49 ideas
24032 | Clever scholars can obscure things which are obvious even to peasants [Descartes] |
15477 | Ontology is highly abstract physics, containing placeholders and exclusions [Martin,CB] |
24033 | Most scholastic disputes concern words, where agreeing on meanings would settle them [Descartes] |
24024 | The secret of the method is to recognise which thing in a series is the simplest [Descartes] |
24018 | One truth leads us to another [Descartes] |
15471 | Truth is a relation between a representation ('bearer') and part of the world ('truthmaker') [Martin,CB] |
24036 | I can only see the proportion of two to three if there is a common measure - their unity [Descartes] |
24035 | Unity is something shared by many things, so in that respect they are equals [Descartes] |
24029 | Among the simples are the graspable negations, such as rest and instants [Descartes] |
15484 | A property is a combination of a disposition and a quality [Martin,CB] |
15478 | Properties are the respects in which objects resemble, which places them in classes [Martin,CB] |
15483 | Properties are ways particular things are, and so they are tied to the identity of their possessor [Martin,CB] |
15480 | Objects are not bundles of tropes (which are ways things are, not parts of things) [Martin,CB] |
15489 | A property that cannot interact is worse than inert - it isn't there at all [Martin,CB] |
15487 | If unmanifested partnerless dispositions are still real, and are not just qualities, they can explain properties [Martin,CB] |
15479 | Properties endow a ball with qualities, and with powers or dispositions [Martin,CB] |
15488 | Qualities and dispositions are aspects of properties - what it exhibits, and what it does [Martin,CB] |
15469 | Dispositions in action can be destroyed, be recovered, or remain unchanged [Martin,CB] |
15467 | Powers depend on circumstances, so can't be given a conditional analysis [Martin,CB] |
15466 | 'The wire is live' can't be analysed as a conditional, because a wire can change its powers [Martin,CB] |
15465 | Structures don't explain dispositions, because they consist of dispositions [Martin,CB] |
15476 | Structural properties involve dispositionality, so cannot be used to explain it [Martin,CB] |
15481 | I favour the idea of a substratum for properties; spacetime seems to be just a bearer of properties [Martin,CB] |
15474 | Properly understood, wholes do no more causal work than their parts [Martin,CB] |
15486 | Only abstract things can have specific and full identity specifications [Martin,CB] |
15475 | The concept of 'identity' must allow for some changes in properties or parts [Martin,CB] |
24030 | 3+4=7 is necessary because we cannot conceive of seven without including three and four [Descartes] |
15472 | It is pointless to say possible worlds are truthmakers, and then deny that possible worlds exist [Martin,CB] |
24019 | If we accept mere probabilities as true we undermine our existing knowledge [Descartes] |
24020 | We all see intuitively that we exist, where intuition is attentive, clear and distinct rational understanding [Descartes] |
24031 | When Socrates doubts, he know he doubts, and that truth is possible [Descartes] |
24025 | Clear and distinct truths must be known all at once (unlike deductions) [Descartes] |
24022 | Our souls possess divine seeds of knowledge, which can bear spontaneous fruit [Descartes] |
24034 | If someone had only seen the basic colours, they could deduce the others from resemblance [Descartes] |
24021 | The method starts with clear intuitions, followed by a process of deduction [Descartes] |
15492 | Explanations are mind-dependent, theory-laden, and interest-relative [Martin,CB] |
15495 | Analogy works, as when we eat food which others seem to be relishing [Martin,CB] |
24027 | Nerves and movement originate in the brain, where imagination moves them [Descartes] |
24026 | Our four knowledge faculties are intelligence, imagination, the senses, and memory [Descartes] |
15493 | Memory requires abstraction, as reminders of what cannot be fully remembered [Martin,CB] |
24028 | The force by which we know things is spiritual, and quite distinct from the body [Descartes] |
541 | Virtue comes more from habit than character [Critias] |
24023 | All the sciences searching for order and measure are related to mathematics [Descartes] |
15485 | Instead of a cause followed by an effect, we have dispositions in reciprocal manifestation [Martin,CB] |
15491 | Causation should be explained in terms of dispositions and manifestations [Martin,CB] |
15468 | Causal counterfactuals are just clumsy linguistic attempts to indicate dispositions [Martin,CB] |
15470 | Causal laws are summaries of powers [Martin,CB] |
15482 | We can't think of space-time as empty and propertyless, and it seems to be a substratum [Martin,CB] |
542 | Fear of the gods was invented to discourage secret sin [Critias] |