10 ideas
| 8526 | We might treat both tropes and substances as fundamental, so we can't presume it is just tropes [Daly] |
| Full Idea: Since C.B. Martin accepts both tropes and substances as fundamental, the claim that tropes are the only fundamental constituents is a further, independent claim. | |
| From: Chris Daly (Tropes [1995], §4) | |
| A reaction: A dubious mode of argument. Martin may only make the claim because he is ignorant, of facts or of language. Why are some tropes perfectly similar? Is it the result of something more fundamental? |
| 8527 | More than one trope (even identical ones!) can occupy the same location [Daly] |
| Full Idea: More than one trope can occupy the same spatio-temporal location, and it even seems possible for a pair of exactly resembling tropes to occupy the same spatio-temporal location. | |
| From: Chris Daly (Tropes [1995], §6) | |
| A reaction: This may be the strongest objection to tropes. Being disc-shaped and red would occupy the same location. Aristotle's example of mixing white with white (Idea 557) would be the second case. Individuation of these 'particulars' is the problem. |
| 8528 | If tropes are linked by the existence of concurrence, a special relation is needed to link them all [Daly] |
| Full Idea: To explain how tropes form bundles, concurrence relations are invoked. But tropes F and G and a concurrence relation C don't ensure that F stands in C to G. So trope theory needs 'instantiation' relations (special relational tropes) after all. | |
| From: Chris Daly (Tropes [1995], §7) | |
| A reaction: Campbell presents relations as 'second-order' items dependent on tropes (Idea 8525), but that seems unclear. Daly's argument resembles Russell's (which he likes), that some sort of universal is inescapable. It also resembles Bradley's regress (7966). |
| 21515 | Incoherence may be more important for enquiry than coherence [Olsson] |
| Full Idea: While coherence may lack the positive role many have assigned to it, ...incoherence plays an important negative role in our enquiries. | |
| From: Erik J. Olsson (Against Coherence [2005], 10.1) | |
| A reaction: [He cites Peirce as the main source for this idea] We can hardly by deeply impressed by incoherence if we have no sense of coherence. Incoherence is just one of many markers for theory failure. Missing the target, bad concepts... |
| 21514 | Coherence is the capacity to answer objections [Olsson] |
| Full Idea: According to Lehrer, coherence should be understood in terms of the capacity to answer objections. | |
| From: Erik J. Olsson (Against Coherence [2005], 9) | |
| A reaction: [Keith Lehrer 1990] We can connect this with the Greek requirement of being able to give an account [logos], which is the hallmark of understanding. I take coherence to be the best method of achieving understanding. Any understanding meets Lehrer's test. |
| 21496 | Mere agreement of testimonies is not enough to make truth very likely [Olsson] |
| Full Idea: Far from guaranteeing a high likelihood of truth by itself, testimonial agreement can apparently do so only if the circumstances are favourable as regards independence, prior probability, and individual credibility. | |
| From: Erik J. Olsson (Against Coherence [2005], 1) | |
| A reaction: This is Olson's main thesis. His targets are C.I.Lewis and Bonjour, who hoped that a mere consensus of evidence would increase verisimilitude. I don't see a problem for coherence in general, since his favourable circumstances are part of it. |
| 21499 | Coherence is only needed if the information sources are not fully reliable [Olsson] |
| Full Idea: An enquirer who is fortunate enough to have at his or her disposal fully reliable information sources has no use for coherence, the need for which arises only in the context of less than fully reliable informations sources. | |
| From: Erik J. Olsson (Against Coherence [2005], 2.6.2) | |
| A reaction: I take this to be entirely false. How do you assess reliability? 'I've seen it with my own eyes'. Why trust your eyes? In what visibility conditions do you begin to doubt your eyes? Why do rational people mistrust their intuitions? |
| 21502 | A purely coherent theory cannot be true of the world without some contact with the world [Olsson] |
| Full Idea: The Input Objection says a pure coherence theory would seem to allow that a system of beliefs be justified in spite of being utterly out of contact with the world it purports to describe, so long as it is, to a sufficient extent, coherent. | |
| From: Erik J. Olsson (Against Coherence [2005], 4.1) | |
| A reaction: Olson seems impressed by this objection, but I don't see how a system could be coherently about the world if it had no known contact with the world. Olson seems to ignore meta-coherence, which evaluates the status of the system being studied. |
| 21512 | Extending a system makes it less probable, so extending coherence can't make it more probable [Olsson] |
| Full Idea: Any non-trivial extension of a belief system is less probable than the original system, but there are extensions that are more coherent than the original system. Hence more coherence does not imply a higher probability. | |
| From: Erik J. Olsson (Against Coherence [2005], 6.4) | |
| A reaction: [Olson cites Klein and Warfield 1994; compressed] The example rightly says the extension could have high internal coherence, but not whether the extension is coherent with the system being extended. |
| 468 | Musical performance can reveal a range of virtues [Damon of Ath.] |
| Full Idea: In singing and playing the lyre, a boy will be likely to reveal not only courage and moderation, but also justice. | |
| From: Damon (fragments/reports [c.460 BCE], B4), quoted by (who?) - where? |