Combining Philosophers

All the ideas for H.Putnam/P.Oppenheim, George Berkeley and Roderick Chisholm

expand these ideas     |    start again     |     specify just one area for these philosophers


115 ideas

1. Philosophy / E. Nature of Metaphysics / 6. Metaphysics as Conceptual
Many philosophers aim to understand metaphysics by studying ourselves [Chisholm]
1. Philosophy / F. Analytic Philosophy / 6. Logical Analysis
I use variables to show that each item remains the same entity throughout [Chisholm]
3. Truth / C. Correspondence Truth / 3. Correspondence Truth critique
An idea can only be like another idea [Berkeley]
6. Mathematics / A. Nature of Mathematics / 5. The Infinite / k. Infinitesimals
Infinitesimals are ghosts of departed quantities [Berkeley]
7. Existence / A. Nature of Existence / 4. Abstract Existence
Abstract ideas are impossible [Berkeley]
7. Existence / A. Nature of Existence / 5. Reason for Existence
I do not believe in the existence of anything, if I see no reason to believe it [Berkeley]
7. Existence / A. Nature of Existence / 6. Criterion for Existence
I know that nothing inconsistent can exist [Berkeley]
7. Existence / B. Change in Existence / 4. Events / a. Nature of events
Events are states of affairs that occur at certain places and times [Chisholm]
7. Existence / D. Theories of Reality / 4. Anti-realism
Berkeley does believe in trees, but is confused about what trees are [Berkeley, by Cameron]
7. Existence / D. Theories of Reality / 9. States of Affairs
A state of affairs pertains to a thing if it implies that it has some property [Chisholm]
The mark of a state of affairs is that it is capable of being accepted [Chisholm]
I propose that events and propositions are two types of states of affairs [Chisholm]
7. Existence / E. Categories / 3. Proposed Categories
Chisholm divides things into contingent and necessary, and then individuals, states and non-states [Chisholm, by Westerhoff]
8. Modes of Existence / B. Properties / 1. Nature of Properties
Some properties, such as 'being a widow', can be seen as 'rooted outside the time they are had' [Chisholm]
Some properties can never be had, like being a round square [Chisholm]
8. Modes of Existence / B. Properties / 10. Properties as Predicates
If some dogs are brown, that entails the properties of 'being brown' and 'being canine' [Chisholm]
8. Modes of Existence / E. Nominalism / 1. Nominalism / b. Nominalism about universals
Universals do not have single meaning, but attach to many different particulars [Berkeley]
No one will think of abstractions if they only have particular ideas [Berkeley]
8. Modes of Existence / E. Nominalism / 2. Resemblance Nominalism
Universals do not have any intrinsic properties, but only relations to particulars [Berkeley]
9. Objects / A. Existence of Objects / 5. Individuation / a. Individuation
Maybe we can only individuate things by relating them to ourselves [Chisholm]
9. Objects / A. Existence of Objects / 5. Individuation / d. Individuation by haecceity
Being the tallest man is an 'individual concept', but not a haecceity [Chisholm]
A haecceity is a property had necessarily, and strictly confined to one entity [Chisholm]
9. Objects / B. Unity of Objects / 2. Substance / d. Substance defined
Material substance is just general existence which can have properties [Berkeley]
There is no other substance, in a strict sense, than spirit [Berkeley]
9. Objects / B. Unity of Objects / 2. Substance / e. Substance critique
A die has no distinct subject, but is merely a name for its modes or accidents [Berkeley]
9. Objects / C. Structure of Objects / 7. Substratum
A peach is sweet and fuzzy, but it doesn't 'have' those qualities [Chisholm]
9. Objects / C. Structure of Objects / 8. Parts of Objects / b. Sums of parts
If x is ever part of y, then y is necessarily such that x is part of y at any time that y exists [Chisholm, by Simons]
9. Objects / D. Essence of Objects / 3. Individual Essences
A traditional individual essence includes all of a thing's necessary characteristics [Chisholm]
9. Objects / D. Essence of Objects / 14. Knowledge of Essences
If there are essential properties, how do you find out what they are? [Chisholm]
9. Objects / E. Objects over Time / 7. Intermittent Objects
Intermittence is seen in a toy fort, which is dismantled then rebuilt with the same bricks [Chisholm, by Simons]
9. Objects / F. Identity among Objects / 5. Self-Identity
The property of being identical with me is an individual concept [Chisholm]
9. Objects / F. Identity among Objects / 9. Sameness
There is 'loose' identity between things if their properties, or truths about them, might differ [Chisholm]
10. Modality / A. Necessity / 10. Impossibility
A thing is shown to be impossible if a contradiction is demonstrated within its definition [Berkeley]
10. Modality / E. Possible worlds / 3. Transworld Objects / a. Transworld identity
Could possible Adam gradually transform into Noah, and vice versa? [Chisholm]
11. Knowledge Aims / A. Knowledge / 5. Aiming at Truth
We have a basic epistemic duty to believe truth and avoid error [Chisholm, by Kvanvig]
11. Knowledge Aims / C. Knowing Reality / 1. Perceptual Realism / a. Naïve realism
Since our ideas vary when the real things are said to be unchanged, they cannot be true copies [Berkeley]
11. Knowledge Aims / C. Knowing Reality / 1. Perceptual Realism / b. Direct realism
If existence is perceived directly, by which sense; if indirectly, how is it inferred from direct perception? [Berkeley]
11. Knowledge Aims / C. Knowing Reality / 2. Phenomenalism
Sensible objects are just sets of sensible qualities [Berkeley]
Perception is existence for my table, but also possible perception, by me or a spirit [Berkeley]
Berkeley did not deny material things; he merely said they must be defined through sensations [Berkeley, by Ayer]
Berkeley needed a phenomenalist account of the self, as well as of material things [Ayer on Berkeley]
11. Knowledge Aims / C. Knowing Reality / 3. Idealism / c. Empirical idealism
The only substance is spirit, or that which perceives [Berkeley]
The 'esse' of objects is 'percipi', and they can only exist in minds [Berkeley]
When I shut my eyes, the things I saw may still exist, but in another mind [Berkeley]
'To be is to be perceived' is a simple confusion of experience with its objects [Russell on Berkeley]
For Berkelely, reality is ideas and a community of minds, including God's [Berkeley, by Grayling]
Time is measured by the succession of ideas in our minds [Berkeley]
There is no such thing as 'material substance' [Berkeley]
I conceive a tree in my mind, but I cannot prove that its existence can be conceived outside a mind [Berkeley]
There is nothing in nature which needs the concept of matter to explain it [Berkeley]
Perceptions are ideas, and ideas exist in the mind, so objects only exist in the mind [Berkeley]
12. Knowledge Sources / B. Perception / 2. Qualities in Perception / c. Primary qualities
Primary qualities (such as shape, solidity, mass) are held to really exist, unlike secondary qualities [Berkeley]
12. Knowledge Sources / B. Perception / 2. Qualities in Perception / e. Primary/secondary critique
No one can, by abstraction, conceive extension and motion of bodies without sensible qualities [Berkeley]
Motion is in the mind, since swifter ideas produce an appearance of slower motion [Berkeley]
Figure and extension seem just as dependent on the observer as heat and cold [Berkeley]
A mite would see its own foot as large, though we would see it as tiny [Berkeley]
The apparent size of an object varies with its distance away, so that can't be a property of the object [Berkeley]
'Solidity' is either not a sensible quality at all, or it is clearly relative to our senses [Berkeley]
Distance is not directly perceived by sight [Berkeley]
12. Knowledge Sources / B. Perception / 3. Representation
Berkeley's idealism resulted from fear of scepticism in representative realism [Robinson,H on Berkeley]
Immediate objects of perception, which some treat as appearances, I treat as the real things themselves [Berkeley]
12. Knowledge Sources / B. Perception / 4. Sense Data / d. Sense-data problems
Do sense-data have structure, location, weight, and constituting matter? [Chisholm]
12. Knowledge Sources / B. Perception / 8. Adverbial Theory
'I feel depressed' is more like 'he runs slowly' than like 'he has a red book' [Chisholm]
If we can say a man senses 'redly', why not also 'rectangularly'? [Chisholm]
So called 'sense-data' are best seen as 'modifications' of the person experiencing them [Chisholm]
12. Knowledge Sources / D. Empiricism / 1. Empiricism
Knowledge is of ideas from senses, or ideas of the mind, or operations on sensations [Berkeley]
Real things and imaginary or dreamed things differ because the latter are much fainter [Berkeley]
12. Knowledge Sources / D. Empiricism / 4. Pro-Empiricism
Geometry is originally perceived by senses, and so is not purely intellectual [Berkeley]
13. Knowledge Criteria / B. Internal Justification / 4. Foundationalism / a. Foundationalism
The 'doctrine of the given' is correct; some beliefs or statements are self-justifying [Chisholm]
13. Knowledge Criteria / D. Scepticism / 3. Illusion Scepticism
It is possible that we could perceive everything as we do now, but nothing actually existed. [Berkeley]
13. Knowledge Criteria / E. Relativism / 3. Subjectivism
A hot hand and a cold hand will have different experiences in the same tepid water [Berkeley]
14. Science / D. Explanation / 1. Explanation / a. Explanation
Explanations have states of affairs as their objects [Chisholm]
14. Science / D. Explanation / 2. Types of Explanation / j. Explanations by reduction
Six reduction levels: groups, lives, cells, molecules, atoms, particles [Putnam/Oppenheim, by Watson]
15. Nature of Minds / A. Nature of Mind / 4. Other Minds / a. Other minds
Berkeley's idealism gives no grounds for believing in other minds [Reid on Berkeley]
15. Nature of Minds / A. Nature of Mind / 4. Other Minds / c. Knowing other minds
I know other minds by ideas which are referred by me to other agents, as their effects [Berkeley]
Experience tells me that other minds exist independently from my own [Berkeley]
15. Nature of Minds / A. Nature of Mind / 7. Animal Minds
If animals have ideas, and are not machines, they must have some reason [Berkeley]
15. Nature of Minds / B. Features of Minds / 4. Intentionality / b. Intentionality theories
Berkeley replaced intentionality with an anti-abstractionist imagist theory of thought [Berkeley, by Robinson,H]
15. Nature of Minds / C. Capacities of Minds / 3. Abstraction by mind
The mind creates abstract ideas by considering qualities separated from their objects [Berkeley]
I can only combine particulars in imagination; I can't create 'abstract' ideas [Berkeley]
16. Persons / B. Nature of the Self / 3. Self as Non-physical
I am picked out uniquely by my individual essence, which is 'being identical with myself' [Chisholm]
16. Persons / C. Self-Awareness / 3. Limits of Introspection
Sartre says the ego is 'opaque'; I prefer to say that it is 'transparent' [Chisholm]
16. Persons / D. Continuity of the Self / 3. Reference of 'I'
People use 'I' to refer to themselves, with the meaning of their own individual essence [Chisholm]
16. Persons / D. Continuity of the Self / 7. Self and Thinking
Ideas are perceived by the mind, soul or self [Berkeley]
16. Persons / E. Rejecting the Self / 1. Self as Indeterminate
Bad theories of the self see it as abstract, or as a bundle, or as a process [Chisholm]
16. Persons / F. Free Will / 4. For Free Will
If actions are not caused by other events, and are not causeless, they must be caused by the person [Chisholm]
16. Persons / F. Free Will / 5. Against Free Will
For Hobbes (but not for Kant) a person's actions can be deduced from their desires and beliefs [Chisholm]
If free will miraculously interrupts causation, animals might do that; why would we want to do it? [Frankfurt on Chisholm]
Determinism claims that every event has a sufficient causal pre-condition [Chisholm]
17. Mind and Body / E. Mind as Physical / 5. Causal Argument
How can that which is unthinking be a cause of thought? [Berkeley]
18. Thought / C. Content / 2. Ideas
Berkeley probably used 'idea' to mean both the act of apprehension and the thing apprehended [Russell on Berkeley]
19. Language / A. Nature of Meaning / 2. Meaning as Mental
Language is presumably for communication, and names stand for ideas [Berkeley]
19. Language / D. Propositions / 4. Mental Propositions
I can't really go wrong if I stick to wordless thought [Berkeley]
20. Action / A. Definition of Action / 1. Action Theory
If a desire leads to a satisfactory result by an odd route, the causal theory looks wrong [Chisholm]
20. Action / B. Preliminaries of Action / 2. Willed Action / c. Agent causation
There has to be a brain event which is not caused by another event, but by the agent [Chisholm]
20. Action / C. Motives for Action / 4. Responsibility for Actions
Responsibility seems to conflict with events being either caused or not caused [Chisholm]
Desires may rule us, but are we responsible for our desires? [Chisholm]
20. Action / C. Motives for Action / 5. Action Dilemmas / c. Omissions
There are mere omissions (through ignorance, perhaps), and people can 'commit an omission' [Chisholm]
22. Metaethics / A. Ethics Foundations / 1. Nature of Ethics / a. Preconditions for ethics
Immorality is not in the action, but in the deviation of the will from moral law [Berkeley]
26. Natural Theory / A. Speculations on Nature / 1. Nature
The concept of physical necessity is basic to both causation, and to the concept of nature [Chisholm]
26. Natural Theory / A. Speculations on Nature / 7. Later Matter Theories / a. Early Modern matter
No one can explain how matter affects mind, so matter is redundant in philosophy [Berkeley]
26. Natural Theory / C. Causation / 2. Types of cause
Some propose a distinct 'agent causation', as well as 'event causation' [Chisholm]
26. Natural Theory / C. Causation / 8. Particular Causation / b. Causal relata
Causation among objects relates either events or states [Chisholm]
26. Natural Theory / C. Causation / 9. General Causation / a. Constant conjunction
We discover natural behaviour by observing settled laws of nature, not necessary connections [Berkeley]
26. Natural Theory / D. Laws of Nature / 4. Regularities / a. Regularity theory
The laws of nature are mental regularities which we learn by experience [Berkeley]
26. Natural Theory / D. Laws of Nature / 7. Strictness of Laws
A 'law of nature' is just something which is physically necessary [Chisholm]
26. Natural Theory / D. Laws of Nature / 8. Scientific Essentialism / e. Anti scientific essentialism
If properties and qualities arise from an inward essence, we will remain ignorant of nature [Berkeley]
27. Natural Reality / B. Modern Physics / 1. Relativity / a. Special relativity
All motion is relative, so a single body cannot move [Berkeley]
27. Natural Reality / D. Time / 1. Nature of Time / c. Idealist time
I cannot imagine time apart from the flow of ideas in my mind [Berkeley]
28. God / B. Proving God / 1. Proof of God
There must be a God, because all sensible things must be perceived by him [Berkeley]
There must be a God, because I and my ideas are not independent [Berkeley]
28. God / B. Proving God / 3. Proofs of Evidence / b. Teleological Proof
It has been proved that creation is the workmanship of God, from its beauty and usefulness [Berkeley]
29. Religion / D. Religious Issues / 3. Problem of Evil / a. Problem of Evil
Particular evils are really good when linked to the whole system of beings [Berkeley]
29. Religion / D. Religious Issues / 3. Problem of Evil / b. Human Evil
People are responsible because they have limited power, though this ultimately derives from God [Berkeley]
29. Religion / D. Religious Issues / 3. Problem of Evil / d. Natural Evil
If sin is not just physical, we don't consider God the origin of sin because he causes physical events [Berkeley]