38 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] |
22647 | A complete system is just a classification of the whole world's ingredients [James] |
22648 | A single explanation must have a single point of view [James] |
4642 | No fact can be real and no proposition true unless there is a Sufficient Reason (even if we can't know it) [Leibniz] |
22644 | Our greatest pleasure is the economy of reducing chaotic facts to one single fact [James] |
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] |
22649 | Classification can only ever be for a particular purpose [James] |
7931 | If a substance is just a thing that has properties, it seems to be a characterless non-entity [Leibniz, by Macdonald,C] |
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] |
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] |
22655 | Scientific genius extracts more than other people from the same evidence [James] |
22658 | Experimenters assume the theory is true, and stick to it as long as result don't disappoint [James] |
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] |
2109 | Increase a conscious machine to the size of a mill - you still won't see perceptions in it [Leibniz] |
21799 | We just use the word 'faculty' when we don't know the psychological cause [Galen] |
19362 | We know the 'I' and its contents by abstraction from awareness of necessary truths [Leibniz] |
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] |
12707 | The true elements are atomic monads [Leibniz] |
22645 | Understanding by means of causes is useless if they are not reduced to a minimum number [James] |
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] |
22653 | Early Christianity says God recognises the neglected weak and tender impulses [James] |