"A difference is an Effect, a change of being, an altered existence, an existence which cannot 'begin of itself' any more than any other in Nature..." Shepherd
"A Cause, therefore, is such action of an object, as shall enable it, in conjunction with another, to form a new nature, capable of exhibiting qualities varying from those of either of the objects unconjoined."
"An Effect is the produced quality exhibited to the senses, as the essential property of natures so conjoined."
(1) Every beginning of existence has a cause.
(2) Every regularity has a cause.
(3) Every composite has a cause.
ERCE 68: transition of mind is not precise enough to be an account of necessary connection (Andrew example)
rational integrity, facultative integrity, bodily integrity
When we ask for clarification of what it would mean to imagine the course of nature to change without cause, we always get explanations that clearly involve its causes changing, not being nonexistent.
A free society will make at least some accommodation to citizens who are wrong, even grievously wrong, if they are acting in a manner that would be reasonable if they were right.
If things could begin to exist without a cause, they could begin to exist despite contrary conditions, so that, for example, in an uncolored space a bit of scarlet could begin to exist while the uncolored space continues to be, entirely uncaused. If conditions can be contrary to an effect in any way, the effect cannot occur without at least the removal or suppression of the impeding contrariety, which removal is a cause of its occurring.
The conflation of partisan political positions with ethical positions is a major cause of political corruption.
Sensible qualities are unified with each other by being considered co-effects.
Hume E 4.17 on challenge arguments
God as the precondition for semiosis
actuality, fontality, fecundity
Everything actual is possible; thus everything actual is either necessary or presupposes what else contributes to its being possible; for every nonnecessary actual, there exists what is sufficient for its possibility.
Any religion that addresses itself only to the individual and not also to the family or household is to that extent defective.
In politics, emergencies that bring emergency powers tend to breed other emergencies.
Doyle and the development of the deliberate format of a recurring character in a series of standalone stories (he developed this on the idea that it might be a greater reason for readers to stick to a magazine -- they couldn't lose interest if they missed one issue, it fit well with Sherlock Holmes, who had done well in two books, and the rest is history)
Any account of invention that does not recognize that a thing can be invented more than once is already wrong.
plotted serial
episodic serial
nonserialized character series
reason adequation, division and elimination, contradiction avoidance, retorsive testing
"The proximate matter and the form are one and the same, the one potentially and the other actually." Aristotle
"...a cause is wanted in the universe equivalent to the change from non-existence to existence!" Shepherd
NB that Shepherd takes responding to the Essay on Miracles to be important to the completion fo the account of causation (ERCE 96).
memory as sameness-recognizing capacity
ritual as a way we build our minds toward profound thought
inference from co-effects as a major part of our causal reasoning
inference from effects
inference from co-effects
inference from systemic causal order
Consumerism is by its nature antisystematic; it encourages everything to go in the direction of buffet eclecticism.
If I get a flashing glimpse that seems to be a tree, there are many possible explanations of this; if I get a steady view of a tree, it is likely to be due, somewhere in the causal chain, to a real tree; this is strengthened if testing of some kind gives further reason to think the tree actually there. At each stage, we are reducing possibilities, as if by many layerings of filters.
-- we usually consider inference from sensation to the external world, but should also consider the inference from memory to the external world
union-based causal inferences vs trace-based causal inferences
the periodic table vs. Hume on 'cause and effect are discoverable only by experience'
-- note that this is still a significant challenge even given that the periodic table is itself built on experiences and even if our inferences from it only give us the approximately right -- Hume's claim is that c&e are discovered entirely by experience. (Hume, in other words, cannot rest with just arguing that we cannot determine causes and effects in a total void. But in the Enquiry discussion he bounces between saying we can't do it without the assistance of experience and saying it depends entirely on experience.)
What Hume describes is not causal inference but profile-fitting inference to existential matter of fact. Taken in such a way, much of what he says applies, but profile-fitting inference is at least partly justified by causal inference.
The graininess of sugar in the mouth is prior to and constantly conjoined with the sweetness of sugar, but it would obviously be absurd to think of the graininess itself as the cause of the sweetness.
Agni & fire as a pedagogical symbol for the divine
reason as "taking notice of the whole of our perceptions, and of their mutual relations" (Shepherd, ERCE 3) -- note the painting example at ERCE 8
Some of our sensations function better as sensations than others.
Ps 80:17-18 -- Let your hand [the Spirit] be upon the man of thy right hand, the son of man [the Son] whom thou hast made strong for thyself! Then we will never turn back from thee; give us life [the Spirit] and we will call on thy name [the Son].
"In all abstract reasonings, there is one point of view, which, if we can happily hit, we shall go farther towards illustrating the subject, than by all the eloquence and copious expression in the world." Hume E 7.30
Most of Hume's illustrations of the uniformity among the actions of men (E8.7) are statistical, about large groups (cf. also 8.10,12).
Note that the problems w/ the reasonings of the philosophers (E8.13-14) on necessity of natural causes, in light of things like quantum uncertainty, carry over to the intelligent cases; and that even if this were not so, the reasoning does not rule out chaotically unpredictable cases.
Note that Hume's explanation of the 'false sensation' of liberty at E8.22n would arguably count as a Shepherdian proof by trial.
It's worth noting that Hume censures criticism of philosophical hypotheses on the basis of their dangerous consequences to morality by claiming that his own method of reasoning has dangerous consequences for morality (E8.26).
The authority of scripture and tradition is not purely an authority of historical testimony.
We often come to recognize illusions or sensory defects on the basis of testimony.
The passion of surprise and wonder arising from clever skeptical paradoxes and eliminative positions, being agreeable, gives a sensible tendency to overweight those positions inciting it. And this goes so far that even those who reject them love to partake in discussion about them, arguing about them by a sort of devil's advocacy, in delight at the admiration and wonder of others. What what greediness do many receive such paradoxes and unexpected eliminations! But when this is joined to incentive for rejecting the things with which the paradoxes and eliminations are concerned, all common sense will often fly away, especially where the paradoxes and eliminations are eloquently expressed, despite our common experience of such paradoxes and eliminations as merely sophistical.
It is common among causes that we know that their power to cause exceeds the precise effect they have in any given situation.
Given that we know someone is wise enough to plan X, we can reasonably extrapolate that they are wise enough to plan a wide variety of analogous things, and the same is true for goodness as for wisdom.
No one, from the sight of Zeuxis' pictures, would conclude that he could do nothing but paint those particular pictures, nor would they conclude that he was capable of nothing but painting. And while we could not definitely conclude from them alone that he was an equally brilliant sculptor, we would be less surprised, having seen his paintings, if we were to find some reason, however small, for thinking he was.
We generally find with intelligent beings that, being able to do something incompletely or badly, they could have, if they used more of what goes into it (time, effort, resources, etc.), or had prepared the materials more, done it completely and well. Given a rough draft with a few promising parts, or with elements that could be refined, we recognize that the drafter could do something much better than just a rough draft.
The argument of the Essay of a Particular Providence and a Future State, seems inspired by the Newtonian rejection of feigning hypotheses; and the target is quite clearly Butler.
Given that a human intelligent cause is capable of things far beyond any particular effect, we have reason to think a much more powerful, much more intelligent cause is also capable of more than any effect we know, because this is how we already know power and intelligence to work.
Humes comments in E12.4 seem a direct paraphrase of the rules in Descartes's Discourse.
