Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'The Impossibility of Superdupervenience', 'Mechanisms' and 'On Multiplying Entities'

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15 ideas

2. Reason / B. Laws of Thought / 6. Ockham's Razor
The quest for simplicity drove scientists to posit new entities, such as molecules in gases [Quine]
In arithmetic, ratios, negatives, irrationals and imaginaries were created in order to generalise [Quine]
7. Existence / B. Change in Existence / 4. Events / c. Reduction of events
Explaining events just by bodies can't explain two events identical in space-time [Quine]
7. Existence / C. Structure of Existence / 3. Levels of Reality
A necessary relation between fact-levels seems to be a further irreducible fact [Lynch/Glasgow]
7. Existence / C. Structure of Existence / 5. Supervenience / c. Significance of supervenience
If some facts 'logically supervene' on some others, they just redescribe them, adding nothing [Lynch/Glasgow]
7. Existence / D. Theories of Reality / 6. Physicalism
Nonreductive materialism says upper 'levels' depend on lower, but don't 'reduce' [Lynch/Glasgow]
The hallmark of physicalism is that each causal power has a base causal power under it [Lynch/Glasgow]
10. Modality / A. Necessity / 11. Denial of Necessity
Necessity could be just generalisation over classes, or (maybe) quantifying over possibilia [Quine]
14. Science / B. Scientific Theories / 2. Aim of Science
Empiricist theories are sets of laws, which give explanations and reductions [Glennan]
14. Science / D. Explanation / 2. Types of Explanation / i. Explanations by mechanism
Modern mechanism need parts with spatial, temporal and function facts, and diagrams [Glennan]
Mechanistic philosophy of science is an alternative to the empiricist law-based tradition [Glennan]
Mechanisms are either systems of parts or sequences of activities [Glennan]
17th century mechanists explained everything by the kinetic physical fundamentals [Glennan]
Unlike the lawlike approach, mechanistic explanation can allow for exceptions [Glennan]
26. Natural Theory / C. Causation / 4. Naturalised causation
Since causal events are related by mechanisms, causation can be analysed in that way [Glennan]