Combining Philosophers

Ideas for Engelbretsen,G/Sayward,C, Einstein,A/Infeld,L and Jerry A. Fodor

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66 ideas

18. Thought / A. Modes of Thought / 1. Thought
12640 Associative thinking avoids syntax, but can't preserve sense, reference or truth [Fodor]
12641 Connectionism gives no account of how constituents make complex concepts [Fodor]
2992 We may be able to explain rationality mechanically [Fodor]
2476 The goal of thought is to understand the world, not instantly sort it into conceptual categories [Fodor]
18. Thought / A. Modes of Thought / 2. Propositional Attitudes
2440 Propositional attitudes are propositions presented in a certain way [Fodor]
18. Thought / A. Modes of Thought / 4. Folk Psychology
2988 Folk psychology is the only explanation of behaviour we have [Fodor]
3975 Folk psychology explains behaviour by reference to intentional states like belief and desire [Fodor]
18. Thought / A. Modes of Thought / 5. Rationality / a. Rationality
2450 Rationality has mental properties - autonomy, productivity, experiment [Fodor]
18. Thought / B. Mechanics of Thought / 3. Modularity of Mind
2499 Modules analyse stimuli, they don't tell you what to do [Fodor]
2496 Blindness doesn't destroy spatial concepts [Fodor]
2509 Modules have in-built specialist information [Fodor]
2500 Babies talk in consistent patterns [Fodor]
2507 Rationality rises above modules [Fodor]
22186 Mental modules are specialised, automatic, and isolated [Fodor, by Okasha]
2491 Modules have encapsulation, inaccessibility, private concepts, innateness [Fodor]
2497 Something must take an overview of the modules [Fodor]
2495 Obvious modules are language and commonsense explanation [Fodor]
2498 Modules make the world manageable [Fodor]
18. Thought / B. Mechanics of Thought / 4. Language of Thought
3010 Belief and desire are structured states, which need mentalese [Fodor]
8090 Since the language of thought is the same for all, it must be something like logical form [Fodor, by Devlin]
2483 Mentalese doesn't require a theory of meaning [Fodor]
2604 We must have expressive power BEFORE we learn language [Fodor]
12643 Ambiguities in English are the classic reason for claiming that we don't think in English [Fodor]
2480 Language is ambiguous, but thought isn't [Fodor]
2487 Mentalese may also incorporate some natural language [Fodor]
18. Thought / B. Mechanics of Thought / 5. Mental Files
12649 We think in file names [Fodor]
12647 Mental representations name things in the world, but also files in our memory [Fodor]
18. Thought / B. Mechanics of Thought / 6. Artificial Thought / a. Artificial Intelligence
3135 Is thought a syntactic computation using representations? [Fodor, by Rey]
12655 Frame Problem: how to eliminate most beliefs as irrelevant, without searching them? [Fodor]
18. Thought / C. Content / 1. Content
2983 Maybe narrow content is physical, broad content less so [Lyons on Fodor]
18. Thought / C. Content / 2. Ideas
12615 Mental representations are the old 'Ideas', but without images [Fodor]
18. Thought / C. Content / 5. Twin Earth
2437 XYZ (Twin Earth 'water') is an impossibility [Fodor]
12630 If concept content is reference, then my Twin and I are referring to the same stuff [Fodor]
18. Thought / C. Content / 6. Broad Content
3982 How could the extrinsic properties of thoughts supervene on their intrinsic properties? [Fodor]
2441 Truth conditions require a broad concept of content [Fodor]
18. Thought / C. Content / 7. Narrow Content
2999 Obsession with narrow content leads to various sorts of hopeless anti-realism [Fodor]
3114 Concepts aren't linked to stuff; they are what is caused by stuff [Fodor]
18. Thought / C. Content / 9. Conceptual Role Semantics
2486 Content can't be causal role, because causal role is decided by content [Fodor]
18. Thought / C. Content / 10. Causal Semantics
3012 Do identical thoughts have identical causal roles? [Fodor]
2452 Knowing the cause of a thought is almost knowing its content [Fodor]
18. Thought / C. Content / 12. Informational Semantics
2432 Is content basically information, fixed externally? [Fodor]
18. Thought / D. Concepts / 2. Origin of Concepts / a. Origin of concepts
12658 Nobody knows how concepts are acquired [Fodor]
18. Thought / D. Concepts / 2. Origin of Concepts / c. Nativist concepts
11143 If concept-learning is hypothesis-testing, that needs innate concepts to get started [Fodor, by Margolis/Laurence]
6650 Fodor is now less keen on the innateness of concepts [Fodor, by Lowe]
2492 Experience can't explain itself; the concepts needed must originate outside experience [Fodor]
12662 We have an innate capacity to form a concept, once we have grasped the stereotype [Fodor]
18. Thought / D. Concepts / 3. Ontology of Concepts / a. Concepts as representations
12618 It is essential to the concept CAT that it be satisfied by cats [Fodor]
12635 Having a concept isn't a pragmatic matter, but being able to think about the concept [Fodor]
12652 Concepts have two sides; they are files that face thought, and also face subject-matter [Fodor]
18. Thought / D. Concepts / 3. Ontology of Concepts / b. Concepts as abilities
2438 In the information view, concepts are potentials for making distinctions [Fodor]
12614 I prefer psychological atomism - that concepts are independent of epistemic capacities [Fodor]
2471 Are concepts best seen as capacities? [Fodor]
2472 For Pragmatists having a concept means being able to do something [Fodor]
12626 Cartesians put concept individuation before concept possession [Fodor]
18. Thought / D. Concepts / 3. Ontology of Concepts / c. Fregean concepts
12637 Frege's puzzles suggest to many that concepts have sense as well as reference [Fodor]
12638 If concepts have sense, we can't see the connection to their causal powers [Fodor]
12639 Belief in 'senses' may explain intentionality, but not mental processes [Fodor]
18. Thought / D. Concepts / 4. Structure of Concepts / a. Conceptual structure
12654 You can't think 'brown dog' without thinking 'brown' and 'dog' [Fodor]
18. Thought / D. Concepts / 4. Structure of Concepts / b. Analysis of concepts
12621 Definable concepts have constituents, which are necessary, individuate them, and demonstrate possession [Fodor]
18. Thought / D. Concepts / 4. Structure of Concepts / d. Concepts as prototypes
12622 Many concepts lack prototypes, and complex prototypes aren't built from simple ones [Fodor]
12659 Maybe stereotypes are a stage in concept acquisition (rather than a by-product) [Fodor]
12660 One stereotype might be a paradigm for two difference concepts [Fodor]
18. Thought / D. Concepts / 4. Structure of Concepts / f. Theory theory of concepts
12623 The theory theory can't actually tell us what concepts are [Fodor]
18. Thought / D. Concepts / 4. Structure of Concepts / g. Conceptual atomism
12629 For the referential view of thought, the content of a concept is just its reference [Fodor]
12631 Compositionality requires that concepts be atomic [Fodor]
18. Thought / E. Abstraction / 2. Abstracta by Selection
12657 Abstractionism claims that instances provide criteria for what is shared [Fodor]