63 ideas
5486 | Essentialism says metaphysics can't be done by analysing unreliable language [Ellis] |
15527 | Defining terms either enables elimination, or shows that they don't require elimination [Lewis] |
5468 | Properties are 'dispositional', or 'categorical' (the latter as 'block' or 'intrinsic' structures) [Ellis, by PG] |
5469 | The passive view of nature says categorical properties are basic, but others say dispositions [Ellis] |
16665 | There are entities, and then positive 'modes', modifying aspects outside the thing's essence [Suárez] |
16666 | A mode determines the state and character of a quantity, without adding to it [Suárez] |
5456 | Redness is not a property as it is not mind-independent [Ellis] |
5481 | Properties have powers; they aren't just ways for logicians to classify objects [Ellis] |
5458 | Nearly all fundamental properties of physics are dispositional [Ellis] |
16667 | Substances are incomplete unless they have modes [Suárez, by Pasnau] |
17007 | Forms must rule over faculties and accidents, and are the source of action and unity [Suárez] |
16780 | Partial forms of leaf and fruit are united in the whole form of the tree [Suárez] |
16758 | The best support for substantial forms is the co-ordinated unity of a natural being [Suárez] |
16743 | We can get at the essential nature of 'quantity' by knowing bulk and extension [Suárez] |
5443 | Kripke and others have made essentialism once again respectable [Ellis] |
5444 | 'Individual essences' fix a particular individual, and 'kind essences' fix the kind it belongs to [Ellis] |
5462 | Essential properties are usually quantitatively determinate [Ellis] |
5448 | 'Real essence' makes it what it is; 'nominal essence' makes us categorise it a certain way [Ellis] |
16742 | We only know essences through non-essential features, esp. those closest to the essence [Suárez] |
22143 | Identity does not exclude possible or imagined difference [Suárez, by Boulter] |
22144 | Real Essential distinction: A and B are of different natural kinds [Suárez, by Boulter] |
22146 | Minor Real distinction: B needs A, but A doesn't need B [Suárez, by Boulter] |
22145 | Major Real distinction: A and B have independent existences [Suárez, by Boulter] |
22147 | Conceptual/Mental distinction: one thing can be conceived of in two different ways [Suárez, by Boulter] |
22148 | Modal distinction: A isn't B or its property, but still needs B [Suárez, by Boulter] |
5477 | One thing can look like something else, without being the something else [Ellis] |
5479 | Scientific essentialists say science should define the limits of the possible [Ellis] |
5483 | Essentialists deny possible worlds, and say possibilities are what is compatible with the actual world [Ellis] |
5447 | Metaphysical necessities are true in virtue of the essences of things [Ellis] |
5476 | Essentialists say natural laws are in a new category: necessary a posteriori [Ellis] |
22149 | Scholastics assess possibility by what has actually happened in reality [Suárez, by Boulter] |
5478 | Imagination tests what is possible for all we know, not true possibility [Ellis] |
5482 | Possible worlds realism is only needed to give truth conditions for modals and conditionals [Ellis] |
15530 | A logically determinate name names the same thing in every possible world [Lewis] |
5453 | Essentialists mostly accept the primary/secondary qualities distinction [Ellis] |
5466 | Primary qualities are number, figure, size, texture, motion, configuration, impenetrability and (?) mass [Ellis] |
15528 | A Ramsey sentence just asserts that a theory can be realised, without saying by what [Lewis] |
15526 | There is a method for defining new scientific terms just using the terms we already understand [Lewis] |
15529 | It is better to have one realisation of a theory than many - but it may not always be possible [Lewis] |
15531 | The Ramsey sentence of a theory says that it has at least one realisation [Lewis] |
5485 | Emeralds are naturally green, and only an external force could turn them blue [Ellis] |
5484 | Essentialists don't infer from some to all, but from essences to necessary behaviour [Ellis] |
5457 | Predicates assert properties, values, denials, relations, conventions, existence and fabrications [Ellis, by PG] |
5488 | Regularity theories of causation cannot give an account of human agency [Ellis] |
5489 | Humans have variable dispositions, and also power to change their dispositions [Ellis] |
5490 | Essentialism fits in with Darwinism, but not with extreme politics of left or right [Ellis] |
5472 | Natural kinds are of objects/substances, or events/processes, or intrinsic natures [Ellis] |
5471 | Essentialism says natural kinds are fundamental to nature, and determine the laws [Ellis] |
5446 | For essentialists two members of a natural kind must be identical [Ellis] |
5480 | The whole of our world is a natural kind, so all worlds like it necessarily have the same laws [Ellis] |
5445 | Essentialists regard inanimate objects as genuine causal agents [Ellis] |
5463 | Essentialists believe causation is necessary, resulting from dispositions and circumstances [Ellis] |
5491 | A general theory of causation is only possible in an area if natural kinds are involved [Ellis] |
5442 | For 'passivists' behaviour is imposed on things from outside [Ellis] |
5473 | The laws of nature imitate the hierarchy of natural kinds [Ellis] |
5474 | Laws of nature tend to describe ideal things, or ideal circumstances [Ellis] |
5475 | We must explain the necessity, idealisation, ontology and structure of natural laws [Ellis] |
5460 | Causal relations cannot be reduced to regularities, as they could occur just once [Ellis] |
5459 | Essentialists say dispositions are basic, rather than supervenient on matter and natural laws [Ellis] |
5461 | The essence of uranium is its atomic number and its electron shell [Ellis] |
5464 | For essentialists, laws of nature are metaphysically necessary, being based on essences of natural kinds [Ellis] |
5487 | Essentialism requires a clear separation of semantics, epistemology and ontology [Ellis] |
16682 | Other things could occupy the same location as an angel [Suárez] |