30 ideas
16014 | It is controversial whether only 'numerical identity' allows two things to be counted as one [Noonan] |
16024 | I could have died at five, but the summation of my adult stages could not [Noonan] |
16023 | Stage theorists accept four-dimensionalism, but call each stage a whole object [Noonan] |
16015 | Problems about identity can't even be formulated without the concept of identity [Noonan] |
16017 | Identity is usually defined as the equivalence relation satisfying Leibniz's Law [Noonan] |
16016 | Identity definitions (such as self-identity, or the smallest equivalence relation) are usually circular [Noonan] |
16020 | Identity can only be characterised in a second-order language [Noonan] |
16018 | Indiscernibility is basic to our understanding of identity and distinctness [Noonan] |
16019 | Leibniz's Law must be kept separate from the substitutivity principle [Noonan] |
13047 | It is knowing 'why' that gives scientific understanding, not knowing 'that' [Salmon] |
13065 | Understanding is an extremely vague concept [Salmon] |
1556 | By nature people are close to one another, but culture drives them apart [Hippias] |
13054 | Correlations can provide predictions, but only causes can give explanations [Salmon] |
13067 | For the instrumentalists there are no scientific explanations [Salmon] |
13055 | Good induction needs 'total evidence' - the absence at the time of any undermining evidence [Salmon] |
13046 | Scientific explanation is not reducing the unfamiliar to the familiar [Salmon] |
13058 | Why-questions can seek evidence as well as explanation [Salmon] |
13064 | The three basic conceptions of scientific explanation are modal, epistemic, and ontic [Salmon] |
13050 | The 'inferential' conception is that all scientific explanations are arguments [Salmon] |
13059 | Ontic explanations can be facts, or reports of facts [Salmon] |
13049 | We must distinguish true laws because they (unlike accidental generalizations) explain things [Salmon] |
13051 | Deductive-nomological explanations will predict, and their predictions will explain [Salmon] |
13053 | A law is not enough for explanation - we need information about what makes a difference [Salmon] |
13061 | Flagpoles explain shadows, and not vice versa, because of temporal ordering [Salmon] |
13045 | Explanation at the quantum level will probably be by entirely new mechanisms [Salmon] |
13062 | Does an item have a function the first time it occurs? [Salmon] |
13063 | Explanations reveal the mechanisms which produce the facts [Salmon] |
13060 | Can events whose probabilities are low be explained? [Salmon] |
13056 | Statistical explanation needs relevance, not high probability [Salmon] |
13057 | Think of probabilities in terms of propensities rather than frequencies [Salmon] |