Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'Individuals without Sortals', 'fragments/reports' and 'Knowledge by Agreement'

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44 ideas

3. Truth / C. Correspondence Truth / 1. Correspondence Truth
Correspondence could be with other beliefs, rather than external facts [Kusch]
3. Truth / F. Semantic Truth / 1. Tarski's Truth / a. Tarski's truth definition
Tarskians distinguish truth from falsehood by relations between members of sets [Kusch]
6. Mathematics / A. Nature of Mathematics / 4. Using Numbers / d. Counting via concepts
Counting 'coin in this box' may have coin as the unit, with 'in this box' merely as the scope [Ayers]
If counting needs a sortal, what of things which fall under two sortals? [Ayers]
7. Existence / B. Change in Existence / 4. Events / a. Nature of events
Events do not have natural boundaries, and we have to set them [Ayers]
9. Objects / A. Existence of Objects / 5. Individuation / a. Individuation
To express borderline cases of objects, you need the concept of an 'object' [Ayers]
9. Objects / A. Existence of Objects / 5. Individuation / e. Individuation by kind
Speakers need the very general category of a thing, if they are to think about it [Ayers]
We use sortals to classify physical objects by the nature and origin of their unity [Ayers]
Seeing caterpillar and moth as the same needs continuity, not identity of sortal concepts [Ayers]
Recognising continuity is separate from sortals, and must precede their use [Ayers]
9. Objects / B. Unity of Objects / 1. Unifying an Object / a. Intrinsic unification
Could the same matter have more than one form or principle of unity? [Ayers]
9. Objects / B. Unity of Objects / 3. Unity Problems / c. Statue and clay
If there are two objects, then 'that marble, man-shaped object' is ambiguous [Ayers]
9. Objects / D. Essence of Objects / 5. Essence as Kind
Sortals basically apply to individuals [Ayers]
9. Objects / E. Objects over Time / 5. Temporal Parts
You can't have the concept of a 'stage' if you lack the concept of an object [Ayers]
Temporal 'parts' cannot be separated or rearranged [Ayers]
9. Objects / F. Identity among Objects / 1. Concept of Identity
Some say a 'covering concept' completes identity; others place the concept in the reference [Ayers]
9. Objects / F. Identity among Objects / 3. Relative Identity
If diachronic identities need covering concepts, why not synchronic identities too? [Ayers]
11. Knowledge Aims / A. Knowledge / 4. Belief / a. Beliefs
We can have knowledge without belief, if others credit us with knowledge [Kusch]
11. Knowledge Aims / C. Knowing Reality / 4. Solipsism
Methodological Solipsism assumes all ideas could be derived from one mind [Kusch]
13. Knowledge Criteria / B. Internal Justification / 4. Foundationalism / f. Foundationalism critique
Foundations seem utterly private, even from oneself at a later time [Kusch]
13. Knowledge Criteria / B. Internal Justification / 5. Coherentism / a. Coherence as justification
Testimony is reliable if it coheres with evidence for a belief, and with other beliefs [Kusch]
The coherentist restricts the space of reasons to the realm of beliefs [Kusch]
13. Knowledge Criteria / B. Internal Justification / 5. Coherentism / c. Coherentism critique
Individualistic coherentism lacks access to all of my beliefs, or critical judgement of my assessment [Kusch]
Individual coherentism cannot generate the necessary normativity [Kusch]
13. Knowledge Criteria / C. External Justification / 2. Causal Justification
Cultures decide causal routes, and they can be critically assessed [Kusch]
13. Knowledge Criteria / C. External Justification / 3. Reliabilism / a. Reliable knowledge
Process reliabilism has been called 'virtue epistemology', resting on perception, memory, reason [Kusch]
13. Knowledge Criteria / C. External Justification / 6. Contextual Justification / a. Contextualism
Justification depends on the audience and one's social role [Kusch]
13. Knowledge Criteria / C. External Justification / 7. Testimony
Testimony is an area in which epistemology meets ethics [Kusch]
Powerless people are assumed to be unreliable, even about their own lives [Kusch]
Testimony does not just transmit knowledge between individuals - it actually generates knowledge [Kusch]
Some want to reduce testimony to foundations of perceptions, memories and inferences [Kusch]
Testimony won't reduce to perception, if perception depends on social concepts and categories [Kusch]
A foundation is what is intelligible, hence from a rational source, and tending towards truth [Kusch]
Vindicating testimony is an expression of individualism [Kusch]
13. Knowledge Criteria / C. External Justification / 8. Social Justification
Myths about lonely genius are based on epistemological individualism [Kusch]
Communitarian Epistemology says 'knowledge' is a social status granted to groups of people [Kusch]
Private justification is justification to imagined other people [Kusch]
16. Persons / E. Rejecting the Self / 2. Self as Social Construct
To be considered 'an individual' is performed by a society [Kusch]
18. Thought / D. Concepts / 1. Concepts / a. Nature of concepts
Our experience may be conceptual, but surely not the world itself? [Kusch]
19. Language / F. Communication / 1. Rhetoric
Often socialising people is the only way to persuade them [Kusch]
24. Political Theory / D. Ideologies / 7. Communitarianism / a. Communitarianism
Communitarianism in epistemology sees the community as the primary knower [Kusch]
26. Natural Theory / B. Natural Kinds / 7. Critique of Kinds
Natural kinds are social institutions [Kusch]
27. Natural Reality / G. Biology / 1. Biology
Eurytus showed that numbers underlie things by making pictures of creatures out of pebbles [Eurytus, by Aristotle]
28. God / A. Divine Nature / 4. Divine Contradictions
Omniscience is incoherent, since knowledge is a social concept [Kusch]