36 ideas
15053 | If metaphysics can't be settled, it hardly matters whether it makes sense [Fine,K] |
15054 | 'Quietist' says abandon metaphysics because answers are unattainable (as in Kant's noumenon) [Fine,K] |
19048 | Contextual definition shifted the emphasis from words to whole sentences [Quine] |
19047 | Bentham's contextual definitions preserved terms after their denotation became doubtful [Quine] |
4901 | Truth has to be correspondence to facts, and a match between relations of ideas and relations in the world [Perry] |
15007 | If you make 'grounding' fundamental, you have to mention some non-fundamental notions [Sider on Fine,K] |
15006 | Something is grounded when it holds, and is explained, and necessitated by something else [Fine,K, by Sider] |
15055 | Grounding relations are best expressed as relations between sentences [Fine,K] |
15050 | Reduction might be producing a sentence which gets closer to the logical form [Fine,K] |
15051 | Reduction might be semantic, where a reduced sentence is understood through its reduction [Fine,K] |
15052 | Reduction is modal, if the reductions necessarily entail the truth of the target sentence [Fine,K] |
15056 | The notion of reduction (unlike that of 'ground') implies the unreality of what is reduced [Fine,K] |
15047 | What is real can only be settled in terms of 'ground' [Fine,K] |
15046 | Reality is a primitive metaphysical concept, which cannot be understood in other terms [Fine,K] |
15060 | Why should what is explanatorily basic be therefore more real? [Fine,K] |
15048 | In metaphysics, reality is regarded as either 'factual', or as 'fundamental' [Fine,K] |
4885 | Identity is a very weak relation, which doesn't require interdefinability, or shared properties [Perry] |
4899 | Possible worlds thinking has clarified the logic of modality, but is problematic in epistemology [Perry] |
4898 | Possible worlds are indices for a language, or concrete realities, or abstract possibilities [Perry] |
15061 | Although colour depends on us, we can describe the world that way if it picks out fundamentals [Fine,K] |
19049 | In scientific theories sentences are too brief to be independent vehicles of empirical meaning [Quine] |
19046 | Empiricism improvements: words for ideas, then sentences, then systems, then no analytic, then naturalism [Quine] |
15059 | Grounding is an explanation of truth, and needs all the virtues of good explanations [Fine,K] |
15057 | Ultimate explanations are in 'grounds', which account for other truths, which hold in virtue of the grounding [Fine,K] |
4887 | We try to cause other things to occur by causing mental events to occur [Perry] |
4884 | Brain states must be in my head, and yet the pain seems to be in my hand [Perry] |
4888 | It seems plausible that many animals have experiences without knowing about them [Perry] |
4891 | If epiphenomenalism just says mental events are effects but not causes, it is consistent with physicalism [Perry] |
4900 | Prior to Kripke, the mind-brain identity theory usually claimed that the identity was contingent [Perry] |
4892 | If physicalists stick with identity (not supervenience), Martian pain will not be like ours [Perry] |
4889 | Although we may classify ideas by content, we individuate them differently, as their content can change [Perry] |
4896 | The intension of an expression is a function from possible worlds to an appropriate extension [Perry] |
4897 | A proposition is a set of possible worlds for which its intension delivers truth [Perry] |
15058 | A proposition ingredient is 'essential' if changing it would change the truth-value [Fine,K] |
4890 | A sharp analytic/synthetic line can rarely be drawn, but some concepts are central to thought [Perry] |
19050 | Holism in language blurs empirical synthetic and empty analytic sentences [Quine] |