66 ideas
| 15053 | If metaphysics can't be settled, it hardly matters whether it makes sense [Fine,K] |
| 13567 | Ontology should give insight into or an explanation of the world revealed by science [Ellis] |
| 15054 | 'Quietist' says abandon metaphysics because answers are unattainable (as in Kant's noumenon) [Fine,K] |
| 13604 | Real possibility and necessity has the logic of S5, which links equivalence classes of worlds of the same kind [Ellis] |
| 13606 | Humean conceptions of reality drive the adoption of extensional logic [Ellis] |
| 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] |
| 15060 | Why should what is explanatorily basic be therefore more real? [Fine,K] |
| 15046 | Reality is a primitive metaphysical concept, which cannot be understood in other terms [Fine,K] |
| 15047 | What is real can only be settled in terms of 'ground' [Fine,K] |
| 15048 | In metaphysics, reality is regarded as either 'factual', or as 'fundamental' [Fine,K] |
| 13584 | The extension of a property is a contingent fact, so cannot be the essence of the property [Ellis] |
| 13587 | There is no property of 'fragility', as things are each fragile in a distinctive way [Ellis] |
| 13577 | Typical 'categorical' properties are spatio-temporal, such as shape [Ellis] |
| 9436 | The property of 'being an electron' is not of anything, and only electrons could have it [Ellis] |
| 13582 | 'Being a methane molecule' is not a property - it is just a predicate [Ellis] |
| 13580 | Causal powers must necessarily act the way they do [Ellis] |
| 13598 | Causal powers are often directional (e.g. centripetal, centrifugal, circulatory) [Ellis] |
| 13568 | Basic powers may not be explained by structure, if at the bottom level there is no structure [Ellis] |
| 13586 | Maybe dispositions can be explained by intrinsic properties or structures [Ellis] |
| 13585 | The most fundamental properties of nature (mass, charge, spin ...) all seem to be dispositions [Ellis] |
| 13596 | A causal power is a disposition to produce forces [Ellis] |
| 13599 | Powers are dispositions of the essences of kinds that involve them in causation [Ellis] |
| 13572 | There are 'substantive' (objects of some kind), 'dynamic' (events of some kind) and 'property' universals [Ellis] |
| 13573 | Universals are all types of natural kind [Ellis] |
| 13571 | Scientific essentialism doesn't really need Kripkean individual essences [Ellis] |
| 13578 | The old idea that identity depends on essence and behaviour is rejected by the empiricists [Ellis] |
| 13576 | Necessities are distinguished by their grounds, not their different modalities [Ellis] |
| 13570 | Individual essences necessitate that individual; natural kind essences necessitate kind membership [Ellis] |
| 15061 | Although colour depends on us, we can describe the world that way if it picks out fundamentals [Fine,K] |
| 13607 | If events are unconnected, then induction cannot be solved [Ellis] |
| 13597 | Good explanations unify [Ellis] |
| 13601 | Explanations of particular events are not essentialist, as they don't reveal essential structures [Ellis] |
| 15059 | Grounding is an explanation of truth, and needs all the virtues of good explanations [Fine,K] |
| 13569 | To give essentialist explanations there have to be natural kinds [Ellis] |
| 15057 | Ultimate explanations are in 'grounds', which account for other truths, which hold in virtue of the grounding [Fine,K] |
| 13600 | The point of models in theories is not to idealise, but to focus on what is essential [Ellis] |
| 15058 | A proposition ingredient is 'essential' if changing it would change the truth-value [Fine,K] |
| 21233 | The beautiful is whatever it is intrinsically good to admire [Moore,GE] |
| 8039 | Moore tries to show that 'good' is indefinable, but doesn't understand what a definition is [MacIntyre on Moore,GE] |
| 11056 | The naturalistic fallacy claims that natural qualties can define 'good' [Moore,GE] |
| 22151 | The Open Question argument leads to anti-realism and the fact-value distinction [Boulter on Moore,GE] |
| 8033 | Moore cannot show why something being good gives us a reason for action [MacIntyre on Moore,GE] |
| 8032 | Can learning to recognise a good friend help us to recognise a good watch? [MacIntyre on Moore,GE] |
| 11050 | Moore's combination of antinaturalism with strong supervenience on the natural is incoherent [Hanna on Moore,GE] |
| 23726 | Despite Moore's caution, non-naturalists incline towards intuitionism [Moore,GE, by Smith,M] |
| 18676 | We should ask what we would judge to be good if it existed in absolute isolation [Moore,GE] |
| 11057 | It is always an open question whether anything that is natural is good [Moore,GE] |
| 5925 | The three main values are good, right and beauty [Moore,GE, by Ross] |
| 5902 | For Moore, 'right' is what produces good [Moore,GE, by Ross] |
| 5903 | 'Right' means 'cause of good result' (hence 'useful'), so the end does justify the means [Moore,GE] |
| 5907 | Relationships imply duties to people, not merely the obligation to benefit them [Ross on Moore,GE] |
| 13583 | There might be uninstantiated natural kinds, such as transuranic elements which have never occurred [Ellis] |
| 13574 | Natural kinds are distinguished by resting on essences [Ellis] |
| 13575 | If there are borderline cases between natural kinds, that makes them superficial [Ellis] |
| 13595 | Laws don't exist in the world; they are true of the world [Ellis] |
| 13566 | A proton must have its causal role, because without it it wouldn't be a proton [Ellis] |
| 13579 | What is most distinctive of scientific essentialism is regarding processes as natural kinds [Ellis] |
| 13581 | Scientific essentialism is more concerned with explanation than with identity (Locke, not Kripke) [Ellis] |
| 13594 | The ontological fundamentals are dispositions, and also categorical (spatio-temporal and structural) properties [Ellis] |
| 13603 | A primary aim of science is to show the limits of the possible [Ellis] |