Showing papers in "Royal Institute of Philosophy Supplement in 2001"
TL;DR: To be announced as discussed by the authors is the title of the lecture of this lecture, and it was the first choice of a title for this lecture which was the best title for the lecture.
Abstract: Consider the task under which I labour: These are supposed to be talks in the millennial spirit. My charge is to find, somewhere in the philosophical landscape, a problem of whose current status I can give some coherent account, and to point the direction in which it seems to me that further research might usefully proceed, And I'm to try to sound reasonably cheerful and optimistic in the course of doing so. No sooner did I begin to ponder these terms of engagement, than it occurred to me that cheer and optimism aren't really my thing; also that I hadn't heard of a topic in the philosophy of mind (which is the only part of philosophy that even I think that I know anything about) which seems to me to be other than a godawful mess. It struck me that my best course would be for me to change my name and go into hiding. Thus my first choice of a title for this lecture, which was ‘To Be Announced’.
69 citations
TL;DR: McTaggart's "The unreality of time" article as discussed by the authors was one of the first works to argue that there is in reality no such thing as time, but that claim was not what made the article so remarkable.
Abstract: Early last century an article appeared which transformed the philosophy of time. The article was James Ellis McTaggart's ‘The unreality of time’, published in 1908. As his title implies, McTaggart argued in this article that there is in reality no such thing as time. But that claim, although startling enough, is not what makes the article so remarkable. The same claim had after all been made long before McTaggart, for example by Kant in 1781, and in McTaggart's sense it is still made by those who think that time is merely one of the four dimensions of an unchanging ‘block universe’. However, most of those who think this are more influenced by Minkowski's comment, also made in 1908, that relativity has doomed space and time to ‘fade away into mere shadows’ of a unified spacetime than they are by McTaggart's more substantial arguments.
67 citations
TL;DR: The rise of modern science is usually seen as a break with the sterility of Aristotelianism, so what exactly is it that modern science does discover, if it is not the essential nature of matter, of force, of energy, of space and time? A famous answer was provided by Poincare.
Abstract: Hume famously warned us that the ‘[The] ultimate springs and principles are totally shut up from human curiosity and enquiry’. Or, again, Newton: ‘Hitherto I have not been able to discover the cause of these properties of gravity … and I frame no hypotheses.’ Aristotelian science was concerned with just such questions, the specification of occult qualities, the real essences that answer the question What is matter, etc?, the preoccupation with circular definitions such as dormative virtues, and so on. The rise of modern science is usually seen as a break with the sterility of Aristotelianism, so what exactly is it that modern science does discover, if it is not the essential nature of matter, of force, of energy, of space and time? A famous answer was provided by Poincare: ‘The true relations between these real objects are the only reality we can attain.’ This is often regarded as the manifesto of so-called structural realism, as espoused in recent years by John Worrall, for example (cp. his (1989)). In response to the arguments of Larry Laudan (1982) against convergent realism, Worrall points to the continuity in the formal relations between elements of reality expressed by mathematical equations, while the intrinsic nature of these elements of reality gets constantly revised.
45 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors argue that most of what an animal needs to know about its environment is not available as natural information of this kind, but more sophisticated forms of inner representation do not.
Abstract: ‘According to informational semantics, if it's necessary that a creature can't distinguish Xs from Ys, it follows that the creature can't have a concept that applies to Xs but not Ys.’ (Fodor, 1994, p. 32)There is, indeed, a form of informational semantics that has this verificationist implication. The original definition of information given in Dretske's Knowledge and the Flow of Information (1981, hereafter KFI), when employed as a base for a theory of intentional representation or ‘content,’ has this implication. I will argue that, in fact, most of what an animal needs to know about its environment is not available as natural information of this kind. It is true, I believe, that there is one fundamental kind of perception that depends on this kind of natural information, but more sophisticated forms of inner representation do not. It is unclear, however, exactly what ‘natural information’ is supposed to mean, certainly in Fodor's, and even in Dretske's writing. In many places, Dretske seems to employ a softer notion than the one he originally defines. I will propose a softer view of natural information that is, I believe, at least hinted at by Dretske, and show that it does not have verificationist consequences. According to this soft informational semantics, a creature can perfectly well have a representation of Xs without being able to discriminate Xs from Ys.
22 citations
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors argue that Steinberg's 1967 New Yorker cover is the metaphorical truth about consciousness, but what is the literal truth? What is going on in the world (largely in this chap's brain, presumably) that makes it the case that this gorgeous metaphor is so apt?
Abstract: If Saul Steinberg's 1967 New Yorker cover is the metaphorical truth about consciousness, what is the literal truth? What is going on in the world (largely in this chap's brain, presumably) that makes it the case that this gorgeous metaphor is so apt?
22 citations
TL;DR: The usual context for raising the issue of "agent-causation" is that of human action as discussed by the authors, and the motivation for mounting a defence of the propriety of agent causation might be to restore moral concepts to a place in human life, via responsibility of actors for their actions, threatened by event (internal or external) causality explanation formats.
Abstract: The usual context for raising the issue of ‘agent-causation’ is that of human action. Cf. the excellent recent book by Fred Vollmer (1999). And a long list of articles. The motivation for mounting a defence of the propriety of agent causation might be to restore moral concepts to a place in human life, via responsibility of actors for their actions, threatened by event (internal or external) causality explanation formats.
20 citations
TL;DR: The following thoughts ran through my mind when I woke up a few days ago as discussed by the authors : 'I need a haircut. If I don't get it first thing this morning, I won't have another chance for two weeks.' But if I go to the barber down the road, he'll want to talk to me about philosophy.
Abstract: When I woke up a few days ago, the following thoughts ran through my mind. ‘I need a haircut. If I don't get it first thing this morning, I won't have another chance for two weeks. But if I go to the barber down the road, he'll want to talk to me about philosophy. So I'd better go to the one in Camden Town. The tube will be very crowded, though. Still, it's a nice day. Why don't I just walk there? It will only take twenty minutes. So I'd better put on these shoes now, have breakfast straight away, and then set out for Camden.’
18 citations
TL;DR: Many people think the mind evolved. as discussed by the authors argued that the mind not only has a history, but also a history essential to its very existence, and that it had to evolve to survive.
Abstract: Many people think the mind evolved. Some of them think it had to evolve. They think the mind not only has a history, but a history essential to its very existence.
15 citations
TL;DR: For instance, this paper pointed out that no one was speaking on language in the lecture series of this lecture series, and this seemed to require comment given the hegemony of philosophy of language at mid-century, after "the linguistic turn".
Abstract: When asked to contribute to this lecture series, my first thought was to talk about philosophy of biology, a new and increasingly influential field in philosophy, surely destined to have great impact in the coming years. But when a preliminary schedule for the series was circulated, I noticed that no one was speaking on language. Given the hegemony of philosophy of language at mid-century, after ‘the linguistic turn’, this seemed to require comment. How did philosophy of language achieve such status at mid-century, and why is it losing it now? Has the Anglo-American tradition really begun to put the philosophy of language in better perspective? I hope so. Indeed, I will end with suggestions for how to keep it more securely in its proper place.
13 citations
TL;DR: This chapter focuses on whether phenomenal consciousness can be given a reductive natural explanation and issues concerning explanation in general, and the explanation of phenomenal consciousness in particular.
Abstract: Can phenomenal consciousness be given a reductive natural explanation? Many people argue not. They claim that there is an 'explanatory gap' between physical and/or intentional states and processes, on the one hand, and phenomenal consciousness, on the other. I reply that, since we have purely recognitional concepts of experience, there is indeed a sort of gap at the level of concepts; but this need not mean that the properties picked out by those concepts are inexplicable. I show how dispositionalist higher-order thought (HOT) theory can reductively explain the subjective feel of experience by deploying a form of 'consumer semantics'. First-order perceptual contents become transformed, acquiring a dimension of subjectivity, by virtue to their availability to a mind-reading (HOT generating) consumer system.
10 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the aim is to explain intentional relations in terms of causal relations, informational relations, teleological or functional relations, relations involving abstract similarity or isomorphism, and various combinations thereof, with a shared presumption that intentionality can be explained in terms that have wider application to intentional systems as well as to systems that have no mental properties at all.
Abstract: One goal of recent philosophy of mind has been to ‘naturalize’ intentionality by showing how a purely physical system could have states that represent or are about items (objects, properties, facts) in the world. The project is reductionist in spirit, the aim being to explain intentional relations—to say what they really are—and to do so in terms that do not themselves utilize intentional or semantic concepts. In this vein there are attempts to explain intentional relations in terms of causal relations, informational relations, teleological or functional relations, relations involving abstract similarity or isomorphism, and various combinations thereof. What makes these accounts naturalistic is the presumed objectivity and scientific respectability of the properties appelated to in the explanans. What makes them all reductive is their shared presumption that intentionality can be explained in terms that have a wider application to intentional systems as well as to systems that have no mental properties at all.
TL;DR: The authors discuss the kinds of evidence that help one determine what mental states, if any, an individual occupies, and the problem of other minds gets solved by a perfunctory invocation of the principle of inference to the best explanation, mainly in order to emphasize that it can lead to mistaken answers.
Abstract: Philosophy of mind is, and for a long while has been, 99% metaphysics and 1% epistemology. Attention is lavished on the question of the nature of mind, but questions concerning how we know about minds are discussed much less thoroughly. University courses in philosophy of mind routinely devote a lot of time to dualism, logical behaviourism, the mind/brain identity theory, and functionalism. But what gets said about the kinds of evidence that help one determine what mental states, if any, an individual occupies? Well, Skinner's puritanical disdain for postulating mental states gets raked over the coals, the problem of other minds gets solved by a perfunctory invocation of the principle of inference to the best explanation, and the Turing test gets discussed, mainly in order to emphasize that it can lead to mistaken answers.
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors define evaluative rationality as "the ability to avoid inconsistency in beliefs and not adopt new beliefs unless what one knows entails or is evidence for the truth of those beliefs".
Abstract: According to the rationality thesis, the possession of propositional attitudes is inextricably tied to rationality. How in this context should we conceive of rationality? In one sense, being rational is contrasted with being non-rational, as when human beings are described as rational animals. In another sense, being rational is contrasted with being irrational. I shall call rationality in this latter sense evaluative rationality. Whatever else it might involve, evaluative rationality surely has to do with satisfying requirements of rationality such as, presumably, the following:(1) That one avoid inconsistency in beliefs.(2) That one not adopt new beliefs unless what one knows entails or is evidence for the truth of those beliefs.(3) That one not have φing as a goal yet do nothing necessary for one to φ. (Means/end requirement.)
TL;DR: This article read a passage from John Locke, An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, Book III, Chapter II, § 2, where the author states: "When a man speaks to another, it is that he may be understood; and the end of speech is that those sounds, as marks, may make known his ideas to the hearer."
Abstract: Our reading is a passage from John Locke, An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, Book III, Chapter II, § 2. When a man speaks to another, it is that he may be understood; and the end of speech is that those sounds, as marks, may make known his ideas to the hearer. … Words being voluntary signs, they cannot be voluntary signs imposed by him on things he knows not. That would be to make them signs of nothing, sounds without signification.
TL;DR: The strongest of the evolutionary psychologists’ in-principle arguments for the evolutionary implausibility of general-purpose mechanisms are considered, based on the requirement that the human cognitive architecture must be capable of solving all the adaptive problems faced by the authors' ancestors.
Abstract: Our aim in this paper is to do some conceptual spring-cleaning. Several prominent evolutionary psychologists have argued that the human cognitive architecture consists in a large number of domain-specific features, rather than, as dissenters claim, a small number of domain-general features. The first difficulty here is that there exists no widely agreed-upon definition of ‘domain’. We show that evolutionary psychology has the resources for such a definition: a domain is defined as an adaptive problem, or a set of suitably related adaptive problems. Adopting this definition, we proceed to introduce the distinction between data and algorithms, and to differentiate four conceptions of our cognitive architecture, only two of which, we argue, are viable: (a) general-purpose mechanisms operating on domain-specific information, and (b) special-purpose mechanisms operating on domain-specific information. Typically, evolutionary psychologists argue in favour of (b), as against (a). Following a defence of this position against a recent claim that the process of exaptation makes general-purpose mechanisms evolutionarily plausible, we consider the strongest of the evolutionary psychologists’ in-principle arguments for the evolutionary implausibility of general-purpose mechanisms. This argument is based on two requirements: that the human cognitive architecture must (i) be capable of solving all the adaptive problems faced by our ancestors, and (ii) have outperformed all competing designs. Work in artificial intelligence suggests that although requirement (i) might be met by general-purpose mechanisms coupled with domain-specific information, requirement (ii) won’t. Nonetheless, we propose (tentatively) that relatively general-purpose mechanisms might result from the operation of multiple, simultaneous, systematically related selection pressures. An examination of this proposal, however, brings into sharp relief the fact that, in many evolutionary scenarios, it simply may not be possible to establish a robust distinction between domain-specific and domain-general features.
TL;DR: The philosophy of mind as discussed by the authors is not any science of the mind, but rather a part of philosophy with some autonomy, enough for students to face examination papers in it by itself, and it is like the rest of philosophy in being more devoted to good thinking about experienced facts than with establishing, elaborating or using them.
Abstract: It was only in the last century of the past millennium that the Philosophy of Mind began to flourish as a part of philosophy with some autonomy, enough for students to face examination papers in it by itself. Despite an inclination in some places to give it the name of Philosophical Psychology, it is not any science of the mind. This is not to say that the Philosophy of Mind is unempirical, but that it is like the rest of philosophy in being more taken up with good thinking about experienced facts than with establishing, elaborating or using them. Logic, if not formal logic, is the core of all philosophy, and so of the Philosophy of Mind. The discipline's first question is what it is for a thing to be conscious, whatever its capabilities. The discipline's second question is how a thing's being conscious is related to the physical world, including chairs, brains and bodily movements—the mind-brain or mind-body problem.
TL;DR: It is now over twenty years since Premack and Woodruff (1978) posed the question, "Do the chimpanzee have a theory of mind?" as discussed by the authors, by which they meant, explained Premack (1988) in a later reappraisal, that "does the ape do what humans do: attribute states of mind to the other one, and use these states to predict and explain the behaviour of other one".
Abstract: It is now over twenty years since Premack and Woodruff (1978) posed the question, ‘Does the chimpanzee have a theory of mind?’—‘by which we meant’, explained Premack (1988) in a later reappraisal, ‘does the ape do what humans do: attribute states of mind to the other one, and use these states to predict and explain the behaviour of the other one? For example, does the ape wonder, while looking quizzically at another individual, What does he really want? What does he believe? What are his intentions?'
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TL;DR: Ruskin said that great nations write their autobiographies in three manuscripts, the book of their deeds, their words, and their art as mentioned in this paper, but of the three the only trustworthy one is the last.
Abstract: Ruskin said ‘Great nations write their autobiographies in three manuscripts, the book of their deeds, the book of their words and the book of their art. Nor one of these books can be understood unless we read the two others, but of the three the only trustworthy one is the last.’
TL;DR: The first laboratory of experimental psychology was established in Germany by Wilhelm Wundt just as Darwin's writings were beginning to have their enormous impact, especially as they might be applied to understand the human mind as discussed by the authors.
Abstract: There is a close coincidence in time between the appearance of psychology as a science and the rise of evolutionary theory. The first laboratory of experimental psychology was established in Germany by Wilhelm Wundt just as Darwin's writings were beginning to have their enormous impact, especially as they might be applied to understanding the human mind (Darwin, 1871). Psychology is an important discipline because it straddles the boundary between the biological sciences and the social or human sciences (defined as those sciences that study exclusively human characteristics) of anthropology, sociology and economics. Given that importance, and given that new sciences lack the conceptual history within which older, established sciences might be mired, it might have been expected that psychology would have embraced in a way that established sciences did not the equally new, sensational and central theorem of biology which spoke to the origins of species as well as the origins of their traits and, crucially, the functions of those traits. Yet for over a century evolutionary theory had virtually no presence in psychology, despite having powerful friends like William James at court (James, 1880).
TL;DR: The first term's essays as mentioned in this paper were the topics of the first term essays, along with smaller infusions of Descartes, Berkeley and Hume, and the syllabus was very clearly set out by the chapter headings of Russell's Problems of Philosophy.
Abstract: I began the study of philosophy in an organized fashion after I was demobilised in 1946. My first steps were firmly Lockean. Innate idea, substance, primary and secondary qualities and personal identity were the topics of the first term's essays, along with smaller infusions of Descartes, Berkeley and Hume. The fundamental examination paper in those days in Oxford was General Philosophy and that meant the problems in the theory of knowledge that had exercised the great philosophers of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries and, beyond them, Russell, Moore, Price and Ayer. The syllabus was very clearly set out by the chapter headings of Russell's Problems of Philosophy .
TL;DR: A striking feature of philosophy in the century just passed is the scale of attention paid to questions concerning the natural environment and technology, a scale so large that any brief survey of the development, current state and possible future of such attention would degenerate into telegrammatic reportage as discussed by the authors.
Abstract: A striking feature of philosophy in the century just passed is the scale of attention paid to questions concerning the natural environment and technology—a scale so large that any brief survey of the development, current state and possible future of such attention would degenerate into telegrammatic reportage. I shall indeed address the question why philosophical concern with environment and technology has ‘taken off’, and with some confidence that its answer will enable a reasonable estimate of the central issues which deserve continuing reflection. But that question, too, is unmanageably large as it stands. So I need to do something to restrict it.
TL;DR: In 1989 Oxford University Press launched a new programme of monographs in moral philosophy entitled the ‘Oxford Ethics Series’ as mentioned in this paper, which contained rigorous analysis and argumentation regarding the nature of reasons and requirements.
Abstract: In 1989 Oxford University Press launched a new programme of monographs in moral philosophy entitled the ‘Oxford Ethics Series’. Given that the series' editor is Derek Parfit it is unsurprising that the books published to date feature rigorous analysis and argumentation regarding the nature of reasons and requirements. Perhaps by way of intended commitment to this profile, the following brief statement appears on the cover of the first volume (Shelly Kagan's The Limits of Morality): ‘The books in the series will contain philosophical arguments about morality or rationality. The aim will be to make undeniable progress’.
TL;DR: In this article, the authors present a broad range of philosophical enquiry including ethics, aesthetics, philosophy of mind and consciousness (MOC), philosophy of time, philosophy-of-the-world (PTT) and philosophy of science, and philosophy and environment.
Abstract: Where is philosophy at the year 2000 and where should it be going in the new millennium? Based on the Royal Institute of Philosophy Annual Lecture Series 1999–2000, this book is written by leading international philosophers and covers the broad range of philosophical enquiry including ethics, aesthetics, philosophy of mind and consciousness, philosophy of time, philosophy of language, philosophy of science, and philosophy and environment.