51 ideas
| 1606 | You have to be a Platonist to debate about reality, so every philosopher is a Platonist [Roochnik] |
| 1595 | Philosophy aims to satisfy the chief human desire - the articulation of beauty itself [Roochnik] |
| 1571 | 'Logos' ranges from thought/reasoning, to words, to rational structures outside thought [Roochnik] |
| 1572 | In the seventeenth century the only acceptable form of logos was technical knowledge [Roochnik] |
| 1573 | The hallmark of a person with logos is that they give reasons why one opinion is superior to another [Roochnik] |
| 1592 | Logos cannot refute the relativist, and so must admit that it too is a matter of desire (for truth and agreement) [Roochnik] |
| 1593 | Human desire has an ordered structure, with logos at the pinnacle [Roochnik] |
| 1603 | Logos is not unconditionally good, but good if there is another person willing to engage with it [Roochnik] |
| 1598 | We prefer reason or poetry according to whether basics are intelligible or not [Roochnik] |
| 1584 | Modern science, by aiming for clarity about the external world, has abandoned rationality in the human world [Roochnik] |
| 1591 | Unfortunately for reason, argument can't be used to establish the value of argument [Roochnik] |
| 1599 | Attempts to suspend all presuppositions are hopeless, because a common ground must be agreed for the process [Roochnik] |
| 4642 | No fact can be real and no proposition true unless there is a Sufficient Reason (even if we can't know it) [Leibniz] |
| 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] |
| 1605 | Reality can be viewed neutrally, or as an object of desire [Roochnik] |
| 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] |
| 16667 | Substances are incomplete unless they have modes [Suárez, by Pasnau] |
| 7931 | If a substance is just a thing that has properties, it seems to be a characterless non-entity [Leibniz, by Macdonald,C] |
| 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] |
| 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] |
| 17554 | There must be some internal difference between any two beings in nature [Leibniz] |
| 2112 | Truths of reason are known by analysis, and are necessary; facts are contingent, and their opposites possible [Leibniz] |
| 22149 | Scholastics assess possibility by what has actually happened in reality [Suárez, by Boulter] |
| 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] |
| 1577 | Relativism is a disease which destroys the possibility of rational debate [Roochnik] |
| 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] |
| 1596 | Reasoning aims not at the understanding of objects, but at the desire to give beautiful speeches [Roochnik] |
| 1578 | If relativism is the correct account of human values, then rhetoric is more important than reasoning [Roochnik] |
| 12707 | The true elements are atomic monads [Leibniz] |
| 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] |
| 16682 | Other things could occupy the same location as an angel [Suárez] |