Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'The Statesman', 'Consciousness, Philosophy and Mathematics' and 'Can Mechanisms Replace Laws of Nature?'

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21 ideas

1. Philosophy / F. Analytic Philosophy / 2. Analysis by Division
16123 Whenever you perceive a community of things, you should also hunt out differences in the group [Plato]
2. Reason / D. Definition / 2. Aims of Definition
16125 To reveal a nature, divide down, and strip away what it has in common with other things [Plato]
16124 No one wants to define 'weaving' just for the sake of weaving [Plato]
6. Mathematics / C. Sources of Mathematics / 10. Constructivism / b. Intuitionism
8728 Intuitionist mathematics deduces by introspective construction, and rejects unknown truths [Brouwer]
12. Knowledge Sources / A. A Priori Knowledge / 3. Innate Knowledge / b. Recollection doctrine
5961 The soul gets its goodness from god, and its evil from previous existence. [Plato]
14. Science / D. Explanation / 2. Types of Explanation / e. Lawlike explanations
12790 Generalisations must be invariant to explain anything [Leuridan]
14. Science / D. Explanation / 2. Types of Explanation / h. Explanations by function
12789 Biological functions are explained by disposition, or by causal role [Leuridan]
14. Science / D. Explanation / 2. Types of Explanation / i. Explanations by mechanism
14388 Mechanisms must produce macro-level regularities, but that needs micro-level regularities [Leuridan]
14386 Mechanisms are ontologically dependent on regularities [Leuridan]
12787 Mechanisms can't explain on their own, as their models rest on pragmatic regularities [Leuridan]
14384 We can show that regularities and pragmatic laws are more basic than mechanisms [Leuridan]
14. Science / D. Explanation / 3. Best Explanation / b. Ultimate explanation
14389 There is nothing wrong with an infinite regress of mechanisms and regularities [Leuridan]
19. Language / F. Communication / 1. Rhetoric
283 The question of whether or not to persuade comes before the science of persuasion [Plato]
21. Aesthetics / A. Aesthetic Experience / 5. Natural Beauty
282 Non-physical beauty can only be shown clearly by speech [Plato]
23. Ethics / C. Virtue Theory / 2. Elements of Virtue Theory / f. The Mean
281 The arts produce good and beautiful things by preserving the mean [Plato]
24. Political Theory / D. Ideologies / 5. Democracy / a. Nature of democracy
22559 Democracy is the worst of good constitutions, but the best of bad constitutions [Plato, by Aristotle]
26. Natural Theory / A. Speculations on Nature / 3. Natural Function
14387 Rather than dispositions, functions may be the element that brought a thing into existence [Leuridan]
26. Natural Theory / D. Laws of Nature / 3. Laws and Generalities
14382 Pragmatic laws allow prediction and explanation, to the extent that reality is stable [Leuridan]
26. Natural Theory / D. Laws of Nature / 4. Regularities / a. Regularity theory
14385 Strict regularities are rarely discovered in life sciences [Leuridan]
26. Natural Theory / D. Laws of Nature / 11. Against Laws of Nature
14383 A 'law of nature' is just a regularity, not some entity that causes the regularity [Leuridan]
28. God / A. Divine Nature / 2. Divine Nature
279 Only divine things can always stay the same, and bodies are not like that [Plato]