59 ideas
| 162 | Can we understand an individual soul without knowing the soul in general? [Plato] |
| 160 | The highest ability in man is the ability to discuss unity and plurality in the nature of things [Plato] |
| 166 | A speaker should be able to divide a subject, right down to the limits of divisibility [Plato] |
| 9449 | The plausible Barcan formula implies modality in the actual world [Bird] |
| 13007 | Archimedes defined a straight line as the shortest distance between two points [Archimedes, by Leibniz] |
| 9501 | If all existents are causally active, that excludes abstracta and causally isolated objects [Bird] |
| 9500 | If naturalism refers to supervenience, that leaves necessary entities untouched [Bird] |
| 7953 | Reasoning needs to cut nature accurately at the joints [Plato] |
| 16121 | I revere anyone who can discern a single thing that encompasses many things [Plato] |
| 9502 | There might be just one fundamental natural property [Bird] |
| 9477 | Categorical properties are not modally fixed, but change across possible worlds [Bird] |
| 9490 | The categoricalist idea is that a property is only individuated by being itself [Bird] |
| 9495 | If we abstractly define a property, that doesn't mean some object could possess it [Bird] |
| 9492 | Categoricalists take properties to be quiddities, with no essential difference between them [Bird] |
| 9503 | To name an abundant property is either a Fregean concept, or a simple predicate [Bird] |
| 14540 | Only real powers are fundamental [Bird, by Mumford/Anjum] |
| 9450 | If all properties are potencies, and stimuli and manifestation characterise them, there is a regress [Bird] |
| 9498 | The essence of a potency involves relations, e.g. mass, to impressed force and acceleration [Bird] |
| 9474 | A disposition is finkish if a time delay might mean the manifestation fizzles out [Bird] |
| 9475 | A robust pot attached to a sensitive bomb is not fragile, but if struck it will easily break [Bird] |
| 9499 | Megarian actualists deny unmanifested dispositions [Bird] |
| 153 | It takes a person to understand, by using universals, and by using reason to create a unity out of sense-impressions [Plato] |
| 9486 | Why should a universal's existence depend on instantiation in an existing particular? [Bird] |
| 154 | We would have an overpowering love of knowledge if we had a pure idea of it - as with the other Forms [Plato] |
| 9472 | Resemblance itself needs explanation, presumably in terms of something held in common [Bird] |
| 9482 | If the laws necessarily imply p, that doesn't give a new 'nomological' necessity [Bird] |
| 9481 | Logical necessitation is not a kind of necessity; George Orwell not being Eric Blair is not a real possibility [Bird] |
| 9505 | Empiricist saw imaginability and possibility as close, but now they seem remote [Bird] |
| 9491 | Haecceitism says identity is independent of qualities and without essence [Bird] |
| 151 | True knowledge is of the reality behind sense experience [Plato] |
| 165 | If the apparent facts strongly conflict with probability, it is in everyone's interests to suppress the facts [Plato] |
| 9487 | We can't reject all explanations because of a regress; inexplicable A can still explain B [Bird] |
| 9296 | The soul is self-motion [Plato] |
| 23997 | Plato saw emotions and appetites as wild horses, in need of taming [Plato, by Goldie] |
| 158 | An excellent speech seems to imply a knowledge of the truth in the mind of the speaker [Plato] |
| 159 | Only a good philosopher can be a good speaker [Plato] |
| 5946 | 'Phaedrus' pioneers the notion of philosophical rhetoric [Lawson-Tancred on Plato] |
| 155 | Beauty is the clearest and most lovely of the Forms [Plato] |
| 143 | The two ruling human principles are the natural desire for pleasure, and an acquired love of virtue [Plato] |
| 157 | Most pleasure is release from pain, and is therefore not worthwhile [Plato] |
| 144 | Reason impels us towards excellence, which teaches us self-control [Plato] |
| 156 | Bad people are never really friends with one another [Plato] |
| 9493 | We should explain causation by powers, not powers by causation [Bird] |
| 9494 | Singularism about causes is wrong, as the universals involved imply laws [Bird] |
| 9507 | Laws are explanatory relationships of things, which supervene on their essences [Bird] |
| 9488 | Laws are either disposition regularities, or relations between properties [Bird] |
| 9496 | That other diamonds are hard does not explain why this one is [Bird] |
| 9479 | Dispositional essentialism says laws (and laws about laws) are guaranteed regularities [Bird] |
| 9473 | Laws cannot offer unified explanations if they don't involve universals [Bird] |
| 9484 | If the universals for laws must be instantiated, a vanishing particular could destroy a law [Bird] |
| 9506 | Salt necessarily dissolves in water, because of the law which makes the existence of salt possible [Bird] |
| 23713 | Most laws supervene on fundamental laws, which are explained by basic powers [Bird, by Friend/Kimpton-Nye] |
| 9489 | Essentialism can't use conditionals to explain regularities, because of possible interventions [Bird] |
| 9504 | The relational view of space-time doesn't cover times and places where things could be [Bird] |
| 148 | If the prime origin is destroyed, it will not come into being again out of anything [Plato] |
| 152 | The mind of God is fully satisfied and happy with a vision of reality and truth [Plato] |
| 150 | We cannot conceive of God, so we have to think of Him as an immortal version of ourselves [Plato] |
| 149 | There isn't a single reason for positing the existence of immortal beings [Plato] |
| 146 | Soul is always in motion, so it must be self-moving and immortal [Plato] |