display all the ideas for this combination of philosophers
4 ideas
| 7722 | If meaning is mental pictures, explain "the cat (or dog!) is NOT on the mat" [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: If meaning is a private mental picture, what does 'the cat is NOT on the mat' mean, and how does it differ from 'the dog is not on the mat?'. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (Locke on Human Understanding [1995], Ch.7) | |
| A reaction: Not insurmountable. We picture an empty mat, combined with a cat (or whatever) located somewhere else. A mental 'picture' of something shouldn't be contrued as a single image in a neat black frame. |
| 16550 | Direct reference doesn't seem to require that thinkers know what it is they are thinking about [Lowe] |
| Full Idea: It may be objected that currently prevailing causal or 'direct' theories of reference precisely deny that a thinker must know what it is the he or she is thinking about in order to be able to think about it. | |
| From: E.J. Lowe (What is the Source of Knowledge of Modal Truths? [2013], 7) | |
| A reaction: Lowe says that at least sometimes we have to know that we are thinking about, so this account of reference can't be universally true. My solution is to pull identity and essence apart. You only need identity, not essence, for 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. |