45 ideas
| 4642 | No fact can be real and no proposition true unless there is a Sufficient Reason (even if we can't know it) [Leibniz] |
| 15557 | Verisimilitude has proved hard to analyse, and seems to have several components [Lewis] |
| 2115 | Everything in the universe is interconnected, so potentially a mind could know everything [Leibniz] |
| 2111 | Falsehood involves a contradiction, and truth is contradictory of falsehood [Leibniz] |
| 7644 | The monad idea incomprehensibly spiritualises matter, instead of materialising soul [La Mettrie on Leibniz] |
| 11857 | He replaced Aristotelian continuants with monads [Leibniz, by Wiggins] |
| 7843 | Is a drop of urine really an infinity of thinking monads? [Voltaire on Leibniz] |
| 12751 | It is unclear in 'Monadology' how extended bodies relate to mind-like monads. [Garber on Leibniz] |
| 19363 | Changes in a monad come from an internal principle, and the diversity within its substance [Leibniz] |
| 19352 | A 'monad' has basic perception and appetite; a 'soul' has distinct perception and memory [Leibniz] |
| 15554 | A disposition needs a causal basis, a property in a certain causal role. Could the disposition be the property? [Lewis] |
| 7931 | If a substance is just a thing that has properties, it seems to be a characterless non-entity [Leibniz, by Macdonald,C] |
| 17554 | There must be some internal difference between any two beings in nature [Leibniz] |
| 15560 | We can explain a chance event, but can never show why some other outcome did not occur [Lewis] |
| 2112 | Truths of reason are known by analysis, and are necessary; facts are contingent, and their opposites possible [Leibniz] |
| 9344 | Mathematical analysis ends in primitive principles, which cannot be and need not be demonstrated [Leibniz] |
| 2110 | We all expect the sun to rise tomorrow by experience, but astronomers expect it by reason [Leibniz] |
| 15559 | Does a good explanation produce understanding? That claim is just empty [Lewis] |
| 15556 | Science may well pursue generalised explanation, rather than laws [Lewis] |
| 15558 | A good explanation is supposed to show that the event had to happen [Lewis] |
| 4809 | Lewis endorses the thesis that all explanation of singular events is causal explanation [Lewis, by Psillos] |
| 14321 | To explain an event is to provide some information about its causal history [Lewis] |
| 2109 | Increase a conscious machine to the size of a mill - you still won't see perceptions in it [Leibniz] |
| 19362 | We know the 'I' and its contents by abstraction from awareness of necessary truths [Leibniz] |
| 18648 | Freedom to live according to our own conception of the good is the ultimate value [Nozick, by Kymlicka] |
| 20585 | If an experience machine gives you any experience you want, should you hook up for life? [Nozick] |
| 18643 | A minimal state should protect, but a state forcing us to do more is unjustified [Nozick] |
| 18642 | Individual rights are so strong that the state and its officials must be very limited in power [Nozick] |
| 18644 | States can't enforce mutual aid on citizens, or interfere for their own good [Nozick] |
| 22661 | My Anarchy, State and Utopia neglected our formal social ties and concerns [Nozick on Nozick] |
| 18641 | If people hold things legitimately, just distribution is simply the result of free exchanges [Nozick, by Kymlicka] |
| 20539 | Property is legitimate by initial acquisition, voluntary transfer, or rectification of injustice [Nozick, by Swift] |
| 18645 | Nozick assumes initial holdings include property rights, but we can challenge that [Kymlicka on Nozick] |
| 20521 | Can I come to own the sea, by mixing my private tomato juice with it? [Nozick] |
| 18646 | How did the private property get started? If violence was involved, we can redistribute it [Kymlicka on Nozick] |
| 18647 | If property is only initially acquired by denying the rights of others, Nozick can't get started [Kymlicka on Nozick] |
| 21737 | Unowned things may be permanently acquired, if it doesn't worsen the position of other people [Nozick] |
| 21738 | Maybe land was originally collectively owned, rather than unowned? [Cohen,GA on Nozick] |
| 12707 | The true elements are atomic monads [Leibniz] |
| 15555 | Explaining match lighting in general is like explaining one lighting of a match [Lewis] |
| 15551 | Ways of carving causes may be natural, but never 'right' [Lewis] |
| 15552 | We only pick 'the' cause for the purposes of some particular enquiry. [Lewis] |
| 15553 | Causal dependence is counterfactual dependence between events [Lewis] |
| 2114 | This is the most perfect possible universe, in its combination of variety with order [Leibniz] |
| 2113 | God alone (the Necessary Being) has the privilege that He must exist if He is possible [Leibniz] |