Combining Philosophers

All the ideas for Anaxarchus, Vann McGee and Bas C. van Fraassen

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20 ideas

1. Philosophy / D. Nature of Philosophy / 7. Despair over Philosophy
12772 Philosophy is a value- and attitude-driven enterprise [Fraassen]
1. Philosophy / E. Nature of Metaphysics / 2. Possibility of Metaphysics
12771 Is it likely that a successful, coherent, explanatory ontological hypothesis is true? [Fraassen]
1. Philosophy / F. Analytic Philosophy / 1. Nature of Analysis
12773 Analytic philosophy has an exceptional arsenal of critical tools [Fraassen]
2. Reason / A. Nature of Reason / 6. Coherence
12770 We may end up with a huge theory of carefully constructed falsehoods [Fraassen]
5. Theory of Logic / B. Logical Consequence / 1. Logical Consequence
18755 Validity is explained as truth in all models, because that relies on the logical terms [McGee]
5. Theory of Logic / E. Structures of Logic / 2. Logical Connectives / a. Logical connectives
18751 Natural language includes connectives like 'because' which are not truth-functional [McGee]
5. Theory of Logic / G. Quantification / 5. Second-Order Quantification
18761 Second-order variables need to range over more than collections of first-order objects [McGee]
5. Theory of Logic / I. Semantics of Logic / 1. Semantics of Logic
18753 An ontologically secure semantics for predicate calculus relies on sets [McGee]
5. Theory of Logic / I. Semantics of Logic / 3. Logical Truth
18754 Logically valid sentences are analytic truths which are just true because of their logical words [McGee]
5. Theory of Logic / K. Features of Logics / 3. Soundness
18757 Soundness theorems are uninformative, because they rely on soundness in their proofs [McGee]
6. Mathematics / B. Foundations for Mathematics / 3. Axioms for Geometry
18760 The culmination of Euclidean geometry was axioms that made all models isomorphic [McGee]
10. Modality / A. Necessity / 11. Denial of Necessity
14919 Empiricists deny what is unobservable, and reject objective modality [Fraassen]
11. Knowledge Aims / A. Knowledge / 4. Belief / c. Aim of beliefs
6783 To 'accept' a theory is not to believe it, but to believe it empirically adequate [Fraassen, by Bird]
13. Knowledge Criteria / D. Scepticism / 1. Scepticism
3061 Anaxarchus said that he was not even sure that he knew nothing [Anaxarchus, by Diog. Laertius]
14. Science / B. Scientific Theories / 2. Aim of Science
14917 To accept a scientific theory, we only need to believe that it is empirically adequate [Fraassen]
14. Science / D. Explanation / 3. Best Explanation / c. Against best explanation
6784 Why should the true explanation be one of the few we have actually thought of? [Fraassen, by Bird]
12769 Inference to best explanation contains all sorts of hidden values [Fraassen]
14. Science / D. Explanation / 4. Explanation Doubts / a. Explanation as pragmatic
13066 An explanation is just descriptive information answering a particular question [Fraassen, by Salmon]
12768 We accept many scientific theories without endorsing them as true [Fraassen]
19. Language / F. Communication / 2. Assertion
18762 A maxim claims that if we are allowed to assert a sentence, that means it must be true [McGee]