21 ideas
1597 | Thales was the first western thinker to believe the arché was intelligible [Roochnik on Thales] |
8568 | A property is merely a constituent of laws of nature; temperature is just part of thermodynamics [Mellor] |
8564 | There is obviously a possible predicate for every property [Mellor] |
8566 | We need universals for causation and laws of nature; the latter give them their identity [Mellor] |
8565 | If properties were just the meanings of predicates, they couldn't give predicates their meaning [Mellor] |
3013 | Nothing is stronger than necessity, which rules everything [Thales, by Diog. Laertius] |
12790 | Generalisations must be invariant to explain anything [Leuridan] |
12789 | Biological functions are explained by disposition, or by causal role [Leuridan] |
14386 | Mechanisms are ontologically dependent on regularities [Leuridan] |
12787 | Mechanisms can't explain on their own, as their models rest on pragmatic regularities [Leuridan] |
14384 | We can show that regularities and pragmatic laws are more basic than mechanisms [Leuridan] |
14388 | Mechanisms must produce macro-level regularities, but that needs micro-level regularities [Leuridan] |
14389 | There is nothing wrong with an infinite regress of mechanisms and regularities [Leuridan] |
14387 | Rather than dispositions, functions may be the element that brought a thing into existence [Leuridan] |
1494 | Thales said water is the first principle, perhaps from observing that food is moist [Thales, by Aristotle] |
8567 | Singular causation requires causes to raise the physical probability of their effects [Mellor] |
14382 | Pragmatic laws allow prediction and explanation, to the extent that reality is stable [Leuridan] |
14385 | Strict regularities are rarely discovered in life sciences [Leuridan] |
14383 | A 'law of nature' is just a regularity, not some entity that causes the regularity [Leuridan] |
1713 | Thales must have thought soul causes movement, since he thought magnets have soul [Thales, by Aristotle] |
1742 | Thales said the gods know our wrong thoughts as well as our evil actions [Thales, by Diog. Laertius] |