A quote from Lewis Carroll 11 Jun 202411 Jun 2024 Well, it’s actually from Charles Dodgson’s The Game of Logic 1887: The world contains many Things (such as “Buns”, “Babies”, “Beetles”, “Battledores”, &c.) ; and the Things possess many Attributes (such as “baked”, “beautiful”, “black”, “broken”, &c: in fact, whatever can be “attributed to”, that is “said to belong to”, any Thing, is an Attribute). Whenever we wish to mention a Thing, we use a Substantive : when we wish to mention an Attribute, we use an Adjective. People have asked the question “Can a Thing exist without any Attributes belonging to it?” It is a very puzzling question, and I’m not going to try to answer it : let us turn up our noses, and treat it with contemptuous silence, as if it really wasn’t worth noticing. But, if they put it the other way, and ask “Can an Attribute exist without any Thing for it to belong to?”, we may say at once “No: no more than a Baby could go a railway-journey with no one to take care of it ! ” You never saw “beautiful” floating about in the air, or littered about on the floor, without any Thing to be beautiful, now did you ? Chapter 1, §1, page 2 The really lovely thing here, apart from the wonderful alliteration [“Buns”, “Babies”, “Beetles”, and “Battledores” is my new band name] is that Dodgson gives, in one paragraph, a summary of metaphysics, philosophy of language, and logical classification. The rest of the book is pretty good too. Logic and philosophy Metaphysics Philosophy
Epistemology A quote on the ethics of belief 31 Aug 2010 Sometimes philosophers nail it. This from James McGrath: And no one man’s belief is in any case a private matter which concerns himself alone. Our lives are guided by that general conception of the course of things which has been created by society for social purposes. Our words, our phrases,… Read More
History The best scientific ideas 20 Feb 2010 Over on talk.origins Roger Ebert’s review of The Creation, a film about Darwin’s private life, was mentioned, which starts out Darwin, it is generally agreed, had the most important idea in the history of science. Thinkers had been feeling their way toward it for decades, but it took Darwin to… Read More
Evolution A schism in the Church of Dick 26 Feb 201018 Sep 2017 I know, it’s just schadenfreude on my part and it’s so very childish, but I can’t help it. The Church of Dick has undergone a schism, with the prophet anathematising previously loyal followers. But, and I state this for the record, it isn’t anything like a religious movement. Nope… Should… Read More