83 ideas
| 2056 | Philosophers are always switching direction to something more interesting [Plato] |
| 14721 | Metaphysical enquiry can survive if its conclusions are tentative [Sider] |
| 2086 | Understanding mainly involves knowing the elements, not their combinations [Plato] |
| 2083 | Either a syllable is its letters (making parts as knowable as whole) or it isn't (meaning it has no parts) [Plato] |
| 2082 | A rational account is essentially a weaving together of things with names [Plato] |
| 2052 | Eristic discussion is aggressive, but dialectic aims to help one's companions in discussion [Plato] |
| 15854 | A primary element has only a name, and no logos, but complexes have an account, by weaving the names [Plato] |
| 10216 | We master arithmetic by knowing all the numbers in our soul [Plato] |
| 2060 | There seem to be two sorts of change: alteration and motion [Plato] |
| 14760 | Four-dimensionalism sees things and processes as belonging in the same category [Sider] |
| 14194 | Proper ontology should only use categorical (actual) properties, not hypothetical ones [Sider] |
| 4938 | Prior to language, concepts are universals created by self-mapping of brain activity [Edelman/Tononi] |
| 14745 | If sortal terms fix the kind and the persistence conditions, we need to know what kinds there are [Sider] |
| 14740 | If Tib is all of Tibbles bar her tail, when Tibbles loses her tail, two different things become one [Sider] |
| 14752 | Artists 'create' statues because they are essentially statues, and so lack identity with the lump of clay [Sider] |
| 14743 | The stage view of objects is best for dealing with coincident entities [Sider] |
| 14747 | 'Composition as identity' says that an object just is the objects which compose it [Sider] |
| 2084 | If a word has no parts and has a single identity, it turns out to be the same kind of thing as a letter [Plato] |
| 15844 | A sum is that from which nothing is lacking, which is a whole [Plato] |
| 15843 | The whole can't be the parts, because it would be all of the parts, which is the whole [Plato] |
| 14757 | Mereological essentialism says an object's parts are necessary for its existence [Sider] |
| 14727 | Three-dimensionalists assert 'enduring', being wholly present at each moment, and deny 'temporal parts' [Sider] |
| 14738 | Some might say that its inconsistency with time travel is a reason to favour three-dimensionalism [Sider] |
| 14726 | Four-dimensionalists assert 'temporal parts', 'perduring', and being spread out over time [Sider] |
| 14728 | 4D says intrinsic change is difference between successive parts [Sider] |
| 14729 | 4D says each spatiotemporal object must have a temporal part at every moment at which it exists [Sider] |
| 14730 | Temporal parts exist, but are not prior building blocks for objects [Sider] |
| 14762 | Four-dimensionalism says temporal parts are caused (through laws of motion) by previous temporal parts [Sider] |
| 14731 | Temporal parts are instantaneous [Sider] |
| 14758 | How can an instantaneous stage believe anything, if beliefs take time? [Sider] |
| 14741 | The ship undergoes 'asymmetric' fission, where one candidate is seen as stronger [Sider] |
| 14754 | If you say Leibniz's Law doesn't apply to 'timebound' properties, you are no longer discussing identity [Sider] |
| 14763 | Counterparts rest on similarity, so there are many such relations in different contexts [Sider] |
| 2080 | Things are only knowable if a rational account (logos) is possible [Plato] |
| 16126 | Expertise is knowledge of the whole by means of the parts [Plato] |
| 2050 | It is impossible to believe something which is held to be false [Plato] |
| 2076 | How can a belief exist if its object doesn't exist? [Plato] |
| 2045 | Perception is infallible, suggesting that it is knowledge [Plato] |
| 2067 | Our senses could have been separate, but they converge on one mind [Plato] |
| 2068 | With what physical faculty do we perceive pairs of opposed abstract qualities? [Plato] |
| 2069 | Thought must grasp being itself before truth becomes possible [Plato] |
| 2078 | You might mistake eleven for twelve in your senses, but not in your mind [Plato] |
| 2089 | An inadequate rational account would still not justify knowledge [Plato] |
| 2085 | Parts and wholes are either equally knowable or equally unknowable [Plato] |
| 2091 | Without distinguishing marks, how do I know what my beliefs are about? [Plato] |
| 2087 | A rational account might be seeing an image of one's belief, like a reflection in a mirror [Plato] |
| 2090 | A rational account involves giving an image, or analysis, or giving a differentiating mark [Plato] |
| 2081 | Maybe primary elements can be named, but not receive a rational account [Plato] |
| 2088 | A rational account of a wagon would mean knowledge of its hundred parts [Plato] |
| 2047 | What evidence can be brought to show whether we are dreaming or not? [Plato] |
| 4934 | Cultures have a common core of colour naming, based on three axes of colour pairs [Edelman/Tononi] |
| 2053 | If you claim that all beliefs are true, that includes beliefs opposed to your own [Plato] |
| 2054 | Clearly some people are superior to others when it comes to medicine [Plato] |
| 2059 | How can a relativist form opinions about what will happen in the future? [Plato] |
| 4924 | A conscious human being rapidly reunifies its mind after any damage to the brain [Edelman/Tononi] |
| 4932 | A conscious state endures for about 100 milliseconds, known as the 'specious present' [Edelman/Tononi] |
| 4931 | Consciousness is a process (of neural interactions), not a location, thing, property, connectivity, or activity [Edelman/Tononi] |
| 4923 | The three essentials of conscious experience are privateness, unity and informativeness [Edelman/Tononi] |
| 4941 | Consciousness can create new axioms, but computers can't do that [Edelman/Tononi] |
| 4930 | Consciousness arises from high speed interactions between clusters of neurons [Edelman/Tononi] |
| 4929 | Dreams and imagery show the brain can generate awareness and meaning without input [Edelman/Tononi] |
| 4940 | Physicists see information as a measure of order, but for biologists it is symbolic exchange between animals [Edelman/Tononi] |
| 4935 | The sensation of red is a point in neural space created by dimensions of neuronal activity [Edelman/Tononi] |
| 4936 | The self is founded on bodily awareness centred in the brain stem [Edelman/Tononi] |
| 4939 | A sense of self begins either internally, or externally through language and society [Edelman/Tononi] |
| 4925 | Brains can initiate free actions before the person is aware of their own decision [Edelman/Tononi] |
| 4933 | Consciousness is a process, not a thing, as it maintains unity as its composition changes [Edelman/Tononi] |
| 4928 | Brain complexity balances segregation and integration, like a good team of specialists [Edelman/Tononi] |
| 4927 | Information-processing views of the brain assume the existence of 'information', and dubious brain codes [Edelman/Tononi] |
| 4922 | Consciousness involves interaction with persons and the world, as well as brain functions [Edelman/Tononi] |
| 5793 | Concepts and generalisations result from brain 'global mapping' by 'reentry' [Edelman/Tononi, by Searle] |
| 4926 | Concepts arise when the brain maps its own activities [Edelman/Tononi] |
| 4937 | Systems that generate a sense of value are basic to the primitive brain [Edelman/Tononi] |
| 14725 | Maybe motion is a dynamical quantity intrinsic to a thing at a particular time [Sider] |
| 14735 | Space is 3D and lacks a direction; time seems connected to causation [Sider] |
| 14722 | Between presentism and eternalism is the 'growing block' view - the past is real, the future is not [Sider] |
| 14756 | For Presentists there must always be a temporal vantage point for any description [Sider] |
| 14724 | Presentists must deny truths about multiple times [Sider] |
| 14723 | Talk using tenses can be eliminated, by reducing it to indexical connections for an utterance [Sider] |
| 14734 | The B-series involves eternalism, and the reduction of tense [Sider] |
| 14736 | The B-theory is adequate, except that it omits to say which time is present [Sider] |
| 2058 | God must be the epitome of goodness, and we can only approach a divine state by being as good as possible [Plato] |
| 2057 | There must always be some force of evil ranged against good [Plato] |