44 ideas
| 9307 | Modern Western culture suddenly appeared in Jena in the 1790s [Svendsen] |
| 9297 | You can't understand love in terms of 'if and only if...' [Svendsen] |
| 16539 | A definition of a circle will show what it is, and show its generating principle [Lowe] |
| 16540 | Defining an ellipse by conic sections reveals necessities, but not the essence of an ellipse [Lowe] |
| 16548 | An essence is what an entity is, revealed by a real definition; this is not an entity in its own right [Lowe] |
| 16549 | Simple things like 'red' can be given real ostensive definitions [Lowe] |
| 12056 | An ancestral relation is either direct or transitively indirect [Wiggins] |
| 12050 | Substances contain a source of change or principle of activity [Wiggins] |
| 12052 | We never single out just 'this', but always 'this something-or-other' [Wiggins] |
| 12055 | Sortal predications are answers to the question 'what is x?' [Wiggins] |
| 12059 | A river may change constantly, but not in respect of being a river [Wiggins] |
| 12063 | Sortal classification becomes science, with cross reference clarifying individuals [Wiggins] |
| 12051 | If the kinds are divided realistically, they fall into substances [Wiggins] |
| 12053 | 'Human being' is a better answer to 'what is it?' than 'poet', as the latter comes in degrees [Wiggins] |
| 12054 | Secondary substances correctly divide primary substances by activity-principles and relations [Wiggins] |
| 12047 | We refer to persisting substances, in perception and in thought, and they aid understanding [Wiggins] |
| 16545 | The essence of lumps and statues shows that two objects coincide but are numerically distinct [Lowe] |
| 16546 | The essence of a bronze statue shows that it could be made of different bronze [Lowe] |
| 12057 | Matter underlies things, composes things, and brings them to be [Wiggins] |
| 16551 | Grasping an essence is just grasping a real definition [Lowe] |
| 16542 | Explanation can't give an account of essence, because it is too multi-faceted [Lowe] |
| 16552 | If we must know some entity to know an essence, we lack a faculty to do that [Lowe] |
| 16533 | Logical necessities, based on laws of logic, are a proper sub-class of metaphysical necessities [Lowe] |
| 16531 | 'Metaphysical' necessity is absolute and objective - the strongest kind of necessity [Lowe] |
| 16532 | 'Epistemic' necessity is better called 'certainty' [Lowe] |
| 16543 | If an essence implies p, then p is an essential truth, and hence metaphysically necessary [Lowe] |
| 16544 | Metaphysical necessity is either an essential truth, or rests on essential truths [Lowe] |
| 16538 | We could give up possible worlds if we based necessity on essences [Lowe] |
| 9308 | If subjective and objective begin to merge, then so do primary and secondary qualities [Svendsen] |
| 16534 | 'Intuitions' are just unreliable 'hunches'; over centuries intuitions change enormously [Lowe] |
| 12064 | The category of substance is more important for epistemology than for ontology [Wiggins] |
| 12049 | Naming the secondary substance provides a mass of general information [Wiggins] |
| 12065 | Seeing a group of soldiers as an army is irresistible, in ontology and explanation [Wiggins] |
| 9309 | Emotions have intentional objects, while a mood is objectless [Svendsen] |
| 16535 | A concept is a way of thinking of things or kinds, whether or not they exist [Lowe] |
| 16550 | Direct reference doesn't seem to require that thinkers know what it is they are thinking about [Lowe] |
| 9304 | Death appears to be more frightening the less one has lived [Svendsen] |
| 9298 | We can be unaware that we are bored [Svendsen] |
| 9301 | Boredom is so radical that suicide could not overcome it; only never having existed would do it [Svendsen] |
| 9302 | We are bored because everything comes to us fully encoded, and we want personal meaning [Svendsen] |
| 9310 | The profoundest boredom is boredom with boredom [Svendsen] |
| 9311 | We have achieved a sort of utopia, and it is boring, so that is the end of utopias [Svendsen] |
| 9303 | The concept of 'alienation' seems no longer applicable [Svendsen] |
| 16547 | H2O isn't necessary, because different laws of nature might affect how O and H combine [Lowe] |