556 ideas
| 9764 | Inspiration and social improvement need wisdom, but not professional philosophy [Quine] |
| 14255 | We understand things through their dependency relations [Fine,K] |
| 9763 | For a good theory of the world, we must focus on our flabby foundational vocabulary [Quine] |
| 9208 | Philosophers with a new concept are like children with a new toy [Fine,K] |
| 13736 | Quinean metaphysics just lists the beings, which is a domain with no internal structure [Schaffer,J on Quine] |
| 14250 | Metaphysics deals with the existence of things and with the nature of things [Fine,K] |
| 15053 | If metaphysics can't be settled, it hardly matters whether it makes sense [Fine,K] |
| 1627 | Any statement can be held true if we make enough adjustment to the rest of the system [Quine] |
| 22153 | Quine rejects Carnap's view that science and philosophy are distinct [Quine, by Boulter] |
| 22438 | Philosophy is largely concerned with finding the minimum that science could get by with [Quine] |
| 6891 | Quine's naturalistic and empirical view is based entirely on first-order logic and set theory [Quine, by Mautner] |
| 17275 | Realist metaphysics concerns what is real; naive metaphysics concerns natures of things [Fine,K] |
| 6310 | Enquiry needs a conceptual scheme, so we should retain the best available [Quine] |
| 11103 | We aren't stuck with our native conceptual scheme; we can gradually change it [Quine] |
| 15054 | 'Quietist' says abandon metaphysics because answers are unattainable (as in Kant's noumenon) [Fine,K] |
| 11159 | My account shows how the concept works, rather than giving an analysis [Fine,K] |
| 8996 | If if time is money then if time is not money then time is money then if if if time is not money... [Quine] |
| 22436 | Logicians don't paraphrase logic into language, because they think in the symbolic language [Quine] |
| 9766 | Study vagueness first by its logic, then by its truth-conditions, and then its metaphysics [Fine,K] |
| 10571 | Concern for rigour can get in the way of understanding phenomena [Fine,K] |
| 16943 | Philosophy is continuous with science, and has no external vantage point [Quine] |
| 9023 | If you say that a contradiction is true, you change the meaning of 'not', and so change the subject [Quine] |
| 6564 | To affirm 'p and not-p' is to have mislearned 'and' or 'not' [Quine] |
| 22431 | Good algorithms and theories need many occurrences of just a few elements [Quine] |
| 8207 | The quest for simplicity drove scientists to posit new entities, such as molecules in gases [Quine] |
| 8208 | In arithmetic, ratios, negatives, irrationals and imaginaries were created in order to generalise [Quine] |
| 1623 | Definition rests on synonymy, rather than explaining it [Quine] |
| 10528 | Definitions concern how we should speak, not how things are [Fine,K] |
| 10143 | 'Creative definitions' do not presuppose the existence of the objects defined [Fine,K] |
| 9143 | Implicit definitions must be satisfiable, creative definitions introduce things, contextual definitions build on things [Fine,K, by Cook/Ebert] |
| 12302 | Definitions formed an abstract hierarchy for Aristotle, as sets do for us [Fine,K] |
| 11157 | Modern philosophy has largely abandoned real definitions, apart from sortals [Fine,K] |
| 14259 | Maybe two objects might require simultaneous real definitions, as with two simultaneous terms [Fine,K] |
| 14266 | Aristotle sees hierarchies in definitions using genus and differentia (as we see them in sets) [Fine,K] |
| 11171 | Defining a term and giving the essence of an object don't just resemble - they are the same [Fine,K] |
| 11178 | The essence or definition of an essence involves either a class of properties or a class of propositions [Fine,K] |
| 19048 | Contextual definition shifted the emphasis from words to whole sentences [Quine] |
| 8995 | Definition by words is determinate but relative; fixing contexts could make it absolute [Quine] |
| 19047 | Bentham's contextual definitions preserved terms after their denotation became doubtful [Quine] |
| 21699 | Russell offered a paraphrase of definite description, to avoid the commitment to objects [Quine] |
| 21697 | The Struthionic Fallacy is that of burying one's head in the sand [Quine] |
| 17282 | Truths need not always have their source in what exists [Fine,K] |
| 15063 | Some sentences depend for their truth on worldly circumstances, and others do not [Fine,K] |
| 17283 | If the truth-making relation is modal, then modal truths will be grounded in anything [Fine,K] |
| 21750 | Science is sympathetic to truth as correspondence, since it depends on observation [Quine] |
| 9012 | Talk of 'truth' when sentences are mentioned; it reminds us that reality is the point of sentences [Quine] |
| 9011 | Truth is redundant for single sentences; we do better to simply speak the sentence [Quine] |
| 22435 | The logician's '→' does not mean the English if-then [Quine] |
| 9013 | We can eliminate 'or' from our basic theory, by paraphrasing 'p or q' as 'not(not-p and not-q)' [Quine] |
| 10928 | Maybe we can quantify modally if the objects are intensional, but it seems unlikely [Quine] |
| 5745 | Quine says quantified modal logic creates nonsense, bad ontology, and false essentialism [Melia on Quine] |
| 13591 | Quantified modal logic collapses if essence is withdrawn [Quine] |
| 9560 | S5 provides the correct logic for necessity in the broadly logical sense [Fine,K] |
| 22433 | It is important that the quantification over temporal entities is timeless [Quine] |
| 14263 | Strong Kleene disjunction just needs one true disjunct; Weak needs the other to have some value [Fine,K] |
| 3302 | Set theory is full of Platonist metaphysics, so Quine aimed to keep it separate from logic [Quine, by Benardete,JA] |
| 9879 | NF has no models, but just blocks the comprehension axiom, to avoid contradictions [Quine, by Dummett] |
| 10211 | Quine wants V = L for a cleaner theory, despite the scepticism of most theorists [Quine, by Shapiro] |
| 21717 | Reducibility undermines type ramification, and is committed to the existence of functions [Quine, by Linsky,B] |
| 18170 | The Axiom of Reducibility is self-effacing: if true, it isn't needed [Quine] |
| 21695 | The set scheme discredited by paradoxes is actually the most natural one [Quine] |
| 10565 | There is no stage at which we can take all the sets to have been generated [Fine,K] |
| 21693 | Russell's antinomy challenged the idea that any condition can produce a set [Quine] |
| 3336 | Two things can never entail three things [Quine, by Benardete,JA] |
| 13331 | Part and whole contribute asymmetrically to one another, so must differ [Fine,K] |
| 10564 | We might combine the axioms of set theory with the axioms of mereology [Fine,K] |
| 9020 | My logical grammar has sentences by predication, then negation, conjunction, and existential quantification [Quine] |
| 13010 | In order to select the logic justified by experience, we would need to use a lot of logic [Boghossian on Quine] |
| 9028 | Maybe logical truth reflects reality, but in different ways in different languages [Quine] |
| 9002 | Elementary logic requires truth-functions, quantifiers (and variables), identity, and also sets of variables [Quine] |
| 23548 | Indeterminacy is in conflict with classical logic [Fine,K] |
| 13639 | Quine says higher-order items are intensional, and lack a clearly defined identity relation [Quine, by Shapiro] |
| 8789 | Various strategies try to deal with the ontological commitments of second-order logic [Hale/Wright on Quine] |
| 10014 | Quine rejects second-order logic, saying that predicates refer to multiple objects [Quine, by Hodes] |
| 10828 | Quantifying over predicates is treating them as names of entities [Quine] |
| 13681 | Logical consequence is marked by being preserved under all nonlogical substitutions [Quine, by Sider] |
| 17286 | Logical consequence is verification by a possible world within a truth-set [Fine,K] |
| 12219 | Whether a modal claim is true depends on how the object is described [Quine, by Fine,K] |
| 22437 | Logical languages are rooted in ordinary language, and that connection must be kept [Quine] |
| 10064 | Quine quickly dismisses If-thenism [Quine, by Musgrave] |
| 20296 | Logic needs general conventions, but that needs logic to apply them to individual cases [Quine, by Rey] |
| 8998 | Claims that logic and mathematics are conventional are either empty, uninteresting, or false [Quine] |
| 8999 | Logic isn't conventional, because logic is needed to infer logic from conventions [Quine] |
| 9000 | If a convention cannot be communicated until after its adoption, what is its role? [Quine] |
| 19043 | Bivalence applies not just to sentences, but that general terms are true or false of each object [Quine] |
| 9024 | Excluded middle has three different definitions [Quine] |
| 9775 | Excluded Middle, and classical logic, may fail for vague predicates [Fine,K] |
| 10012 | Quantification theory can still be proved complete if we add identity [Quine] |
| 22434 | Reduction to logical forms first simplifies idioms and grammar, then finds a single reading of it [Quine] |
| 12220 | Is it the sentence-token or the sentence-type that has a logical form? [Fine,K] |
| 13829 | If logical truths essentially depend on logical constants, we had better define the latter [Hacking on Quine] |
| 11175 | Logical concepts rest on certain inferences, not on facts about implications [Fine,K] |
| 1618 | We study bound variables not to know reality, but to know what reality language asserts [Quine] |
| 12221 | 'Corner quotes' (quasi-quotation) designate 'whatever these terms designate' [Quine] |
| 15590 | It seemed that Frege gave the syntax for variables, and Tarski the semantics, and that was that [Fine,K] |
| 15591 | In separate expressions variables seem identical in role, but in the same expression they aren't [Fine,K] |
| 15595 | The 'algebraic' account of variables reduces quantification to the algebra of its component parts [Fine,K] |
| 15594 | 'Instantial' accounts of variables say we grasp arbitrary instances from their use in quantification [Fine,K] |
| 15592 | The usual Tarskian interpretation of variables is to specify their range of values [Fine,K] |
| 15593 | Variables can be viewed as special terms - functions taking assignments into individuals [Fine,K] |
| 9148 | I think of variables as objects rather than as signs [Fine,K] |
| 21698 | All relations, apart from ancestrals, can be reduced to simpler logic [Quine] |
| 14620 | Theories in logic are sentences closed under consequence, but in truth discussions theories have axioms [Fine,K] |
| 8453 | If we had to name objects to make existence claims, we couldn't discuss all the real numbers [Quine] |
| 10925 | Failure of substitutivity shows that a personal name is not purely referential [Quine] |
| 15599 | Cicero/Cicero and Cicero/Tully may differ in relationship, despite being semantically the same [Fine,K] |
| 19321 | We might do without names, by converting them into predicates [Quine, by Kirkham] |
| 8455 | Canonical notation needs quantification, variables and predicates, but not names [Quine, by Orenstein] |
| 8456 | Quine extended Russell's defining away of definite descriptions, to also define away names [Quine, by Orenstein] |
| 9204 | Quine's arguments fail because he naively conflates names with descriptions [Fine,K on Quine] |
| 9016 | Names are not essential, because naming can be turned into predication [Quine] |
| 1611 | Names can be converted to descriptions, and Russell showed how to eliminate those [Quine] |
| 11176 | The property of Property Abstraction says any suitable condition must imply a property [Fine,K] |
| 10926 | Quantifying into referentially opaque contexts often produces nonsense [Quine] |
| 10922 | Objects are the values of variables, so a referentially opaque context cannot be quantified into [Quine] |
| 10311 | No sense can be made of quantification into opaque contexts [Quine, by Hale] |
| 10538 | Finite quantification can be eliminated in favour of disjunction and conjunction [Quine, by Dummett] |
| 9015 | Universal quantification is widespread, but it is definable in terms of existential quantification [Quine] |
| 10793 | Quine thought substitutional quantification confused use and mention, but then saw its nominalist appeal [Quine, by Marcus (Barcan)] |
| 10801 | Either reference really matters, or we don't need to replace it with substitutions [Quine] |
| 21642 | If quantification is all substitutional, there is no ontology [Quine] |
| 9025 | You can't base quantification on substituting names for variables, if the irrationals cannot all be named [Quine] |
| 9026 | Some quantifications could be false substitutionally and true objectually, because of nameless objects [Quine] |
| 12222 | Substitutional quantification is referential quantification over expressions [Fine,K] |
| 10705 | Putting a predicate letter in a quantifier is to make it the name of an entity [Quine] |
| 10569 | If you ask what F the second-order quantifier quantifies over, you treat it as first-order [Fine,K] |
| 12798 | Plurals can in principle be paraphrased away altogether [Quine] |
| 10570 | Assigning an entity to each predicate in semantics is largely a technical convenience [Fine,K] |
| 23539 | Classical semantics has referents for names, extensions for predicates, and T or F for sentences [Fine,K] |
| 11174 | A logical truth is true in virtue of the nature of the logical concepts [Fine,K] |
| 9771 | Logic holding between indefinite sentences is the core of all language [Fine,K] |
| 9027 | A sentence is logically true if all sentences with that grammatical structure are true [Quine] |
| 21691 | Antinomies contradict accepted ways of reasoning, and demand revisions [Quine] |
| 21690 | Whenever the pursuer reaches the spot where the pursuer has been, the pursued has moved on [Quine] |
| 9003 | Set theory was struggling with higher infinities, when new paradoxes made it baffling [Quine] |
| 21689 | A barber shaves only those who do not shave themselves. So does he shave himself? [Quine] |
| 21694 | Membership conditions which involve membership and non-membership are paradoxical [Quine] |
| 21692 | If we write it as '"this sentence is false" is false', there is no paradox [Quine] |
| 16949 | Klein summarised geometry as grouped together by transformations [Quine] |
| 8994 | If analytic geometry identifies figures with arithmetical relations, logicism can include geometry [Quine] |
| 10573 | Dedekind cuts lead to the bizarre idea that there are many different number 1's [Fine,K] |
| 17905 | Any progression will do nicely for numbers; they can all then be used to measure multiplicity [Quine] |
| 10575 | Why should a Dedekind cut correspond to a number? [Fine,K] |
| 10574 | Unless we know whether 0 is identical with the null set, we create confusions [Fine,K] |
| 8997 | There are four different possible conventional accounts of geometry [Quine] |
| 12215 | The existence of numbers is not a matter of identities, but of constituents of the world [Fine,K] |
| 10529 | If Hume's Principle can define numbers, we needn't worry about its truth [Fine,K] |
| 10530 | Hume's Principle is either adequate for number but fails to define properly, or vice versa [Fine,K] |
| 8463 | Maths can be reduced to logic and set theory [Quine] |
| 8203 | All the arithmetical entities can be reduced to classes of integers, and hence to sets [Quine] |
| 10560 | Set-theoretic imperialists think sets can represent every mathematical object [Fine,K] |
| 10242 | I apply structuralism to concrete and abstract objects indiscriminately [Quine] |
| 12211 | It is plausible that x^2 = -1 had no solutions before complex numbers were 'introduced' [Fine,K] |
| 21696 | Nominalism rejects both attributes and classes (where extensionalism accepts the classes) [Quine] |
| 17738 | Quine blurs the difference between knowledge of arithmetic and of physics [Jenkins on Quine] |
| 12209 | The indispensability argument shows that nature is non-numerical, not the denial of numbers [Fine,K] |
| 9556 | Nearly all of mathematics has to quantify over abstract objects [Quine] |
| 18198 | Mathematics is part of science; transfinite mathematics I take as mostly uninterpreted [Quine] |
| 8993 | If mathematics follows from definitions, then it is conventional, and part of logic [Quine] |
| 10568 | Logicists say mathematics can be derived from definitions, and can be known that way [Fine,K] |
| 21557 | Russell confused use and mention, and reduced classes to properties, not to language [Quine, by Lackey] |
| 9224 | Proceduralism offers a version of logicism with no axioms, or objects, or ontological commitment [Fine,K] |
| 1635 | Mathematics reduces to set theory (which is a bit vague and unobvious), but not to logic proper [Quine] |
| 1613 | Logicists cheerfully accept reference to bound variables and all sorts of abstract entities [Quine] |
| 9004 | If set theory is not actually a branch of logic, then Frege's derivation of arithmetic would not be from logic [Quine] |
| 1616 | Formalism says maths is built of meaningless notations; these build into rules which have meaning [Quine] |
| 9222 | The objects and truths of mathematics are imperative procedures for their construction [Fine,K] |
| 9223 | My Proceduralism has one simple rule, and four complex rules [Fine,K] |
| 1615 | Intuitionism says classes are invented, and abstract entities are constructed from specified ingredients [Quine] |
| 8466 | For Quine, intuitionist ontology is inadequate for classical mathematics [Quine, by Orenstein] |
| 8467 | Intuitionists only admit numbers properly constructed, but classical maths covers all reals in a 'limit' [Quine, by Orenstein] |
| 1614 | Conceptualism holds that there are universals but they are mind-made [Quine] |
| 12214 | 'Exists' is a predicate, not a quantifier; 'electrons exist' is like 'electrons spin' [Fine,K] |
| 10241 | For Quine, there is only one way to exist [Quine, by Shapiro] |
| 15078 | There are levels of existence, as well as reality; objects exist at the lowest level in which they can function [Fine,K] |
| 14253 | An object's 'being' isn't existence; there's more to an object than existence, and its nature doesn't include existence [Fine,K] |
| 16966 | Philosophers tend to distinguish broad 'being' from narrower 'existence' - but I reject that [Quine] |
| 4064 | The idea of a thing and the idea of existence are two sides of the same coin [Quine, by Crane] |
| 10145 | Abstracts cannot be identified with sets [Fine,K] |
| 10136 | Points in Euclidean space are abstract objects, but not introduced by abstraction [Fine,K] |
| 10144 | Postulationism says avoid abstract objects by giving procedures that produce truth [Fine,K] |
| 12212 | Just as we introduced complex numbers, so we introduced sums and temporal parts [Fine,K] |
| 1633 | Absolute ontological questions are meaningless, because the answers are circular definitions [Quine] |
| 19277 | Quine rests existence on bound variables, because he thinks singular terms can be analysed away [Quine, by Hale] |
| 16965 | All we have of general existence is what existential quantifiers express [Quine] |
| 12216 | Real objects are those which figure in the facts that constitute reality [Fine,K] |
| 12218 | Being real and being fundamental are separate; Thales's water might be real and divisible [Fine,K] |
| 11092 | A river is a process, with stages; if we consider it as one thing, we are considering a process [Quine] |
| 8205 | Explaining events just by bodies can't explain two events identical in space-time [Quine] |
| 15007 | If you make 'grounding' fundamental, you have to mention some non-fundamental notions [Sider on Fine,K] |
| 15006 | Something is grounded when it holds, and is explained, and necessitated by something else [Fine,K, by Sider] |
| 14262 | Formal grounding needs transitivity of grounding, no self-grounding, and the existence of both parties [Fine,K] |
| 17272 | 2+2=4 is necessary if it is snowing, but not true in virtue of the fact that it is snowing [Fine,K] |
| 17276 | If you say one thing causes another, that leaves open that the 'other' has its own distinct reality [Fine,K] |
| 17284 | An immediate ground is the next lower level, which gives the concept of a hierarchy [Fine,K] |
| 17285 | 'Strict' ground moves down the explanations, but 'weak' ground can move sideways [Fine,K] |
| 17288 | We learn grounding from what is grounded, not what does the grounding [Fine,K] |
| 15055 | Grounding relations are best expressed as relations between sentences [Fine,K] |
| 17281 | If grounding is a relation it must be between entities of the same type, preferably between facts [Fine,K] |
| 17280 | Ground is best understood as a sentence operator, rather than a relation between predicates [Fine,K] |
| 17290 | Only metaphysical grounding must be explained by essence [Fine,K] |
| 14268 | Maybe bottom-up grounding shows constitution, and top-down grounding shows essence [Fine,K] |
| 17274 | Philosophical explanation is largely by ground (just as cause is used in science) [Fine,K] |
| 17278 | We can only explain how a reduction is possible if we accept the concept of ground [Fine,K] |
| 15050 | Reduction might be producing a sentence which gets closer to the logical form [Fine,K] |
| 15051 | Reduction might be semantic, where a reduced sentence is understood through its reduction [Fine,K] |
| 15052 | Reduction is modal, if the reductions necessarily entail the truth of the target sentence [Fine,K] |
| 15056 | The notion of reduction (unlike that of 'ground') implies the unreality of what is reduced [Fine,K] |
| 14261 | There is 'weak' dependence in one definition, and 'strong' dependence in all the definitions [Fine,K] |
| 11151 | An object is dependent if its essence prevents it from existing without some other object [Fine,K] |
| 14251 | A natural modal account of dependence says x depends on y if y must exist when x does [Fine,K] |
| 14257 | An object depends on another if the second cannot be eliminated from the first's definition [Fine,K] |
| 14254 | Dependency is the real counterpart of one term defining another [Fine,K] |
| 1630 | We can only see an alien language in terms of our own thought structures (e.g. physical/abstract) [Quine] |
| 11093 | We don't say 'red' is abstract, unlike a river, just because it has discontinuous shape [Quine] |
| 9210 | Possible objects are abstract; actual concrete objects are possible; so abstract/concrete are compatible [Fine,K] |
| 10563 | A generative conception of abstracts proposes stages, based on concepts of previous objects [Fine,K] |
| 16939 | Mass terms just concern spread, but other terms involve both spread and individuation [Quine] |
| 12210 | Quine's ontology is wrong; his question is scientific, and his answer is partly philosophical [Fine,K on Quine] |
| 12217 | For ontology we need, not internal or external views, but a view from outside reality [Fine,K] |
| 15060 | Why should what is explanatorily basic be therefore more real? [Fine,K] |
| 15048 | In metaphysics, reality is regarded as either 'factual', or as 'fundamental' [Fine,K] |
| 15072 | Bottom level facts are subject to time and world, middle to world but not time, and top to neither [Fine,K] |
| 9211 | A non-standard realism, with no privileged standpoint, might challenge its absoluteness or coherence [Fine,K] |
| 15047 | What is real can only be settled in terms of 'ground' [Fine,K] |
| 15046 | Reality is a primitive metaphysical concept, which cannot be understood in other terms [Fine,K] |
| 18438 | Every worldly event, without exception, is a redistribution of microphysical states [Quine] |
| 10243 | My ontology is quarks etc., classes of such things, classes of such classes etc. [Quine] |
| 17287 | Facts, such as redness and roundness of a ball, can be 'fused' into one fact [Fine,K] |
| 15071 | Tensed and tenseless sentences state two sorts of fact, which belong to two different 'realms' of reality [Fine,K] |
| 23540 | Conjoining two indefinites by related sentences seems to produce a contradiction [Fine,K] |
| 23546 | Standardly vagueness involves borderline cases, and a higher standpoint from which they can be seen [Fine,K] |
| 23544 | Local indeterminacy concerns a single object, and global indeterminacy covers a range [Fine,K] |
| 23542 | Identifying vagueness with ignorance is the common mistake of confusing symptoms with cause [Fine,K] |
| 19042 | Terms learned by ostension tend to be vague, because that must be quick and unrefined [Quine] |
| 9768 | Vagueness is semantic, a deficiency of meaning [Fine,K] |
| 9776 | A thing might be vaguely vague, giving us higher-order vagueness [Fine,K] |
| 9767 | A vague sentence is only true for all ways of making it completely precise [Fine,K] |
| 9770 | Logical connectives cease to be truth-functional if vagueness is treated with three values [Fine,K] |
| 9772 | Meaning is both actual (determining instances) and potential (possibility of greater precision) [Fine,K] |
| 9773 | With the super-truth approach, the classical connectives continue to work [Fine,K] |
| 9774 | Borderline cases must be under our control, as capable of greater precision [Fine,K] |
| 23541 | Supervaluation can give no answer to 'who is the last bald man' [Fine,K] |
| 8496 | What actually exists does not, of course, depend on language [Quine] |
| 11101 | General terms don't commit us ontologically, but singular terms with substitution do [Quine] |
| 19485 | Names have no ontological commitment, because we can deny that they name anything [Quine] |
| 10667 | A logically perfect language could express all truths, so all truths must be logically expressible [Quine, by Hossack] |
| 1610 | To be is to be the value of a variable, which amounts to being in the range of reference of a pronoun [Quine] |
| 19486 | We can use quantification for commitment to unnameable things like the real numbers [Quine] |
| 5747 | "No entity without identity" - our ontology must contain items with settled identity conditions [Quine, by Melia] |
| 16963 | Existence is implied by the quantifiers, not by the constants [Quine] |
| 12213 | Ontological claims are often universal, and not a matter of existential quantification [Fine,K] |
| 16021 | Quine says we can expand predicates easily (ideology), but not names (ontology) [Quine, by Noonan] |
| 16964 | Theories are committed to objects of which some of its predicates must be true [Quine] |
| 8459 | Fictional quantification has no ontology, so we study ontology through scientific theories [Quine, by Orenstein] |
| 8497 | An ontology is like a scientific theory; we accept the simplest scheme that fits disorderly experiences [Quine] |
| 4216 | Express a theory in first-order predicate logic; its ontology is the types of bound variable needed for truth [Quine, by Lowe] |
| 18966 | Ontological commitment of theories only arise if they are classically quantified [Quine] |
| 18964 | Ontology is relative to both a background theory and a translation manual [Quine] |
| 3325 | For Quine everything exists theoretically, as reference, predication and quantification [Quine, by Benardete,JA] |
| 16261 | If commitment rests on first-order logic, we obviously lose the ontology concerning predication [Maudlin on Quine] |
| 7698 | If to be is to be the value of a variable, we must already know the values available [Jacquette on Quine] |
| 19492 | Quine is hopeless circular, deriving ontology from what is literal, and 'literal' from good ontology [Yablo on Quine] |
| 14490 | You can be implicitly committed to something without quantifying over it [Thomasson on Quine] |
| 16961 | In formal terms, a category is the range of some style of variables [Quine] |
| 16462 | The quest for ultimate categories is the quest for a simple clear pattern of notation [Quine] |
| 11096 | Discourse generally departmentalizes itself to some degree [Quine] |
| 14217 | The 'standard' view of relations is that they hold of several objects in a given order [Fine,K] |
| 14216 | The 'positionalist' view of relations says the number of places is fixed, but not the order [Fine,K] |
| 14218 | A block on top of another contains one relation, not both 'on top of' and 'beneath' [Fine,K] |
| 14219 | Language imposes a direction on a road which is not really part of the road [Fine,K] |
| 14220 | Explain biased relations as orderings of the unbiased, or the unbiased as permutation classes of the biased? [Fine,K] |
| 8461 | The category of objects incorporates the old distinction of substances and their modes [Quine] |
| 8534 | Quine says the predicate of a true statement has no ontological implications [Quine, by Armstrong] |
| 7925 | There is no proper identity concept for properties, and it is hard to distinguish one from two [Quine] |
| 10295 | Quine suggests that properties can be replaced with extensional entities like sets [Quine, by Shapiro] |
| 3322 | Quine says that if second-order logic is to quantify over properties, that can be done in first-order predicate logic [Quine, by Benardete,JA] |
| 6078 | Quine brought classes into semantics to get rid of properties [Quine, by McGinn] |
| 9017 | Predicates are not names; predicates are the other parties to predication [Quine] |
| 8479 | Don't analyse 'red is a colour' as involving properties. Say 'all red things are coloured things' [Quine, by Orenstein] |
| 18439 | Because things can share attributes, we cannot individuate attributes clearly [Quine] |
| 14296 | Dispositions are physical states of mechanism; when known, these replace the old disposition term [Quine] |
| 16755 | The possible Aristotelian view that forms are real and active principles is clearly wrong [Fine,K, by Pasnau] |
| 15723 | Either dispositions rest on structures, or we keep saying 'all things being equal' [Quine] |
| 16948 | Once we know the mechanism of a disposition, we can eliminate 'similarity' [Quine] |
| 15490 | Explain unmanifested dispositions as structural similarities to objects which have manifested them [Quine, by Martin,CB] |
| 16945 | We judge things to be soluble if they are the same kind as, or similar to, things that do dissolve [Quine] |
| 1612 | Realism, conceptualism and nominalism in medieval universals reappear in maths as logicism, intuitionism and formalism [Quine] |
| 3751 | Universals are acceptable if they are needed to make an accepted theory true [Quine, by Jacquette] |
| 15402 | There is no entity called 'redness', and that some things are red is ultimate and irreducible [Quine] |
| 9006 | Commitment to universals is as arbitrary or pragmatic as the adoption of a new system of bookkeeping [Quine] |
| 4443 | Quine has argued that predicates do not have any ontological commitment [Quine, by Armstrong] |
| 11099 | Understanding 'is square' is knowing when to apply it, not knowing some object [Quine] |
| 8504 | Quine aims to deal with properties by the use of eternal open sentences, or classes [Quine, by Devitt] |
| 7970 | Quine is committed to sets, but is more a Class Nominalist than a Platonist [Quine, by Macdonald,C] |
| 18442 | You only know an attribute if you know what things have it [Quine] |
| 11097 | Red is the largest red thing in the universe [Quine] |
| 11094 | 'Red' is a single concrete object in space-time; 'red' and 'drop' are parts of a red drop [Quine] |
| 7924 | The notion of a physical object is by far the most useful one for science [Quine] |
| 1628 | If physical objects are a myth, they are useful for making sense of experience [Quine] |
| 8498 | Treating scattered sensations as single objects simplifies our understanding of experience [Quine] |
| 8464 | Physical objects in space-time are just events or processes, no matter how disconnected [Quine] |
| 9018 | A physical object is the four-dimensional material content of a portion of space-time [Quine] |
| 13387 | Our conceptual scheme becomes more powerful when we posit abstract objects [Quine] |
| 9202 | Objects, as well as sentences, can have logical form [Fine,K] |
| 15783 | Definite descriptions can't unambiguously pick out an object which doesn't exist [Lycan on Quine] |
| 8277 | I prefer 'no object without identity' to Quine's 'no entity without identity' [Lowe on Quine] |
| 18441 | No entity without identity (which requires a principle of individuation) [Quine] |
| 15075 | Modal features are not part of entities, because they are accounted for by the entity [Fine,K] |
| 14252 | We should understand identity in terms of the propositions it renders true [Fine,K] |
| 13332 | Hierarchical set membership models objects better than the subset or aggregate relations do [Fine,K] |
| 9769 | Vagueness can be in predicates, names or quantifiers [Fine,K] |
| 23545 | We do not have an intelligible concept of a borderline case [Fine,K] |
| 13333 | The matter is a relatively unstructured version of the object, like a set without membership structure [Fine,K] |
| 14267 | There is no distinctive idea of constitution, because you can't say constitution begins and ends [Fine,K] |
| 14264 | Is there a plausible Aristotelian notion of constitution, applicable to both physical and non-physical? [Fine,K] |
| 13326 | A 'temporary' part is a part at one time, but may not be at another, like a carburetor [Fine,K] |
| 13327 | A 'timeless' part just is a part, not a part at some time; some atoms are timeless parts of a water molecule [Fine,K] |
| 13329 | An 'aggregative' sum is spread in time, and exists whenever a component exists [Fine,K] |
| 13330 | An 'compound' sum is not spread in time, and only exists when all the components exists [Fine,K] |
| 13328 | Two sorts of whole have 'rigid embodiment' (timeless parts) or 'variable embodiment' (temporary parts) [Fine,K] |
| 11177 | Can the essence of an object circularly involve itself, or involve another object? [Fine,K] |
| 14256 | How do we distinguish basic from derived esssences? [Fine,K] |
| 11152 | Essences are either taken as real definitions, or as necessary properties [Fine,K] |
| 14258 | Maybe some things have essential relationships as well as essential properties [Fine,K] |
| 11173 | Being a man is a consequence of his essence, not constitutive of it [Fine,K] |
| 11179 | If there are alternative definitions, then we have three possibilities for essence [Fine,K] |
| 14260 | An object only essentially has a property if that property follows from every definition of the object [Fine,K] |
| 11161 | Essentially having a property is naturally expressed as 'the property it must have to be what it is' [Fine,K] |
| 15065 | What it is is fixed prior to existence or the object's worldly features [Fine,K] |
| 11160 | Simple modal essentialism refers to necessary properties of an object [Fine,K] |
| 11158 | Essentialist claims can be formulated more clearly with quantified modal logic [Fine,K] |
| 11167 | Metaphysical necessity is a special case of essence, not vice versa [Fine,K] |
| 16537 | Essence as necessary properties produces a profusion of essential properties [Fine,K, by Lowe] |
| 11163 | The nature of singleton Socrates has him as a member, but not vice versa [Fine,K] |
| 11164 | It is not part of the essence of Socrates that a huge array of necessary truths should hold [Fine,K] |
| 9206 | We must distinguish between the identity or essence of an object, and its necessary features [Fine,K] |
| 10935 | An essential property of something must be bound up with what it is to be that thing [Fine,K, by Rami] |
| 10923 | Aristotelian essentialism says a thing has some necessary and some non-necessary properties [Quine] |
| 10936 | Essential properties are part of an object's 'definition' [Fine,K, by Rami] |
| 15076 | Essential features of an object have no relation to how things actually are [Fine,K] |
| 10929 | Aristotelian essence of the object has become the modern essence of meaning [Quine] |
| 10930 | Quantification into modal contexts requires objects to have an essence [Quine] |
| 8482 | Mathematicians must be rational but not two-legged, cyclists the opposite. So a mathematical cyclist? [Quine] |
| 12136 | Cyclist are not actually essentially two-legged [Brody on Quine] |
| 13590 | Essences can make sense in a particular context or enquiry, as the most basic predicates [Quine] |
| 12295 | 3-D says things are stretched in space but not in time, and entire at a time but not at a location [Fine,K] |
| 12298 | Genuine motion, rather than variation of position, requires the 'entire presence' of the object [Fine,K] |
| 9019 | Four-d objects helps predication of what no longer exists, and quantification over items from different times [Quine] |
| 12296 | 4-D says things are stretched in space and in time, and not entire at a time or at a location [Fine,K] |
| 18882 | You can ask when the wedding was, but not (usually) when the bride was [Fine,K, by Simons] |
| 12297 | Three-dimensionalist can accept temporal parts, as things enduring only for an instant [Fine,K] |
| 17279 | Even a three-dimensionalist might identify temporal parts, in their thinking [Fine,K] |
| 11165 | If Socrates lacks necessary existence, then his nature cannot require his parents' existence [Fine,K] |
| 17595 | To unite a sequence of ostensions to make one object, a prior concept of identity is needed [Quine] |
| 18965 | We know what things are by distinguishing them, so identity is part of ontology [Quine] |
| 15603 | I can only represent individuals as the same if I do not already represent them as the same [Fine,K] |
| 17594 | We can paraphrase 'x=y' as a sequence of the form 'if Fx then Fy' [Quine] |
| 15073 | Self-identity should have two components, its existence, and its neutral identity with itself [Fine,K] |
| 15604 | If Cicero=Tully refers to the man twice, then surely Cicero=Cicero does as well? [Fine,K] |
| 15074 | We would understand identity between objects, even if their existence was impossible [Fine,K] |
| 18440 | Identity of physical objects is just being coextensive [Quine] |
| 11095 | We should just identify any items which are indiscernible within a given discourse [Quine] |
| 10921 | Necessity can attach to statement-names, to statements, and to open sentences [Quine] |
| 9205 | The three basic types of necessity are metaphysical, natural and normative [Fine,K] |
| 14645 | To be necessarily greater than 7 is not a trait of 7, but depends on how 7 is referred to [Quine] |
| 9209 | Metaphysical necessity may be 'whatever the circumstance', or 'regardless of circumstances' [Fine,K] |
| 12188 | Contrary to some claims, Quine does not deny logical necessity [Quine, by McFetridge] |
| 9001 | Frege moved Kant's question about a priori synthetic to 'how is logical certainty possible?' [Quine] |
| 15064 | Proper necessary truths hold whatever the circumstances; transcendent truths regardless of circumstances [Fine,K] |
| 9201 | Whether 9 is necessarily greater than 7 depends on how '9' is described [Quine, by Fine,K] |
| 15090 | Quine's attack on the analytic-synthetic distinction undermined necessary truths [Quine, by Shoemaker] |
| 10927 | Necessity only applies to objects if they are distinctively specified [Quine] |
| 10924 | Necessity is in the way in which we say things, and not things themselves [Quine] |
| 4577 | There is no necessity higher than natural necessity, and that is just regularity [Quine] |
| 8206 | Necessity could be just generalisation over classes, or (maybe) quantifying over possibilia [Quine] |
| 8483 | Necessity is relative to context; it is what is assumed in an inquiry [Quine] |
| 9200 | Empiricists suspect modal notions: either it happens or it doesn't; it is just regularities. [Fine,K] |
| 9212 | Possible states of affairs are not propositions; a proposition can't be a state of affairs! [Fine,K] |
| 15782 | Quine wants identity and individuation-conditions for possibilia [Quine, by Lycan] |
| 9014 | Some conditionals can be explained just by negation and conjunction: not(p and not-q) [Quine] |
| 15725 | Normal conditionals have a truth-value gap when the antecedent is false. [Quine] |
| 15722 | Conditionals are pointless if the truth value of the antecedent is known [Quine] |
| 22432 | Normally conditionals have no truth value; it is the consequent which has a conditional truth value [Quine] |
| 15719 | We feign belief in counterfactual antecedents, and assess how convincing the consequent is [Quine] |
| 15721 | Counterfactuals are plausible when dispositions are involved, as they imply structures [Quine] |
| 15724 | Counterfactuals have no place in a strict account of science [Quine] |
| 15720 | What stays the same in assessing a counterfactual antecedent depends on context [Quine] |
| 14530 | The role of semantic necessity in semantics is like metaphysical necessity in metaphysics [Fine,K, by Hale/Hoffmann,A] |
| 17289 | Every necessary truth is grounded in the nature of something [Fine,K] |
| 11166 | The subject of a proposition need not be the source of its necessity [Fine,K] |
| 9216 | Each area of enquiry, and its source, has its own distinctive type of necessity [Fine,K] |
| 17273 | Each basic modality has its 'own' explanatory relation [Fine,K] |
| 11169 | Conceptual necessities rest on the nature of all concepts [Fine,K] |
| 11162 | Socrates is necessarily distinct from the Eiffel Tower, but that is not part of his essence [Fine,K] |
| 11168 | Metaphysical necessities are true in virtue of the nature of all objects [Fine,K] |
| 15070 | It is the nature of Socrates to be a man, so necessarily he is a man [Fine,K] |
| 2796 | For Quine the only way to know a necessity is empirically [Quine, by Dancy,J] |
| 8856 | Quine's indispensability argument said arguments for abstracta were a posteriori [Quine, by Yablo] |
| 13589 | Possible worlds are a way to dramatise essentialism, and yet they presuppose essentialism [Quine] |
| 9213 | The actual world is a possible world, so we can't define possible worlds as 'what might have been' [Fine,K] |
| 15069 | Possible worlds may be more limited, to how things might actually turn out [Fine,K] |
| 15068 | The actual world is a totality of facts, so we also think of possible worlds as totalities [Fine,K] |
| 12443 | Can an unactualized possible have self-identity, and be distinct from other possibles? [Quine] |
| 9203 | We can't quantify in modal contexts, because the modality depends on descriptions, not objects [Quine, by Fine,K] |
| 13588 | A rigid designator (for all possible worlds) picks out an object by its essential traits [Quine] |
| 13592 | Beliefs can be ascribed to machines [Quine] |
| 18969 | How do you distinguish three beliefs from four beliefs or two beliefs? [Quine] |
| 18209 | We can never translate our whole language of objects into phenomenalism [Quine] |
| 9379 | A sentence is obvious if it is true, and any speaker of the language will instantly agree to it [Quine] |
| 9005 | Examination of convention in the a priori begins to blur the distinction with empirical knowledge [Quine] |
| 9383 | Metaphysical analyticity (and linguistic necessity) are hopeless, but epistemic analyticity is a priori [Boghossian on Quine] |
| 12424 | Quine challenges the claim that analytic truths are knowable a priori [Quine, by Kitcher] |
| 9338 | Quine's objections to a priori knowledge only work in the domain of science [Horwich on Quine] |
| 9337 | Science is empirical, simple and conservative; any belief can hence be abandoned; so no a priori [Quine, by Horwich] |
| 9340 | Logic, arithmetic and geometry are revisable and a posteriori; quantum logic could be right [Horwich on Quine] |
| 15061 | Although colour depends on us, we can describe the world that way if it picks out fundamentals [Fine,K] |
| 21686 | Sense-data are dubious abstractions, with none of the plausibility of tables [Quine] |
| 1620 | Empiricism makes a basic distinction between truths based or not based on facts [Quine] |
| 8450 | Quine's empiricism is based on whole theoretical systems, not on single mental events [Quine, by Orenstein] |
| 19046 | Empiricism improvements: words for ideas, then sentences, then systems, then no analytic, then naturalism [Quine] |
| 19049 | In scientific theories sentences are too brief to be independent vehicles of empirical meaning [Quine] |
| 1629 | Our outer beliefs must match experience, and our inner ones must be simple [Quine] |
| 21685 | Empiricism says evidence rests on the senses, but that insight is derived from science [Quine] |
| 19488 | The second dogma is linking every statement to some determinate observations [Quine, by Yablo] |
| 9214 | Unsupported testimony may still be believable [Fine,K] |
| 7627 | You can't reduce epistemology to psychology, because that presupposes epistemology [Maund on Quine] |
| 8871 | We should abandon a search for justification or foundations, and focus on how knowledge is acquired [Quine, by Davidson] |
| 8826 | If we abandon justification and normativity in epistemology, we must also abandon knowledge [Kim on Quine] |
| 8827 | Without normativity, naturalized epistemology isn't even about beliefs [Kim on Quine] |
| 8899 | Epistemology is a part of psychology, studying how our theories relate to our evidence [Quine] |
| 3868 | To proclaim cultural relativism is to thereby rise above it [Quine, by Newton-Smith] |
| 1634 | Two things are relative - the background theory, and translating the object theory into the background theory [Quine] |
| 16944 | Science is common sense, with a sophisticated method [Quine] |
| 4630 | Two theories can be internally consistent and match all the facts, yet be inconsistent with one another [Quine, by Baggini /Fosl] |
| 21687 | It seems obvious to prefer the simpler of two theories, on grounds of beauty and convenience [Quine] |
| 21688 | There are four suspicious reasons why we prefer simpler theories [Quine] |
| 4713 | For Quine, theories are instruments used to make predictions about observations [Quine, by O'Grady] |
| 1625 | Statements about the external world face the tribunal of sense experience as a corporate body [Quine] |
| 16941 | Induction relies on similar effects following from each cause [Quine] |
| 16940 | Induction is just more of the same: animal expectations [Quine] |
| 21748 | More careful inductions gradually lead to the hypothetico-deductive method [Quine] |
| 16933 | Grue is a puzzle because the notions of similarity and kind are dubious in science [Quine] |
| 17291 | We explain by identity (what it is), or by truth (how things are) [Fine,K] |
| 17271 | Is there metaphysical explanation (as well as causal), involving a constitutive form of determination? [Fine,K] |
| 15059 | Grounding is an explanation of truth, and needs all the virtues of good explanations [Fine,K] |
| 15057 | Ultimate explanations are in 'grounds', which account for other truths, which hold in virtue of the grounding [Fine,K] |
| 9152 | If green is abstracted from a thing, it is only seen as a type if it is common to many things [Fine,K] |
| 16934 | General terms depend on similarities among things [Quine] |
| 16938 | To learn yellow by observation, must we be told to look at the colour? [Quine] |
| 8486 | Standards of similarity are innate, and the spacing of qualities such as colours can be mapped [Quine] |
| 16947 | Similarity is just interchangeability in the cosmic machine [Quine] |
| 23547 | It seems absurd that there is no identity of any kind between two objects which involve survival [Fine,K] |
| 17277 | If mind supervenes on the physical, it may also explain the physical (and not vice versa) [Fine,K] |
| 3131 | Quine expresses the instrumental version of eliminativism [Quine, by Rey] |
| 8462 | A hallucination can, like an ague, be identified with its host; the ontology is physical, the idiom mental [Quine] |
| 15602 | Mental files are devices for keeping track of basic coordination of objects [Fine,K] |
| 15588 | You cannot determine the full content from a thought's intrinsic character, as relations are involved [Fine,K] |
| 11104 | Concepts are language [Quine] |
| 11102 | Apply '-ness' or 'class of' to abstract general terms, to get second-level abstract singular terms [Quine] |
| 9144 | Fine's 'procedural postulationism' uses creative definitions, but avoids abstract ontology [Fine,K, by Cook/Ebert] |
| 9149 | To obtain the number 2 by abstraction, we only want to abstract the distinctness of a pair of objects [Fine,K] |
| 9150 | We should define abstraction in general, with number abstraction taken as a special case [Fine,K] |
| 10141 | Many different kinds of mathematical objects can be regarded as forms of abstraction [Fine,K] |
| 10135 | We can abstract from concepts (e.g. to number) and from objects (e.g. to direction) [Fine,K] |
| 9142 | Fine considers abstraction as reconceptualization, to produce new senses by analysing given senses [Fine,K, by Cook/Ebert] |
| 10137 | Abstractionism can be regarded as an alternative to set theory [Fine,K] |
| 10138 | An object is the abstract of a concept with respect to a relation on concepts [Fine,K] |
| 10561 | Abstraction-theoretic imperialists think Fregean abstracts can represent every mathematical object [Fine,K] |
| 10562 | We can combine ZF sets with abstracts as urelements [Fine,K] |
| 10567 | We can create objects from conditions, rather than from concepts [Fine,K] |
| 10527 | An abstraction principle should not 'inflate', producing more abstractions than objects [Fine,K] |
| 9146 | After abstraction all numbers seem identical, so only 0 and 1 will exist! [Fine,K] |
| 1626 | It is troublesome nonsense to split statements into a linguistic and a factual component [Quine] |
| 8898 | Inculcations of meanings of words rests ultimately on sensory evidence [Quine] |
| 22430 | If we understand a statement, we know the circumstances of its truth [Quine] |
| 21700 | Taking sentences as the unit of meaning makes useful paraphrasing possible [Quine] |
| 21701 | Knowing a word is knowing the meanings of sentences which contain it [Quine] |
| 1619 | There is an attempt to give a verificationist account of meaning, without the error of reducing everything to sensations [Dennett on Quine] |
| 7317 | 'Renate' and 'cordate' have identical extensions, but are not synonymous [Quine, by Miller,A] |
| 9009 | Single words are strongly synonymous if their interchange preserves truth [Quine] |
| 1621 | Once meaning and reference are separated, meaning ceases to seem important [Quine] |
| 9471 | Intensions are creatures of darkness which should be exorcised [Quine] |
| 8202 | Meaning is essence divorced from things and wedded to words [Quine] |
| 1617 | The word 'meaning' is only useful when talking about significance or about synonymy [Quine] |
| 1609 | I do not believe there is some abstract entity called a 'meaning' which we can 'have' [Quine] |
| 4712 | Quine says there is no matter of fact about reference - it is 'inscrutable' [Quine, by O'Grady] |
| 8470 | Reference is inscrutable, because we cannot choose between theories of numbers [Quine, by Orenstein] |
| 15788 | Syntax and semantics are indeterminate, and modern 'semantics' is a bogus subject [Quine, by Lycan] |
| 15596 | The standard aim of semantics is to assign a semantic value to each expression [Fine,K] |
| 15587 | That two utterances say the same thing may not be intrinsic to them, but involve their relationships [Fine,K] |
| 15589 | The two main theories are Holism (which is inferential), and Representational (which is atomistic) [Fine,K] |
| 15598 | We should pursue semantic facts as stated by truths in theories (and not put the theories first!) [Fine,K] |
| 15600 | Referentialist semantics has objects for names, properties for predicates, and propositions for connectives [Fine,K] |
| 15601 | Fregeans approach the world through sense, Referentialists through reference [Fine,K] |
| 14618 | Semantics is either an assignment of semantic values, or a theory of truth [Fine,K] |
| 14621 | Semantics is a body of semantic requirements, not semantic truths or assigned values [Fine,K] |
| 19159 | Quine relates predicates to their objects, by being 'true of' them [Quine, by Davidson] |
| 16932 | Projectible predicates can be universalised about the kind to which they refer [Quine] |
| 14622 | Referential semantics (unlike Fregeanism) allows objects themselves in to semantic requirements [Fine,K] |
| 9207 | If sentence content is all worlds where it is true, all necessary truths have the same content! [Fine,K] |
| 15605 | I take indexicals such as 'this' and 'that' to be linked to some associated demonstration [Fine,K] |
| 18967 | A 'proposition' is said to be the timeless cognitive part of the meaning of a sentence [Quine] |
| 15058 | A proposition ingredient is 'essential' if changing it would change the truth-value [Fine,K] |
| 18968 | The problem with propositions is their individuation. When do two sentences express one proposition? [Quine] |
| 9007 | It makes no sense to say that two sentences express the same proposition [Quine] |
| 9008 | There is no rule for separating the information from other features of sentences [Quine] |
| 9010 | We can abandon propositions, and just talk of sentences and equivalence [Quine] |
| 9371 | Analytic statements are either logical truths (all reinterpretations) or they depend on synonymy [Quine] |
| 11170 | Analytic truth may only be true in virtue of the meanings of certain terms [Fine,K] |
| 11172 | The meaning of 'bachelor' is irrelevant to the meaning of 'unmarried man' [Fine,K] |
| 19487 | Without the analytic/synthetic distinction, Carnap's ontology/empirical distinction collapses [Quine] |
| 1622 | Did someone ever actually define 'bachelor' as 'unmarried man'? [Quine] |
| 9366 | Quine's attack on analyticity undermined linguistic views of necessity, and analytic views of the a priori [Quine, by Boghossian] |
| 14473 | Quine attacks the Fregean idea that we can define analyticity through synonyous substitution [Quine, by Thomasson] |
| 7321 | The last two parts of 'Two Dogmas' are much the best [Miller,A on Quine] |
| 8803 | Erasing the analytic/synthetic distinction got rid of meanings, and saved philosophy of language [Davidson on Quine] |
| 17737 | The analytic needs excessively small units of meaning and empirical confirmation [Quine, by Jenkins] |
| 1624 | If we try to define analyticity by synonymy, that leads back to analyticity [Quine] |
| 8900 | In observation sentences, we could substitute community acceptance for analyticity [Quine] |
| 8201 | The distinction between meaning and further information is as vague as the essence/accident distinction [Quine] |
| 19050 | Holism in language blurs empirical synthetic and empty analytic sentences [Quine] |
| 14619 | The Quinean doubt: are semantics and facts separate, and do analytic sentences have no factual part? [Fine,K] |
| 21338 | I will even consider changing a meaning to save a law; I question the meaning-fact cleavage [Quine] |
| 9021 | A good way of explaining an expression is saying what conditions make its contexts true [Quine] |
| 19045 | Translation is too flimsy a notion to support theories of cultural incommensurability [Quine] |
| 3988 | Indeterminacy of translation also implies indeterminacy in interpreting people's mental states [Dennett on Quine] |
| 6311 | The firmer the links between sentences and stimuli, the less translations can diverge [Quine] |
| 6312 | We can never precisely pin down how to translate the native word 'Gavagai' [Quine] |
| 6313 | Stimulus synonymy of 'Gavagai' and 'Rabbit' does not even guarantee they are coextensive [Quine] |
| 6317 | Dispositions to speech behaviour, and actual speech, are never enough to fix any one translation [Quine] |
| 1631 | You could know the complete behavioural conditions for a foreign language, and still not know their beliefs [Quine] |
| 1632 | Translation of our remote past or language could be as problematic as alien languages [Quine] |
| 18963 | Indeterminacy translating 'rabbit' depends on translating individuation terms [Quine] |
| 6315 | We should be suspicious of a translation which implies that a people have very strange beliefs [Quine] |
| 6314 | Weird translations are always possible, but they improve if we impose our own logic on them [Quine] |
| 7330 | The principle of charity only applies to the logical constants [Quine, by Miller,A] |
| 21749 | Altruistic values concern other persons, and ceremonial values concern practices [Quine] |
| 21751 | Love seems to diminish with distance from oneself [Quine] |
| 20239 | Unlike us, the early Greeks thought envy was a good thing, and hope a bad thing [Hesiod, by Nietzsche] |
| 14265 | The components of abstract definitions could play the same role as matter for physical objects [Fine,K] |
| 7375 | Quine probably regrets natural kinds now being treated as essences [Quine, by Dennett] |
| 16935 | If similarity has no degrees, kinds cannot be contained within one another [Quine] |
| 16936 | Comparative similarity allows the kind 'colored' to contain the kind 'red' [Quine] |
| 16937 | You can't base kinds just on resemblance, because chains of resemblance are a muddle [Quine] |
| 10370 | Causal relata are individuated by coarse spacetime regions [Quine, by Schaffer,J] |
| 16942 | It is hard to see how regularities could be explained [Quine] |
| 23543 | We identify laws with regularities because we mistakenly identify causes with their symptoms [Fine,K] |
| 9215 | Causation is easier to disrupt than logic, so metaphysics is part of nature, not vice versa [Fine,K] |
| 17862 | Essence gives an illusion of understanding [Quine, by Almog] |
| 10931 | We can't say 'necessarily if x is in water then x dissolves' if we can't quantify modally [Quine] |
| 18970 | The concept of a 'point' makes no sense without the idea of absolute position [Quine] |
| 15067 | A-theorists tend to reject the tensed/tenseless distinction [Fine,K] |
| 15077 | It is said that in the A-theory, all existents and objects must be tensed, as well as the sentences [Fine,K] |
| 13713 | Quine holds time to be 'space-like': past objects are as real as spatially remote ones [Quine, by Sider] |
| 15066 | B-theorists say tensed sentences have an unfilled argument-place for a time [Fine,K] |