58 ideas
20801 | A wise man's chief strength is not being tricked; nothing is worse than error, frivolity or rashness [Zeno of Citium, by Cicero] |
3600 | Slow and accurate thought makes the greatest progress [Descartes] |
1771 | When shown seven versions of the mowing argument, he paid twice the asking price for them [Zeno of Citium, by Diog. Laertius] |
20770 | Philosophy has three parts, studying nature, character, and rational discourse [Zeno of Citium, by Diog. Laertius] |
3601 | Most things in human life seem vain and useless [Descartes] |
3602 | Almost every daft idea has been expressed by some philosopher [Descartes] |
3603 | Methodical thinking is cautious, analytical, systematic, and panoramic [Descartes, by PG] |
3612 | Clear and distinct conceptions are true because a perfect God exists [Descartes] |
23291 | Without truth, both language and thought are impossible [Davidson] |
23286 | Truth can't be a goal, because we can neither recognise it nor confim it [Davidson] |
23284 | Plato's Forms confused truth with the most eminent truths, so only Truth itself is completely true [Davidson] |
3610 | Truth is clear and distinct conception - of which it is hard to be sure [Descartes] |
23292 | Correspondence can't be defined, but it shows how truth depends on the world [Davidson] |
23288 | When Tarski defines truth for different languages, how do we know it is a single concept? [Davidson] |
23287 | Disquotation only accounts for truth if the metalanguage contains the object language [Davidson] |
6022 | Someone who says 'it is day' proposes it is day, and it is true if it is day [Zeno of Citium, by Diog. Laertius] |
7555 | Zeno achieved the statement of the problems of infinitesimals, infinity and continuity [Russell on Zeno of Citium] |
20860 | Whatever participates in substance exists [Zeno of Citium, by Stobaeus] |
23285 | If we try to identify facts precisely, they all melt into one (as the Slingshot Argument proves) [Davidson] |
21397 | Perception an open hand, a fist is 'grasping', and holding that fist is knowledge [Zeno of Citium, by Long] |
3605 | We can believe a thing without knowing we believe it [Descartes] |
20799 | A grasp by the senses is true, because it leaves nothing out, and so nature endorses it [Zeno of Citium, by Cicero] |
1583 | In morals Descartes accepts the conventional, but rejects it in epistemology [Roochnik on Descartes] |
3607 | In thinking everything else false, my own existence remains totally certain [Descartes] |
3617 | I aim to find the principles and causes of everything, using the seeds within my mind [Descartes] |
3611 | Understanding, rather than imagination or senses, gives knowledge [Descartes] |
20797 | If a grasped perception cannot be shaken by argument, it is 'knowledge' [Zeno of Citium, by Cicero] |
3606 | I was searching for reliable rock under the shifting sand [Descartes] |
21398 | A presentation is true if we judge that no false presentation could appear like it [Zeno of Citium, by Cicero] |
3604 | When rebuilding a house, one needs alternative lodgings [Descartes] |
3618 | Only experiments can settle disagreements between rival explanations [Descartes] |
3615 | Little reason is needed to speak, so animals have no reason at all [Descartes] |
3609 | I am a thinking substance, which doesn't need a place or material support [Descartes] |
1770 | When a slave said 'It was fated that I should steal', Zeno replied 'Yes, and that you should be beaten' [Zeno of Citium, by Diog. Laertius] |
3799 | A dog tied to a cart either chooses to follow and is pulled, or it is just pulled [Zeno of Citium, by Hippolytus] |
3608 | I can deny my body and the world, but not my own existence [Descartes] |
3613 | Reason is universal in its responses, but a physical machine is constrained by its organs [Descartes] |
3616 | The soul must unite with the body to have appetites and sensations [Descartes] |
21402 | Incorporeal substances can't do anything, and can't be acted upon either [Zeno of Citium, by Cicero] |
20816 | A body is required for anything to have causal relations [Zeno of Citium, by Cicero] |
3614 | A machine could speak in response to physical stimulus, but not hold a conversation [Descartes] |
23289 | Knowing the potential truth conditions of a sentence is necessary and sufficient for understanding [Davidson] |
23290 | It could be that the use of a sentence is explained by its truth conditions [Davidson] |
1773 | A sentence always has signification, but a word by itself never does [Zeno of Citium, by Diog. Laertius] |
20841 | Zeno said live in agreement with nature, which accords with virtue [Zeno of Citium, by Diog. Laertius] |
1774 | Since we are essentially rational animals, living according to reason is living according to nature [Zeno of Citium, by Diog. Laertius] |
20863 | The goal is to 'live in agreement', according to one rational consistent principle [Zeno of Citium, by Stobaeus] |
2662 | Zeno saw virtue as a splendid state, not just a source of splendid action [Zeno of Citium, by Cicero] |
1581 | Greeks elevate virtues enormously, but never explain them [Descartes] |
21395 | One of Zeno's books was 'That Which is Appropriate' [Zeno of Citium, by Long] |
5964 | Zeno says there are four main virtues, which are inseparable but distinct [Zeno of Citium, by Plutarch] |
16686 | God has established laws throughout nature, and implanted ideas of them within us [Descartes] |
20822 | There is no void in the cosmos, but indefinite void outside it [Zeno of Citium, by Ps-Plutarch] |
20811 | Since the cosmos produces what is alive and rational, it too must be alive and rational [Zeno of Citium] |
2648 | Things are more perfect if they have reason; nothing is more perfect than the universe, so it must have reason [Zeno of Citium] |
20810 | Rational is better than non-rational; the cosmos is supreme, so it is rational [Zeno of Citium] |
2649 | If tuneful flutes grew on olive trees, you would assume the olive had some knowledge of the flute [Zeno of Citium] |
20807 | The cosmos and heavens are the substance of god [Zeno of Citium, by Diog. Laertius] |