82 ideas
| 18730 | The history of philosophy only matters if the subject is a choice between rival theories [Wittgenstein] |
| 18704 | Philosophy tries to be rid of certain intellectual puzzles, irrelevant to daily life [Wittgenstein] |
| 18710 | Philosophers express puzzlement, but don't clearly state the puzzle [Wittgenstein] |
| 4194 | Metaphysics is concerned with the fundamental structure of reality as a whole [Lowe] |
| 4214 | Maybe such concepts as causation, identity and existence are primitive and irreducible [Lowe] |
| 18732 | We don't need a theory of truth, because we use the word perfectly well [Wittgenstein] |
| 18714 | We already know what we want to know, and analysis gives us no new facts [Wittgenstein] |
| 4222 | If all that exists is what is being measured, what about the people and instruments doing the measuring? [Lowe] |
| 4217 | It is more extravagant, in general, to revise one's logic than to augment one's ontology [Lowe] |
| 18706 | Words of the same kind can be substituted in a proposition without producing nonsense [Wittgenstein] |
| 18735 | Talking nonsense is not following the rules [Wittgenstein] |
| 18719 | Grammar says that saying 'sound is red' is not false, but nonsense [Wittgenstein] |
| 18731 | There is no theory of truth, because it isn't a concept [Wittgenstein] |
| 18707 | All thought has the logical form of reality [Wittgenstein] |
| 18724 | In logic nothing is hidden [Wittgenstein] |
| 18709 | Laws of logic are like laws of chess - if you change them, it's just a different game [Wittgenstein] |
| 18736 | Contradiction is between two rules, not between rule and reality [Wittgenstein] |
| 18723 | We may correctly use 'not' without making the rule explicit [Wittgenstein] |
| 18718 | Saying 'and' has meaning is just saying it works in a sentence [Wittgenstein] |
| 18727 | A person's name doesn't mean their body; bodies don't sit down, and their existence can be denied [Wittgenstein] |
| 4229 | An infinite series of tasks can't be completed because it has no last member [Lowe] |
| 4240 | It might be argued that mathematics does not, or should not, aim at truth [Lowe] |
| 18738 | We don't get 'nearer' to something by adding decimals to 1.1412... (root-2) [Wittgenstein] |
| 18708 | Infinity is not a number, so doesn't say how many; it is the property of a law [Wittgenstein] |
| 4241 | If there are infinite numbers and finite concrete objects, this implies that numbers are abstract objects [Lowe] |
| 4239 | Nominalists deny abstract objects, because we can have no reason to believe in their existence [Lowe] |
| 4202 | Change can be of composition (the component parts), or quality (properties), or substance [Lowe] |
| 4201 | Four theories of qualitative change are 'a is F now', or 'a is F-at-t', or 'a-at-t is F', or 'a is-at-t F' [Lowe, by PG] |
| 4219 | Numerically distinct events of the same kind (like two battles) can coincide in space and time [Lowe] |
| 4221 | Maybe modern physics requires an event-ontology, rather than a thing-ontology [Lowe] |
| 4220 | Maybe an event is the exemplification of a property at a time [Lowe] |
| 4225 | Events are changes in the properties of or relations between things [Lowe] |
| 18737 | There are no positive or negative facts; these are just the forms of propositions [Wittgenstein] |
| 4196 | The main categories of existence are either universal and particular, or abstract and concrete [Lowe] |
| 4234 | Trope theory says blueness is a real feature of objects, but not the same as an identical blue found elsewhere [Lowe] |
| 4235 | Maybe a cushion is just a bundle of tropes, such as roundness, blueness and softness [Lowe] |
| 4236 | Tropes seem to be abstract entities, because they can't exist alone, but must come in bundles [Lowe] |
| 4197 | The category of universals can be sub-divided into properties and relations [Lowe] |
| 18715 | Using 'green' is a commitment to future usage of 'green' [Wittgenstein] |
| 4232 | Nominalists believe that only particulars exist [Lowe] |
| 4205 | 'Is non-self-exemplifying' is a predicate which cannot denote a property (as it would be a contradiction) [Lowe] |
| 4233 | If 'blueness' is a set of particulars, there is danger of circularity, or using universals, in identifying the set [Lowe] |
| 4206 | Conventionalists see the world as an amorphous lump without identities, but are we part of the lump? [Lowe] |
| 4204 | Statues can't survive much change to their shape, unlike lumps of bronze, which must retain material [Lowe] |
| 4200 | If old parts are stored and then appropriated, they are no longer part of the original (which is the renovated ship). [Lowe] |
| 4198 | If 5% replacement preserves a ship, we can replace 4% and 4% again, and still retain the ship [Lowe] |
| 4199 | A renovation or a reconstruction of an original ship would be accepted, as long as the other one didn't exist [Lowe] |
| 4203 | Identity of Indiscernibles (same properties, same thing) ) is not Leibniz's Law (same thing, same properties) [Lowe] |
| 4195 | It is impossible to reach a valid false conclusion from true premises, so reason itself depends on possibility [Lowe] |
| 18726 | For each necessity in the world there is an arbitrary rule of language [Wittgenstein] |
| 4207 | We might eliminate 'possible' and 'necessary' in favour of quantification over possible worlds [Lowe] |
| 18712 | Understanding is translation, into action or into other symbols [Wittgenstein] |
| 18280 | We live in sense-data, but talk about physical objects [Wittgenstein] |
| 18729 | Part of what we mean by stating the facts is the way we tend to experience them [Wittgenstein] |
| 18734 | If you remember wrongly, then there must be some other criterion than your remembering [Wittgenstein] |
| 4223 | Unfalsifiability may be a failure in an empirical theory, but it is a virtue in metaphysics [Lowe] |
| 18721 | Explanation and understanding are the same [Wittgenstein] |
| 18720 | Explanation gives understanding by revealing the full multiplicity of the thing [Wittgenstein] |
| 4193 | The behaviour of persons and social groups seems to need rational rather than causal explanation [Lowe] |
| 18716 | A machine strikes us as being a rule of movement [Wittgenstein] |
| 18713 | If an explanation is good, the symbol is used properly in the future [Wittgenstein] |
| 18717 | Thought is an activity which we perform by the expression of it [Wittgenstein] |
| 4237 | Concrete and abstract objects are distinct because the former have causal powers and relations [Lowe] |
| 4238 | The centre of mass of the solar system is a non-causal abstract object, despite having a location [Lowe] |
| 18725 | A proposition draws a line around the facts which agree with it [Wittgenstein] |
| 18728 | The meaning of a proposition is the mode of its verification [Wittgenstein] |
| 18705 | Words function only in propositions, like levers in a machine [Wittgenstein] |
| 18711 | A proposition is any expression which can be significantly negated [Wittgenstein] |
| 4210 | If the concept of a cause says it precedes its effect, that rules out backward causation by definition [Lowe] |
| 4215 | It seems proper to say that only substances (rather than events) have causal powers [Lowe] |
| 4209 | The theories of fact causation and event causation are both worth serious consideration [Lowe] |
| 4211 | Causal overdetermination is either actual overdetermination, or pre-emption, or the fail-safe case [Lowe] |
| 4213 | Causation may be instances of laws (seen either as constant conjunctions, or as necessities) [Lowe] |
| 4212 | Hume showed that causation could at most be natural necessity, never metaphysical necessity [Lowe] |
| 14581 | The normative view says laws show the natural behaviour of natural kind members [Lowe, by Mumford/Anjum] |
| 4208 | 'If he wasn't born he wouldn't have died' doesn't mean birth causes death, so causation isn't counterfactual [Lowe] |
| 18733 | Laws of nature are an aspect of the phenomena, and are just our mode of description [Wittgenstein] |
| 4224 | If motion is change of distance between objects, it involves no intrinsic change in the objects [Lowe] |
| 4227 | Surfaces, lines and points are not, strictly speaking, parts of space, but 'limits', which are abstract [Lowe] |
| 4228 | If space is entirely relational, what makes a boundary, or a place unoccupied by physical objects? [Lowe] |
| 16713 | Philosophers are the forefathers of heretics [Tertullian] |
| 6610 | I believe because it is absurd [Tertullian] |