Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'fragments/reports', 'Explanation - Opening Address' and 'Philosophy'

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26 ideas

2. Reason / A. Nature of Reason / 6. Coherence
17070 Coherence is consilience, simplicity, analogy, and fitting into a web of belief [Smart]
17072 We need comprehensiveness, as well as self-coherence [Smart]
3. Truth / A. Truth Problems / 4. Uses of Truth
20320 Truth is what unites, and the profound truths create a community [Jaspers]
7. Existence / A. Nature of Existence / 3. Being / d. Non-being
18933 Not-Being obviously doesn't exist, and the five modes of Being are all impossible [Gorgias, by Diog. Laertius]
13. Knowledge Criteria / B. Internal Justification / 3. Evidentialism / a. Evidence
17073 I simply reject evidence, if it is totally contrary to my web of belief [Smart]
14. Science / D. Explanation / 1. Explanation / c. Direction of explanation
17077 The height of a flagpole could be fixed by its angle of shadow, but that would be very unusual [Smart]
17078 Universe expansion explains the red shift, but not vice versa [Smart]
14. Science / D. Explanation / 2. Types of Explanation / c. Explanations by coherence
17074 Explanations are bad by fitting badly with a web of beliefs, or fitting well into a bad web [Smart]
17076 Deducing from laws is one possible way to achieve a coherent explanation [Smart]
17061 Explanation of a fact is fitting it into a system of beliefs [Smart]
14. Science / D. Explanation / 2. Types of Explanation / d. Consilience
17071 An explanation is better if it also explains phenomena from a different field [Smart]
14. Science / D. Explanation / 2. Types of Explanation / g. Causal explanations
17062 If scientific explanation is causal, that rules out mathematical explanation [Smart]
14. Science / D. Explanation / 2. Types of Explanation / j. Explanations by reduction
17075 Scientific explanation tends to reduce things to the unfamiliar (not the familiar) [Smart]
16. Persons / F. Free Will / 2. Sources of Free Will
20323 Freedom needs knowledge, the possibility of arbitrariness, and law [Jaspers]
16. Persons / F. Free Will / 4. For Free Will
20322 I am aware that freedom is possible, and the freedom is not in theory, but in seeking freedom [Jaspers]
19. Language / F. Communication / 1. Rhetoric
9866 Gorgias says rhetoric is the best of arts, because it enslaves without using force [Gorgias, by Plato]
5864 Destroy seriousness with laughter, and laughter with seriousness [Gorgias]
20. Action / C. Motives for Action / 4. Responsibility for Actions
20324 My freedom increases as I broaden my vision of possiblities and motives [Jaspers]
23. Ethics / F. Existentialism / 1. Existentialism
20321 The struggle for Existenz is between people who are equals, and are utterly honest [Jaspers]
20318 My helplessness in philosophising reveals my being, and begins its upsurge [Jaspers]
20325 Once we grasp freedom 'from' things, then freedom 'for' things becomes urgent [Jaspers]
23. Ethics / F. Existentialism / 6. Authentic Self
20315 'Existenz' is the potential being, which I could have, and ought to have [Jaspers]
20317 Mundane existence is general, falling under universals, but Existens is unique to individuals [Jaspers]
20319 We want the correct grasp on being that is neither solipsism nor absorption in the crowd [Jaspers]
23. Ethics / F. Existentialism / 7. Existential Action
20316 Every decision I make moves towards or away from fulfilled Existenz [Jaspers]
27. Natural Reality / B. Modern Physics / 1. Relativity / b. General relativity
17063 Unlike Newton, Einstein's general theory explains the perihelion of Mercury [Smart]