76 ideas
| 19693 | There is practical wisdom (for action), and theoretical wisdom (for deep understanding) [Aristotle, by Whitcomb] |
| Full Idea: Aristotle takes wisdom to come in two forms, the practical and the theoretical, the former of which is good judgement about how to act, and the latter of which is deep knowledge or understanding. | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by Dennis Whitcomb - Wisdom Intro | |
| A reaction: The interesting question is then whether the two are connected. One might be thoroughly 'sensible' about action, without counting as 'wise', which seems to require a broader view of what is being done. Whitcomb endorses Aristotle on this idea. |
| 20728 | Metaphysics is hopeless with its present epistemology; common-sense realism is needed [Colvin] |
| Full Idea: Despair over metaphysics will not change until it has shaken off the incubus of a perverted epistemology, which has left thought in a hopeless tangle - until common-sense critical realism is made the starting point for investigating reality. | |
| From: Stephen S. Colvin (The Common-Sense View of Reality [1902], p.144) | |
| A reaction: It seems to me that this is what has happened to analytic metaphysics since Kripke. Careful discussions about the nature of an object, or a category, or a property, are relying on unquestioned robust realism. Quite right too. |
| 1575 | For Aristotle logos is essentially the ability to talk rationally about questions of value [Roochnik on Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: For Aristotle logos is the ability to speak rationally about, with the hope of attaining knowledge, questions of value. | |
| From: comment on Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by David Roochnik - The Tragedy of Reason p.26 |
| 1589 | Aristotle is the supreme optimist about the ability of logos to explain nature [Roochnik on Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: Aristotle is the great theoretician who articulates a vision of a world in which natural and stable structures can be rationally discovered. His is the most optimistic and richest view of the possibilities of logos | |
| From: comment on Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by David Roochnik - The Tragedy of Reason p.95 |
| 8200 | Aristotelian definitions aim to give the essential properties of the thing defined [Aristotle, by Quine] |
| Full Idea: A real definition, according to the Aristotelian tradition, gives the essence of the kind of thing defined. Man is defined as a rational animal, and thus rationality and animality are of the essence of each of us. | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by Willard Quine - Vagaries of Definition p.51 | |
| A reaction: Compare Idea 4385. Personally I prefer the Aristotelian approach, but we may have to say 'We cannot identify the essence of x, and so x cannot be defined'. Compare 'his mood was hard to define' with 'his mood was hostile'. |
| 4385 | Aristotelian definition involves first stating the genus, then the differentia of the thing [Aristotle, by Urmson] |
| Full Idea: For Aristotle, to give a definition one must first state the genus and then the differentia of the kind of thing to be defined. | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by J.O. Urmson - Aristotle's Doctrine of the Mean p.157 | |
| A reaction: Presumably a modern definition would just be a list of properties, but Aristotle seeks the substance. How does he define a genus? - by placing it in a further genus? |
| 13282 | Aristotle relativises the notion of wholeness to different measures [Aristotle, by Koslicki] |
| Full Idea: Aristotle proposes to relativise unity and plurality, so that a single object can be both one (indivisible) and many (divisible) simultaneously, without contradiction, relative to different measures. Wholeness has degrees, with the strength of the unity. | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by Kathrin Koslicki - The Structure of Objects 7.2.12 | |
| A reaction: [see Koslicki's account of Aristotle for details] As always, the Aristotelian approach looks by far the most promising. Simplistic mechanical accounts of how parts make wholes aren't going to work. We must include the conventional and conceptual bit. |
| 4730 | For Aristotle, the subject-predicate structure of Greek reflected a substance-accident structure of reality [Aristotle, by O'Grady] |
| Full Idea: Aristotle apparently believed that the subject-predicate structure of Greek reflected the substance-accident nature of reality. | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by Paul O'Grady - Relativism Ch.4 | |
| A reaction: We need not assume that Aristotle is wrong. It is a chicken-and-egg. There is something obvious about subject-predicate language, if one assumes that unified objects are part of nature, and not just conventional. |
| 6653 | Syntactical methods of proof need only structure, where semantic methods (truth-tables) need truth [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: Syntactical methods of proof (e.g.'natural deduction') have regard only to the formal structure of premises and conclusions, whereas semantic methods (e.g. truth-tables) consider their possible interpretations as expressing true or false propositions. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch. 8) | |
| A reaction: This is highly significant, because the first method of reasoning could be mechanical, whereas the second requires truth, and hence meaning, and hence (presumably) consciousness. Is full rationality possible with 'natural deduction'? |
| 20726 | We can only distinguish self from non-self if there is an inflexible external reality [Colvin] |
| Full Idea: Were there no inflexible reality outside of the individual, opposing and limiting it, knowledge of the self and the non-self would never develop. | |
| From: Stephen S. Colvin (The Common-Sense View of Reality [1902], p.140) | |
| A reaction: Presumably opponents would have to say that such 'knowledge' is an illusion. This is in no way a conclusive argument, but I approach the problem of realism in quest of the best explanation, and this idea is important evidence. |
| 20727 | Common-sense realism rests on our interests and practical life [Colvin] |
| Full Idea: It is the determination of the external world from the practical standpoint, from the standpoint of interest, that may be defined as the common-sense view of reality. | |
| From: Stephen S. Colvin (The Common-Sense View of Reality [1902], p.141) | |
| A reaction: Probably more appropriately named the 'pragmatic' view of reality. Relying on what is 'practical' seems to offer some objectivity, but relying on 'interest' rather less so. Can I be an anti-realist when life goes badly, and a realist when it goes well? |
| 20729 | Arguments that objects are unknowable or non-existent assume the knower's existence [Colvin] |
| Full Idea: Arguments for the absolute unknowability or non-existence of an external object only works by assuming that another external object, an individual, is known completely in so far as that individual expresses a judgement about an external object. | |
| From: Stephen S. Colvin (The Common-Sense View of Reality [1902], p.145) | |
| A reaction: Anti-realism is a decay that eats into everything. You can't doubt all the externals without doubting all the internals as well. |
| 20730 | If objects are doubted because their appearances change, that presupposes one object [Colvin] |
| Full Idea: If objects are doubted because the same object appears differently at different times and circumstances, in order that this judgement shall have weight it must be assumed that the object under question is the same in its different presentations. | |
| From: Stephen S. Colvin (The Common-Sense View of Reality [1902], p.145) | |
| A reaction: [compressed] Scepticism could eat into the underlying object as well. Is the underlying object a 'substrate'? If so, what's that? Is the object just a bundle of a properties? If so, there is no underlying object. |
| 20731 | The idea that everything is relations is contradictory; relations are part of the concept of things [Colvin] |
| Full Idea: The doctrine [that all we can know is the relations between subject and object] is in its essence self-contradictory, since our very idea of thing implies that it is something in relation either actually or potentially. | |
| From: Stephen S. Colvin (The Common-Sense View of Reality [1902], p.150) | |
| A reaction: Ladyman and Ross try to defend an account of reality based entirely on relations. I'm with Colvin on this one. All accounts of reality based either on pure relations or pure functions have a huge hole in their theory. |
| 13276 | The unmoved mover and the soul show Aristotelian form as the ultimate mereological atom [Aristotle, by Koslicki] |
| Full Idea: Aristotle's discussion of the unmoved mover and of the soul confirms the suspicion that form, when it is not thought of as the object represented in a definition, plays the role of the ultimate mereological atom within his system. | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by Kathrin Koslicki - The Structure of Objects 6.6 | |
| A reaction: Aristotle is concerned with which things are 'divisible', and he cites these two examples as indivisible, but they may be too unusual to offer an actual theory of how Aristotle builds up wholes from atoms. He denies atoms in matter. |
| 13277 | The 'form' is the recipe for building wholes of a particular kind [Aristotle, by Koslicki] |
| Full Idea: Thus in Aristotle we may think of an object's formal components as a sort of recipe for how to build wholes of that particular kind. | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by Kathrin Koslicki - The Structure of Objects 7.2.5 | |
| A reaction: In the elusive business of pinning down what Aristotle means by the crucial idea of 'form', this analogy strikes me as being quite illuminating. It would fit DNA in living things, and the design of an artifact. |
| 6618 | A 'substance' is a thing that remains the same when its properties change [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: By 'substance', in the context of the mind, we mean a persisting object or thing which can undergo changes in its properties over time while remaining one and the same thing. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch. 2) | |
| A reaction: A neat account of the traditional philosophical notion of a substance. It invites the obvious question of how you know that a thing is the same if all of its properties seem to have changed (as with Descartes' wax). Epistemology discredits ontology. |
| 5991 | For Aristotle, knowledge is of causes, and is theoretical, practical or productive [Aristotle, by Code] |
| Full Idea: Aristotle thinks that in general we have knowledge or understanding when we grasp causes, and he distinguishes three fundamental types of knowledge - theoretical, practical and productive. | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by Alan D. Code - Aristotle | |
| A reaction: Productive knowledge we tend to label as 'knowing how'. The centrality of causes for knowledge would get Aristotle nowadays labelled as a 'naturalist'. It is hard to disagree with his three types, though they may overlap. |
| 6635 | Causal theories of belief make all beliefs true, and can't explain belief about the future [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: The causal theory of beliefs seems condemned to treat all beliefs as true, which is absurd, …and we do not want to say that tomorrow's rain 'causes' today's belief that it will rain tomorrow. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch. 4) | |
| A reaction: This is aimed at Fodor. A false belief might be caused by reality if one had one's internal wires crossed, and a belief about the future might be caused by events happening now. This theory is not dead. |
| 6619 | Perhaps 'I' no more refers than the 'it' in 'it is raining' [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: Perhaps the 'I' in 'I think' no more serves to pick out a certain object than does the 'it' in 'it is raining'. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch. 2) | |
| A reaction: A nice example to remind us that not all English pronouns have genuine reference. You could reply that 'it' does refer, to the weather; or that you can switch to 'you think', but not to 'they/we are raining'. |
| 6643 | 'Ecological' approaches say we don't infer information, but pick it up directly from reality [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: The 'ecological' approach to perception resists the idea that our brains have to construct information about our environment by inference from sensations, because the information is already present in the environment, available to well-tuned senses. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch. 6) | |
| A reaction: The psychologist J.J.Gibson is the source of this view. This pushes us towards direct realism, and away from representative theories, which are based too much on problems arising from illusions (which are freak cases). Interesting. |
| 11239 | The notion of a priori truth is absent in Aristotle [Aristotle, by Politis] |
| Full Idea: The notion of a priori truth is conspicuously absent in Aristotle. | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by Vassilis Politis - Aristotle and the Metaphysics 1.5 | |
| A reaction: Cf. Idea 11240. |
| 6638 | One must be able to visually recognise a table, as well as knowing its form [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: A bare knowledge that tables have a particular form will not enable one to recognise a table visually, unless one knows how something with such a form typically appears or looks from a variety of different angles. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch. 6) | |
| A reaction: This seems to be a rather significant point, if we are trying to work out how concepts and models operate in the process of perception. Lowe points out that with electrons, we have some knowledge of the form, but no capacity for recognition. |
| 6644 | Computationalists object that the 'ecological' approach can't tell us how we get the information [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: Computational psychologists object to the 'ecological' approach to perception (with its externalist, direct realist picture), because it leaves us entirely in the dark as to how our senses 'pick up' information about the environment. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch. 6) | |
| A reaction: I find myself siding with the computationalists, but then I have always favoured the representational view of perception among philosophers. Lowe comments that both approaches neglect actual experience. We construct models, e.g. of London. |
| 6647 | Comparing shapes is proportional in time to the angle of rotation [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: When two objects, one of them rotated, are compared, the length of time it takes the subjects to determine they are of the same shape is roughly proportional to the size of angle of rotation, ...which suggests analogue modes of representation. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch. 7) | |
| A reaction: I consider this to be highly significant for our whole understanding of the mind, which I think of as a set of models organised like a database. Think about the weather, phenomenalism, London, the Renaissance, your leg. You play with models. |
| 6639 | The 'disjunctive' theory of perception says true perceptions and hallucinations need have nothing in common [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: The 'disjunctive' theory of perception says that we have either veridical perception or else hallucination, but there is no common element in the form of a 'perceptual experience' which would be present in either case and merely caused in different ways. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch. 6) | |
| A reaction: McDowell is associated with this view. It seems to be another attempt to get rid of sense-data. It seems odd, though, to say that a hallucination of a dagger has nothing in common at all with experience of real daggers. Why did hallucinations evolve? |
| 6640 | A causal theorist can be a direct realist, if all objects of perception are external [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: A causal theorist can be a 'direct realist' in the sense that he can hold that the only objects of perception are external objects. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch. 6) | |
| A reaction: There still seem to be problems with perceiving reflections, or very distant objects (the time-lag problem), or perceiving 'secondary' qualities. |
| 6645 | If blindsight shows we don't need perceptual experiences, the causal theory is wrong [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: If we don't need to have perceptual experiences in order to see things (as 'blindsight' might suggest), the causal theory of perception cannot be correct. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch. 6) | |
| A reaction: This is because the causal theory implies a chain of events culminating in experience as the last stage. There is no suggestion, though, that unconscious perception would be non-causal, as it bypasses all the problems about consciousness. |
| 6637 | How could one paraphrase very complex sense-data reports adverbially? [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: How could one paraphrase the sense-datum report 'I am aware of a red square sense-datum to the right of a blue round sense-datum' in an adverbial way? 'I am appeared to redly and squarely and roundly and bluely'? | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch. 5) | |
| A reaction: It is a nice question, but not an instant refutation of the adverbial theory. Vision may be a complex tangle of modes of seeing things, rather than a large collection of sense-data. As I look out of the window, how many sense-data do I experience? |
| 23312 | Aristotle is a rationalist, but reason is slowly acquired through perception and experience [Aristotle, by Frede,M] |
| Full Idea: Aristotle is a rationalist …but reason for him is a disposition which we only acquire over time. Its acquisition is made possible primarily by perception and experience. | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by Michael Frede - Aristotle's Rationalism p.173 | |
| A reaction: I would describe this process as the gradual acquisition of the skill of objectivity, which needs the right knowledge and concepts to evaluate new experiences. |
| 16111 | Aristotle wants to fit common intuitions, and therefore uses language as a guide [Aristotle, by Gill,ML] |
| Full Idea: Since Aristotle generally prefers a metaphysical theory that accords with common intuitions, he frequently relies on facts about language to guide his metaphysical claims. | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by Mary Louise Gill - Aristotle on Substance Ch.5 | |
| A reaction: I approve of his procedure. I take intuition to be largely rational justifications too complex for us to enunciate fully, and language embodies folk intuitions in its concepts (especially if the concepts occur in many languages). |
| 6667 | There are memories of facts, memories of practical skills, and autobiographical memory [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: Memory of facts is quite different from memory of practical skills, and both are quite distinct from what is sometimes called personal or autobiographical memory. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch.10) | |
| A reaction: If we accept David Marshall's proposal (Idea 6668), then all of the mind is memory, of many different types, and so the above analysis will be much too simple. |
| 6642 | Psychologists say illusions only occur in unnatural and passive situations [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: Psychologists point out that illusions almost always occur in unnatural environments in which subjects are prevented from exploiting the natural interplay between perception and action. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch. 6) | |
| A reaction: It has always struck me that philosophers make a great deal out of illusions, but I don't think I have ever had one. I don't know anyone who has seen a non-existent dagger. |
| 16971 | Plato says sciences are unified around Forms; Aristotle says they're unified around substance [Aristotle, by Moravcsik] |
| Full Idea: Plato's unity of science principle states that all - legitimate - sciences are ultimately about the Forms. Aristotle's principle states that all sciences must be, ultimately, about substances, or aspects of substances. | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE], 1) by Julius Moravcsik - Aristotle on Adequate Explanations 1 |
| 11243 | Aristotelian explanations are facts, while modern explanations depend on human conceptions [Aristotle, by Politis] |
| Full Idea: For Aristotle things which explain (the explanantia) are facts, which should not be associated with the modern view that says explanations are dependent on how we conceive and describe the world (where causes are independent of us). | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by Vassilis Politis - Aristotle and the Metaphysics 2.1 | |
| A reaction: There must be some room in modern thought for the Aristotelian view, if some sort of robust scientific realism is being maintained against the highly linguistic view of philosophy found in the twentieth century. |
| 3320 | Aristotle's standard analysis of species and genus involves specifying things in terms of something more general [Aristotle, by Benardete,JA] |
| Full Idea: The standard Aristotelian doctrine of species and genus in the theory of anything whatever involves specifying what the thing is in terms of something more general. | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by José A. Benardete - Metaphysics: the logical approach Ch.10 |
| 12000 | Aristotle regularly says that essential properties explain other significant properties [Aristotle, by Kung] |
| Full Idea: The view that essential properties are those in virtue of which other significant properties of the subjects under investigation can be explained is encountered repeatedly in Aristotle's work. | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by Joan Kung - Aristotle on Essence and Explanation IV | |
| A reaction: What does 'significant' mean here? I take it that the significant properties are the ones which explain the role, function and powers of the object. |
| 6641 | Externalists say minds depend on environment for their very existence and identity [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: Externalism maintains that our minds 'reach out' into our physical environment, at least in the sense that our states of mind can depend for their very existence and identity upon what things that environment contains. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch. 6) | |
| A reaction: A nice statement of the externalist view. Does this mean that a brain in a vat would not have a mind? Does a photograph 'reach out' to its subject-matter? |
| 6617 | The main questions are: is mind distinct from body, and does it have unique properties? [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: Philosophy of mind seems to address the questions of whether the mind is distinct from the body, and whether the mind has properties, such as consciousness, which are unique to it. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Intro) | |
| A reaction: Simple enough, but the modern debate seems to centre on the second question, which is here stated nice and clearly. Of course, wild garlic has a unique smell, but that doesn't quite qualify as a 'unique property'. Are the properties of mind unpredictable? |
| 6626 | 'Phenomenal' consciousness is of qualities; 'apperceptive' consciousness includes beliefs and desires [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: There is 'phenomenal' consciousness, which is what is distinctive of qualitative states of experience, and 'apperceptive' consciousness, which is awareness of all of one's mental states, including beliefs and desires. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch. 3) | |
| A reaction: I am not convinced that this distinction is sharp enough to be useful, though I approve of trying to analyse the components of consciousness. Is there 'intentional' consciousness? Desires, and even beliefs, can have qualities. |
| 6646 | The brain may have two systems for vision, with only the older one intact in blindsight [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: Some physiologists maintain that the human brain is equipped with two different visual systems, an older one and a more recently evolved one, only the first of which is intact in blindsight subjects. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch. 6) | |
| A reaction: Ramachandran (on TV) suggested that lizards lack the newer system, and therefore may not actually be conscious. The proposal of two systems seems to make nice sense of an odd phenomenon. We clearly have a non-conscious route to visual information. |
| 6665 | Persons are selves - subjects of experience, with reflexive self-knowledge [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: I suggest that persons are selves - that is, they are subjects of experience which have the capacity to recognised themselves as being individual subjects of experience; selves possess reflexive self-knowledge. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch.10) | |
| A reaction: I would express this as 'a capacity for meta-thought'. I increasingly see that as the hallmark of homo sapiens, and the key quality I look for in assessing the intelligence of aliens. Very intelligent people are exceptionally self-aware. |
| 6670 | If my brain could survive on its own, I cannot be identical with my whole body [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: If, as seems intuitively plausible, I could survive with my brain detached from the rest of my body, I most certainly cannot be identical with my whole body. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch.10) | |
| A reaction: A key mistake is to treat the notion of 'I' as all-or-nothing. My surviving brain is much more like me than my surviving kidney, but the notion of my brain saying to my family 'it's me in that jar over there' sounds wrong. It is a bit of me. |
| 6671 | It seems impossible to get generally applicable mental concepts from self-observation [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: It seems impossible for me to acquire perfectly general concepts of thought and feeling, applicable to other people as well as to myself, purely from some queer kind of mental self-observation, but this is what the observational model demands. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch.10) | |
| A reaction: I don't understand the word 'queer' here, which seems part of an odd modern fashion for denigrating introspection. It is right, though, that the acquisition of general mental concepts from my mind seems to depend on analogy, which is a suspect method. |
| 6666 | All human languages have an equivalent of the word 'I' [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: Every human language appears to have a word or expression equivalent to the English word 'I'. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch.10) | |
| A reaction: If this is true (what is his evidence?) I take it to be very significant support for what I take to be obvious anyway, that the mind/brain has a central controlling core, which understands and decides, and which is the most valued part of us. |
| 6625 | If qualia are causally inert, how can we even know about them? [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: The idea that 'qualia' exist but are causally inert is difficult to sustain: for if they are causally inert, how can we even know about them? | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch. 3) | |
| A reaction: The brain might be a special case. I can't know about a 'causally inert' object in my kitchen, but I might know about it if in some way I AM that object. Personally, though, I think everything that exists is causally active. |
| 6621 | You can only identify behaviour by ascribing belief, so the behaviour can't explain the belief [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: One must already understand what it means to ascribe to someone a belief that it is raining in order to be able to generate the items on the list of rain-behaviour, so the list cannot be used to explain what it means to ascribe to someone such a belief. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch. 3) | |
| A reaction: This is thought by many to be a decisive objection of behaviourism, because it makes the enterprise hopelessly circular. If I put up an umbrella when it was dry, you would probably infer that I believed it was raining. |
| 6654 | A computer program is equivalent to the person AND the manual [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: A computer executing its program is not equivalent to the English-speaker in the Chinese Room, but to the combination of the English-speaker and the operation manual. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch. 8) | |
| A reaction: Searle replies that there would be no understanding even if the person learned the manual off by heart. However, if we ask 'Is there any understanding of the universe in Newton's book?' the answer has to be 'yes'. So the manual contains understanding. |
| 6629 | Functionalism commits us to bizarre possibilities, such as 'zombies' [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: Functionalism seems to commit us to bizarre possibilities, such as 'zombies'. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch. 3) | |
| A reaction: This goes with the tendency of functionalism to imply epiphenomenalism - that is, to make the intrinsic character of mental states irrelevant to thinking. I'd love to eavesdrop on two zombies in an art gallery. |
| 6623 | Functionalism can't distinguish our experiences in spectrum inversion [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: It seems that functionalism can recognise no difference between my colour experiences and yours, in the case of spectrum inversion, suggesting that it fails to characterise colour experience adequately, by omitting its qualitative character. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch. 3) | |
| A reaction: This is a standard objection to functionalism, but then it is an objection to most other theories as well. Even dualism just offers a mystery as to why experiences have qualities. Observing a patch of red involves about three billion brain connections. |
| 6628 | Functionalism only discusses relational properties of mental states, not intrinsic properties [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: Functionalism has nothing positive to say about the intrinsic properties of mental states, only something about their relational properties. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch. 3) | |
| A reaction: This seems to me highly significant. All references to function (e.g. in Aristotle) invite the question of what enables something to have that function. Maybe the core question of philosophy of mind is whether mental states are intrinsic or relational. |
| 6622 | Non-reductive physicalism accepts token-token identity (not type-type) and asserts 'supervenience' of mind and brain [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: The rejection of type-type identity and acceptance of token-token identity is referred to as 'non-reductive physicalism', and is usually link with the idea that mental state types are not identical with physical state types, but 'supervene' on them. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch. 3) | |
| A reaction: A nice summary of the view (built on the arguments of Davidson) which has also become known as 'property dualism'. Personally I regard it as dangerous nonsense. If two things 'supervene' on one another, the first question to ask is: why? |
| 6634 | Physicalists must believe in narrow content (because thoughts are merely the brain states) [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: Physicalists will, it seems, be committed to the notion of narrow content, because if a person and their counterpart are neurological duplicates, they must exemplify the same mental state types, and thus possess beliefs with the same contents. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch. 4) | |
| A reaction: Very important. How many philosophers currently believe in both wide content and reductive physicalism? However, if content is physical brain-plus-environment, we might reply that the whole package must be identical for same content. Cf Idea 7884! |
| 6630 | Eliminativism is incoherent if it eliminates reason and truth as well as propositional attitudes [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: Eliminative materialism may be accused of incoherence, insofar as is threatens to eliminate reason and truth along with the propositional attitudes. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch. 3) | |
| A reaction: Lowe does not enlarge on this intriguing suggestion. I don't see a threat to truth, if brain events represent the outer world, as they can do it more or less well. Logic is built on truth. Reason grows out of logic. Evidence seems okay… Hm. |
| 6648 | Some behaviourists believe thought is just suppressed speech [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: Some behaviourists have held the view that thinking just is, in effect, suppressed speech. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch. 7) | |
| A reaction: He cites J.B.Watson. This would imply that infants and animals can't think. Introspecting my own case, I don't believe it. When I am navigating through a town, for example, I directly relate to my mental map; I see little sign of anything verbal. |
| 6651 | People are wildly inaccurate in estimating probabilities about an observed event [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: In the 'cab problem' (what colour was the cab in the accident?) most people estimate an 80% probability of it being a blue cab, but Bayes' Theorem calculates the probability at 41%, suggesting people put too much faith in eyewitness testimony. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch. 8) | |
| A reaction: For details of the 'cab problem', see Lowe p.200. My suspicion is that people get into a tangle when confronted with numbers in a theoretical situation, but are much better at it when faced with a real life problem, like 'who ate my chocolate?' |
| 6652 | 'Base rate neglect' makes people favour the evidence over its background [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: 'Base rate neglect' (attending to the witness or evidence, and ignoring background information) is responsible for doctors exaggerating the significance of positive results in diagnosis of relatively rare medical conditions. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch. 8) | |
| A reaction: This seems to be one of the clearest cases where people's behaviour is irrational, though I suspect that people are much more rational about things if the case is simple and non-numerical. However, people are very credulous about wonderful events. |
| 23300 | Aristotle and the Stoics denied rationality to animals, while Platonists affirmed it [Aristotle, by Sorabji] |
| Full Idea: Aristotle, and also the Stoics, denied rationality to animals. …The Platonists, the Pythagoreans, and some more independent Aristotelians, did grant reason and intellect to animals. | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by Richard Sorabji - Rationality 'Denial' | |
| A reaction: This is not the same as affirming or denying their consciousness. The debate depends on how rationality is conceived. |
| 6655 | The 'Frame Problem' is how to program the appropriate application of general knowledge [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: The 'Frame Problem' in artificial intelligence is how to write a program which not only embodies people's general knowledge, but specifies how that knowledge is to be applied appropriately, when circumstances can't be specified in advance. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch. 8) | |
| A reaction: As Lowe observes, this is a problem, but not necessarily an impossibility. There should be a way to symbolically map the concepts of knowledge onto the concepts of perception, just as we must do. |
| 6657 | Computers can't be rational, because they lack motivation and curiosity [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: Lack of motivation and curiosity are perhaps the most fundamental reason for denying that computers could be, in any literal sense, rational beings. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch. 9) | |
| A reaction: I don't see why programmers couldn't move those two priorities to the top of the list in the program. When you switch on a robot, its first words could be 'Teach me something!', or 'Let's do something interesting!' Every piece of software has priorities. |
| 6656 | The Turing test is too behaviourist, and too verbal in its methods [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: The Turing test is open to the objection that it is inspired by behaviourist assumptions and focuses too narrowly on verbal evidence of intelligence. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch. 8) | |
| A reaction: This is part of the objection that the test exhibits human chauvinism, and robots and aliens are wasting their time trying to pass it. You need human behaviour, especially speech, to do well. Inarticulate people can exhibit high practical intelligence. |
| 6636 | The naturalistic views of how content is created are the causal theory and the teleological theory [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: The leading naturalistic theories of what it is that confers a specific content upon a given attitudinal state are the causal theory, and the teleological theory, both of which contain serious difficulties. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch. 4) | |
| A reaction: 'Causal' theories (Fodor) say the world directly causes content; 'teleological' theories (Millikan, Papineau) are based on the evolutionary purpose of content for the subject. I agree that neither seems adequate… |
| 6633 | Twin Earth cases imply that even beliefs about kinds of stuff are indexical [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: The implication of considerations of Twin Earth cases is that even beliefs about the properties of kinds of stuff are implicitly indexical, or context-dependent, in character. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch. 4) | |
| A reaction: This is a significant connection, between debates about the nature of indexicals (such as 'I' and 'this') and externalism about content generally. Is there no distinction between objective reference and contextual reference? |
| 6632 | The same proposition provides contents for the that-clause of an utterance and a belief [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: We use the same that-clause ('that snow is white') to specify the contents of both a person's utterances and of their beliefs, because it is the same proposition. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch. 4) | |
| A reaction: Certainly to say 'he believes that we should declare war' seems to refer to something non-linguistic, but it doesn't demonstrate that anything concrete or real is being referred to. It may be an abstract account of dispositions and desires. |
| 6631 | If propositions are abstract entities, how can minds depend on their causal powers? [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: If propositions are abstract entities, more like the objects of mathematics, it seems mysterious that states of mind should depend for their causal powers upon the propositions which allegedly constitute their 'contents'. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], 70) | |
| A reaction: Compare standard objections to Platonic Forms (e.g. Idea 3353). You can't believe in abstract propositions, but be a reductive physicalist about the mind. So propositions are dynamic brain structures. Easy. |
| 11240 | The notion of analytic truth is absent in Aristotle [Aristotle, by Politis] |
| Full Idea: The notion of analytic truth is conspicuously absent in Aristotle. | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by Vassilis Politis - Aristotle and the Metaphysics 1.5 | |
| A reaction: Cf. Idea 11239. |
| 6659 | The three main theories of action involve the will, or belief-plus-desire, or an agent [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: The two alternatives to volitionism in explaining action are (firstly) certain complexes of belief and desire, and (secondly) causation by an agent. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch. 9) | |
| A reaction: A helpful framework. A key test case seems to that of trying to perform an action and failing (e.g. through paralysis), and this goes against the whole 'agent' being the most basic concept. One also needs room for reasons, and this supports volitionism. |
| 6661 | Libet gives empirical support for the will, as a kind of 'executive' mental operation [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: Libet's experiments (on conscious and non-conscious choice) seem to provide empirical support for the concept of 'volition', conceived as a special kind of 'executive' mental operation. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch. 9) | |
| A reaction: Despite the strictures of Hobbes (Idea 2362) and Williams (Idea 2171), the will strikes me as a genuine item, clearly observable by introspection, and offering the best explanation of human behaviour. I take it to be part of the brain's frontal lobes. |
| 6662 | We feel belief and desire as reasons for choice, not causes of choice [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: When we choose how to act in the light of our beliefs and desires, we do not feel our choices to be caused by them, but we conceive of them as giving us reasons to choose. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch. 9) | |
| A reaction: I agree, though this 'feeling' could be a delusion, and we certainly don't need to start talking about a 'free' will. The best account of action seems to be that the will operates on the raw material of beliefs and desires. The will is our 'decision box'. |
| 6663 | People's actions are explained either by their motives, or their reasons, or the causes [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: When we ask why people act in the ways that they do, we are sometimes enquiring into people's motives, at other times we want to uncover their reasons, and at others we want to know the causes of their actions. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind [2000], Ch. 9) | |
| A reaction: Helpful distinctions. Any one of these explanations might be collapsed into the others. Kantians, utilitarians and contractarians can study reasons, nihilists can study causes, and virtue theorists I take to be concerned with motives. |
| 6559 | Aristotle never actually says that man is a rational animal [Aristotle, by Fogelin] |
| Full Idea: To the best of my knowledge (and somewhat to my surprise), Aristotle never actually says that man is a rational animal; however, he all but says it. | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by Robert Fogelin - Walking the Tightrope of Reason Ch.1 | |
| A reaction: When I read this I thought that this database would prove Fogelin wrong, but it actually supports him, as I can't find it in Aristotle either. Descartes refers to it in Med.Two. In Idea 5133 Aristotle does say that man is a 'social being'. But 22586! |
| 11150 | It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain an idea without accepting it [Aristotle] |
| Full Idea: It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain an idea without accepting it. | |
| From: Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) | |
| A reaction: The epigraph on a David Chalmers website. A wonderful remark, and it should be on the wall of every beginners' philosophy class. However, while it is in the spirit of Aristotle, it appears to be a misattribution with no ancient provenance. |
| 3037 | Aristotle said the educated were superior to the uneducated as the living are to the dead [Aristotle, by Diog. Laertius] |
| Full Idea: Aristotle was asked how much educated men were superior to those uneducated; "As much," he said, "as the living are to the dead." | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by Diogenes Laertius - Lives of Eminent Philosophers 05.1.11 |
| 8660 | There are potential infinities (never running out), but actual infinity is incoherent [Aristotle, by Friend] |
| Full Idea: Aristotle developed his own distinction between potential infinity (never running out) and actual infinity (there being a collection of an actual infinite number of things, such as places, times, objects). He decided that actual infinity was incoherent. | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by Michèle Friend - Introducing the Philosophy of Mathematics 1.3 | |
| A reaction: Friend argues, plausibly, that this won't do, since potential infinity doesn't make much sense if there is not an actual infinity of things to supply the demand. It seems to just illustrate how boggling and uncongenial infinity was to Aristotle. |
| 12058 | Aristotle's matter can become any other kind of matter [Aristotle, by Wiggins] |
| Full Idea: Aristotle's conception of matter permits any kind of matter to become any other kind of matter. | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE]) by David Wiggins - Substance 4.11.2 | |
| A reaction: This is obviously crucial background information when we read Aristotle on matter. Our 92+ elements, and fixed fundamental particles, gives a quite different picture. Aristotle would discuss form and matter quite differently now. |
| 22729 | The concepts of gods arose from observing the soul, and the cosmos [Aristotle, by Sext.Empiricus] |
| Full Idea: Aristotle said that the conception of gods arose among mankind from two originating causes, namely from events which concern the soul and from celestial phenomena. | |
| From: report of Aristotle (works [c.330 BCE], Frag 10) by Sextus Empiricus - Against the Physicists (two books) I.20 | |
| A reaction: The cosmos suggests order, and possible creation. What do events of the soul suggest? It doesn't seem to be its non-physical nature, because Aristotle is more of a functionalist. Puzzling. (It says later that gods are like the soul). |