28 ideas
15435 | If you think universals are immanent, you must believe them to be sparse, and not every related predicate [Lewis] |
15451 | I assume there could be natural properties that are not instantiated in our world [Lewis] |
15433 | Tropes are particular properties, which cannot recur, but can be exact duplicates [Lewis] |
15436 | Universals are meant to give an account of resemblance [Lewis] |
15438 | We can add a primitive natural/unnatural distinction to class nominalism [Lewis] |
15448 | The 'magical' view of structural universals says they are atoms, even though they have parts [Lewis] |
15449 | If 'methane' is an atomic structural universal, it has nothing to connect it to its carbon universals [Lewis] |
15439 | The 'pictorial' view of structural universals says they are wholes made of universals as parts [Lewis] |
15441 | The structural universal 'methane' needs the universal 'hydrogen' four times over [Lewis] |
15445 | Butane and Isobutane have the same atoms, but different structures [Lewis] |
15434 | Structural universals have a necessary connection to the universals forming its parts [Lewis] |
15437 | We can't get rid of structural universals if there are no simple universals [Lewis] |
15446 | Composition is not just making new things from old; there are too many counterexamples [Lewis] |
15440 | A whole is distinct from its parts, but is not a further addition in ontology [Lewis] |
15444 | Different things (a toy house and toy car) can be made of the same parts at different times [Lewis] |
15450 | Maybe abstraction is just mereological subtraction [Lewis] |
6382 | The 'grain problem' says physical objects are granular, where sensations appear not to be [Sellars, by Polger] |
15443 | Mathematicians abstract by equivalence classes, but that doesn't turn a many into one [Lewis] |
23865 | Morality would improve if people could pursue private interests [Weil] |
23866 | In oppressive societies the scope of actual control is extended by a religion of power [Weil] |
23871 | No central authority can initiate decentralisation [Weil] |
23867 | After a bloody revolution the group which already had the power comes to the fore [Weil] |
23870 | Decentralisation is only possible by co-operation between strong and weak - which is absurd [Weil] |
23863 | Only individual people of good will can achieve social progress [Weil] |
23869 | In the least evil societies people can think, control community life, and be autonomous [Weil] |
23861 | Marx showed that capitalist oppression, because of competition, is unstoppable [Weil] |
23868 | The pleasure of completing tasks motivates just as well as the whip of slavery [Weil] |
23864 | Inequality could easily be mitigated, if it were not for the struggle for power [Weil] |