I do sometimes wonder whether the appalling degradation in American culture, morality, and intelligence that we have winessed in the last twenty years (including in universities) was caused by the horrific events of 9/11. At the time I feared that the American reaction to these events might exceed in harmfulness the events in question. Can […]
Is Shape Physical? Shape is included on the traditional list of primary qualities, but that doesn’t settle the question of whether it is physical. Indeed the question is seldom raised: is the shape of an object a physical property of it? Nor is it an easy question to answer—largely because of […]
Read it and weep!
Social Interactions What is the nature of a social interaction? The subjects interacting have their own nature, but what about the interaction itself? It will no doubt reflect the nature of the interacting subjects, but it may be expected to have a nature of its own. There have been varying views of […]
I happened to be watching a repeat of SNL last night and was struck again by a sketch about cancel culture. A preening pair, woman and man, were congratulating themselves on their activities in canceling young children. The kids were aged from 3 to 5 and the pair were relishing their destruction of the future […]
Knowledge of Color As colors have a metaphysics, so they have an epistemology. In addition to ordinary empirical truths about what colors objects have, there are also general truths stating a priori necessities: for example, “Orange is closer to red than to blue”, “There cannot be reddish green”, “Nothing can be white […]
Colors and Powers Again Locke distinguishes primary qualities from powers to produce sense impressions of them in perceivers, but he thinks that secondary qualities are “nothing else, but several powers in them, depending on these primary qualities…to produce several different ideas in us”. [1] That is, he identifies colors with powers to produce […]
Colors and Powers According to Locke, colors are nothing but powers in objects to produce ideas in our minds. He writes: “What I have said concerning colours and smells, may be understood also of tastes, and sounds, and other the like sensible qualities; which, whatever reality we by mistake, attribute […]
Color and Causality Color and causality don’t mix: causality doesn’t mention color and color is indifferent to causality. Shape is very different: shape always affects causal powers. Shape and causality are made for each other, while color and causality are complete strangers. This means that ordinary objects have two aspects—causal and non-causal. […]
Color and Perception For color, to be is to be perceived: not so for shape. That was a central tenet of the modern philosophers. Color depends on perceivers for its existence, but shape does not. Thus it makes no sense to suppose that colors exist in a possible world and yet no […]