Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'works', 'Thinking About Mechanisms' and '74: Reply to Colotes'

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20 ideas

7. Existence / B. Change in Existence / 2. Processes
Activities have place, rate, duration, entities, properties, modes, direction, polarity, energy and range [Machamer/Darden/Craver]
8. Modes of Existence / C. Powers and Dispositions / 2. Powers as Basic
Penicillin causes nothing; the cause is what penicillin does [Machamer/Darden/Craver]
11. Knowledge Aims / A. Knowledge / 2. Understanding
We understand something by presenting its low-level entities and activities [Machamer/Darden/Craver]
14. Science / D. Explanation / 2. Types of Explanation / e. Lawlike explanations
The explanation is not the regularity, but the activity sustaining it [Machamer/Darden/Craver]
14. Science / D. Explanation / 2. Types of Explanation / h. Explanations by function
Functions are not properties of objects, they are activities contributing to mechanisms [Machamer/Darden/Craver]
14. Science / D. Explanation / 2. Types of Explanation / i. Explanations by mechanism
Mechanisms are not just push-pull systems [Machamer/Darden/Craver]
Mechanisms are systems organised to produce regular change [Machamer/Darden/Craver]
A mechanism explains a phenomenon by showing how it was produced [Machamer/Darden/Craver]
Our account of mechanism combines both entities and activities [Machamer/Darden/Craver]
Descriptions of explanatory mechanisms have a bottom level, where going further is irrelevant [Machamer/Darden/Craver]
14. Science / D. Explanation / 3. Best Explanation / b. Ultimate explanation
There are four types of bottom-level activities which will explain phenomena [Machamer/Darden/Craver]
15. Nature of Minds / C. Capacities of Minds / 3. Abstraction by mind
We can abstract by taking an exemplary case and ignoring the detail [Machamer/Darden/Craver]
16. Persons / B. Nature of the Self / 7. Self and Body / c. Self as brain controller
Rather than being the whole soul, maybe I am its chief part? [Plutarch]
17. Mind and Body / E. Mind as Physical / 7. Anti-Physicalism / a. Physicalism critique
If atoms have no qualities, they cannot possibly produce a mind [Plutarch]
20. Action / B. Preliminaries of Action / 1. Intention to Act / c. Reducing intentions
Action needs an affinity for a presentation, and an impulse toward the affinity [Plutarch]
22. Metaethics / A. Ethics Foundations / 2. Source of Ethics / e. Human nature
The most important aspect of a human being is not reason, but passion [Kierkegaard, by Carlisle]
23. Ethics / C. Virtue Theory / 3. Virtues / a. Virtues
The good life involves social participation, loyalty, temperance and honesty [Plutarch]
26. Natural Theory / A. Speculations on Nature / 6. Early Matter Theories / g. Atomism
If only atoms exist, how do qualities arise when the atoms come together? [Plutarch]
26. Natural Theory / D. Laws of Nature / 11. Against Laws of Nature
Laws of nature have very little application in biology [Machamer/Darden/Craver]
29. Religion / D. Religious Issues / 1. Religious Commitment / a. Religious Belief
No one will ever find a city that lacks religious practices [Plutarch]