Philosophy Quotes

"Counterfactual reasoning reveals genuine objective facts about possibility."

"The necessity of identity statements reflects mind-independent facts about reality."

"Possible worlds are not entities in the full metaphysical sense, but useful fictions."

"Philosophical method must respect both intuition and empirical constraint."

"We must resist the temptation to reduce all modality to linguistic possibility."

"An object's essential properties are those it possesses in all possible worlds containing it."

"We can coherently discuss what would be true if things had been otherwise."

"Essentialism explains why some truths hold across all possible worlds."

"Counterfactuals are not reducible to material conditionals in standard logic."

"The world contains objective possibilities that constrain what could have been."

"Our modal intuitions, while not infallible, provide genuine access to reality."

"Possible worlds are what make counterfactual statements truth-apt."

"We can meaningfully discuss non-actual possibilities without reifying them ontologically."

"Possible worlds are legitimate theoretical posits despite their apparent extravagance."

"Our grasp of possibility is immediate and not derived from logical or linguistic facts."

"Language is not a perfect instrument for expressing our thoughts."

"Metaphysics is a purely formal science."

"Emotional expressions are not propositions that can be true or false."

"The only way to understand philosophy is to practice it constantly."

"The mind is not a substance but a collection of perceptions."

"Philosophy begins where certainty ends."

"The original position is a device of representation, not a historical fact."

"Political philosophy must grapple with the question of how free and equal citizens can live together."

"We must distinguish between ideal theory and non-ideal theory in political philosophy."

"Public reason constrains what we can appeal to in political arguments."

"The parties in the original position choose principles that would satisfy them in any position."

"The original position models the conditions for a fair agreement."

"A reasonable comprehensive doctrine accepts a liberal political conception of justice."

"A conception of justice must be stable with respect to reasonable disagreement."

"The idea of the social contract remains relevant to modern political theory."