42 ideas
22438 | Philosophy is largely concerned with finding the minimum that science could get by with [Quine] |
6887 | Linguistic philosophy approaches problems by attending to actual linguistic usage [Mautner] |
22436 | Logicians don't paraphrase logic into language, because they think in the symbolic language [Quine] |
6881 | Analytic philosophy studies the unimportant, and sharpens tools instead of using them [Mautner] |
5439 | The 'hermeneutic circle' says parts and wholes are interdependent, and so cannot be interpreted [Mautner] |
22431 | Good algorithms and theories need many occurrences of just a few elements [Quine] |
9959 | 'Real' definitions give the essential properties of things under a concept [Mautner] |
9961 | 'Contextual definitions' replace whole statements, not just expressions [Mautner] |
9958 | Recursive definition defines each instance from a previous instance [Mautner] |
9960 | A stipulative definition lays down that an expression is to have a certain meaning [Mautner] |
9957 | Ostensive definitions point to an object which an expression denotes [Mautner] |
6219 | The fallacy of composition is the assumption that what is true of the parts is true of the whole [Mautner] |
22435 | The logician's '→' does not mean the English if-then [Quine] |
22433 | It is important that the quantification over temporal entities is timeless [Quine] |
6888 | Fuzzy logic is based on the notion that there can be membership of a set to some degree [Mautner] |
6877 | Entailment is logical requirement; it may be not(p and not-q), but that has problems [Mautner] |
6880 | Strict implication says false propositions imply everything, and everything implies true propositions [Mautner] |
6879 | 'Material implication' is defined as 'not(p and not-q)', but seems to imply a connection between p and q [Mautner] |
6878 | A person who 'infers' draws the conclusion, but a person who 'implies' leaves it to the audience [Mautner] |
22437 | Logical languages are rooted in ordinary language, and that connection must be kept [Quine] |
6889 | Vagueness seems to be inconsistent with the view that every proposition is true or false [Mautner] |
22434 | Reduction to logical forms first simplifies idioms and grammar, then finds a single reading of it [Quine] |
6890 | Quantifiers turn an open sentence into one to which a truth-value can be assigned [Mautner] |
22432 | Normally conditionals have no truth value; it is the consequent which has a conditional truth value [Quine] |
6886 | Counterfactuals are not true, they are merely valid [Mautner] |
6885 | Counterfactuals are true if in every world close to actual where p is the case, q is also the case [Mautner] |
6884 | Counterfactuals say 'If it had been, or were, p, then it would be q' [Mautner] |
6883 | Maybe counterfactuals are only true if they contain valid inference from premisses [Mautner] |
6882 | Counterfactuals presuppose a belief (or a fact) that the condition is false [Mautner] |
5449 | Essentialism is often identified with belief in 'de re' necessary truths [Mautner] |
6898 | Fallibilism is the view that all knowledge-claims are provisional [Mautner] |
6452 | 'Sense-data' arrived in 1910, but it denotes ideas in Locke, Berkeley and Hume [Mautner] |
4783 | Observing lots of green x can confirm 'all x are green' or 'all x are grue', where 'grue' is arbitrary [Mautner, by PG] |
4782 | 'All x are y' is equivalent to 'all non-y are non-x', so observing paper is white confirms 'ravens are black' [Mautner, by PG] |
22430 | If we understand a statement, we know the circumstances of its truth [Quine] |
6899 | The references of indexicals ('there', 'now', 'I') depend on the circumstances of utterance [Mautner] |
6896 | Double effect is the distinction between what is foreseen and what is intended [Mautner] |
6897 | Double effect acts need goodness, unintended evil, good not caused by evil, and outweighing [Mautner] |
5452 | 'Essentialism' is opposed to existentialism, and claims there is a human nature [Mautner] |
13713 | Quine holds time to be 'space-like': past objects are as real as spatially remote ones [Quine, by Sider] |
16713 | Philosophers are the forefathers of heretics [Tertullian] |
6610 | I believe because it is absurd [Tertullian] |