62 ideas
1922 | Spiritual qualities only become advantageous with the growth of wisdom [Plato] |
7973 | There is no longer anything on which there is nothing to say [Baudrillard] |
7975 | The task of philosophy is to unmask the illusion of objective reality [Baudrillard] |
7986 | Drunken boat pilots are less likely to collide than clearly focused ones [Baudrillard] |
7982 | Instead of thesis and antithesis leading to synthesis, they now cancel out, and the conflict is levelled [Baudrillard] |
18395 | Sets are mereological sums of the singletons of their members [Lewis, by Armstrong] |
15496 | We can build set theory on singletons: classes are then fusions of subclasses, membership is the singleton [Lewis] |
15500 | Classes divide into subclasses in many ways, but into members in only one way [Lewis] |
15499 | A subclass of a subclass is itself a subclass; a member of a member is not in general a member [Lewis] |
15503 | We needn't accept this speck of nothingness, this black hole in the fabric of Reality! [Lewis] |
15498 | We can accept the null set, but there is no null class of anything [Lewis] |
15502 | There are four main reasons for asserting that there is an empty set [Lewis] |
15506 | If we don't understand the singleton, then we don't understand classes [Lewis] |
15497 | We can replace the membership relation with the member-singleton relation (plus mereology) [Lewis] |
15511 | If singleton membership is external, why is an object a member of one rather than another? [Lewis] |
15513 | Maybe singletons have a structure, of a thing and a lasso? [Lewis] |
15507 | Set theory has some unofficial axioms, generalisations about how to understand it [Lewis] |
10191 | Set theory reduces to a mereological theory with singletons as the only atoms [Lewis, by MacBride] |
15508 | If singletons are where their members are, then so are all sets [Lewis] |
15514 | A huge part of Reality is only accepted as existing if you have accepted set theory [Lewis] |
15523 | Set theory isn't innocent; it generates infinities from a single thing; but mathematics needs it [Lewis] |
15525 | Plural quantification lacks a complete axiom system [Lewis] |
15518 | I like plural quantification, but am not convinced of its connection with second-order logic [Lewis] |
11259 | How can you seek knowledge of something if you don't know it? [Plato] |
15524 | Zermelo's model of arithmetic is distinctive because it rests on a primitive of set theory [Lewis] |
15517 | Giving up classes means giving up successful mathematics because of dubious philosophy [Lewis] |
15515 | To be a structuralist, you quantify over relations [Lewis] |
15520 | Existence doesn't come in degrees; once asserted, it can't then be qualified [Lewis] |
15501 | We have no idea of a third sort of thing, that isn't an individual, a class, or their mixture [Lewis] |
15504 | Atomless gunk is an individual whose parts all have further proper parts [Lewis] |
7974 | Without God we faced reality: what do we face without reality? [Baudrillard] |
7987 | Nothing is true, but everything is exact [Baudrillard] |
15516 | A property is any class of possibilia [Lewis] |
14748 | The many are many and the one is one, so they can't be identical [Lewis] |
6129 | Lewis affirms 'composition as identity' - that an object is no more than its parts [Lewis, by Merricks] |
15512 | In mereology no two things consist of the same atoms [Lewis] |
15519 | Trout-turkeys exist, despite lacking cohesion, natural joints and united causal power [Lewis] |
15521 | Given cats, a fusion of cats adds nothing further to reality [Lewis] |
15522 | The one has different truths from the many; it is one rather than many, one rather than six [Lewis] |
14244 | Lewis only uses fusions to create unities, but fusions notoriously flatten our distinctions [Oliver/Smiley on Lewis] |
10660 | A commitment to cat-fusions is not a further commitment; it is them and they are it [Lewis] |
10566 | Lewis prefers giving up singletons to giving up sums [Lewis, by Fine,K] |
20219 | True opinions only become really valuable when they are tied down by reasons [Plato] |
5985 | Seeking and learning are just recollection [Plato] |
5986 | The slave boy learns geometry from questioning, not teaching, so it is recollection [Plato] |
15509 | Some say qualities are parts of things - as repeatable universals, or as particulars [Lewis] |
1923 | As a guide to action, true opinion is as good as knowledge [Plato] |
1919 | You don't need to learn what you know, and how do you seek for what you don't know? [Plato] |
7978 | There is no need to involve the idea of free will to make choices about one's life [Baudrillard] |
7980 | In modern times, being useless is the essential aesthetic ingredient for an object [Baudrillard] |
7983 | Good versus evil has been banefully reduced to happiness versus misfortune [Baudrillard] |
1913 | Is virtue taught, or achieved by practice, or a natural aptitude, or what? [Plato] |
1921 | If virtue is a type of knowledge then it ought to be taught [Plato] |
1927 | It seems that virtue is neither natural nor taught, but is a divine gift [Plato] |
1918 | How can you know part of virtue without knowing the whole? [Plato] |
1916 | Even if virtues are many and various, they must have something in common to make them virtues [Plato] |
7981 | Whole populations are terrorist threats to authorities, who unite against them [Baudrillard] |
7976 | People like democracy because it means they can avoid power [Baudrillard] |
7977 | Only in the last 200 years have people demanded the democratic privilege of being individuals [Baudrillard] |
7979 | The arrival of the news media brought history to an end [Baudrillard] |
7984 | Suicide is ascribed to depression, with the originality of the act of will ignored [Baudrillard] |
7985 | Pascal says secular life is acceptable, but more fun with the hypothesis of God [Baudrillard] |