8 ideas
| 16659 | Relations do not add anything to reality, though they are real aspects of the world [Olivi] |
| Full Idea: It does not seem that a relation adds anything real to that on which it is founded, but only makes for another real aspect belonging to the same thing. It is real since an aspect exists in re, not solely in the intellect, but it is not another thing. | |
| From: Peter John Olivi (Summa quaestionum super Sententias [1290], II.54), quoted by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 12.4 |
| 16672 | Quantity is the quantified parts of a thing, plus location and coordination [Olivi] |
| Full Idea: Quantity refers to nothing other than the parts of the thing quantified, together with their location or position, being extrinsically coordinated with each other. | |
| From: Peter John Olivi (Treatise on Quantity [1286], f. 49vb), quoted by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 14.1 | |
| A reaction: I'm not sure I understand 'extrinsically'. Is there some external stretching force? God spends his time spreading out his stuff? It is nice that being spread out isn't taken for granted. We take much more for granted than they did. Motion, for example. |
| 16673 | Quantity just adds union and location to the extension of parts [Olivi] |
| Full Idea: Quantity or extension adds absolutely nothing really distinct to the quantified matter or to the extended and quantified form, except perhaps the union and location and position of those parts. | |
| From: Peter John Olivi (Summa quaestionum super Sententias [1290], II:58,II:440), quoted by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 14.1 | |
| A reaction: Other views seem to say that the Quantity provides the extension, but he seems to take that as given. |
| 20653 | Six reduction levels: groups, lives, cells, molecules, atoms, particles [Putnam/Oppenheim, by Watson] |
| Full Idea: There are six 'reductive levels' in science: social groups, (multicellular) living things, cells, molecules, atoms, and elementary particles. | |
| From: report of H.Putnam/P.Oppenheim (Unity of Science as a Working Hypothesis [1958]) by Peter Watson - Convergence 10 'Intro' | |
| A reaction: I have the impression that fields are seen as more fundamental that elementary particles. What is the status of the 'laws' that are supposed to govern these things? What is the status of space and time within this picture? |
| 15675 | We don't condemn people for being bad at reasoning [Finlayson] |
| Full Idea: We do not morally disapprove of people who are incompetent reasoners. | |
| From: James Gordon Finlayson (Habermas [2005], Ch.6:83) | |
| A reaction: Well, we don't morally disapprove simply of their lack of reasoning ability, but we may morally disapprove of their actions, which have arisen entirely from the disability. |
| 15674 | One can universalise good advice, but that doesn't make it an obligation [Finlayson] |
| Full Idea: 'Early to bed and early to rise' is a universalizable maxim, but, though it might be good advice, there is obviously no such obligation. | |
| From: James Gordon Finlayson (Habermas [2005], Ch.6:83) | |
| A reaction: I take it that Kant's rule won't distinguish moral guidance from prudential guidance. Unfair, I think. I may be a lark, but when I universalise this maxim I see that it can't be willed as a universal rule, because we should tolerate the owls. |
| 15662 | The 'culture industry' is an advertisement for the way things are [Finlayson] |
| Full Idea: Critical theory said that culture unwittingly played the role of an advertisement for the way things are. Horkheimer and Adorno referred to this phenomenon as the 'culture industry'. | |
| From: James Gordon Finlayson (Habermas [2005], Ch.1:04) | |
| A reaction: An interesting perspective. However, absolutely everything is an advertisement for what it offers. I think this is especially true of moral (and immoral) actions. |
| 16663 | Things are limited by the species to certain modes of being [Olivi] |
| Full Idea: A subject is limited by its species to certain modes of being. | |
| From: Peter John Olivi (Summa quaestionum super Sententias [1290], I:586-7), quoted by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 13.2 | |
| A reaction: I think this is so very the wrong way round. Species characteristics are generalisations about similar individual creatures. The 'species' doesn't do anything at all. It is a classification. See ring species, for example. |