|
6007
|
If you know your father, but don't recognise your father veiled, you know and don't know the same person [Eubulides, by Dancy,R]
|
|
Full Idea:
The 'undetected' or 'veiled' paradox of Eubulides says: if you know your father, and don't know the veiled person before you, but that person is your father, you both know and don't know the same person.
|
|
From:
report of Eubulides (fragments/reports [c.390 BCE]) by R.M. Dancy - Megarian School
|
|
A reaction:
Essentially an uninteresting equivocation on two senses of "know", but this paradox comes into its own when we try to give an account of how linguistic reference works. Frege's distinction of sense and reference tried to sort it out (Idea 4976).
|
|
6008
|
Removing one grain doesn't destroy a heap, so a heap can't be destroyed [Eubulides, by Dancy,R]
|
|
Full Idea:
The 'sorites' paradox of Eubulides says: if you take one grain of sand from a heap (soros), what is left is still a heap; so no matter how many grains of sand you take one by one, the result is always a heap.
|
|
From:
report of Eubulides (fragments/reports [c.390 BCE]) by R.M. Dancy - Megarian School
|
|
A reaction:
(also Cic. Acad. 2.49) This is a very nice paradox, which goes to the heart of our bewilderment when we try to fully understand reality. It homes in on problems of identity, as best exemplified in the Ship of Theseus (Ideas 1212 + 1213).
|
|
11972
|
Essence is a transworld heir line, rather than a collection of properties [Kaplan]
|
|
Full Idea:
I prefer to think of essence as a transworld heir line, rather than as the more familiar collection of properties, because the latter too much suggests the idea of a fixed and final essential description.
|
|
From:
David Kaplan (Transworld Heir Lines [1967], p.100)
|
|
A reaction:
He is sympathetic to the counterpart idea, and close to Lewis's view of essences, as the intersection of counterparts. I like his rebellion against fixed and final descriptions, but am a bit doubtful about his basic idea. Causation should be involved.
|
|
11990
|
'Haecceitism' says that sameness or difference of individuals is independent of appearances [Kaplan]
|
|
Full Idea:
The doctrine that we can ask whether this is the same individual in another possible world, and that a common 'thisness' may underlie extreme dissimilarity, or distinct thisnesses may underlie great resemblance, I call 'Haecceitism'.
|
|
From:
David Kaplan (How to Russell a Frege-Church [1975], IV)
|
|
A reaction:
Penelope Mackie emphasises that this doctrine, that each thing is somehow individuated, is not the same as believing in actual haecceities, specific properties which achieve the individuating.
|
|
11991
|
If quantification into modal contexts is legitimate, that seems to imply some form of haecceitism [Kaplan]
|
|
Full Idea:
If one regards the usual form of quantification into modal and other intensional contexts - modality de re - as legitimate (without special explanations), then one seems committed to some form of haecceitism.
|
|
From:
David Kaplan (How to Russell a Frege-Church [1975], IV)
|
|
A reaction:
That is, modal reference requires fixed identities, irrespective of possible changes in properties. Why could one not refer to objects just as bundles of properties, with some sort of rules about when it ceased to be that particular bundle (keep 60%?)?
|
|
18810
|
Aristotle's proofs give understanding, so it can't be otherwise, so consequence is necessary [Smiley, by Rumfitt]
|
|
Full Idea:
The ingredient of necessity [in Aristotle's account of consequence] is required by his demand that proof should produce 'understanding' [episteme], coupled with his claim that understanding something involves seeing that it cannot be otherwise.
|
|
From:
report of Timothy Smiley (Conceptions of Consequence [1998], p.599) by Ian Rumfitt - The Boundary Stones of Thought 3.2
|
|
A reaction:
An intriguing reverse of the normal order. Not 'necessity in logic delivers understanding', but 'reaching understanding shows the logic was necessary'.
|
|
14080
|
Are causal descriptions part of the causal theory of reference, or are they just metasemantic? [Kaplan, by Schaffer,J]
|
|
Full Idea:
Kaplan notes that the causal theory of reference can be understood in two quite different ways, as part of the semantics (involving descriptions of causal processes), or as metasemantics, explaining why a term has the referent it does.
|
|
From:
report of David Kaplan (Dthat [1970]) by Jonathan Schaffer - Deflationary Metaontology of Thomasson 1
|
|
A reaction:
[Kaplan 'Afterthought' 1989] The theory tends to be labelled as 'direct' rather than as 'causal' these days, but causal chains are still at the heart of the story (even if more diffused socially). Nice question. Kaplan takes the meta- version as orthodox.
|
|
14700
|
'Content' gives the standard modal profile, and 'character' gives rules for a context [Kaplan, by Schroeter]
|
|
Full Idea:
Kaplan sees two aspects of meaning, the 'content', reflecting a thing's modal profile, which is modelled by standard possible worlds semantics, and 'character', giving rules for different contexts. Proper names have constant character; indexicals vary.
|
|
From:
report of David Kaplan (Demonstratives [1989]) by Laura Schroeter - Two-Dimensional Semantics 1.1.1
|
|
A reaction:
This gives rise to 2-D matrices for representing meaning, and the possible worlds are used twice, for evaluating meaning and then for evaluating context of use. I've always been struck by the two-dimensional semantics of passwords.
|