52 ideas
17663 | If you know what it is, investigation is pointless. If you don't, investigation is impossible [Armstrong] |
17688 | Negative facts are supervenient on positive facts, suggesting they are positive facts [Armstrong] |
17691 | Nothing is genuinely related to itself [Armstrong] |
17679 | All instances of some property are strictly identical [Armstrong] |
12677 | Armstrong holds that all basic properties are categorical [Armstrong, by Ellis] |
17666 | Actualism means that ontology cannot contain what is merely physically possible [Armstrong] |
17667 | Dispositions exist, but their truth-makers are actual or categorical properties [Armstrong] |
17687 | If everything is powers there is a vicious regress, as powers are defined by more powers [Armstrong] |
17678 | Universals are just the repeatable features of a world [Armstrong] |
17669 | Realist regularity theories of laws need universals, to pick out the same phenomena [Armstrong] |
17677 | Past, present and future must be equally real if universals are instantiated [Armstrong] |
17686 | Universals are abstractions from states of affairs [Armstrong] |
15442 | Universals are abstractions from their particular instances [Armstrong, by Lewis] |
17668 | It is likely that particulars can be individuated by unique conjunctions of properties [Armstrong] |
17680 | The identity of a thing with itself can be ruled out as a pseudo-property [Armstrong] |
17693 | The necessary/contingent distinction may need to recognise possibilities as real [Armstrong] |
17685 | Induction aims at 'all Fs', but abduction aims at hidden or theoretical entities [Armstrong] |
17683 | Science suggests that the predicate 'grue' is not a genuine single universal [Armstrong] |
17675 | Unlike 'green', the 'grue' predicate involves a time and a change [Armstrong] |
17674 | The raven paradox has three disjuncts, confirmed by confirming any one of them [Armstrong] |
17672 | A good reason for something (the smoke) is not an explanation of it (the fire) [Armstrong] |
17684 | To explain observations by a regular law is to explain the observations by the observations [Armstrong] |
17676 | Best explanations explain the most by means of the least [Armstrong] |
17664 | Each subject has an appropriate level of abstraction [Armstrong] |
20014 | Actions include: the involuntary, the purposeful, the intentional, and the self-consciously autonomous [Wilson/Schpall] |
20019 | Maybe bodily movements are not actions, but only part of an agent's action of moving [Wilson/Schpall] |
20021 | Is the action the arm movement, the whole causal process, or just the trying to do it? [Wilson/Schpall] |
20022 | To be intentional, an action must succeed in the manner in which it was planned [Wilson/Schpall] |
20023 | If someone believes they can control the lottery, and then wins, the relevant skill is missing [Wilson/Schpall] |
20025 | We might intend two ways to acting, knowing only one of them can succeed [Wilson/Schpall] |
20031 | On one model, an intention is belief-desire states, and intentional actions relate to beliefs and desires [Wilson/Schpall] |
20028 | Groups may act for reasons held by none of the members, so maybe groups are agents [Wilson/Schpall] |
20027 | If there are shared obligations and intentions, we may need a primitive notion of 'joint commitment' [Wilson/Schpall] |
20016 | Strong Cognitivism identifies an intention to act with a belief [Wilson/Schpall] |
20017 | Weak Cognitivism says intentions are only partly constituted by a belief [Wilson/Schpall] |
20018 | Strong Cognitivism implies a mode of 'practical' knowledge, not based on observation [Wilson/Schpall] |
20012 | Maybe the explanation of an action is in the reasons that make it intelligible to the agent [Wilson/Schpall] |
20013 | It is generally assumed that reason explanations are causal [Wilson/Schpall] |
20029 | Causalists allow purposive explanations, but then reduce the purpose to the action's cause [Wilson/Schpall] |
17692 | We can't deduce the phenomena from the One [Armstrong] |
15150 | The properties of an electron can't be explained just as 'clustering' [Chakravartty on Boyd] |
15149 | Properties cluster together, either because of intrinsic relations, or because of an underlying process [Boyd, by Chakravartty] |
17689 | Absences might be effects, but surely not causes? [Armstrong] |
17662 | Science depends on laws of nature to study unobserved times and spaces [Armstrong] |
17682 | A universe couldn't consist of mere laws [Armstrong] |
17690 | Oaken conditional laws, Iron universal laws, and Steel necessary laws [Armstrong, by PG] |
17670 | Newton's First Law refers to bodies not acted upon by a force, but there may be no such body [Armstrong] |
8582 | Regularities are lawful if a second-order universal unites two first-order universals [Armstrong, by Lewis] |
17671 | A naive regularity view says if it never occurs then it is impossible [Armstrong] |
17681 | The laws of nature link properties with properties [Armstrong] |
16246 | Rather than take necessitation between universals as primitive, just make laws primitive [Maudlin on Armstrong] |
9480 | Armstrong has an unclear notion of contingent necessitation, which can't necessitate anything [Bird on Armstrong] |