90 ideas
6200 | Wisdom is knowing the highest good, and conforming the will to it [Kant] |
6207 | What fills me with awe are the starry heavens above me and the moral law within me [Kant] |
6184 | Consistency is the highest obligation of a philosopher [Kant] |
6947 | Metaphysics does not rest on facts, but on what we are inclined to believe [Peirce] |
6203 | Metaphysics is just a priori universal principles of physics [Kant] |
6937 | Reason aims to discover the unknown by thinking about the known [Peirce] |
21492 | Realism is basic to the scientific method [Peirce] |
6949 | If someone doubted reality, they would not actually feel dissatisfaction [Peirce] |
6181 | Necessity cannot be extracted from an empirical proposition [Kant] |
6941 | We are entirely satisfied with a firm belief, even if it is false [Peirce] |
6940 | The feeling of belief shows a habit which will determine our actions [Peirce] |
6942 | We want true beliefs, but obviously we think our beliefs are true [Peirce] |
6943 | A mere question does not stimulate a struggle for belief; there must be a real doubt [Peirce] |
6598 | We need our beliefs to be determined by some external inhuman permanency [Peirce] |
6944 | Demonstration does not rest on first principles of reason or sensation, but on freedom from actual doubt [Peirce] |
6948 | Doubts should be satisfied by some external permanency upon which thinking has no effect [Peirce] |
6945 | Once doubt ceases, there is no point in continuing to argue [Peirce] |
6183 | Can pure reason determine the will, or are empirical conditions relevant? [Kant] |
6191 | The will is the faculty of purposes, which guide desires according to principles [Kant] |
6190 | The sole objects of practical reason are the good and the evil [Kant] |
18235 | Only human reason can confer value on our choices [Kant, by Korsgaard] |
6196 | People cannot come to morality through feeling, because morality must not be sensuous [Kant] |
18675 | Kant may rate two things as finally valuable: having a good will, and deserving happiness [Orsi on Kant] |
22007 | An autonomous agent has dignity [Würde], which has absolute worth [Kant, by Pinkard] |
18234 | The good will is unconditionally good, because it is the only possible source of value [Kant, by Korsgaard] |
6192 | Good or evil cannot be a thing, but only a maxim of action, making the person good or evil [Kant] |
6197 | Morality involves duty and respect for law, not love of the outcome [Kant] |
6193 | Our happiness is all that matters, not as a sensation, but as satisfaction with our whole existence [Kant] |
1452 | Happiness is the condition of a rational being for whom everything goes as they wish [Kant] |
1454 | Morality is not about making ourselves happy, but about being worthy of happiness [Kant] |
6194 | The highest worth for human beings lies in dispositions, not just actions [Kant] |
6198 | Virtue is the supreme state of our pursuit of happiness, and so is supreme good [Kant] |
1456 | Moral law is holy, and the best we can do is achieve virtue through respect for the law [Kant] |
6185 | No one would lend money unless a universal law made it secure, even after death [Kant] |
6187 | Universality determines the will, and hence extends self-love into altruism [Kant] |
6201 | Everyone (even God) must treat rational beings as ends in themselves, and not just as means [Kant] |
6186 | A holy will is incapable of any maxims which conflict with the moral law [Kant] |
6195 | Reason cannot solve the problem of why a law should motivate the will [Kant] |
6188 | A permanent natural order could not universalise a rule permitting suicide [Kant] |
6939 | What is true of one piece of copper is true of another (unlike brass) [Peirce] |
21167 | Gravity is unusual, in that it always attracts and never repels [New Sci.] |
21176 | In the Big Bang general relativity fails, because gravity is too powerful [New Sci.] |
21155 | Photons have zero rest mass, so virtual photons have infinite range [New Sci.] |
21147 | Quantum electrodynamics incorporates special relativity and quantum mechanics [New Sci.] |
21161 | In the standard model all the fundamental force fields merge at extremely high energies [New Sci.] |
21146 | Electrons move fast, so are subject to special relativity [New Sci.] |
21148 | The strong force is repulsive at short distances, strong at medium, and fades at long [New Sci.] |
21151 | Gluons, the particles carrying the strong force, interact because of their colour charge [New Sci.] |
21152 | The strong force binds quarks tight, and the nucleus more weakly [New Sci.] |
21143 | Quarks in threes can build hadrons with spin ½ or with spin 3/2 [New Sci.] |
21150 | Three different colours of quark (as in the proton) can cancel out to give no colour [New Sci.] |
21142 | Classifying hadrons revealed two symmetry patterns, produced by three basic elements [New Sci.] |
21145 | The four fundamental forces (gravity, electromagnetism, weak and strong) are the effects of particles [New Sci.] |
21154 | Three particles enable the weak force: W+ and W- are charged, and Z° is not [New Sci.] |
21153 | The weak force explains beta decay, and the change of type by quarks and leptons [New Sci.] |
21156 | The weak force particles are heavy, so the force has a short range [New Sci.] |
21164 | Why do the charges of the very different proton and electron perfectly match up? [New Sci.] |
21170 | The Standard Model cannot explain dark energy, survival of matter, gravity, or force strength [New Sci.] |
21158 | Fermions, with spin ½, are antisocial, and cannot share quantum states [New Sci.] |
21165 | Spin is akin to rotation, and is easily measured in a magnetic field [New Sci.] |
21149 | Quarks have red, green or blue colour charge (akin to electric charge) [New Sci.] |
21140 | Spin is a built-in ration of angular momentum [New Sci.] |
21157 | Particles are spread out, with wave-like properties, and higher energy shortens the wavelength [New Sci.] |
21163 | The mass of protons and neutrinos is mostly binding energy, not the quarks [New Sci.] |
21168 | Gravitional mass turns out to be the same as inertial mass [New Sci.] |
21138 | Neutrons are slightly heavier than protons, and decay into them by emitting an electron [New Sci.] |
21144 | Top, bottom, charm and strange quarks quickly decay into up and down [New Sci.] |
21169 | Only neutrinos spin anticlockwise [New Sci.] |
21141 | Neutrinos were proposed as the missing energy in neutron beta decay [New Sci.] |
21166 | Standard antineutrinos have opposite spin and opposite lepton number [New Sci.] |
21171 | The symmetry of unified electromagnetic and weak forces was broken by the Higgs field [New Sci.] |
21175 | String theory might be tested by colliding strings to make bigger 'stringballs' [New Sci.] |
21177 | String theory offers a quantum theory of gravity, by describing the graviton [New Sci.] |
21179 | Supersymmetric string theory can be expressed using loop quantum gravity [New Sci.] |
21178 | String theory is now part of 11-dimensional M-Theory, involving p-branes [New Sci.] |
21159 | Supersymmetry has extra heavy bosons and heavy fermions [New Sci.] |
21172 | The evidence for supersymmetry keeps failing to appear [New Sci.] |
21173 | Supersymmetry says particles and superpartners were unities, but then split [New Sci.] |
21162 | Only supersymmetry offers to incorporate gravity into the scheme [New Sci.] |
21160 | The Higgs field means even low energy space is not empty [New Sci.] |
21174 | Dark matter must have mass, to produce gravity, and no electric charge, to not reflect light [New Sci.] |
6938 | Natural selection might well fill an animal's mind with pleasing thoughts rather than true ones [Peirce] |
6199 | Obligation does not rest on the existence of God, but on the autonomy of reason [Kant] |
1453 | We have to postulate something outside nature which makes happiness coincide with morality [Kant] |
1455 | Belief in justice requires belief in a place for justice (heaven), a time (eternity), and a cause (God) [Kant, by PG] |
6946 | If death is annihilation, belief in heaven is a cheap pleasure with no disappointment [Peirce] |
6205 | To know if this world must have been created by God, we would need to know all other possible worlds [Kant] |
6204 | Using God to explain nature is referring to something inconceivable to explain what is in front of you [Kant] |
6206 | From our limited knowledge we can infer great virtues in God, but not ultimate ones [Kant] |
6202 | In all naturalistic concepts of God, if you remove the human qualities there is nothing left [Kant] |