43 ideas
| 20678 | The Scientific Revolution was the discovery of our own ignorance [Harari] |
| 20686 | For millenia people didn't know how to convert one type of energy into another [Harari] |
| 13838 | A decent modern definition should always imply a semantics [Hacking] |
| 12129 | 'Truth' may only apply within a theory [Kuhn] |
| 13834 | Gentzen's Cut Rule (or transitivity of deduction) is 'If A |- B and B |- C, then A |- C' [Hacking] |
| 13835 | Only Cut reduces complexity, so logic is constructive without it, and it can be dispensed with [Hacking] |
| 13833 | 'Thinning' ('dilution') is the key difference between deduction (which allows it) and induction [Hacking] |
| 13845 | The various logics are abstractions made from terms like 'if...then' in English [Hacking] |
| 13840 | First-order logic is the strongest complete compact theory with Löwenheim-Skolem [Hacking] |
| 13844 | A limitation of first-order logic is that it cannot handle branching quantifiers [Hacking] |
| 13842 | Second-order completeness seems to need intensional entities and possible worlds [Hacking] |
| 13837 | With a pure notion of truth and consequence, the meanings of connectives are fixed syntactically [Hacking] |
| 13839 | Perhaps variables could be dispensed with, by arrows joining places in the scope of quantifiers [Hacking] |
| 13843 | If it is a logic, the Löwenheim-Skolem theorem holds for it [Hacking] |
| 6809 | Kuhn came to accept that all scientists agree on a particular set of values [Kuhn, by Bird] |
| 12128 | In theory change, words shift their natural reference, so the theories are incommensurable [Kuhn] |
| 20692 | Money does produce happiness, but only up to a point [Harari] |
| 20663 | If a group is bound by gossip, the natural size is 150 people [Harari] |
| 20677 | Since 1500 human population has increased fourteenfold, and consumption far more [Harari] |
| 20688 | People 300m tons; domesticated animals 700m tons; larger wild animals 100m tons [Harari] |
| 20674 | The Nazi aim was to encourage progressive evolution, and avoid degeneration [Harari] |
| 20679 | We stabilise societies with dogmas, either of dubious science, or of non-scientific values [Harari] |
| 20690 | The state fostered individualism, to break the power of family and community [Harari] |
| 20689 | In 1750 losing your family and community meant death [Harari] |
| 20681 | The sacred command of capitalism is that profits must be used to increase production [Harari] |
| 20682 | The main rule of capitalism is that all other goods depend on economic growth [Harari] |
| 20683 | The progress of capitalism depends entirely on the new discoveries and gadgets of science [Harari] |
| 20687 | In capitalism the rich invest, and the rest of us go shopping [Harari] |
| 20685 | No market is free of political bias, and markets need protection of their freedoms [Harari] |
| 20693 | Freedom may work against us, as individuals can choose to leave, and make fewer commitments [Harari] |
| 20691 | Real peace is the implausibility of war (and not just its absence) [Harari] |
| 20684 | Financing is increasingly through credit rather than taxes; people prefer investing to taxation [Harari] |
| 20675 | The more you know about history, the harder it becomes to explain [Harari] |
| 20676 | History teaches us that the present was not inevitable, and shows us the possibilities [Harari] |
| 20671 | In order to explain both order and evil, a single evil creator is best, but no one favours that [Harari] |
| 20664 | Animism is belief that every part of nature is aware and feeling, and can communicate [Harari] |
| 20666 | Most polytheist recognise one supreme power or law, behind the various gods [Harari] |
| 20667 | Polytheism is open-minded, and rarely persecutes opponents [Harari] |
| 20665 | Mythologies are usual contracts with the gods, exchanging devotion for control of nature [Harari] |
| 20669 | Dualist religions see everything as a battleground of good and evil forces [Harari] |
| 20670 | Dualist religions say the cosmos is a battleground, so can’t explain its order [Harari] |
| 20673 | Manichaeans and Gnostics: good made spirit, evil made flesh [Harari] |
| 20668 | Monotheism appeared in Egypt in 1350 BCE, when the god Aten was declared supreme [Harari] |