146 ideas
7396 | Hobbes created English-language philosophy [Hobbes, by Tuck] |
17240 | Definitions are the first step in philosophy [Hobbes] |
6211 | Laughter is a sudden glory in realising the infirmity of others, or our own formerly [Hobbes] |
8014 | Resolve a complex into simple elements, then reconstruct the complex by using them [Hobbes, by MacIntyre] |
17237 | Definitions of things that are caused must express their manner of generation [Hobbes] |
17239 | Definition is resolution of names into successive genera, and finally the difference [Hobbes] |
17241 | A defined name should not appear in the definition [Hobbes] |
17242 | 'Petitio principii' is reusing the idea to be defined, in disguised words [Hobbes] |
9161 | Maybe reasonableness requires circular justifications - that is one coherentist view [Field,H] |
10825 | The notion of truth is to help us make use of the utterances of others [Field,H] |
10820 | In the early 1930s many philosophers thought truth was not scientific [Field,H] |
13499 | Tarski reduced truth to reference or denotation [Field,H, by Hart,WD] |
10818 | Tarski really explained truth in terms of denoting, predicating and satisfied functions [Field,H] |
10817 | Tarski just reduced truth to some other undefined semantic notions [Field,H] |
9570 | In Field's Platonist view, set theory is false because it asserts existence for non-existent things [Field,H, by Chihara] |
17245 | A part of a part is a part of a whole [Hobbes] |
10260 | Logical consequence is defined by the impossibility of P and ¬q [Field,H, by Shapiro] |
10819 | Tarski gives us the account of truth needed to build a group of true sentences in a model [Field,H] |
10827 | Model theory is unusual in restricting the range of the quantifiers [Field,H] |
9226 | If mathematical theories conflict, it may just be that they have different subject matter [Field,H] |
8958 | In Field's version of science, space-time points replace real numbers [Field,H, by Szabó] |
17258 | If we just say one, one, one, one, we don't know where we have got to [Hobbes] |
18221 | 'Metric' axioms uses functions, points and numbers; 'synthetic' axioms give facts about space [Field,H] |
8757 | The Indispensability Argument is the only serious ground for the existence of mathematical entities [Field,H] |
18212 | Nominalists try to only refer to physical objects, or language, or mental constructions [Field,H] |
10261 | The application of mathematics only needs its possibility, not its truth [Field,H, by Shapiro] |
18218 | Hilbert explains geometry, by non-numerical facts about space [Field,H] |
9623 | Field needs a semantical notion of second-order consequence, and that needs sets [Brown,JR on Field,H] |
18215 | It seems impossible to explain the idea that the conclusion is contained in the premises [Field,H] |
18216 | Abstractions can form useful counterparts to concrete statements [Field,H] |
18214 | Mathematics is only empirical as regards which theory is useful [Field,H] |
8714 | Fictionalists say 2+2=4 is true in the way that 'Oliver Twist lived in London' is true [Field,H] |
18210 | Why regard standard mathematics as truths, rather than as interesting fictions? [Field,H] |
16789 | Only supernatural means could annihilate anything once it had being [Hobbes] |
17253 | Change is nothing but movement [Hobbes] |
7559 | Every part of the universe is body, and non-body is not part of it [Hobbes] |
18211 | You can reduce ontological commitment by expanding the logic [Field,H] |
16670 | Accidents are just modes of thinking about bodies [Hobbes] |
16621 | Accidents are not parts of bodies (like blood in a cloth); they have accidents as things have a size [Hobbes] |
8959 | Field presumes properties can be eliminated from science [Field,H, by Szabó] |
16734 | The complete power of an event is just the aggregate of the qualities that produced it [Hobbes] |
17247 | The only generalities or universals are names or signs [Hobbes] |
18213 | Abstract objects are only applicable to the world if they are impure, and connect to the physical [Field,H] |
14960 | Bodies are independent of thought, and coincide with part of space [Hobbes] |
17250 | If you separate the two places of one thing, you will also separate the thing [Hobbes] |
17249 | If you separated two things in the same place, you would also separate the places [Hobbes] |
17248 | If a whole body is moved, its parts must move with it [Hobbes] |
16620 | A chair is wood, and its shape is the form; it isn't 'compounded' of the matter and form [Hobbes] |
16790 | A body is always the same, whether the parts are together or dispersed [Hobbes] |
17244 | To make a whole, parts needn't be put together, but can be united in the mind [Hobbes] |
12887 | A whole must have one characteristic, an internal relation, and a structure [Rescher/Oppenheim] |
17233 | Particulars contain universal things [Hobbes] |
17246 | Some accidental features are permanent, unless the object perishes [Hobbes] |
17251 | The feature which picks out or names a thing is usually called its 'essence' [Hobbes] |
16622 | Essence is just an artificial word from logic, giving a way of thinking about substances [Hobbes] |
17257 | It is the same river if it has the same source, no matter what flows in it [Hobbes] |
12853 | Some individuate the ship by unity of matter, and others by unity of form [Hobbes] |
17256 | If a new ship were made of the discarded planks, would two ships be numerically the same? [Hobbes] |
16794 | As an infant, Socrates was not the same body, but he was the same human being [Hobbes] |
17255 | Two bodies differ when (at some time) you can say something of one you can't say of the other [Hobbes] |
6215 | 'Contingent' means that the cause is unperceived, not that there is no cause [Hobbes] |
16582 | We can imagine a point swelling and contracting - but not how this could be done [Hobbes] |
9160 | Lots of propositions are default reasonable, but the a priori ones are empirically indefeasible [Field,H] |
9164 | We treat basic rules as if they were indefeasible and a priori, with no interest in counter-evidence [Field,H] |
16638 | The qualities of the world are mere appearances; reality is the motions which cause them [Hobbes] |
2356 | Appearance and reality can be separated by mirrors and echoes [Hobbes] |
16688 | Evidence is conception, which is imagination, which proceeds from the senses [Hobbes] |
7405 | Experience can't prove universal truths [Hobbes] |
9165 | Reliability only makes a rule reasonable if we place a value on the truth produced by reliable processes [Field,H] |
9162 | Believing nothing, or only logical truths, is very reliable, but we want a lot more than that [Field,H] |
9166 | People vary in their epistemological standards, and none of them is 'correct' [Field,H] |
2357 | Dreams must be false because they seem absurd, but dreams don't see waking as absurd [Hobbes] |
9163 | If we only use induction to assess induction, it is empirically indefeasible, and hence a priori [Field,H] |
18222 | Beneath every extrinsic explanation there is an intrinsic explanation [Field,H] |
17238 | Science aims to show causes and generation of things [Hobbes] |
17260 | Imagination is just weakened sensation [Hobbes] |
19373 | A 'conatus' is an initial motion, experienced by us as desire or aversion [Hobbes, by Arthur,R] |
2385 | If a man suddenly develops an intention of doing something, the cause is out of his control, not in his will [Hobbes] |
2358 | Freedom is absence of opposition to action; the idea of 'free will' is absurd [Hobbes] |
2384 | Those actions that follow immediately the last appetite are voluntary [Hobbes] |
6213 | A man cannot will to will, or will to will to will, so the idea of a voluntary will is absurd [Hobbes] |
6214 | Liberty and necessity are consistent, as when water freely flows, by necessity [Hobbes] |
6208 | Conceptions and apparitions are just motion in some internal substance of the head [Hobbes] |
2948 | Sensation is merely internal motion of the sentient being [Hobbes] |
10826 | 'Valence' and 'gene' had to be reduced to show their compatibility with physicalism [Field,H] |
23987 | The 'simple passions' are appetite, desire, love, aversion, hate, joy, and grief [Hobbes, by Goldie] |
17261 | Apart from pleasure and pain, the only emotions are appetite and aversion [Hobbes] |
17236 | Words are not for communication, but as marks for remembering what we have learned [Hobbes] |
9917 | 'Abstract' is unclear, but numbers, functions and sets are clearly abstract [Field,H] |
22244 | 'Partial reference' is when the subject thinks two objects are one object [Field,H, by Recanati] |
7615 | Field says reference is a causal physical relation between mental states and objects [Field,H, by Putnam] |
2362 | The will is just the last appetite before action [Hobbes] |
7408 | It is an error that reason should control the passions, which give right guidance on their own [Hobbes, by Tuck] |
2363 | Reason is usually general, but deliberation is of particulars [Hobbes] |
7407 | Good and evil are what please us; goodness and badness the powers causing them [Hobbes] |
2360 | 'Good' is just what we desire, and 'Evil' what we hate [Hobbes] |
7410 | Self-preservation is basic, and people judge differently about that, implying ethical relativism [Hobbes, by Tuck] |
2368 | Men's natural desires are no sin, and neither are their actions, until law makes it so [Hobbes] |
6209 | There is no absolute good, for even the goodness of God is goodness to us [Hobbes] |
2359 | Desire and love are the same, but in the desire the object is absent, and in love it is present [Hobbes] |
2370 | All voluntary acts aim at some good for the doer [Hobbes] |
7409 | Hobbes shifted from talk of 'the good' to talk of 'rights' [Hobbes, by Tuck] |
6210 | Life has no end (not even happiness), because we have desires, which presuppose a further end [Hobbes] |
8015 | Hobbes wants a contract to found morality, but shared values are needed to make a contract [MacIntyre on Hobbes] |
2371 | A contract is a mutual transfer of rights [Hobbes] |
2372 | The person who performs first in a contract is said to 'merit' the return, and is owed it [Hobbes] |
5337 | For Hobbes the Golden Rule concerns not doing things, whereas Jesus encourages active love [Hobbes, by Flanagan] |
2374 | In the violent state of nature, the merest suspicion is enough to justify breaking a contract [Hobbes] |
8016 | Fear of sanctions is the only motive for acceptance of authority that Hobbes can think of [MacIntyre on Hobbes] |
2375 | Suspicion will not destroy a contract, if there is a common power to enforce it [Hobbes] |
2377 | No one who admitted to not keeping contracts could ever be accepted as a citizen [Hobbes] |
2379 | If there is a good reason for breaking a contract, the same reason should have stopped the making of it [Hobbes] |
2373 | The first performer in a contract is handing himself over to an enemy [Hobbes] |
2382 | Someone who keeps all his contracts when others are breaking them is making himself a prey to others [Hobbes] |
2383 | Virtues are a means to peaceful, sociable and comfortable living [Hobbes] |
2376 | Injustice is the failure to keep a contract, and justice is the constant will to give what is owed [Hobbes] |
2367 | In time of war the life of man is solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short [Hobbes] |
19764 | Hobbes attributed to savages the passions which arise in a law-bound society [Hobbes, by Rousseau] |
20566 | Hobbes says the people voluntarily give up their sovereignty, in a contract with a ruler [Hobbes, by Oksala] |
2366 | There is not enough difference between people for one to claim more benefit than another [Hobbes] |
20485 | Hobbes says people are roughly equal; Locke says there is no right to impose inequality [Hobbes, by Wolff,J] |
2369 | If we seek peace and defend ourselves, we must compromise on our rights [Hobbes] |
20484 | We should obey the laws of nature, provided other people are also obeying them [Hobbes, by Wolff,J] |
7573 | The legal positivism of Hobbes said law is just formal or procedural [Hobbes, by Jolley] |
2380 | Punishment should only be for reform or deterrence [Hobbes] |
23609 | I act justly if I follow my Prince in an apparently unjust war, and refusing to fight would be injustice [Hobbes] |
2361 | If fear of unknown powers is legal it is religion, if it is illegal it is superstition [Hobbes] |
6212 | Lust involves pleasure, and also the sense of power in pleasing others [Hobbes] |
16600 | Prime matter is body considered with mere size and extension, and potential [Hobbes] |
17252 | Acting on a body is either creating or destroying a property in it [Hobbes] |
8404 | Explain single events by general rules, or vice versa, or probability explains both, or they are unconnected [Field,H] |
8401 | Physical laws are largely time-symmetric, so they make a poor basis for directional causation [Field,H] |
8400 | Identifying cause and effect is not just conventional; we explain later events by earlier ones [Field,H] |
8402 | The only reason for adding the notion of 'cause' to fundamental physics is directionality [Field,H] |
17254 | An effect needs a sufficient and necessary cause [Hobbes] |
2364 | Causation is only observation of similar events following each other, with nothing visible in between [Hobbes] |
17235 | A cause is the complete sum of the features which necessitate the effect [Hobbes] |
17234 | Motion is losing one place and acquiring another [Hobbes] |
17259 | 'Force' is the quantity of movement imposed on something [Hobbes] |
18223 | In theories of fields, space-time points or regions are causal agents [Field,H] |
18220 | Both philosophy and physics now make substantivalism more attractive [Field,H] |
18219 | Relational space is problematic if you take the idea of a field seriously [Field,H] |
17243 | Past times can't exist anywhere, apart from in our memories [Hobbes] |
7411 | The attributes of God just show our inability to conceive his nature [Hobbes] |
2365 | Religion is built on ignorance and misinterpretation of what is unknown or frightening [Hobbes] |
2378 | Belief in an afterlife is based on poorly founded gossip [Hobbes] |