39 ideas
3600 | Slow and accurate thought makes the greatest progress [Descartes] |
6851 | We overvalue whether arguments are valid, and undervalue whether they are interesting [Monk] |
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] |
2098 | The principle of sufficient reason is needed if we are to proceed from maths to physics [Leibniz] |
3646 | There is always a reason why things are thus rather than otherwise [Leibniz] |
2104 | No reason could limit the quantity of matter, so there is no limit [Leibniz] |
3612 | Clear and distinct conceptions are true because a perfect God exists [Descartes] |
3610 | Truth is clear and distinct conception - of which it is hard to be sure [Descartes] |
19385 | All simply substances are in harmony, because they all represent the one universe [Leibniz] |
21346 | The ratio between two lines can't be a feature of one, and cannot be in both [Leibniz] |
3605 | We can believe a thing without knowing we believe it [Descartes] |
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] |
3606 | I was searching for reliable rock under the shifting sand [Descartes] |
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] |
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] |
3614 | A machine could speak in response to physical stimulus, but not hold a conversation [Descartes] |
6850 | Wittgenstein pared his life down in his search for decency [Monk] |
1581 | Greeks elevate virtues enormously, but never explain them [Descartes] |
2106 | The only simple things are monads, with no parts or extension [Leibniz] |
2102 | Atomism is irrational because it suggests that two atoms can be indistinguishable [Leibniz] |
2105 | Things are infinitely subdivisible and contain new worlds, which atoms would make impossible [Leibniz] |
16686 | God has established laws throughout nature, and implanted ideas of them within us [Descartes] |
20965 | Leibniz upheld conservations of momentum and energy [Leibniz, by Papineau] |
2103 | The idea that the universe could be moved forward with no other change is just a fantasy [Leibniz] |
2100 | Space and time are purely relative [Leibniz] |
2107 | No time exists except instants, and instants are not even a part of time, so time does not exist [Leibniz] |
2101 | If everything in the universe happened a year earlier, there would be no discernible difference [Leibniz] |
22894 | If time were absolute that would make God's existence dependent on it [Leibniz, by Bardon] |
2099 | The existence of God, and all metaphysics, follows from the Principle of Sufficient Reason [Leibniz] |