Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'fragments/reports', 'Philosophy of Science' and 'The Statesman'

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23 ideas

1. Philosophy / B. History of Ideas / 2. Ancient Thought
1597 Thales was the first western thinker to believe the arché was intelligible [Roochnik on Thales]
1. Philosophy / F. Analytic Philosophy / 2. Analysis by Division
16123 Whenever you perceive a community of things, you should also hunt out differences in the group [Plato]
2. Reason / D. Definition / 2. Aims of Definition
16125 To reveal a nature, divide down, and strip away what it has in common with other things [Plato]
16124 No one wants to define 'weaving' just for the sake of weaving [Plato]
10. Modality / C. Sources of Modality / 5. Modality from Actuality
3013 Nothing is stronger than necessity, which rules everything [Thales, by Diog. Laertius]
12. Knowledge Sources / A. A Priori Knowledge / 3. Innate Knowledge / b. Recollection doctrine
5961 The soul gets its goodness from god, and its evil from previous existence. [Plato]
14. Science / A. Basis of Science / 6. Falsification
22189 Why abandon a theory if you don't have a better one? [Gorham]
22190 If a theory is more informative it is less probable [Gorham]
14. Science / B. Scientific Theories / 1. Scientific Theory
22192 Is Newton simpler with universal simultaneity, or Einstein simpler without absolute time? [Gorham]
22194 Structural Realism says mathematical structures persist after theory rejection [Gorham]
22195 Structural Realists must show the mathematics is both crucial and separate [Gorham]
14. Science / B. Scientific Theories / 3. Instrumentalism
22196 For most scientists their concepts are not just useful, but are meant to be true and accurate [Gorham]
22197 Theories aren't just for organising present experience if they concern the past or future [Gorham]
14. Science / D. Explanation / 2. Types of Explanation / d. Consilience
22193 Consilience makes the component sciences more likely [Gorham]
19. Language / F. Communication / 1. Rhetoric
283 The question of whether or not to persuade comes before the science of persuasion [Plato]
21. Aesthetics / A. Aesthetic Experience / 5. Natural Beauty
282 Non-physical beauty can only be shown clearly by speech [Plato]
23. Ethics / C. Virtue Theory / 2. Elements of Virtue Theory / f. The Mean
281 The arts produce good and beautiful things by preserving the mean [Plato]
24. Political Theory / D. Ideologies / 5. Democracy / a. Nature of democracy
22559 Democracy is the worst of good constitutions, but the best of bad constitutions [Plato, by Aristotle]
26. Natural Theory / A. Speculations on Nature / 1. Nature
22198 Aristotelian physics has circular celestial motion and linear earthly motion [Gorham]
26. Natural Theory / A. Speculations on Nature / 6. Early Matter Theories / c. Ultimate substances
1494 Thales said water is the first principle, perhaps from observing that food is moist [Thales, by Aristotle]
27. Natural Reality / A. Classical Physics / 1. Mechanics / a. Explaining movement
1713 Thales must have thought soul causes movement, since he thought magnets have soul [Thales, by Aristotle]
28. God / A. Divine Nature / 2. Divine Nature
279 Only divine things can always stay the same, and bodies are not like that [Plato]
29. Religion / A. Polytheistic Religion / 2. Greek Polytheism
1742 Thales said the gods know our wrong thoughts as well as our evil actions [Thales, by Diog. Laertius]