57 ideas
| 20678 | The Scientific Revolution was the discovery of our own ignorance [Harari] |
| 20686 | For millenia people didn't know how to convert one type of energy into another [Harari] |
| 2557 | Analytical philosophy seems to have little interest in how to tell a good analysis from a bad one [Rorty] |
| 2556 | Rational certainty may be victory in argument rather than knowledge of facts [Rorty] |
| 4726 | Rorty seems to view truth as simply being able to hold one's view against all comers [Rorty, by O'Grady] |
| 12463 | Unlike correspondence, truthmaking can be one truth to many truthmakers, or vice versa [Jacobs] |
| 2549 | For James truth is "what it is better for us to believe" rather than a correct picture of reality [Rorty] |
| 14375 | If structures result from intrinsic natures of properties, the 'relations' between them can drop out [Jacobs] |
| 14378 | Science aims at identifying the structure and nature of the powers that exist [Jacobs] |
| 12467 | Powers come from concrete particulars, not from the laws of nature [Jacobs] |
| 14377 | Possibilities are manifestations of some power, and impossibilies rest on no powers [Jacobs] |
| 14376 | States of affairs are only possible if some substance could initiate a causal chain to get there [Jacobs] |
| 14379 | Counterfactuals invite us to consider the powers picked out by the antecedent [Jacobs] |
| 14372 | Possible worlds are just not suitable truthmakers for modality [Jacobs] |
| 12466 | All modality is in the properties and relations of the actual world [Jacobs] |
| 14371 | We can base counterfactuals on powers, not possible worlds, and hence define necessity [Jacobs] |
| 12465 | Concrete worlds, unlike fictions, at least offer evidence of how the actual world could be [Jacobs] |
| 12464 | If some book described a possibe life for you, that isn't what makes such a life possible [Jacobs] |
| 12469 | Possible worlds semantics gives little insight into modality [Jacobs] |
| 2548 | If knowledge is merely justified belief, justification is social [Rorty] |
| 6599 | Knowing has no definable essence, but is a social right, found in the context of conversations [Rorty] |
| 2566 | You can't debate about whether to have higher standards for the application of words [Rorty] |
| 2553 | The mind is a property, or it is baffling [Rorty] |
| 2550 | Pain lacks intentionality; beliefs lack qualia [Rorty] |
| 2554 | Is intentionality a special sort of function? [Rorty] |
| 2565 | Nature has no preferred way of being represented [Rorty] |
| 2560 | Can meanings remain the same when beliefs change? [Rorty] |
| 2562 | A theory of reference seems needed to pick out objects without ghostly inner states [Rorty] |
| 2559 | Davidson's theory of meaning focuses not on terms, but on relations between sentences [Rorty] |
| 20692 | Money does produce happiness, but only up to a point [Harari] |
| 2558 | Since Hegel we have tended to see a human as merely animal if it is outside a society [Rorty] |
| 20663 | If a group is bound by gossip, the natural size is 150 people [Harari] |
| 20677 | Since 1500 human population has increased fourteenfold, and consumption far more [Harari] |
| 20688 | People 300m tons; domesticated animals 700m tons; larger wild animals 100m tons [Harari] |
| 20674 | The Nazi aim was to encourage progressive evolution, and avoid degeneration [Harari] |
| 20679 | We stabilise societies with dogmas, either of dubious science, or of non-scientific values [Harari] |
| 20690 | The state fostered individualism, to break the power of family and community [Harari] |
| 20689 | In 1750 losing your family and community meant death [Harari] |
| 20681 | The sacred command of capitalism is that profits must be used to increase production [Harari] |
| 20682 | The main rule of capitalism is that all other goods depend on economic growth [Harari] |
| 20683 | The progress of capitalism depends entirely on the new discoveries and gadgets of science [Harari] |
| 20687 | In capitalism the rich invest, and the rest of us go shopping [Harari] |
| 20685 | No market is free of political bias, and markets need protection of their freedoms [Harari] |
| 20693 | Freedom may work against us, as individuals can choose to leave, and make fewer commitments [Harari] |
| 20691 | Real peace is the implausibility of war (and not just its absence) [Harari] |
| 20684 | Financing is increasingly through credit rather than taxes; people prefer investing to taxation [Harari] |
| 20675 | The more you know about history, the harder it becomes to explain [Harari] |
| 20676 | History teaches us that the present was not inevitable, and shows us the possibilities [Harari] |
| 20671 | In order to explain both order and evil, a single evil creator is best, but no one favours that [Harari] |
| 20664 | Animism is belief that every part of nature is aware and feeling, and can communicate [Harari] |
| 20666 | Most polytheist recognise one supreme power or law, behind the various gods [Harari] |
| 20667 | Polytheism is open-minded, and rarely persecutes opponents [Harari] |
| 20665 | Mythologies are usual contracts with the gods, exchanging devotion for control of nature [Harari] |
| 20669 | Dualist religions see everything as a battleground of good and evil forces [Harari] |
| 20670 | Dualist religions say the cosmos is a battleground, so can’t explain its order [Harari] |
| 20673 | Manichaeans and Gnostics: good made spirit, evil made flesh [Harari] |
| 20668 | Monotheism appeared in Egypt in 1350 BCE, when the god Aten was declared supreme [Harari] |