23 ideas
10185 | Set theory is the standard background for modern mathematics [Burgess] |
10184 | Structuralists take the name 'R' of the reals to be a variable ranging over structures, not a structure [Burgess] |
10189 | There is no one relation for the real number 2, as relations differ in different models [Burgess] |
10186 | If set theory is used to define 'structure', we can't define set theory structurally [Burgess] |
10187 | Abstract algebra concerns relations between models, not common features of all the models [Burgess] |
10188 | How can mathematical relations be either internal, or external, or intrinsic? [Burgess] |
9476 | If dispositions are more fundamental than causes, then they won't conceptually reduce to them [Bird on Lewis] |
13074 | Only natural kinds and their members have real essences [Suárez, by Cover/O'Leary-Hawthorne] |
8425 | For true counterfactuals, both antecedent and consequent true is closest to actuality [Lewis] |
8424 | Determinism says there can't be two identical worlds up to a time, with identical laws, which then differ [Lewis] |
8420 | A proposition is a set of possible worlds where it is true [Lewis] |
7563 | The old 'influx' view of causation says it is a flow of accidental properties from A to B [Suárez, by Jolley] |
8405 | A theory of causation should explain why cause precedes effect, not take it for granted [Lewis, by Field,H] |
8427 | I reject making the direction of causation axiomatic, since that takes too much for granted [Lewis] |
10392 | It is just individious discrimination to pick out one cause and label it as 'the' cause [Lewis] |
8419 | The modern regularity view says a cause is a member of a minimal set of sufficient conditions [Lewis] |
8421 | Regularity analyses could make c an effect of e, or an epiphenomenon, or inefficacious, or pre-empted [Lewis] |
17525 | The counterfactual view says causes are necessary (rather than sufficient) for their effects [Lewis, by Bird] |
17524 | Lewis has basic causation, counterfactuals, and a general ancestral (thus handling pre-emption) [Lewis, by Bird] |
8397 | Counterfactual causation implies all laws are causal, which they aren't [Tooley on Lewis] |
8423 | My counterfactual analysis applies to particular cases, not generalisations [Lewis] |
8426 | One event causes another iff there is a causal chain from first to second [Lewis] |
4795 | Lewis's account of counterfactuals is fine if we know what a law of nature is, but it won't explain the latter [Cohen,LJ on Lewis] |