59 ideas
| 14027 | If we are to use words in enquiry, we need their main, unambiguous and uncontested meanings [Epicurus] |
| 14040 | Observation and applied thought are always true [Epicurus] |
| 5745 | Quine says quantified modal logic creates nonsense, bad ontology, and false essentialism [Melia on Quine] |
| 6548 | Physicalism requires the naturalisation or rejection of set theory [Lycan] |
| 8789 | Various strategies try to deal with the ontological commitments of second-order logic [Hale/Wright on Quine] |
| 14028 | Nothing comes to be from what doesn't exist [Epicurus] |
| 14029 | If disappearing things went to nothingness, nothing could return, and it would all be gone by now [Epicurus] |
| 16966 | Philosophers tend to distinguish broad 'being' from narrower 'existence' - but I reject that [Quine] |
| 16965 | All we have of general existence is what existential quantifiers express [Quine] |
| 14030 | The totality is complete, so there is no room for it to change, and nothing extraneous to change it [Epicurus] |
| 6531 | Institutions are not reducible as types, but they are as tokens [Lycan] |
| 6532 | Types cannot be reduced, but levels of reduction are varied groupings of the same tokens [Lycan] |
| 6534 | One location may contain molecules, a metal strip, a key, an opener of doors, and a human tragedy [Lycan] |
| 14048 | Astronomical movements are blessed, but they don't need the help of the gods [Epicurus] |
| 16963 | Existence is implied by the quantifiers, not by the constants [Quine] |
| 16964 | Theories are committed to objects of which some of its predicates must be true [Quine] |
| 4216 | Express a theory in first-order predicate logic; its ontology is the types of bound variable needed for truth [Quine, by Lowe] |
| 18966 | Ontological commitment of theories only arise if they are classically quantified [Quine] |
| 14490 | You can be implicitly committed to something without quantifying over it [Thomasson on Quine] |
| 16961 | In formal terms, a category is the range of some style of variables [Quine] |
| 6529 | I see the 'role'/'occupant' distinction as fundamental to metaphysics [Lycan] |
| 14044 | The perceived accidental properties of bodies cannot be conceived of as independent natures [Epicurus] |
| 14045 | Accidental properties give a body its nature, but are not themselves bodies or parts of bodies [Epicurus] |
| 14046 | A 'body' is a conception of an aggregate, with properties defined by application conditions [Epicurus] |
| 14047 | Bodies have impermanent properties, and permanent ones which define its conceived nature [Epicurus] |
| 14039 | Above and below us will never appear to be the same, because it is inconceivable [Epicurus] |
| 14050 | We aim to dissolve our fears, by understanding their causes [Epicurus] |
| 6549 | I think greenness is a complex microphysical property of green objects [Lycan] |
| 14037 | Atoms only have shape, weight and size, and the properties which accompany shape [Epicurus] |
| 6010 | Illusions are not false perceptions, as we accurately perceive the pattern of atoms [Epicurus, by Modrak] |
| 14041 | The soul is fine parts distributed through the body, resembling hot breath [Epicurus] |
| 6543 | Intentionality comes in degrees [Lycan] |
| 6537 | Teleological views allow for false intentional content, unlike causal and nomological theories [Lycan] |
| 6546 | Pain is composed of urges, desires, impulses etc, at different levels of abstraction [Lycan] |
| 6547 | The right 'level' for qualia is uncertain, though top (behaviourism) and bottom (particles) are false [Lycan] |
| 6527 | If energy in the brain disappears into thin air, this breaches physical conservation laws [Lycan] |
| 6528 | In lower animals, psychology is continuous with chemistry, and humans are continuous with animals [Lycan] |
| 6554 | Two behaviourists meet. The first says,"You're fine; how am I?" [Lycan] |
| 6545 | If functionalism focuses on folk psychology, it ignores lower levels of function [Lycan] |
| 6541 | Functionalism must not be too abstract to allow inverted spectrum, or so structural that it becomes chauvinistic [Lycan] |
| 6539 | The distinction between software and hardware is not clear in computing [Lycan] |
| 6533 | Mental types are a subclass of teleological types at a high level of functional abstraction [Lycan] |
| 6535 | Teleological characterisations shade off smoothly into brutely physical ones [Lycan] |
| 6544 | Identity theory is functionalism, but located at the lowest level of abstraction [Lycan] |
| 6530 | We reduce the mind through homuncular groups, described abstractly by purpose [Lycan] |
| 6536 | Teleological functionalism helps us to understand psycho-biological laws [Lycan] |
| 14042 | The soul cannot be incorporeal, because then it could neither act nor be acted upon [Epicurus] |
| 6542 | A Martian may exhibit human-like behaviour while having very different sensations [Lycan] |
| 6538 | We need a notion of teleology that comes in degrees [Lycan] |
| 14032 | Totality has no edge; an edge implies a contrast beyond the edge, and there can't be one [Epicurus] |
| 14033 | Bodies are unlimited as well as void, since the two necessarily go together [Epicurus] |
| 14034 | There exists an infinity of each shape of atom, but the number of shapes is beyond our knowledge [Epicurus] |
| 14035 | Atoms just have shape, size and weight; colour results from their arrangement [Epicurus] |
| 14038 | There cannot be unlimited division, because it would reduce things to non-existence [Epicurus] |
| 14049 | We aim to know the natures which are observed in natural phenomena [Epicurus] |
| 6551 | 'Physical' means either figuring in physics descriptions, or just located in space-time [Lycan] |
| 14043 | The void cannot interact, but just gives the possibility of motion [Epicurus] |
| 14031 | Space must exist, since movement is obvious, and there must be somewhere to move in [Epicurus] |
| 14036 | There are endless cosmoi, some like and some unlike this one [Epicurus] |