34 ideas
3600 | Slow and accurate thought makes the greatest progress [Descartes] |
3601 | Most things in human life seem vain and useless [Descartes] |
3602 | Almost every daft idea has been expressed by some philosopher [Descartes] |
12124 | Metaphysics is the best knowledge, because it is the simplest [Bacon] |
12123 | Natural history supports physical knowledge, which supports metaphysical knowledge [Bacon] |
12119 | Physics studies transitory matter; metaphysics what is abstracted and necessary [Bacon] |
12120 | Physics is of material and efficient causes, metaphysics of formal and final causes [Bacon] |
3603 | Methodical thinking is cautious, analytical, systematic, and panoramic [Descartes, by PG] |
3612 | Clear and distinct conceptions are true because a perfect God exists [Descartes] |
3610 | Truth is clear and distinct conception - of which it is hard to be sure [Descartes] |
15990 | Every individual thing which exists has an essence, which is its internal constitution [Locke] |
3605 | We can believe a thing without knowing we believe it [Descartes] |
1583 | In morals Descartes accepts the conventional, but rejects it in epistemology [Roochnik on Descartes] |
15994 | If it is knowledge, it is certain; if it isn't certain, it isn't knowledge [Locke] |
3607 | In thinking everything else false, my own existence remains totally certain [Descartes] |
3617 | I aim to find the principles and causes of everything, using the seeds within my mind [Descartes] |
3611 | Understanding, rather than imagination or senses, gives knowledge [Descartes] |
12121 | We don't assume there is no land, because we can only see sea [Bacon] |
3606 | I was searching for reliable rock under the shifting sand [Descartes] |
3604 | When rebuilding a house, one needs alternative lodgings [Descartes] |
12117 | Science moves up and down between inventions of causes, and experiments [Bacon] |
3618 | Only experiments can settle disagreements between rival explanations [Descartes] |
12127 | Many different theories will fit the observed facts [Bacon] |
3615 | Little reason is needed to speak, so animals have no reason at all [Descartes] |
12126 | People love (unfortunately) extreme generality, rather than particular knowledge [Bacon] |
3609 | I am a thinking substance, which doesn't need a place or material support [Descartes] |
3608 | I can deny my body and the world, but not my own existence [Descartes] |
3613 | Reason is universal in its responses, but a physical machine is constrained by its organs [Descartes] |
3616 | The soul must unite with the body to have appetites and sensations [Descartes] |
3614 | A machine could speak in response to physical stimulus, but not hold a conversation [Descartes] |
1581 | Greeks elevate virtues enormously, but never explain them [Descartes] |
12125 | Teleological accounts are fine in metaphysics, but they stop us from searching for the causes [Bacon] |
16686 | God has established laws throughout nature, and implanted ideas of them within us [Descartes] |
12118 | Essences are part of first philosophy, but as part of nature, not part of logic [Bacon] |