87 ideas
| 15010 | Your metaphysics is 'cheating' if your ontology won't support the beliefs you accept [Sider] |
| 14977 | Metaphysics is not about what exists or is true or essential; it is about the structure of reality [Sider] |
| 14994 | Extreme doubts about metaphysics also threaten to undermine the science of unobservables [Sider] |
| 15003 | It seems unlikely that the way we speak will give insights into the universe [Sider] |
| 14986 | Conceptual analysts trust particular intuitions much more than general ones [Sider] |
| 15015 | It seems possible for a correct definition to be factually incorrect, as in defining 'contact' [Sider] |
| 14981 | Philosophical concepts are rarely defined, and are not understood by means of definitions [Sider] |
| 14992 | We don't care about plain truth, but truth in joint-carving terms [Sider] |
| 15012 | Orthodox truthmaker theories make entities fundamental, but that is poor for explanation [Sider] |
| 15023 | The Barcan schema implies if X might have fathered something, there is something X might have fathered [Sider] |
| 15004 | 'Gunk' is an object in which proper parts all endlessly have further proper parts [Sider] |
| 14984 | Which should be primitive in mereology - part, or overlap? [Sider] |
| 14980 | There is a real issue over what is the 'correct' logic [Sider] |
| 15000 | 'It is raining' and 'it is not raining' can't be legislated, so we can't legislate 'p or ¬p' [Sider] |
| 15020 | Classical logic is good for mathematics and science, but less good for natural language [Sider] |
| 15029 | Modal accounts of logical consequence are simple necessity, or essential use of logical words [Sider] |
| 15019 | Define logical constants by role in proofs, or as fixed in meaning, or as topic-neutral [Sider] |
| 15001 | 'Tonk' is supposed to follow the elimination and introduction rules, but it can't be so interpreted [Sider] |
| 3942 | I do not believe in the existence of anything, if I see no reason to believe it [Berkeley] |
| 3952 | I know that nothing inconsistent can exist [Berkeley] |
| 15017 | Supervenience is a modal connection [Sider] |
| 15008 | Is fundamentality in whole propositions (and holistic), or in concepts (and atomic)? [Sider] |
| 15013 | Tables and chairs have fundamental existence, but not fundamental natures [Sider] |
| 15014 | Unlike things, stuff obeys unrestricted composition and mereological essentialism [Sider] |
| 15009 | We must distinguish 'concrete' from 'abstract' and necessary states of affairs. [Sider] |
| 14983 | Accept the ontology of your best theory - and also that it carves nature at the joints [Sider] |
| 14978 | A property is intrinsic if an object alone in the world can instantiate it [Sider] |
| 14995 | Predicates can be 'sparse' if there is a universal, or if there is a natural property or relation [Sider] |
| 3959 | There is no other substance, in a strict sense, than spirit [Berkeley] |
| 15026 | Essence (even if nonmodal) is not fundamental in metaphysics [Sider] |
| 3946 | A thing is shown to be impossible if a contradiction is demonstrated within its definition [Berkeley] |
| 15030 | Humeans say that we decide what is necessary [Sider] |
| 15031 | Modal terms in English are entirely contextual, with no modality outside the language [Sider] |
| 15027 | If truths are necessary 'by convention', that seems to make them contingent [Sider] |
| 15028 | Conventionalism doesn't seem to apply to examples of the necessary a posteriori [Sider] |
| 15033 | Humeans says mathematics and logic are necessary because that is how our concept of necessity works [Sider] |
| 15025 | The world does not contain necessity and possibility - merely how things are [Sider] |
| 3958 | Since our ideas vary when the real things are said to be unchanged, they cannot be true copies [Berkeley] |
| 3943 | If existence is perceived directly, by which sense; if indirectly, how is it inferred from direct perception? [Berkeley] |
| 3931 | Sensible objects are just sets of sensible qualities [Berkeley] |
| 5192 | Berkeley did not deny material things; he merely said they must be defined through sensations [Berkeley, by Ayer] |
| 5174 | Berkeley needed a phenomenalist account of the self, as well as of material things [Ayer on Berkeley] |
| 1103 | 'To be is to be perceived' is a simple confusion of experience with its objects [Russell on Berkeley] |
| 6403 | For Berkelely, reality is ideas and a community of minds, including God's [Berkeley, by Grayling] |
| 3936 | Time is measured by the succession of ideas in our minds [Berkeley] |
| 3930 | There is no such thing as 'material substance' [Berkeley] |
| 3939 | I conceive a tree in my mind, but I cannot prove that its existence can be conceived outside a mind [Berkeley] |
| 3945 | There is nothing in nature which needs the concept of matter to explain it [Berkeley] |
| 3947 | Perceptions are ideas, and ideas exist in the mind, so objects only exist in the mind [Berkeley] |
| 3933 | Primary qualities (such as shape, solidity, mass) are held to really exist, unlike secondary qualities [Berkeley] |
| 3934 | A mite would see its own foot as large, though we would see it as tiny [Berkeley] |
| 3935 | The apparent size of an object varies with its distance away, so that can't be a property of the object [Berkeley] |
| 3937 | 'Solidity' is either not a sensible quality at all, or it is clearly relative to our senses [Berkeley] |
| 3940 | Distance is not directly perceived by sight [Berkeley] |
| 3957 | Immediate objects of perception, which some treat as appearances, I treat as the real things themselves [Berkeley] |
| 3953 | Real things and imaginary or dreamed things differ because the latter are much fainter [Berkeley] |
| 3938 | Geometry is originally perceived by senses, and so is not purely intellectual [Berkeley] |
| 3944 | It is possible that we could perceive everything as we do now, but nothing actually existed. [Berkeley] |
| 3932 | A hot hand and a cold hand will have different experiences in the same tepid water [Berkeley] |
| 14988 | A theory which doesn't fit nature is unexplanatory, even if it is true [Sider] |
| 14982 | If I used Ramsey sentences to eliminate fundamentality from my theory, that would be a real loss [Sider] |
| 14989 | Problem predicates in induction don't reflect the structure of nature [Sider] |
| 14997 | Two applications of 'grue' do not guarantee a similarity between two things [Sider] |
| 14990 | Bayes produces weird results if the prior probabilities are bizarre [Sider] |
| 15005 | Explanations must cite generalisations [Sider] |
| 15011 | If the ultimate explanation is a list of entities, no laws, patterns or mechanisms can be cited [Sider] |
| 3948 | Experience tells me that other minds exist independently from my own [Berkeley] |
| 15018 | Intentionality is too superficial to appear in the catalogue of ultimate physics [Sider] |
| 3941 | How can that which is unthinking be a cause of thought? [Berkeley] |
| 5374 | Berkeley probably used 'idea' to mean both the act of apprehension and the thing apprehended [Russell on Berkeley] |
| 14999 | Prior to conventions, not all green things were green? [Sider] |
| 14998 | Conventions are contingent and analytic truths are necessary, so that isn't their explanation [Sider] |
| 15016 | Analyticity has lost its traditional role, which relied on truth by convention [Sider] |
| 299 | What is fine is always difficult [Plato] |
| 297 | What is fine is the parent of goodness [Plato] |
| 3954 | Immorality is not in the action, but in the deviation of the will from moral law [Berkeley] |
| 298 | While sex is very pleasant, it should be in secret, as it looks contemptible [Plato] |
| 14985 | The notion of law doesn't seem to enhance physical theories [Sider] |
| 14987 | Many of the key theories of modern physics do not appear to be 'laws' [Sider] |
| 14991 | Space has real betweenness and congruence structure (though it is not the Euclidean concepts) [Sider] |
| 15021 | The central question in the philosophy of time is: How alike are time and space? [Sider] |
| 15024 | The spotlight theorists accepts eternal time, but with a spotlight of the present moving across it [Sider] |
| 3950 | There must be a God, because all sensible things must be perceived by him [Berkeley] |
| 3951 | There must be a God, because I and my ideas are not independent [Berkeley] |
| 3949 | It has been proved that creation is the workmanship of God, from its beauty and usefulness [Berkeley] |
| 3956 | People are responsible because they have limited power, though this ultimately derives from God [Berkeley] |
| 3955 | If sin is not just physical, we don't consider God the origin of sin because he causes physical events [Berkeley] |