111 ideas
18730 | The history of philosophy only matters if the subject is a choice between rival theories [Wittgenstein] |
18704 | Philosophy tries to be rid of certain intellectual puzzles, irrelevant to daily life [Wittgenstein] |
18710 | Philosophers express puzzlement, but don't clearly state the puzzle [Wittgenstein] |
16414 | Science needs metaphysics to weed out its presuppositions [Lowe, by Hofweber] |
9414 | Metaphysics is the mapping of possibilities [Lowe, by Mumford] |
8282 | Only metaphysics can decide whether identity survives through change [Lowe] |
16127 | Metaphysics tells us what there could be, rather than what there is [Lowe] |
18732 | We don't need a theory of truth, because we use the word perfectly well [Wittgenstein] |
18714 | We already know what we want to know, and analysis gives us no new facts [Wittgenstein] |
8262 | How can a theory of meaning show the ontological commitments of two paraphrases of one idea? [Lowe] |
18706 | Words of the same kind can be substituted in a proposition without producing nonsense [Wittgenstein] |
18735 | Talking nonsense is not following the rules [Wittgenstein] |
18719 | Grammar says that saying 'sound is red' is not false, but nonsense [Wittgenstein] |
18731 | There is no theory of truth, because it isn't a concept [Wittgenstein] |
18707 | All thought has the logical form of reality [Wittgenstein] |
8315 | Maybe facts are just true propositions [Lowe] |
8319 | One-to-one correspondence would need countable, individuable items [Lowe] |
8309 | A set is a 'number of things', not a 'collection', because nothing actually collects the members [Lowe] |
8322 | I don't believe in the empty set, because (lacking members) it lacks identity-conditions [Lowe] |
18724 | In logic nothing is hidden [Wittgenstein] |
18709 | Laws of logic are like laws of chess - if you change them, it's just a different game [Wittgenstein] |
18736 | Contradiction is between two rules, not between rule and reality [Wittgenstein] |
18723 | We may correctly use 'not' without making the rule explicit [Wittgenstein] |
18718 | Saying 'and' has meaning is just saying it works in a sentence [Wittgenstein] |
18727 | A person's name doesn't mean their body; bodies don't sit down, and their existence can be denied [Wittgenstein] |
8312 | It is better if the existential quantifier refers to 'something', rather than a 'thing' which needs individuation [Lowe] |
18738 | We don't get 'nearer' to something by adding decimals to 1.1412... (root-2) [Wittgenstein] |
16014 | It is controversial whether only 'numerical identity' allows two things to be counted as one [Noonan] |
18708 | Infinity is not a number, so doesn't say how many; it is the property of a law [Wittgenstein] |
8297 | Numbers are universals, being sets whose instances are sets of appropriate cardinality [Lowe] |
8266 | Simple counting is more basic than spotting that one-to-one correlation makes sets equinumerous [Lowe] |
8302 | Fs and Gs are identical in number if they one-to-one correlate with one another [Lowe] |
8298 | Sets are instances of numbers (rather than 'collections'); numbers explain sets, not vice versa [Lowe] |
8311 | If 2 is a particular, then adding particulars to themselves does nothing, and 2+2=2 [Lowe] |
8310 | Does the existence of numbers matter, in the way space, time and persons do? [Lowe] |
8321 | All possible worlds contain abstracta (e.g. numbers), which means they contain concrete objects [Lowe] |
8300 | Perhaps possession of causal power is the hallmark of existence (and a reason to deny the void) [Lowe] |
8281 | Heraclitus says change is new creation, and Spinoza that it is just phases of the one substance [Lowe] |
8270 | Events are changes or non-changes in properties and relations of persisting objects [Lowe] |
8308 | Events are ontologically indispensable for singular causal explanations [Lowe] |
8314 | Are facts wholly abstract, or can they contain some concrete constituents? [Lowe] |
8316 | Facts cannot be wholly abstract if they enter into causal relations [Lowe] |
8318 | The problem with the structured complex view of facts is what binds the constituents [Lowe] |
8323 | It is whimsical to try to count facts - how many facts did I learn before breakfast? [Lowe] |
18737 | There are no positive or negative facts; these are just the forms of propositions [Wittgenstein] |
8313 | Facts are needed for truth-making and causation, but they seem to lack identity criteria [Lowe] |
8258 | Two of the main rivals for the foundations of ontology are substances, and facts or states-of-affairs [Lowe] |
8301 | Some abstractions exist despite lacking causal powers, because explanation needs them [Lowe] |
8283 | Ontological categories are not natural kinds: the latter can only be distinguished using the former [Lowe] |
8284 | The top division of categories is either abstract/concrete, or universal/particular, or necessary/contingent [Lowe] |
13122 | Lowe divides things into universals and particulars, then kinds and properties, and abstract/concrete [Lowe, by Westerhoff] |
8273 | Is 'the Thames is broad in London' relational, or adverbial, or segmental? [Lowe] |
8285 | I prefer 'modes' to 'tropes', because it emphasises their dependence [Lowe] |
8295 | Why cannot a trope float off and join another bundle? [Lowe] |
8286 | Tropes cannot have clear identity-conditions, so they are not objects [Lowe] |
8294 | How can tropes depend on objects for their identity, if objects are just bundles of tropes? [Lowe] |
8296 | Does a ball snug in plaster have one trope, or two which coincide? [Lowe] |
8288 | Sortal terms for universals involve a substance, whereas adjectival terms do not [Lowe] |
8293 | Real universals are needed to explain laws of nature [Lowe] |
8307 | Particulars are instantiations, and universals are instantiables [Lowe] |
18715 | Using 'green' is a commitment to future usage of 'green' [Wittgenstein] |
16130 | To be an object at all requires identity-conditions [Lowe] |
8265 | Our commitment to the existence of objects should depend on their explanatory value [Lowe] |
8275 | Objects are entities with full identity-conditions, but there are entities other than objects [Lowe] |
8267 | Perhaps concrete objects are entities which are in space-time and subject to causality [Lowe] |
8263 | An object is an entity which has identity-conditions [Lowe] |
8268 | Some things (such as electrons) can be countable, while lacking proper identity [Lowe] |
8303 | Criteria of identity cannot individuate objects, because they are shared among different types [Lowe] |
8292 | Diversity of two tigers is their difference in space-time; difference of matter is a consequence [Lowe] |
8291 | Individuation principles identify what kind it is; identity criteria distinguish items of the same kind [Lowe] |
16128 | A 'substance' is an object which doesn't depend for existence on other objects [Lowe] |
8279 | The identity of composite objects isn't fixed by original composition, because how do you identify the origin? [Lowe] |
8271 | An object 'endures' if it is always wholly present, and 'perdures' if different parts exist at different times [Lowe] |
16024 | I could have died at five, but the summation of my adult stages could not [Noonan] |
8272 | How can you identify temporal parts of tomatoes without referring to tomatoes? [Lowe] |
16023 | Stage theorists accept four-dimensionalism, but call each stage a whole object [Noonan] |
16015 | Problems about identity can't even be formulated without the concept of identity [Noonan] |
16017 | Identity is usually defined as the equivalence relation satisfying Leibniz's Law [Noonan] |
16016 | Identity definitions (such as self-identity, or the smallest equivalence relation) are usually circular [Noonan] |
16020 | Identity can only be characterised in a second-order language [Noonan] |
8305 | A clear idea of the kind of an object must precede a criterion of identity for it [Lowe] |
8290 | One view is that two objects of the same type are only distinguished by differing in matter [Lowe] |
16018 | Indiscernibility is basic to our understanding of identity and distinctness [Noonan] |
16019 | Leibniz's Law must be kept separate from the substitutivity principle [Noonan] |
15079 | 'Conceptual' necessity is narrow logical necessity, true because of concepts and logical laws [Lowe] |
16063 | Metaphysical necessity is logical necessity 'broadly construed' [Lowe, by Lynch/Glasgow] |
8260 | Logical necessity can be 'strict' (laws), or 'narrow' (laws and definitions), or 'broad' (all logical worlds) [Lowe] |
16131 | The metaphysically possible is what acceptable principles and categories will permit [Lowe] |
18726 | For each necessity in the world there is an arbitrary rule of language [Wittgenstein] |
8320 | Does every abstract possible world exist in every possible world? [Lowe] |
18712 | Understanding is translation, into action or into other symbols [Wittgenstein] |
8280 | While space may just be appearance, time and change can't be, because the appearances change [Lowe] |
8276 | Properties or qualities are essentially adjectival, not objectual [Lowe] |
18280 | We live in sense-data, but talk about physical objects [Wittgenstein] |
18729 | Part of what we mean by stating the facts is the way we tend to experience them [Wittgenstein] |
18734 | If you remember wrongly, then there must be some other criterion than your remembering [Wittgenstein] |
18721 | Explanation and understanding are the same [Wittgenstein] |
18720 | Explanation gives understanding by revealing the full multiplicity of the thing [Wittgenstein] |
18716 | A machine strikes us as being a rule of movement [Wittgenstein] |
18713 | If an explanation is good, the symbol is used properly in the future [Wittgenstein] |
8289 | The idea that Cartesian souls are made of some ghostly 'immaterial' stuff is quite unwarranted [Lowe] |
18717 | Thought is an activity which we perform by the expression of it [Wittgenstein] |
8299 | Abstractions are non-spatial, or dependent, or derived from concepts [Lowe] |
8306 | You can think of a direction without a line, but a direction existing with no lines is inconceivable [Lowe] |
18725 | A proposition draws a line around the facts which agree with it [Wittgenstein] |
18728 | The meaning of a proposition is the mode of its verification [Wittgenstein] |
18705 | Words function only in propositions, like levers in a machine [Wittgenstein] |
18711 | A proposition is any expression which can be significantly negated [Wittgenstein] |
8317 | To cite facts as the elements in causation is to confuse states of affairs with states of objects [Lowe] |
18733 | Laws of nature are an aspect of the phenomena, and are just our mode of description [Wittgenstein] |
8269 | Points are limits of parts of space, so parts of space cannot be aggregates of them [Lowe] |