120 ideas
| 11832 | We learn a concept's relations by using it, without reducing it to anything [Wiggins] |
| 16512 | Semantic facts are preferable to transcendental philosophical fiction [Wiggins] |
| 9108 | From an impossibility anything follows [William of Ockham] |
| 16676 | Why use more things when fewer will do? [William of Ockham] |
| 6806 | Do not multiply entities beyond necessity [William of Ockham] |
| 9107 | A proposition is true if its subject and predicate stand for the same thing [William of Ockham] |
| 16300 | Ockham had an early axiomatic account of truth [William of Ockham, by Halbach] |
| 11863 | (λx)[Man x] means 'the property x has iff x is a man'. [Wiggins] |
| 9106 | The word 'every' only signifies when added to a term such as 'man', referring to all men [William of Ockham] |
| 17529 | Maybe the concept needed under which things coincide must also yield a principle of counting [Wiggins] |
| 17530 | The sortal needed for identities may not always be sufficient to support counting [Wiggins] |
| 9113 | Just as unity is not a property of a single thing, so numbers are not properties of many things [William of Ockham] |
| 9110 | The words 'thing' and 'to be' assert the same idea, as a noun and as a verb [William of Ockham] |
| 14746 | What exists can't depend on our conceptual scheme, and using all conceptual schemes is too liberal [Sider on Wiggins] |
| 16523 | Realist Conceptualists accept that our interests affect our concepts [Wiggins] |
| 16524 | Conceptualism says we must use our individuating concepts to grasp reality [Wiggins] |
| 16526 | Animal classifications: the Emperor's, fabulous, innumerable, like flies, stray dogs, embalmed…. [Wiggins] |
| 16608 | Ockham was an anti-realist about the categories [William of Ockham, by Pasnau] |
| 16654 | Our words and concepts don't always correspond to what is out there [William of Ockham] |
| 18529 | Relations are expressed either as absolute facts, or by a relational concept [William of Ockham] |
| 12056 | An ancestral relation is either direct or transitively indirect [Wiggins] |
| 12050 | Substances contain a source of change or principle of activity [Wiggins] |
| 22132 | Species and genera are individual concepts which naturally signify many individuals [William of Ockham] |
| 9103 | A universal is not a real feature of objects, but only a thought-object in the mind [William of Ockham] |
| 15388 | Universals are single things, and only universal in what they signify [William of Ockham] |
| 16492 | Individuation needs accounts of identity, of change, and of singling out [Wiggins] |
| 16493 | Individuation can only be understood by the relation between things and thinkers [Wiggins] |
| 11900 | We can accept criteria of distinctness and persistence, without making the counterfactual claims [Mackie,P on Wiggins] |
| 11870 | Activity individuates natural things, functions do artefacts, and intentions do artworks [Wiggins] |
| 16496 | Singling out extends back and forward in time [Wiggins] |
| 11866 | The idea of 'thisness' is better expressed with designation/predication and particular/universal [Wiggins] |
| 12052 | We never single out just 'this', but always 'this something-or-other' [Wiggins] |
| 13128 | 'Ultimate sortals' cannot explain ontological categories [Westerhoff on Wiggins] |
| 16495 | The only singling out is singling out 'as' something [Wiggins] |
| 16501 | In Aristotle's sense, saying x falls under f is to say what x is [Wiggins] |
| 16506 | Every determinate thing falls under a sortal, which fixes its persistence [Wiggins] |
| 12055 | Sortal predications are answers to the question 'what is x?' [Wiggins] |
| 12059 | A river may change constantly, but not in respect of being a river [Wiggins] |
| 12063 | Sortal classification becomes science, with cross reference clarifying individuals [Wiggins] |
| 12051 | If the kinds are divided realistically, they fall into substances [Wiggins] |
| 12053 | 'Human being' is a better answer to 'what is it?' than 'poet', as the latter comes in degrees [Wiggins] |
| 12054 | Secondary substances correctly divide primary substances by activity-principles and relations [Wiggins] |
| 11896 | A sortal essence is a thing's principle of individuation [Wiggins, by Mackie,P] |
| 15835 | Wiggins's sortal essentialism rests on a thing's principle of individuation [Wiggins, by Mackie,P] |
| 11841 | The evening star is the same planet but not the same star as the morning star, since it is not a star [Wiggins] |
| 10679 | 'Sortalism' says parts only compose a whole if it falls under a sort or kind [Wiggins, by Hossack] |
| 14363 | Identity a=b is only possible with some concept to give persistence and existence conditions [Wiggins, by Strawson,P] |
| 14364 | A thing is necessarily its highest sortal kind, which entails an essential constitution [Wiggins, by Strawson,P] |
| 11851 | Many predicates are purely generic, or pure determiners, rather than sortals [Wiggins] |
| 11865 | The possibility of a property needs an essential sortal concept to conceive it [Wiggins] |
| 16779 | Cut wood doesn't make a new substance, but seems to make separate subjects [William of Ockham] |
| 12047 | We refer to persisting substances, in perception and in thought, and they aid understanding [Wiggins] |
| 14744 | Objects can only coincide if they are of different kinds; trees can't coincide with other trees [Wiggins, by Sider] |
| 11852 | Is the Pope's crown one crown, if it is made of many crowns? [Wiggins] |
| 11875 | Boundaries are not crucial to mountains, so they are determinate without a determinate extent [Wiggins] |
| 16757 | Hot water naturally cools down, which is due to the substantial form of the water [William of Ockham] |
| 12057 | Matter underlies things, composes things, and brings them to be [Wiggins] |
| 16599 | Ockham says matter must be extended, so we don't need Quantity [William of Ockham, by Pasnau] |
| 16681 | Matter gets its quantity from condensation and rarefaction, which is just local motion [William of Ockham] |
| 14749 | Identity is an atemporal relation, but composition is relative to times [Wiggins, by Sider] |
| 11844 | If I destroy an item, I do not destroy each part of it [Wiggins] |
| 12887 | A whole must have one characteristic, an internal relation, and a structure [Rescher/Oppenheim] |
| 11861 | We can forget about individual or particularized essences [Wiggins] |
| 16509 | Natural kinds are well suited to be the sortals which fix substances [Wiggins] |
| 9109 | If essence and existence were two things, one could exist without the other, which is impossible [William of Ockham] |
| 11871 | Essences are not explanations, but individuations [Wiggins] |
| 11879 | Essentialism is best represented as a predicate-modifier: □(a exists → a is F) [Wiggins, by Mackie,P] |
| 16514 | Artefacts are individuated by some matter having a certain function [Wiggins] |
| 16792 | If parts change, the whole changes [William of Ockham] |
| 16510 | Nominal essences don't fix membership, ignore evolution, and aren't contextual [Wiggins] |
| 11835 | The nominal essence is the idea behind a name used for sorting [Wiggins] |
| 16503 | 'What is it?' gives the kind, nature, persistence conditions and identity over time of a thing [Wiggins] |
| 11876 | It is easier to go from horses to horse-stages than from horse-stages to horses [Wiggins] |
| 16499 | A restored church is the same 'church', but not the same 'building' or 'brickwork' [Wiggins] |
| 16515 | A thing begins only once; for a clock, it is when its making is first completed [Wiggins] |
| 11858 | The question is not what gets the title 'Theseus' Ship', but what is identical with the original [Wiggins] |
| 16517 | Priests prefer the working ship; antiquarians prefer the reconstruction [Wiggins] |
| 11843 | Identity over a time and at a time aren't different concepts [Wiggins] |
| 11864 | Hesperus=Hesperus, and Phosphorus=Hesperus, so necessarily Phosphorus=Hesperus [Wiggins] |
| 16498 | Identity cannot be defined, because definitions are identities [Wiggins] |
| 11831 | The formal properties of identity are reflexivity and Leibniz's Law [Wiggins] |
| 16497 | Leibniz's Law (not transitivity, symmetry, reflexivity) marks what is peculiar to identity [Wiggins] |
| 16502 | Identity is primitive [Wiggins] |
| 14362 | Relative Identity is incompatible with the Indiscernibility of Identicals [Wiggins, by Strawson,P] |
| 11838 | Relativity of Identity makes identity entirely depend on a category [Wiggins] |
| 11847 | To identify two items, we must have a common sort for them [Wiggins] |
| 16521 | A is necessarily A, so if B is A, then B is also necessarily A [Wiggins] |
| 16505 | By the principle of Indiscernibility, a symmetrical object could only be half of itself! [Wiggins] |
| 11839 | Do both 'same f as' and '=' support Leibniz's Law? [Wiggins] |
| 11845 | Substitutivity, and hence most reasoning, needs Leibniz's Law [Wiggins] |
| 16494 | We want to explain sameness as coincidence of substance, not as anything qualitative [Wiggins] |
| 16522 | It is hard or impossible to think of Caesar as not human [Wiggins] |
| 11869 | Possible worlds rest on the objects about which we have suppositions [Wiggins] |
| 11850 | Not every story corresponds to a possible world [Wiggins] |
| 9089 | Knowledge is a quality existing subjectively in the soul [William of Ockham] |
| 9091 | Sometimes 'knowledge' just concerns the conclusion, sometimes the whole demonstration [William of Ockham] |
| 9100 | Our intellect only assents to what we believe to be true [William of Ockham] |
| 9090 | Knowledge is certain cognition of something that is true [William of Ockham] |
| 16525 | Our sortal concepts fix what we find in experience [Wiggins] |
| 12064 | The category of substance is more important for epistemology than for ontology [Wiggins] |
| 12049 | Naming the secondary substance provides a mass of general information [Wiggins] |
| 11848 | Asking 'what is it?' nicely points us to the persistence of a continuing entity [Wiggins] |
| 9101 | Abstractive cognition knows universals abstracted from many singulars [William of Ockham] |
| 9102 | If an animal approached from a distance, we might abstract 'animal' from one instance [William of Ockham] |
| 12065 | Seeing a group of soldiers as an army is irresistible, in ontology and explanation [Wiggins] |
| 9114 | There are no secure foundations to prove the separate existence of mind, in reason or experience [William of Ockham] |
| 11859 | The mind conceptualizes objects; yet objects impinge upon the mind [Wiggins] |
| 16518 | We conceptualise objects, but they impinge on us [Wiggins] |
| 11836 | We can use 'concept' for the reference, and 'conception' for sense [Wiggins] |
| 16511 | A 'conception' of a horse is a full theory of what it is (and not just the 'concept') [Wiggins] |
| 9104 | A universal is the result of abstraction, which is only a kind of mental picturing [William of Ockham] |
| 9105 | Some concepts for propositions exist only in the mind, and in no language [William of Ockham] |
| 16675 | Every extended material substance is composed of parts distant from one another [William of Ockham] |
| 11860 | Lawlike propensities are enough to individuate natural kinds [Wiggins] |
| 19381 | The past has ceased to exist, and the future does not yet exist, so time does not exist [William of Ockham] |
| 9111 | God is not wise, but more-than-wise; God is not good, but more-than-good [William of Ockham] |
| 8010 | William of Ockham is the main spokesman for God's commands being the source of morality [William of Ockham] |
| 9112 | We could never form a concept of God's wisdom if we couldn't abstract it from creatures [William of Ockham] |
| 9115 | To love God means to love whatever God wills to be loved [William of Ockham] |
| 16679 | Even an angel must have some location [William of Ockham, by Pasnau] |