30 ideas
22659 | It is wisdom to believe what you desire, because belief is needed to achieve it [James] |
22657 | All good philosophers start from a dumb conviction about which truths can be revealed [James] |
12124 | Metaphysics is the best knowledge, because it is the simplest [Bacon] |
22647 | A complete system is just a classification of the whole world's ingredients [James] |
12123 | Natural history supports physical knowledge, which supports metaphysical knowledge [Bacon] |
12119 | Physics studies transitory matter; metaphysics what is abstracted and necessary [Bacon] |
12120 | Physics is of material and efficient causes, metaphysics of formal and final causes [Bacon] |
22648 | A single explanation must have a single point of view [James] |
22644 | Our greatest pleasure is the economy of reducing chaotic facts to one single fact [James] |
22649 | Classification can only ever be for a particular purpose [James] |
12121 | We don't assume there is no land, because we can only see sea [Bacon] |
22655 | Scientific genius extracts more than other people from the same evidence [James] |
12117 | Science moves up and down between inventions of causes, and experiments [Bacon] |
22658 | Experimenters assume the theory is true, and stick to it as long as result don't disappoint [James] |
12127 | Many different theories will fit the observed facts [Bacon] |
22654 | We can't know if the laws of nature are stable, but we must postulate it or assume it [James] |
22656 | Trying to assess probabilities by mere calculation is absurd and impossible [James] |
22646 | We have a passion for knowing the parts of something, rather than the whole [James] |
22652 | The mind has evolved entirely for practical interests, seen in our reflex actions [James] |
22651 | Dogs' curiosity only concerns what will happen next [James] |
12126 | People love (unfortunately) extreme generality, rather than particular knowledge [Bacon] |
22650 | How can the ground of rationality be itself rational? [James] |
22643 | It seems that we feel rational when we detect no irrationality [James] |
22660 | Evolution suggests prevailing or survival as a new criterion of right and wrong [James] |
7071 | Life and rationality are pointless if we can only contemplate the freedom of our own ego [Jacobi] |
7072 | Jacobi was the first philosopher to talk of nihilism [Jacobi, by Critchley] |
12125 | Teleological accounts are fine in metaphysics, but they stop us from searching for the causes [Bacon] |
22645 | Understanding by means of causes is useless if they are not reduced to a minimum number [James] |
12118 | Essences are part of first philosophy, but as part of nature, not part of logic [Bacon] |
22653 | Early Christianity says God recognises the neglected weak and tender impulses [James] |