32 ideas
| 19740 | A very hungry man cannot choose between equidistant piles of food [Aristotle] |
| 16185 | Causality indicates which properties are real [Cartwright,N] |
| 335 | Do the gods also hold different opinions about what is right and honourable? [Plato] |
| 16182 | Two main types of explanation are by causes, or by citing a theoretical framework [Cartwright,N] |
| 16184 | An explanation is a model that fits a theory and predicts the phenomenological laws [Cartwright,N] |
| 16167 | Laws get the facts wrong, and explanation rests on improvements and qualifications of laws [Cartwright,N] |
| 16169 | Laws apply to separate domains, but real explanations apply to intersecting domains [Cartwright,N] |
| 16171 | The covering law view assumes that each phenomenon has a 'right' explanation [Cartwright,N] |
| 16176 | Covering-law explanation lets us explain storms by falling barometers [Cartwright,N] |
| 16177 | I disagree with the covering-law view that there is a law to cover every single case [Cartwright,N] |
| 16180 | You can't explain one quail's behaviour by just saying that all quails do it [Cartwright,N] |
| 16183 | In science, best explanations have regularly turned out to be false [Cartwright,N] |
| 398 | Each thing that has a function is for the sake of that function [Aristotle] |
| 394 | An unworn sandal is in vain, but nothing in nature is in vain [Aristotle] |
| 396 | There has to be some goal, and not just movement to infinity [Aristotle] |
| 16102 | Aether moves in circles and is imperishable; the four elements perish, and move in straight lines [Aristotle, by Gill,ML] |
| 17463 | An element is what bodies are analysed into, and won't itself divide into something else [Aristotle] |
| 16175 | A cause won't increase the effect frequency if other causes keep interfering [Cartwright,N] |
| 6781 | There are fundamental explanatory laws (false!), and phenomenological laws (regularities) [Cartwright,N, by Bird] |
| 16166 | Laws of appearances are 'phenomenological'; laws of reality are 'theoretical' [Cartwright,N] |
| 16179 | Good organisation may not be true, and the truth may not organise very much [Cartwright,N] |
| 16178 | There are few laws for when one theory meets another [Cartwright,N] |
| 16170 | To get from facts to equations, we need a prepared descriptions suited to mathematics [Cartwright,N] |
| 16181 | Simple laws have quite different outcomes when they act in combinations [Cartwright,N] |
| 399 | If the more you raise some earth the faster it moves, why does the whole earth not move? [Aristotle] |
| 20918 | Void is a kind of place, so it can't explain place [Aristotle] |
| 402 | The Earth must be spherical, because it casts a convex shadow on the moon [Aristotle] |
| 403 | The earth must be round and of limited size, because moving north or south makes different stars visible [Aristotle] |
| 1498 | Everyone agrees that the world had a beginning, but thinkers disagree over whether it will end [Aristotle] |
| 395 | It seems possible that there exists a limited number of other worlds apart from this one [Aristotle] |
| 336 | Is what is pious loved by the gods because it is pious, or is it pious because they love it? (the 'Euthyphro Question') [Plato] |
| 337 | It seems that the gods love things because they are pious, rather than making them pious by loving them [Plato] |