Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'Theory of Knowledge (2nd edn)', 'A Future for Presentism' and 'Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature'

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31 ideas

1. Philosophy / C. History of Philosophy / 4. Later European Philosophy / b. Seventeenth century philosophy
Most philosophers start with reality and then examine knowledge; Descartes put the study of knowledge first [Lehrer]
1. Philosophy / F. Analytic Philosophy / 4. Conceptual Analysis
You cannot demand an analysis of a concept without knowing the purpose of the analysis [Lehrer]
1. Philosophy / F. Analytic Philosophy / 7. Limitations of Analysis
Analytical philosophy seems to have little interest in how to tell a good analysis from a bad one [Rorty]
2. Reason / B. Laws of Thought / 2. Sufficient Reason
Is Sufficient Reason self-refuting (no reason to accept it!), or is it a legitimate explanatory tool? [Bourne]
2. Reason / C. Styles of Reason / 3. Eristic
Rational certainty may be victory in argument rather than knowledge of facts [Rorty]
3. Truth / A. Truth Problems / 9. Rejecting Truth
Rorty seems to view truth as simply being able to hold one's view against all comers [Rorty, by O'Grady]
3. Truth / E. Pragmatic Truth / 1. Pragmatic Truth
For James truth is "what it is better for us to believe" rather than a correct picture of reality [Rorty]
3. Truth / H. Deflationary Truth / 1. Redundant Truth
The redundancy theory conflates metalinguistic bivalence with object-language excluded middle [Bourne]
8. Modes of Existence / A. Relations / 1. Nature of Relations
All relations between spatio-temporal objects are either spatio-temporal, or causal [Bourne]
It is a necessary condition for the existence of relations that both of the relata exist [Bourne]
13. Knowledge Criteria / B. Internal Justification / 2. Pragmatic justification
If knowledge is merely justified belief, justification is social [Rorty]
13. Knowledge Criteria / C. External Justification / 8. Social Justification
Knowing has no definable essence, but is a social right, found in the context of conversations [Rorty]
13. Knowledge Criteria / D. Scepticism / 6. Scepticism Critique
You can't debate about whether to have higher standards for the application of words [Rorty]
15. Nature of Minds / A. Nature of Mind / 1. Mind / a. Mind
The mind is a property, or it is baffling [Rorty]
15. Nature of Minds / A. Nature of Mind / 1. Mind / c. Features of mind
Pain lacks intentionality; beliefs lack qualia [Rorty]
15. Nature of Minds / B. Features of Minds / 4. Intentionality / b. Intentionality theories
Is intentionality a special sort of function? [Rorty]
19. Language / A. Nature of Meaning / 1. Meaning
Nature has no preferred way of being represented [Rorty]
19. Language / A. Nature of Meaning / 7. Meaning Holism / b. Language holism
Can meanings remain the same when beliefs change? [Rorty]
19. Language / B. Reference / 1. Reference theories
A theory of reference seems needed to pick out objects without ghostly inner states [Rorty]
19. Language / C. Assigning Meanings / 6. Truth-Conditions Semantics
Davidson's theory of meaning focuses not on terms, but on relations between sentences [Rorty]
24. Political Theory / A. Basis of a State / 1. A People / a. Human distinctiveness
Since Hegel we have tended to see a human as merely animal if it is outside a society [Rorty]
27. Natural Reality / B. Modern Physics / 1. Relativity / a. Special relativity
The idea of simultaneity in Special Relativity is full of verificationist assumptions [Bourne]
Relativity denies simultaneity, so it needs past, present and future (unlike Presentism) [Bourne]
27. Natural Reality / D. Time / 1. Nature of Time / a. Absolute time
Special Relativity allows an absolute past, future, elsewhere and simultaneity [Bourne]
27. Natural Reality / D. Time / 1. Nature of Time / g. Growing block
No-Futurists believe in past and present, but not future, and say the world grows as facts increase [Bourne]
27. Natural Reality / D. Time / 1. Nature of Time / h. Presentism
How can presentists talk of 'earlier than', and distinguish past from future? [Bourne]
Presentism seems to deny causation, because the cause and the effect can never coexist [Bourne]
Since presentists treat the presentness of events as basic, simultaneity should be define by that means [Bourne]
27. Natural Reality / D. Time / 2. Passage of Time / d. Time series
Time is tensed or tenseless; the latter says all times and objects are real, and there is no passage of time [Bourne]
B-series objects relate to each other; A-series objects relate to the present [Bourne]
27. Natural Reality / D. Time / 2. Passage of Time / e. Tensed (A) series
Time flows, past is fixed, future is open, future is feared but not past, we remember past, we plan future [Bourne]