5 ideas
21829 | Philosophy aims to understand how things (broadly understood) hang together (broadly understood) [Sellars] |
Full Idea: The aim of philosophy, abstractly formulated, is to understand how things in the broadest possible sense of the term hang together in the broadest possible sense of the term. | |
From: Wilfrid Sellars (Philosophy and Scientific Image of Man [1962], p.3), quoted by Owen Flanagan - The Really Hard Problem 1 'Vocation' | |
A reaction: I'm happier with broad things than broad hanging together, but to me this sounds about right. |
6550 | Reduction requires that an object's properties consist of its constituents' properties and relations [Sellars] |
Full Idea: The 'Principle of Reducibility' says if an object is a system of objects, then every property of the object must consist in the fact that its constituents have such and such qualities and such and such relations | |
From: Wilfrid Sellars (Philosophy and Scientific Image of Man [1962], p.27), quoted by William Lycan - Consciousness | |
A reaction: This sounds to me a more promising attitude to reduction than all this talk of Ernest Nagel's 'Bridge Laws'. If we ask HOW a higher level property arises because of a lower level property, we can describe a mechanism rather than a law. |
13304 | Learned men gain more in one day than others do in a lifetime [Posidonius] |
Full Idea: In a single day there lies open to men of learning more than there ever does to the unenlightened in the longest of lifetimes. | |
From: Posidonius (fragments/reports [c.95 BCE]), quoted by Seneca the Younger - Letters from a Stoic 078 | |
A reaction: These remarks endorsing the infinite superiority of the educated to the uneducated seem to have been popular in late antiquity. It tends to be the religions which discourage great learning, especially in their emphasis on a single book. |
20820 | Time is an interval of motion, or the measure of speed [Posidonius, by Stobaeus] |
Full Idea: Posidonius defined time thus: it is an interval of motion, or the measure of speed and slowness. | |
From: report of Posidonius (fragments/reports [c.95 BCE]) by John Stobaeus - Anthology 1.08.42 | |
A reaction: Hm. Can we define motion or speed without alluding to time? Looks like we have to define them as a conjoined pair, which means we cannot fully understand either of them. |
7469 | There is no hereafter in the Book of Job [Anon (Job), by Watson] |
Full Idea: The entire Book of Job is concerned with faith and suffering and inequality in a life where there is no hereafter (all the rewards promised to the Jews by their God are worldly). | |
From: report of Anon (Job) (18: Book of Job [c.535 BCE]) by Peter Watson - Ideas Ch.5 | |
A reaction: It is extraordinary how such ideas can creep into the great religions, and then become taken for granted, as if no one had ever doubted them. |