104 ideas
| 2056 | Philosophers are always switching direction to something more interesting [Plato] |
| 2086 | Understanding mainly involves knowing the elements, not their combinations [Plato] |
| 2083 | Either a syllable is its letters (making parts as knowable as whole) or it isn't (meaning it has no parts) [Plato] |
| 11051 | Frege's logical approach dominates the analytical tradition [Hanna] |
| 11054 | Scientism says most knowledge comes from the exact sciences [Hanna] |
| 2082 | A rational account is essentially a weaving together of things with names [Plato] |
| 19767 | Reason leads to prudent selfishness, which overrules natural compassion [Rousseau] |
| 2052 | Eristic discussion is aggressive, but dialectic aims to help one's companions in discussion [Plato] |
| 15854 | A primary element has only a name, and no logos, but complexes have an account, by weaving the names [Plato] |
| 11070 | 'Denying the antecedent' fallacy: φ→ψ, ¬φ, so ¬ψ [Hanna] |
| 11071 | 'Affirming the consequent' fallacy: φ→ψ, ψ, so φ [Hanna] |
| 11088 | We can list at least fourteen informal fallacies [Hanna] |
| 11059 | Circular arguments are formally valid, though informally inadmissible [Hanna] |
| 11089 | Formally, composition and division fallacies occur in mereology [Hanna] |
| 11058 | Logic is explanatorily and ontologically dependent on rational animals [Hanna] |
| 11072 | Logic is personal and variable, but it has a universal core [Hanna] |
| 11061 | Intensional consequence is based on the content of the concepts [Hanna] |
| 10216 | We master arithmetic by knowing all the numbers in our soul [Plato] |
| 11063 | Logicism struggles because there is no decent theory of analyticity [Hanna] |
| 2060 | There seem to be two sorts of change: alteration and motion [Plato] |
| 11055 | Supervenience can add covariation, upward dependence, and nomological connection [Hanna] |
| 2084 | If a word has no parts and has a single identity, it turns out to be the same kind of thing as a letter [Plato] |
| 15844 | A sum is that from which nothing is lacking, which is a whole [Plato] |
| 15843 | The whole can't be the parts, because it would be all of the parts, which is the whole [Plato] |
| 11083 | A sentence is necessary if it is true in a set of worlds, and nonfalse in the other worlds [Hanna] |
| 11086 | Metaphysical necessity can be 'weak' (same as logical) and 'strong' (based on essences) [Hanna] |
| 11084 | Logical necessity is truth in all logically possible worlds, because of laws and concepts [Hanna] |
| 11085 | Nomological necessity is truth in all logically possible worlds with our laws [Hanna] |
| 2080 | Things are only knowable if a rational account (logos) is possible [Plato] |
| 19757 | No one would bother to reason, and try to know things, without a desire for enjoyment [Rousseau] |
| 16126 | Expertise is knowledge of the whole by means of the parts [Plato] |
| 2050 | It is impossible to believe something which is held to be false [Plato] |
| 2076 | How can a belief exist if its object doesn't exist? [Plato] |
| 2045 | Perception is infallible, suggesting that it is knowledge [Plato] |
| 2067 | Our senses could have been separate, but they converge on one mind [Plato] |
| 2068 | With what physical faculty do we perceive pairs of opposed abstract qualities? [Plato] |
| 2078 | You might mistake eleven for twelve in your senses, but not in your mind [Plato] |
| 2069 | Thought must grasp being itself before truth becomes possible [Plato] |
| 11078 | Intuition is only outside the 'space of reasons' if all reasons are inferential [Hanna] |
| 11077 | Intuition includes apriority, clarity, modality, authority, fallibility and no inferences [Hanna] |
| 11080 | Intuition is more like memory, imagination or understanding, than like perception [Hanna] |
| 2089 | An inadequate rational account would still not justify knowledge [Plato] |
| 2085 | Parts and wholes are either equally knowable or equally unknowable [Plato] |
| 2091 | Without distinguishing marks, how do I know what my beliefs are about? [Plato] |
| 2087 | A rational account might be seeing an image of one's belief, like a reflection in a mirror [Plato] |
| 2090 | A rational account involves giving an image, or analysis, or giving a differentiating mark [Plato] |
| 2081 | Maybe primary elements can be named, but not receive a rational account [Plato] |
| 2088 | A rational account of a wagon would mean knowledge of its hundred parts [Plato] |
| 2047 | What evidence can be brought to show whether we are dreaming or not? [Plato] |
| 2053 | If you claim that all beliefs are true, that includes beliefs opposed to your own [Plato] |
| 2059 | How can a relativist form opinions about what will happen in the future? [Plato] |
| 2054 | Clearly some people are superior to others when it comes to medicine [Plato] |
| 11053 | Explanatory reduction is stronger than ontological reduction [Hanna] |
| 11081 | Imagination grasps abstracta, generates images, and has its own correctness conditions [Hanna] |
| 19760 | General ideas are purely intellectual; imagining them is immediately particular [Rousseau] |
| 19759 | Only words can introduce general ideas into the mind [Rousseau] |
| 11082 | Should we take the 'depictivist' or the 'descriptivist/propositionalist' view of mental imagery? [Hanna] |
| 11067 | Rational animals have a normative concept of necessity [Hanna] |
| 11068 | One tradition says talking is the essence of rationality; the other says the essence is logic [Hanna] |
| 11047 | Hegelian holistic rationality is the capacity to seek coherence [Hanna] |
| 11048 | Humean Instrumental rationality is the capacity to seek contingent truths [Hanna] |
| 11046 | Kantian principled rationality is recognition of a priori universal truths [Hanna] |
| 11045 | Most psychologists are now cognitivists [Hanna] |
| 19758 | Language may aid thinking, but powerful thought was needed to produce language [Rousseau] |
| 19773 | Without love, what use is beauty? [Rousseau] |
| 19769 | Rational morality is OK for brainy people, but ordinary life can't rely on that [Rousseau] |
| 19752 | If we should not mistreat humans, it is mainly because of sentience, not rationality [Rousseau] |
| 19768 | The better Golden Rule is 'do good for yourself without harming others' [Rousseau] |
| 19766 | The fact that we weep (e.g. in theatres) shows that we are naturally compassionate [Rousseau] |
| 19756 | Humans are less distinguished from other animals by understanding, than by being free agents [Rousseau] |
| 19755 | Most human ills are self-inflicted; the simple, solitary, regular natural life is good [Rousseau] |
| 19762 | Is language a pre-requisite for society, or might it emerge afterwards? [Rousseau] |
| 19763 | I doubt whether a savage person ever complains of life, or considers suicide [Rousseau] |
| 19778 | Leisure led to envy, inequality, vice and revenge, which we now see in savages [Rousseau] |
| 19779 | Primitive man was very gentle [Rousseau] |
| 19751 | Our two starting principles are concern for self-interest, and compassion for others [Rousseau] |
| 19765 | Savages avoid evil because they are calm, and never think of it (not because they know goodness) [Rousseau] |
| 19771 | Savage men quietly pursue desires, without the havoc of modern frenzied imagination [Rousseau] |
| 19774 | A savage can steal fruit or a home, but there is no means of achieving obedience [Rousseau] |
| 19772 | In a state of nature people are much more equal; it is society which increases inequalities [Rousseau] |
| 19789 | It is against nature for children to rule old men, fools to rule the wise, and the rich to hog resources [Rousseau] |
| 19787 | People accept the right to be commanded, because they themselves wish to command [Rousseau] |
| 19780 | We seem to have made individual progress since savagery, but actually the species has decayed [Rousseau] |
| 19747 | Revolutionaries usually confuse liberty with total freedom, and end up with heavier chains [Rousseau] |
| 19748 | Plebiscites are bad, because they exclude the leaders from crucial decisions [Rousseau] |
| 19749 | In a direct democracy, only the leaders should be able to propose new laws [Rousseau] |
| 19775 | People must be made dependent before they can be enslaved [Rousseau] |
| 19784 | Enslaved peoples often boast of their condition, calling it a state of 'peace' [Rousseau] |
| 19785 | If the child of a slave woman is born a slave, then a man is not born a man [Rousseau] |
| 19746 | Like rich food, liberty can ruin people who are too weak to cope with it [Rousseau] |
| 19786 | Three stages of the state produce inequalities of wealth, power, and enslavement [Rousseau] |
| 19788 | The pleasure of wealth and power is largely seeing others deprived of them [Rousseau] |
| 19777 | Persuading other people that some land was 'owned' was the beginning of society [Rousseau] |
| 19782 | What else could property arise from, but the labour people add to it? [Rousseau] |
| 19781 | Land cultivation led to a general right of ownership, administered justly [Rousseau] |
| 19754 | If we have a natural right to property, what exactly does 'belonging to' mean? [Rousseau] |
| 19750 | Writers just propose natural law as the likely useful agreements among people [Rousseau] |
| 19770 | Primitive people simply redressed the evil caused by violence, without thought of punishing [Rousseau] |
| 19783 | A state of war remains after a conquest, if the losers don't accept the winners [Rousseau] |
| 19753 | Both men and animals are sentient, which should give the latter the right not to be mistreated [Rousseau] |
| 19761 | Men started with too few particular names, but later had too few natural kind names [Rousseau] |
| 19776 | Small uninterrupted causes can have big effects [Rousseau] |
| 2058 | God must be the epitome of goodness, and we can only approach a divine state by being as good as possible [Plato] |
| 2057 | There must always be some force of evil ranged against good [Plato] |