Biocentrism reference in Witcher 3?
"Do universals exist as real and distinct entities, or only as mental constructs?"
"Do universals exist as real and distinct entities, or only as mental constructs?"
It's referencing a common debate in philosophy.
In classical philosophy, a universal is a rule that applies in every possible circumstance. An example might be "all human beings came from a mother and father." An example of something that is not a universal is "the sky is clear outside." That's because, even though that may be true where I live, there is probably somewhere in the world where the sky is clouded over right now.
There are schools of thought in philosophy and mathematics that question whether universals really exist. Essentially, for various reasons, they believe no rule can apply in every possible circumstance. Hence, universals are not found in nature but merely mental concepts we made up.
It's complicated, I know. But that's philosophy for you.
Naturally, ALL witchers are brilliant students of philosphy.
And Uma is the Stephen Hawking of the Witcher world. So his response to Geralt's question was too complicated for us to understand.
In classical philosophy, a universal is a rule that applies in every possible circumstance. An example might be "all human beings came from a mother and father." An example of something that is not a universal is "the sky is clear outside." That's because, even though that may be true where I live, there is probably somewhere in the world where the sky is clouded over right now.
There are schools of thought in philosophy and mathematics that question whether universals really exist. Essentially, for various reasons, they believe no rule can apply in every possible circumstance. Hence, universals are not found in nature but merely mental concepts we made up.
It's complicated, I know. But that's philosophy for you.
Naturally, ALL witchers are brilliant students of philosphy.
And Uma is the Stephen Hawking of the Witcher world. So his response to Geralt's question was too complicated for us to understand.
This relates to the debate that raged in Western philosophy throughout much of the Middle Ages, between the Realist and Nominalist schools of thought.
Last edited:
Doesn't specifically deal with biocentrism. This is a common debate in metaphysics. As noted above, the two positions are realism and nominalism. Nominalism suggests that in a given universe there are only particulars. So a "dog" is a particular and an "idea of a dog" is a separate and unique particular (not a universal). Nominalism argues that we relate one dog to another dog based on the common resemblance of features between the two particulars. The idea of what a dog is is simply a particular that incorporates the most common shared features. So there is no universal concept of "dog", merely a particular mental construct we call the "idea of dog" that is composed of our mental representation of what a dog is based on the aforementioned most common resemblance features. Therefore, the idea of universals in and of themselves is merely a mental construct. Universal themselves do not exist.
The realist however disagrees with this position and instead holds that universals do indeed exist as separate and unique entities. The most famous example of this school of thought is Plato's forms. In essence, you have the universal form of "dog". This universal form exists as a real and distinct entity, and can be thought of as a template for what a dog is. All actual dogs in the world participate to varying degrees in this form (template) along with other forms. This varying level and degree of participation in various forms is what makes each dog appear unique from the next, yet all dogs share the unique participation in the universal form of dog. So in essence, you could destroy every known dog in existence and wipe away anything about dogs from everyone's memories and "dogs" still exist. "Dog" is now merely an empty set with no participating individuals (particulars) but since the set itself still exists, then what's left is the universal "dog" itself which must be real and distinct since it exists.