Ideas of David Papineau, by Theme

[British, b.1947, British, born 1947, based at Cambridge University, and then King's College, London]

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1. Philosophy / G. Scientific Philosophy / 3. Scientism
13407 All worthwhile philosophy is synthetic theorizing, evaluated by experience
7. Existence / D. Theories of Reality / 5. Naturalism
3509 Externalism may be the key idea in philosophical naturalism
7. Existence / D. Theories of Reality / 11. Ontological Commitment / e. Ontological commitment problems
13409 Our best theories may commit us to mathematical abstracta, but that doesn't justify the commitment
11. Knowledge Aims / A. Knowledge / 4. Belief / a. Beliefs
12583 Belief truth-conditions are normal circumstances where the belief is supposed to occur
12. Knowledge Sources / A. A Priori Knowledge / 9. A Priori from Concepts
13406 A priori knowledge is analytic - the structure of our concepts - and hence unimportant
12. Knowledge Sources / B. Perception / 7. Causal Perception
7871 Perceptual concepts can't just refer to what causes classification
12. Knowledge Sources / E. Direct Knowledge / 2. Intuition
13408 Intuition and thought-experiments embody substantial information about the world
15. Nature of Minds / A. Nature of Mind / 1. Mind / e. Questions about mind
7852 The only serious mind-brain theories now are identity, token identity, realization and supervenience
15. Nature of Minds / A. Nature of Mind / 3. Mental Causation
7864 Maybe mind and body do overdetermine acts, but are linked (for some reason)
15. Nature of Minds / A. Nature of Mind / 4. Other Minds / c. Knowing other minds
7873 Young children can see that other individuals sometimes have false beliefs
7874 Do we understand other minds by simulation-theory, or by theory-theory?
15. Nature of Minds / A. Nature of Mind / 8. Brain
7882 Researching phenomenal consciousness is peculiar, because the concepts involved are peculiar
15. Nature of Minds / B. Features of Minds / 1. Consciousness / a. Consciousness
7854 Whether octopuses feel pain is unclear, because our phenomenal concepts are too vague
7889 Our concept of consciousness is crude, and lacks theoretical articulation
7891 We can’t decide what 'conscious' means, so it is undecidable whether cats are conscious
15. Nature of Minds / B. Features of Minds / 1. Consciousness / e. Cause of consciousness
7890 Maybe a creature is conscious if its mental states represent things in a distinct way
15. Nature of Minds / B. Features of Minds / 1. Consciousness / f. Higher-order thought
7885 The 'actualist' HOT theory says consciousness comes from actual higher judgements of mental states
7886 Actualist HOT theories imply that a non-conscious mental event could become conscious when remembered
7887 States are conscious if they could be the subject of higher-order mental judgements
7888 Higher-order judgements may be possible where the subject denies having been conscious
17. Mind and Body / A. Mind-Body Dualism / 6. Epiphenomenalism
7860 The epiphenomenal relation of mind and brain is a 'causal dangler', unlike anything else
7862 Maybe minds do not cause actions, but do cause us to report our decisions
17. Mind and Body / A. Mind-Body Dualism / 8. Dualism of Mind Critique
3513 How does a dualist mind represent, exist outside space, and be transparent to itself?
17. Mind and Body / C. Functionalism / 8. Functionalism critique
3514 Functionalism needs causation and intentionality to explain actions
7870 Role concepts either name the realising property, or the higher property constituting the role
17. Mind and Body / D. Property Dualism / 2. Anomalous Monism
7858 If causes are basic particulars, this doesn't make conscious and physical properties identical
17. Mind and Body / D. Property Dualism / 5. Supervenience of mind
3510 Epiphenomenalism is supervenience without physicalism
3511 Supervenience requires all mental events to have physical effects
7865 Supervenience can be replaced by identifying mind with higher-order or disjunctional properties
17. Mind and Body / E. Mind as Physical / 1. Physical Mind
3515 Knowing what it is like to be something only involves being (physically) that thing
7892 The completeness of physics is needed for mind-brain identity
17. Mind and Body / E. Mind as Physical / 2. Reduction of Mind
7879 Mind-brain reduction is less explanatory, because phenomenal concepts lack causal roles
20971 Weak reduction of mind is to physical causes; strong reduction is also to physical laws
17. Mind and Body / E. Mind as Physical / 5. Causal Argument
7856 It is absurd to think that physical effects are caused twice, so conscious causes must be physical
17. Mind and Body / E. Mind as Physical / 6. Conceptual Dualism
7881 Accept ontological monism, but conceptual dualism; we think in a different way about phenomenal thought
17. Mind and Body / E. Mind as Physical / 7. Anti-Physicalism / b. Multiple realisability
3512 If a mental state is multiply realisable, why does it lead to similar behaviour?
17. Mind and Body / E. Mind as Physical / 7. Anti-Physicalism / c. Knowledge argument
7866 Mary acquires new concepts; she previously thought about the same property using material concepts
18. Thought / A. Modes of Thought / 1. Thought
7850 Thinking about a thing doesn't require activating it
7851 Consciousness affects bodily movement, so thoughts must be material states
18. Thought / B. Mechanics of Thought / 5. Mental Files
16369 There is a single file per object, memorised, reactivated, consolidated and expanded [Recanati]
18. Thought / C. Content / 6. Broad Content
7884 Most reductive accounts of representation imply broad content
7863 If content hinges on matters outside of you, how can it causally influence your actions?
19. Language / A. Nature of Meaning / 5. Meaning as Verification
7883 Verificationists tend to infer indefinite answers from undecidable questions
13410 Verificationism about concepts means you can't deny a theory, because you can't have the concept
19. Language / C. Assigning Meanings / 2. Semantics
7872 Teleosemantics equates meaning with the item the concept is intended to track
19. Language / C. Assigning Meanings / 8. Possible Worlds Semantics
7869 Truth conditions in possible worlds can't handle statements about impossibilities
7868 Thought content is possible worlds that make the thought true; if that includes the actual world, it's true
19. Language / F. Communication / 4. Private Language
3516 The Private Language argument only means people may misjudge their experiences
26. Natural Theory / C. Causation / 8. Particular Causation / b. Causal relata
7853 Causation is based on either events, or facts, or states of affairs
7857 Causes are instantiations of properties by particulars, or they are themselves basic particulars
26. Natural Theory / D. Laws of Nature / 10. Closure of Physics
20976 The completeness of physics cannot be proved
20974 Modern biological research, especially into the cell, has revealed no special new natural forces
20970 Determinism is possible without a complete physics, if mental forces play a role
27. Natural Reality / A. Classical Physics / 2. Thermodynamics / c. Conservation of energy
20975 Quantum 'wave collapses' seem to violate conservation of energy