Logic Chases Truth Up The Tree Of

Different Persons Growing Up In The Same Language Are Like Different Bushes Trimmed And Trained To Take The Shape Of Identical Elephants. The Anatomical Details Of Twigs And Branches Will Fulfill The Elephantine Form Differently From Bush To Bush, But The Overall Outward Results Are Alike.

The Line That I Am Urging As Today's Conventional Wisdom Is Not A Denial Of Consciousness. It Is Often Called, With More Reason, Arepudiation Of Mind. It Is Indeed A Repudiation Of Mind As A Second Substance, Over And Above Body. It Can Be Described Less Harshly As An Identification Of Mind With Some Of The Faculties, States, And Activities Of The Body. Mental States And Events Are A Special Subclass Of The States And Events Of The Human Or Animal Body.

Logic Is An Old Subject, And Since 1879 It Has Been A Great One.

To Call A Posit A Posit Is Not To Patronize It. A Posit Can Be Unavoidable Except At The Cost Of Other No Less Artificial Expedients. Everything To Which We Concede Existence Is A Posit From The Standpoint Of A Description Of The Theory-building Process, And Simultaneously Real From The Standpoint Of The Theory That Is Being Built.

The Variables Of Quantification, 'something,' 'nothing,' 'everything,' Range Over Our Whole Ontology, Whatever It May Be; And We Are Convicted Of A Particular Ontological Presupposition If, And Only If, The Alleged Presuppositum Has To Be Reckoned Among The Entities Over Which Our Variables Range In Order To Render One Of Our Affirmations True.