62 ideas
| 9218 | Maybe what distinguishes philosophy from science is its pursuit of necessary truths [Sider] |
| 16241 | The metaphysics of nature should focus on physics [Maudlin] |
| 16257 | Kant survives in seeing metaphysics as analysing our conceptual system, which is a priori [Maudlin] |
| 16276 | Wide metaphysical possibility may reduce metaphysics to analysis of fantasies [Maudlin] |
| 2463 | A standard naturalist view is realist, externalist, and computationalist, and believes in rationality [Fodor] |
| 16244 | If the universe is profligate, the Razor leads us astray [Maudlin] |
| 16255 | The Razor rightly prefers one cause of multiple events to coincidences of causes [Maudlin] |
| 2435 | Psychology has to include the idea that mental processes are typically truth-preserving [Fodor] |
| 2442 | Inferences are surely part of the causal structure of the world [Fodor] |
| 16243 | The Humean view is wrong; laws and direction of time are primitive, and atoms are decided by physics [Maudlin] |
| 16271 | Lewis says it supervenes on the Mosaic, but actually thinks the Mosaic is all there is [Maudlin] |
| 16273 | If the Humean Mosaic is ontological bedrock, there can be no explanation of its structure [Maudlin] |
| 16275 | The 'spinning disc' is just impossible, because there cannot be 'homogeneous matter' [Maudlin] |
| 16258 | To get an ontology from ontological commitment, just add that some theory is actually true [Maudlin] |
| 16259 | Naïve translation from natural to formal language can hide or multiply the ontology [Maudlin] |
| 16253 | A property is fundamental if two objects can differ in only that respect [Maudlin] |
| 16263 | Fundamental physics seems to suggest there are no such things as properties [Maudlin] |
| 16260 | Existence of universals may just be decided by acceptance, or not, of second-order logic [Maudlin] |
| 16277 | Logically impossible is metaphysically impossible, but logically possible is not metaphysically possible [Maudlin] |
| 16249 | A counterfactual antecedent commands the redescription of a selected moment [Maudlin] |
| 2462 | Control of belief is possible if you know truth conditions and what causes beliefs [Fodor] |
| 2460 | Participation in an experiment requires agreement about what the outcome will mean [Fodor] |
| 2454 | We can deliberately cause ourselves to have true thoughts - hence the value of experiments [Fodor] |
| 2455 | Interrogation and experiment submit us to having beliefs caused [Fodor] |
| 2461 | An experiment is a deliberate version of what informal thinking does all the time [Fodor] |
| 2458 | Theories are links in the causal chain between the environment and our beliefs [Fodor] |
| 16254 | Induction leaps into the unknown, but usually lands safely [Maudlin] |
| 16245 | Laws should help explain the things they govern, or that manifest them [Maudlin] |
| 2443 | I say psychology is intentional, semantics is informational, and thinking is computation [Fodor] |
| 2453 | We are probably the only creatures that can think about our own thoughts [Fodor] |
| 2445 | Semantics v syntax is the interaction problem all over again [Fodor] |
| 2446 | Cartesians consider interaction to be a miracle [Fodor] |
| 2464 | Type physicalism equates mental kinds with physical kinds [Fodor] |
| 2447 | Hume has no theory of the co-ordination of the mind [Fodor] |
| 2440 | Propositional attitudes are propositions presented in a certain way [Fodor] |
| 2450 | Rationality has mental properties - autonomy, productivity, experiment [Fodor] |
| 2437 | XYZ (Twin Earth 'water') is an impossibility [Fodor] |
| 2441 | Truth conditions require a broad concept of content [Fodor] |
| 3114 | Concepts aren't linked to stuff; they are what is caused by stuff [Fodor] |
| 2452 | Knowing the cause of a thought is almost knowing its content [Fodor] |
| 2432 | Is content basically information, fixed externally? [Fodor] |
| 2438 | In the information view, concepts are potentials for making distinctions [Fodor] |
| 2439 | Semantic externalism says the concept 'elm' needs no further beliefs or inferences [Fodor] |
| 2457 | If meaning is information, that establishes the causal link between the state of the world and our beliefs [Fodor] |
| 2451 | To know the content of a thought is to know what would make it true [Fodor] |
| 2433 | For holists no two thoughts are ever quite the same, which destroys faith in meaning [Fodor] |
| 2436 | It is claimed that reference doesn't fix sense (Jocasta), and sense doesn't fix reference (Twin Earth) [Fodor] |
| 2434 | Broad semantics holds that the basic semantic properties are truth and denotation [Fodor] |
| 2459 | Externalist semantics are necessary to connect the contents of beliefs with how the world is [Fodor] |
| 16248 | Evaluating counterfactuals involves context and interests [Maudlin] |
| 16250 | We don't pick a similar world from many - we construct one possibility from the description [Maudlin] |
| 16267 | If we know the cause of an event, we seem to assent to the counterfactual [Maudlin] |
| 16268 | The counterfactual is ruined if some other cause steps in when the antecedent fails [Maudlin] |
| 16269 | If the effect hadn't occurred the cause wouldn't have happened, so counterfactuals are two-way [Maudlin] |
| 16242 | Laws of nature are ontological bedrock, and beyond analysis [Maudlin] |
| 16247 | Laws are primitive, so two indiscernible worlds could have the same laws [Maudlin] |
| 16272 | Fundamental laws say how nature will, or might, evolve from some initial state [Maudlin] |
| 16251 | 'Humans with prime house numbers are mortal' is not a law, because not a natural kind [Maudlin] |
| 16270 | If laws are just regularities, then there have to be laws [Maudlin] |
| 16264 | I believe the passing of time is a fundamental fact about the world [Maudlin] |
| 16265 | If time passes, presumably it passes at one second per second [Maudlin] |
| 16266 | There is one ordered B series, but an infinitude of A series, depending on when the present is [Maudlin] |