40 ideas
| 17275 | Realist metaphysics concerns what is real; naive metaphysics concerns natures of things [Fine,K] |
| 17282 | Truths need not always have their source in what exists [Fine,K] |
| 17283 | If the truth-making relation is modal, then modal truths will be grounded in anything [Fine,K] |
| 17286 | Logical consequence is verification by a possible world within a truth-set [Fine,K] |
| 17272 | 2+2=4 is necessary if it is snowing, but not true in virtue of the fact that it is snowing [Fine,K] |
| 17276 | If you say one thing causes another, that leaves open that the 'other' has its own distinct reality [Fine,K] |
| 17284 | An immediate ground is the next lower level, which gives the concept of a hierarchy [Fine,K] |
| 17285 | 'Strict' ground moves down the explanations, but 'weak' ground can move sideways [Fine,K] |
| 17288 | We learn grounding from what is grounded, not what does the grounding [Fine,K] |
| 17281 | If grounding is a relation it must be between entities of the same type, preferably between facts [Fine,K] |
| 17280 | Ground is best understood as a sentence operator, rather than a relation between predicates [Fine,K] |
| 17290 | Only metaphysical grounding must be explained by essence [Fine,K] |
| 17274 | Philosophical explanation is largely by ground (just as cause is used in science) [Fine,K] |
| 17278 | We can only explain how a reduction is possible if we accept the concept of ground [Fine,K] |
| 17287 | Facts, such as redness and roundness of a ball, can be 'fused' into one fact [Fine,K] |
| 15435 | If you think universals are immanent, you must believe them to be sparse, and not every related predicate [Lewis] |
| 15451 | I assume there could be natural properties that are not instantiated in our world [Lewis] |
| 15433 | Tropes are particular properties, which cannot recur, but can be exact duplicates [Lewis] |
| 15436 | Universals are meant to give an account of resemblance [Lewis] |
| 15438 | We can add a primitive natural/unnatural distinction to class nominalism [Lewis] |
| 15448 | The 'magical' view of structural universals says they are atoms, even though they have parts [Lewis] |
| 15449 | If 'methane' is an atomic structural universal, it has nothing to connect it to its carbon universals [Lewis] |
| 15439 | The 'pictorial' view of structural universals says they are wholes made of universals as parts [Lewis] |
| 15441 | The structural universal 'methane' needs the universal 'hydrogen' four times over [Lewis] |
| 15445 | Butane and Isobutane have the same atoms, but different structures [Lewis] |
| 15434 | Structural universals have a necessary connection to the universals forming its parts [Lewis] |
| 15437 | We can't get rid of structural universals if there are no simple universals [Lewis] |
| 15446 | Composition is not just making new things from old; there are too many counterexamples [Lewis] |
| 15440 | A whole is distinct from its parts, but is not a further addition in ontology [Lewis] |
| 15444 | Different things (a toy house and toy car) can be made of the same parts at different times [Lewis] |
| 17279 | Even a three-dimensionalist might identify temporal parts, in their thinking [Fine,K] |
| 17273 | Each basic modality has its 'own' explanatory relation [Fine,K] |
| 17289 | Every necessary truth is grounded in the nature of something [Fine,K] |
| 16736 | Explanation is generally to deduce it from something better known, which comes in degrees [Boyle] |
| 17291 | We explain by identity (what it is), or by truth (how things are) [Fine,K] |
| 17271 | Is there metaphysical explanation (as well as causal), involving a constitutive form of determination? [Fine,K] |
| 16737 | The best explanations get down to primary basics, but others go less deep [Boyle] |
| 15450 | Maybe abstraction is just mereological subtraction [Lewis] |
| 17277 | If mind supervenes on the physical, it may also explain the physical (and not vice versa) [Fine,K] |
| 15443 | Mathematicians abstract by equivalence classes, but that doesn't turn a many into one [Lewis] |