49 ideas
| 16512 | Semantic facts are preferable to transcendental philosophical fiction [Wiggins] |
| 9148 | I think of variables as objects rather than as signs [Fine,K] |
| 17529 | Maybe the concept needed under which things coincide must also yield a principle of counting [Wiggins] |
| 17518 | Counting 'coin in this box' may have coin as the unit, with 'in this box' merely as the scope [Ayers] |
| 17516 | If counting needs a sortal, what of things which fall under two sortals? [Ayers] |
| 17530 | The sortal needed for identities may not always be sufficient to support counting [Wiggins] |
| 17520 | Events do not have natural boundaries, and we have to set them [Ayers] |
| 16523 | Realist Conceptualists accept that our interests affect our concepts [Wiggins] |
| 16524 | Conceptualism says we must use our individuating concepts to grasp reality [Wiggins] |
| 16526 | Animal classifications: the Emperor's, fabulous, innumerable, like flies, stray dogs, embalmed…. [Wiggins] |
| 17519 | To express borderline cases of objects, you need the concept of an 'object' [Ayers] |
| 16492 | Individuation needs accounts of identity, of change, and of singling out [Wiggins] |
| 16493 | Individuation can only be understood by the relation between things and thinkers [Wiggins] |
| 16496 | Singling out extends back and forward in time [Wiggins] |
| 17510 | Speakers need the very general category of a thing, if they are to think about it [Ayers] |
| 17522 | We use sortals to classify physical objects by the nature and origin of their unity [Ayers] |
| 17515 | Seeing caterpillar and moth as the same needs continuity, not identity of sortal concepts [Ayers] |
| 16495 | The only singling out is singling out 'as' something [Wiggins] |
| 16501 | In Aristotle's sense, saying x falls under f is to say what x is [Wiggins] |
| 16506 | Every determinate thing falls under a sortal, which fixes its persistence [Wiggins] |
| 17511 | Recognising continuity is separate from sortals, and must precede their use [Ayers] |
| 17517 | Could the same matter have more than one form or principle of unity? [Ayers] |
| 17513 | If there are two objects, then 'that marble, man-shaped object' is ambiguous [Ayers] |
| 16509 | Natural kinds are well suited to be the sortals which fix substances [Wiggins] |
| 17523 | Sortals basically apply to individuals [Ayers] |
| 16514 | Artefacts are individuated by some matter having a certain function [Wiggins] |
| 16510 | Nominal essences don't fix membership, ignore evolution, and aren't contextual [Wiggins] |
| 16503 | 'What is it?' gives the kind, nature, persistence conditions and identity over time of a thing [Wiggins] |
| 17521 | You can't have the concept of a 'stage' if you lack the concept of an object [Ayers] |
| 17514 | Temporal 'parts' cannot be separated or rearranged [Ayers] |
| 16499 | A restored church is the same 'church', but not the same 'building' or 'brickwork' [Wiggins] |
| 16515 | A thing begins only once; for a clock, it is when its making is first completed [Wiggins] |
| 16517 | Priests prefer the working ship; antiquarians prefer the reconstruction [Wiggins] |
| 17509 | Some say a 'covering concept' completes identity; others place the concept in the reference [Ayers] |
| 16498 | Identity cannot be defined, because definitions are identities [Wiggins] |
| 16497 | Leibniz's Law (not transitivity, symmetry, reflexivity) marks what is peculiar to identity [Wiggins] |
| 16502 | Identity is primitive [Wiggins] |
| 17512 | If diachronic identities need covering concepts, why not synchronic identities too? [Ayers] |
| 16521 | A is necessarily A, so if B is A, then B is also necessarily A [Wiggins] |
| 16505 | By the principle of Indiscernibility, a symmetrical object could only be half of itself! [Wiggins] |
| 16494 | We want to explain sameness as coincidence of substance, not as anything qualitative [Wiggins] |
| 16522 | It is hard or impossible to think of Caesar as not human [Wiggins] |
| 16525 | Our sortal concepts fix what we find in experience [Wiggins] |
| 9152 | If green is abstracted from a thing, it is only seen as a type if it is common to many things [Fine,K] |
| 16518 | We conceptualise objects, but they impinge on us [Wiggins] |
| 16511 | A 'conception' of a horse is a full theory of what it is (and not just the 'concept') [Wiggins] |
| 9149 | To obtain the number 2 by abstraction, we only want to abstract the distinctness of a pair of objects [Fine,K] |
| 9150 | We should define abstraction in general, with number abstraction taken as a special case [Fine,K] |
| 9146 | After abstraction all numbers seem identical, so only 0 and 1 will exist! [Fine,K] |