellis] |
| 13575 | If there are borderline cases between natural kinds, that makes them superficial [Ellis] |
| 13595 | Laws don't exist in the world; they are true of the world [Ellis] |
| 13566 | A proton must have its causal role, because without it it wouldn't be a proton [Ellis] |
| 13579 | What is most distinctive of scientific essentialism is regarding processes as natural kinds [Ellis] |
| 13581 | Scientific essentialism is more concerned with explanation than with identity (Locke, not Kripke) [Ellis] |
| 13594 | The ontological fundamentals are dispositions, and also categorical (spatio-temporal and structural) properties [Ellis] |
| 13603 | A primary aim of science is to show the limits of the possible [Ellis] |
| 4786 | Russell's 'at-at' theory says motion is to be at the intervening points at the intervening instants [Russell, by Psillos] |