146 ideas
5082 | Reason grasps generalities, while the senses grasp particulars [Aristotle] |
18019 | People have dreams which involve category mistakes [Magidor] |
17998 | Category mistakes are either syntactic, semantic, or pragmatic [Magidor] |
18012 | Category mistakes as syntactic needs a huge number of fine-grained rules [Magidor] |
18013 | Embedded (in 'he said that…') category mistakes show syntax isn't the problem [Magidor] |
18011 | Category mistakes seem to be universal across languages [Magidor] |
18016 | Two good sentences should combine to make a good sentence, but that might be absurd [Magidor] |
18015 | The normal compositional view makes category mistakes meaningful [Magidor] |
18017 | If a category mistake is synonymous across two languages, that implies it is meaningful [Magidor] |
18021 | Category mistakes are meaningful, because metaphors are meaningful category mistakes [Magidor] |
18030 | A good explanation of why category mistakes sound wrong is that they are meaningless [Magidor] |
18031 | If a category mistake has unimaginable truth-conditions, then it seems to be meaningless [Magidor] |
18032 | Category mistakes are neither verifiable nor analytic, so verificationism says they are meaningless [Magidor] |
18034 | Category mistakes play no role in mental life, so conceptual role semantics makes them meaningless [Magidor] |
18037 | Maybe when you say 'two is green', the predicate somehow fails to apply? [Magidor] |
18039 | If category mistakes aren't syntax failure or meaningless, maybe they just lack a truth-value? [Magidor] |
18041 | Category mistakes suffer from pragmatic presupposition failure (which is not mere triviality) [Magidor] |
18055 | In 'two is green', 'green' has a presupposition of being coloured [Magidor] |
18056 | Category mistakes because of presuppositions still have a truth value (usually 'false') [Magidor] |
18057 | 'Numbers are coloured and the number two is green' seems to be acceptable [Magidor] |
18058 | Maybe the presuppositions of category mistakes are the abilities of things? [Magidor] |
18059 | The presuppositions in category mistakes reveal nothing about ontology [Magidor] |
18040 | Intensional logic maps logical space, showing which predicates are compatible or incompatible [Magidor] |
13270 | Are a part and whole one or many? Either way, what is the cause? [Aristotle] |
9790 | Geometry studies naturally occurring lines, but not as they occur in nature [Aristotle] |
22962 | Two is the least number, but there is no least magnitude, because it is always divisible [Aristotle] |
18090 | Without infinity time has limits, magnitudes are indivisible, and numbers come to an end [Aristotle] |
22929 | Aristotle's infinity is a property of the counting process, that it has no natural limit [Aristotle, by Le Poidevin] |
22930 | Lengths do not contain infinite parts; parts are created by acts of division [Aristotle, by Le Poidevin] |
18833 | A continuous line cannot be composed of indivisible points [Aristotle] |
17997 | Some suggest that the Julius Caesar problem involves category mistakes [Magidor] |
9974 | Ten sheep and ten dogs are the same numerically, but it is not the same ten [Aristotle] |
5105 | The incommensurability of the diagonal always exists, and so it is not in time [Aristotle] |
16115 | Change is the implied actuality of that which exists potentially [Aristotle] |
22960 | The sophists thought a man in the Lyceum is different from that man in the marketplace [Aristotle] |
17262 | Aristotle's formal and material 'becauses' [aitiai] arguably involve grounding [Aristotle, by Correia/Schnieder] |
16656 | The separation from here to there is not the same as the separation from there to here [Aristotle] |
16644 | The features of a thing (whether quality or quantity) are inseparable from their subjects [Aristotle] |
5117 | Heavy and light are defined by their tendency to move down or up [Aristotle] |
17041 | Natural objects include animals and their parts, plants, and the simple elements [Aristotle] |
16172 | Substance is not predicated of anything - but it still has something underlying it, that originates it [Aristotle] |
16623 | We only infer underlying natures by analogy, observing bronze of a statue, or wood of a bed [Aristotle] |
16174 | A nature is related to a substance as shapeless matter is to something which has a shape [Aristotle] |
18060 | We can explain the statue/clay problem by a category mistake with a false premise [Magidor] |
17043 | Form, not matter, is a thing's nature, because it is actual, rather than potential [Aristotle] |
16970 | A thing's form and purpose are often the same, and form can be the initiator of change too [Aristotle] |
16104 | Unity of the form is just unity of the definition [Aristotle] |
11255 | In feature-generation the matter (such as bronze) endures, but in generation it doesn't [Aristotle, by Politis] |
9071 | We first sense whole entities, and then move to particular parts of it [Aristotle] |
16791 | There is no whole except for the parts [Aristotle] |
16972 | The four explanations are the main aspects of a thing's nature [Aristotle, by Moravcsik] |
5084 | A thing's nature is what causes its changes and stability [Aristotle] |
16173 | Coming to be is by shape-change, addition, subtraction, composition or alteration [Aristotle] |
17042 | Natural things are their own source of stability through change [Aristotle] |
16691 | A day, or the games, has one thing after another, actually and potentially occurring [Aristotle] |
16574 | Coming-to-be may be from nothing in a qualified way, as arising from an absence [Aristotle] |
11254 | Matter is potentiality [Aristotle, by Politis] |
13110 | Intrinsic cause is prior to coincidence, so nature and intelligence are primary causes, chance secondary [Aristotle] |
13108 | Chance is a coincidental cause among events involving purpose and choice [Aristotle] |
13106 | Maybe there is no pure chance; a man's choices cause his chance meetings [Aristotle] |
8331 | To know something we need understanding, which is grasp of the primary cause [Aristotle] |
5080 | We know a thing if we grasp its first causes, principles and basic elements [Aristotle] |
16969 | Science refers the question Why? to four causes/explanations: matter, form, source, purpose [Aristotle] |
11250 | Four Explanations: the essence and form; the matter; the source; and the end [Aristotle, by Politis] |
12045 | Aristotle's four 'causes' are four items which figure in basic explanations of nature [Aristotle, by Annas] |
16968 | There are as many causes/explanations as there are different types of why-question [Aristotle] |
13109 | Chance is inexplicable, because we can only explain what happens always or usually [Aristotle] |
20363 | Leaves are unequal, but we form the concept 'leaf' by discarding their individual differences [Nietzsche] |
18020 | Propositional attitudes relate agents to either propositions, or meanings, or sentence/utterances [Magidor] |
18035 | Two sentences with different meanings can, on occasion, have the same content [Magidor] |
18018 | To grasp 'two' and 'green', must you know that two is not green? [Magidor] |
9789 | You can't abstract natural properties to make Forms - objects and attributes are defined together [Aristotle] |
9788 | Mathematicians study what is conceptually separable, and doesn't lead to error [Aristotle] |
18008 | Generative semantics says structure is determined by semantics as well as syntactic rules [Magidor] |
18010 | 'John is easy to please' and 'John is eager to please' have different deep structure [Magidor] |
18053 | The semantics of a sentence is its potential for changing a context [Magidor] |
5107 | Predicates are substance, quality, place, relation, quantity and action or affection [Aristotle] |
17999 | Strong compositionality says meaningful expressions syntactically well-formed are meaningful [Magidor] |
18000 | Weaker compositionality says meaningful well-formed sentences get the meaning from the parts [Magidor] |
18014 | Understanding unlimited numbers of sentences suggests that meaning is compositional [Magidor] |
18001 | Are there partial propositions, lacking truth value in some possible worlds? [Magidor] |
18036 | A sentence can be meaningful, and yet lack a truth value [Magidor] |
18051 | In the pragmatic approach, presuppositions are assumed in a context, for successful assertion [Magidor] |
18043 | The infelicitiousness of trivial truth is explained by uninformativeness, or a static context-set [Magidor] |
18042 | The infelicitiousness of trivial falsity is explained by expectations, or the loss of a context-set [Magidor] |
18047 | A presupposition is what makes an utterance sound wrong if it is not assumed? [Magidor] |
18048 | A test for presupposition would be if it provoked 'hey wait a minute - I have no idea that....' [Magidor] |
18049 | The best tests for presupposition are projecting it to negation, conditional, conjunction, questions [Magidor] |
18050 | If both s and not-s entail a sentence p, then p is a presupposition [Magidor] |
18054 | Why do certain words trigger presuppositions? [Magidor] |
18028 | Gricean theories of metaphor involve conversational implicatures based on literal meanings [Magidor] |
18029 | Non-cognitivist views of metaphor says there are no metaphorical meanings, just effects of the literal [Magidor] |
18022 | Metaphors tend to involve category mistakes, by joining disjoint domains [Magidor] |
18024 | One theory says metaphors mean the same as the corresponding simile [Magidor] |
18023 | Theories of metaphor divide over whether they must have literal meanings [Magidor] |
18025 | The simile view of metaphors removes their magic, and won't explain why we use them [Magidor] |
18026 | Maybe a metaphor is just a substitute for what is intended literally, like 'icy' for 'unemotional' [Magidor] |
18027 | Metaphors as substitutes for the literal misses one predicate varying with context [Magidor] |
20042 | We assign the cause of someone's walking when we say why they are doing it [Aristotle] |
5110 | Goodness is when a thing (such as a circle) is complete, and conforms with its nature [Aristotle] |
5111 | All moral virtue is concerned with bodily pleasure and pain [Aristotle] |
5092 | Nature is a principle of change, so we must understand change first [Aristotle] |
5113 | Nothing natural is disorderly, because nature is responsible for all order [Aristotle] |
5085 | 'Nature' refers to two things - form and matter [Aristotle] |
5089 | Nature has purpose, and aims at what is better. Is it coincidence that crops grow when it rains? [Aristotle] |
5086 | The nature of a thing is its end and purpose [Aristotle] |
5087 | A thing's purpose is ambiguous, and from one point of view we ourselves are ends [Aristotle] |
5091 | Teeth and crops are predictable, so they cannot be mere chance, but must have a purpose [Aristotle] |
5108 | Is ceasing-to-be unnatural if it happens by force, and natural otherwise? [Aristotle] |
5093 | Continuity depends on infinity, because the continuous is infinitely divisible [Aristotle] |
5095 | The heavens seem to be infinite, because we cannot imagine their end [Aristotle] |
16762 | Matter desires form, as female desires male, and ugliness desires beauty [Aristotle] |
17464 | When Aristotle's elements compound they are stable, so why would they ever separate? [Weisberg/Needham/Hendry on Aristotle] |
11252 | The 'form' of a thing explains why the matter constitutes that particular thing [Aristotle, by Politis] |
11253 | A 'material' cause/explanation is the form of whatever is the source [Aristotle, by Politis] |
13107 | Causes produce a few things in their own right, and innumerable things coincidentally [Aristotle] |
8332 | The four causes are the material, the form, the source, and the end [Aristotle] |
9787 | Scientists must know the essential attributes of the things they study [Aristotle] |
20063 | Motion fulfils potentiality [Aristotle] |
5114 | If movement can arise within an animal, why can't it also arise in the universe? [Aristotle] |
5116 | When there is unnatural movement (e.g. fire going downwards) the cause is obvious [Aristotle] |
5099 | The universe as a whole is not anywhere [Aristotle] |
5097 | If everything has a place, this causes an infinite regress, because each place must have place [Aristotle] |
5098 | Place is not shape, or matter, or extension between limits; it is the limits of a body [Aristotle] |
20920 | If there were many cosmoses, each would have its own time, giving many times [Aristotle] |
5106 | Would there be time if there were no mind? [Aristotle] |
22967 | It is unclear whether time depends on the existence of soul [Aristotle] |
8590 | Time does not exist without change [Aristotle] |
22965 | Time measures rest, as well as change [Aristotle] |
22885 | For Aristotle time is not a process but a means for measuring processes [Aristotle, by Bardon] |
22959 | Time is not change, but the number we associate with change [Aristotle] |
22964 | Change only exists in time through its being temporally measure [Aristotle] |
5104 | Time is an aspect of change [Aristotle] |
22956 | How can time exist, when it is composed of what has ceased to be and is yet to be? [Aristotle] |
5102 | If all of time has either ceased to exist, or has not yet happened, maybe time does not exist [Aristotle] |
5103 | Time is not change, but requires change in our minds to be noticed [Aristotle] |
22961 | The present moment is obviously a necessary feature of time [Aristotle] |
22916 | Unlike time, change goes at different rates, and is usually localised [Aristotle, by Le Poidevin] |
16693 | Time has parts, but the now is not one of them, and time is not composed of nows [Aristotle] |
22958 | Nows can't be linked together, any more than points on a line [Aristotle] |
22968 | Circular motion is the most obvious measure of time, and especially the celestial sphere [Aristotle] |
22963 | We measure change by time, and time by change, as they are interdefined [Aristotle] |
22966 | The present moment is a link (of past to future), and also a limit (of past and of future) [Aristotle] |
22957 | We can't tell whether the changing present moment is one thing, or a succession of things [Aristotle] |
5083 | Do things come to be from what is, or from what is not? Both seem problematical. [Aristotle] |
5119 | The source of all movement must be indivisible and have no magnitude [Aristotle] |