142 ideas
| 3798 | An overexamined life is as bad as an unexamined one [Dennett] |
| 6979 | Serious metaphysics cares about entailment between sentences [Jackson] |
| 6980 | Conceptual analysis studies whether one story is made true by another story [Jackson] |
| 6983 | Intuitions about possibilities are basic to conceptual analysis [Jackson] |
| 14707 | Conceptual analysis is needed to establish that metaphysical reductions respect original meanings [Jackson, by Schroeter] |
| 3801 | Rationality requires the assumption that things are either for better or worse [Dennett] |
| 18405 | A 'teepee' argument has several mutually supporting planks to it [Cappelen/Dever] |
| 7005 | Something can only have a place in a preferred account of things if it is entailed by the account [Jackson] |
| 6994 | Truth supervenes on being [Jackson] |
| 14352 | '¬', '&', and 'v' are truth functions: the truth of the compound is fixed by the truth of the components [Jackson] |
| 6984 | Smooth reductions preserve high-level laws in the lower level [Jackson] |
| 6978 | Baldness is just hair distribution, but the former is indeterminate, unlike the latter [Jackson] |
| 6993 | Redness is a property, but only as a presentation to normal humans [Jackson] |
| 14308 | We can bring dispositions into existence, as in creating an identifier [Dennett, by Mumford] |
| 8499 | Nominalists cannot translate 'red resembles pink more than blue' into particulars [Jackson] |
| 8500 | Colour resemblance isn't just resemblance between things; 'colour' must be mentioned [Jackson] |
| 14633 | How do we tell a table's being contingently plastic from its being essentially plastic? [Jackson] |
| 14635 | An x is essentially F if it is F in every possible world in which it appears [Jackson] |
| 7384 | Words are fixed by being attached to similarity clusters, without mention of 'essences' [Dennett] |
| 14632 | Quine may have conflated de re and de dicto essentialism, but there is a real epistemological problem [Jackson] |
| 6987 | We should not multiply senses of necessity beyond necessity [Jackson] |
| 14360 | Possible worlds for subjunctives (and dispositions), and no-truth for indicatives? [Jackson] |
| 14288 | 'If A,B' affirms that A⊃B, and also that this wouldn't change if A were certain [Jackson, by Edgington] |
| 13769 | Conditionals are truth-functional, but should only be asserted when they are confident [Jackson, by Edgington] |
| 13858 | The truth-functional account of conditionals is right, if the antecedent is really acceptable [Jackson, by Edgington] |
| 14289 | There are some assertable conditionals one would reject if one learned the antecedent [Jackson, by Edgington] |
| 14353 | Modus ponens requires that A→B is F when A is T and B is F [Jackson] |
| 14354 | When A and B have the same truth value, A→B is true, because A→A is a logical truth [Jackson] |
| 14355 | (A&B)→A is a logical truth, even if antecedent false and consequent true, so it is T if A is F and B is T [Jackson] |
| 14358 | In the possible worlds account of conditionals, modus ponens and modus tollens are validated [Jackson] |
| 14359 | Only assertions have truth-values, and conditionals are not proper assertions [Jackson] |
| 14357 | Possible worlds account, unlike A⊃B, says nothing about when A is false [Jackson] |
| 14356 | We can't insist that A is relevant to B, as conditionals can express lack of relevance [Jackson] |
| 2526 | Philosophers regularly confuse failures of imagination with insights into necessity [Dennett] |
| 14631 | How can you show the necessity of an a posteriori necessity, if it might turn out to be false? [Jackson] |
| 3802 | Why pronounce impossible what you cannot imagine? [Dennett] |
| 6988 | Mathematical sentences are a problem in a possible-worlds framework [Jackson] |
| 6975 | Possible worlds could be concrete, abstract, universals, sentences, or properties [Jackson] |
| 6982 | Long arithmetic calculations show the a priori can be fallible [Jackson] |
| 6991 | We examine objects to determine colour; we do not introspect [Jackson] |
| 7374 | Light wavelengths entering the eye are only indirectly related to object colours [Dennett] |
| 2523 | That every mammal has a mother is a secure reality, but without foundations [Dennett] |
| 3795 | Causal theories require the "right" sort of link (usually unspecified) [Dennett] |
| 7369 | Brains are essentially anticipation machines [Dennett] |
| 4608 | Minds are hard-wired, or trial-and-error, or experimental, or full self-aware [Dennett, by Heil] |
| 7393 | We can't draw a clear line between conscious and unconscious [Dennett] |
| 7367 | Perhaps the brain doesn't 'fill in' gaps in consciousness if no one is looking. [Dennett] |
| 4880 | Sentience comes in grades from robotic to super-human; we only draw a line for moral reasons [Dennett] |
| 2528 | Does consciousness need the concept of consciousness? [Dennett] |
| 2525 | Maybe language is crucial to consciousness [Dennett] |
| 7394 | Conscious events can only be explained in terms of unconscious events [Dennett] |
| 7391 | We can know a lot of what it is like to be a bat, and nothing important is unknown [Dennett] |
| 3158 | Theories of intentionality presuppose rationality, so can't explain it [Dennett] |
| 2527 | Unconscious intentionality is the foundation of the mind [Dennett] |
| 4894 | I say Mary does not have new knowledge, but knows an old fact in a new way [Perry on Jackson] |
| 4895 | Is it unfair that physicalist knowledge can be written down, but dualist knowledge can't be [Perry on Jackson] |
| 4886 | Mary knows all the physical facts of seeing red, but experiencing it is new knowledge [Jackson] |
| 6624 | Dennett denies the existence of qualia [Dennett, by Lowe] |
| 4873 | What is it like to notice an uncomfortable position when you are asleep? [Dennett] |
| 7387 | "Qualia" can be replaced by complex dispositional brain states [Dennett] |
| 7658 | Obviously there can't be a functional anaylsis of qualia if they are defined by intrinsic properties [Dennett] |
| 7376 | We can't assume that dispositions will remain normal when qualia have been inverted [Dennett] |
| 7372 | In peripheral vision we see objects without their details, so blindsight is not that special [Dennett] |
| 7373 | Blindsight subjects glean very paltry information [Dennett] |
| 3797 | I am the sum total of what I directly control [Dennett] |
| 7385 | People accept blurred boundaries in many things, but insist self is All or Nothing [Dennett] |
| 4881 | Being a person must involve having second-order beliefs and desires (about beliefs and desires) [Dennett] |
| 7383 | The psychological self is an abstraction, not a thing in the brain [Dennett] |
| 18422 | Prioprioception focuses on your body parts, not on your self, or indexicality [Cappelen/Dever] |
| 18425 | We can acquire self-knowledge with mirrors, not just with proprioception and introspection [Cappelen/Dever] |
| 18421 | Proprioception is only immune from error if you are certain that it represents the agent [Cappelen/Dever] |
| 7386 | Selves are not soul-pearls, but artefacts of social processes [Dennett] |
| 7381 | We tell stories about ourselves, to protect, control and define who we are [Dennett] |
| 7382 | We spin narratives about ourselves, and the audience posits a centre of gravity for them [Dennett] |
| 7370 | The brain is controlled by shifting coalitions, guided by good purposeful habits [Dennett] |
| 7655 | The work done by the 'homunculus in the theatre' must be spread amongst non-conscious agencies [Dennett] |
| 3800 | You can be free even though force would have prevented you doing otherwise [Dennett, by PG] |
| 3803 | Can we conceive of a being with a will freer than our own? [Dennett] |
| 3791 | Awareness of thought is a step beyond awareness of the world [Dennett] |
| 3794 | Foreknowledge permits control [Dennett] |
| 7379 | If an epiphenomenon has no physical effects, it has to be undetectable [Dennett] |
| 7365 | Dualism wallows in mystery, and to accept it is to give up [Dennett] |
| 3159 | Beliefs and desires aren't real; they are prediction techniques [Dennett] |
| 3796 | The active self is a fiction created because we are ignorant of our motivations [Dennett] |
| 3161 | If mind is just an explanation, the explainer must have beliefs [Rey on Dennett] |
| 3986 | The 'intentional stance' is a way of interpreting an entity by assuming it is rational and self-aware [Dennett] |
| 18419 | Folk Functionalism is a Ramsification of our folk psychology [Cappelen/Dever] |
| 2530 | Could a robot be made conscious just by software? [Dennett] |
| 7371 | All functionalism is 'homuncular', of one grain size or another [Dennett] |
| 4875 | We descend from robots, and our intentionality is composed of billions of crude intentional systems [Dennett] |
| 6976 | In physicalism, the psychological depends on the physical, not the other way around [Jackson] |
| 4879 | There is no more anger in adrenaline than silliness in a bottle of whiskey [Dennett] |
| 6986 | Is the dependence of the psychological on the physical a priori or a posteriori? [Jackson] |
| 7657 | Intelligent agents are composed of nested homunculi, of decreasing intelligence, ending in machines [Dennett] |
| 7656 | I don't deny consciousness; it just isn't what people think it is [Dennett] |
| 7366 | It is arbitrary to say which moment of brain processing is conscious [Dennett] |
| 7380 | Visual experience is composed of neural activity, which we find pleasing [Dennett] |
| 4876 | Maybe there is a minimum brain speed for supporting a mind [Dennett] |
| 6992 | If different states can fulfil the same role, the converse must also be possible [Jackson] |
| 4878 | The materials for a mind only matter because of speed, and a need for transducers and effectors [Dennett] |
| 7880 | If a blind persons suddenly sees a kestrel, that doesn't make visual and theoretical kestrels different [Papineau on Jackson] |
| 7378 | No one bothers to imagine what it would really be like to have ALL the physical information [Dennett on Jackson] |
| 7377 | Mary learns when she sees colour, so her complete physical information had missed something [Jackson] |
| 3987 | Like the 'centre of gravity', desires and beliefs are abstract concepts with no actual existence [Dennett] |
| 3177 | You couldn't drive a car without folk psychology [Dennett] |
| 6996 | Folk psychology covers input, internal role, and output [Jackson] |
| 18407 | Indexicality is not significantly connected to agency [Cappelen/Dever] |
| 18404 | It is assumed that indexical content is needed to represent the perspective of perception [Cappelen/Dever] |
| 18426 | All information is objective, and purely indexical information is not much use [Cappelen/Dever] |
| 18427 | If some of our thought is tied to its context, it will be hard to communicate it [Cappelen/Dever] |
| 18428 | You don't remember your house interior just from an experienced viewpoint [Cappelen/Dever] |
| 18429 | Our beliefs and desires are not organised around ourselves, but around the world [Cappelen/Dever] |
| 4874 | The predecessor and rival of the language of thought hypothesis is the picture theory of ideas [Dennett] |
| 2524 | A language of thought doesn't explain content [Dennett] |
| 7654 | What matters about neuro-science is the discovery of the functional role of the chemistry [Dennett] |
| 23803 | States have content if we can predict them well by assuming intentionality [Dennett, by Schulte] |
| 6977 | Egocentric or de se content seems to be irreducibly so [Jackson] |
| 6990 | Keep distinct the essential properties of water, and application conditions for the word 'water' [Jackson] |
| 3984 | The nature of content is entirely based on its functional role [Dennett] |
| 6985 | Analysis is finding necessary and sufficient conditions by studying possible cases [Jackson] |
| 4882 | Concepts are things we (unlike dogs) can think about, because we have language [Dennett] |
| 2529 | Maybe there can be non-conscious concepts (e.g. in bees) [Dennett] |
| 6995 | Successful predication supervenes on nature [Jackson] |
| 18413 | Fregeans can't agree on what 'senses' are [Cappelen/Dever] |
| 6989 | I can understand "He has a beard", without identifying 'he', and hence the truth conditions [Jackson] |
| 18417 | Possible worlds accounts of content are notoriously coarse-grained [Cappelen/Dever] |
| 18408 | Indexicals are just non-constant in meaning, and don't involve any special concepts [Cappelen/Dever] |
| 18414 | Fregeans say 'I' differs in reference, so it must also differ in sense [Cappelen/Dever] |
| 18423 | All indexicals can be expressed non-indexically [Cappelen/Dever] |
| 18406 | The basic Kaplan view is that there is truth-conditional content, and contextual character [Cappelen/Dever] |
| 18411 | It is proposed that a huge range of linguistic items are context-sensitive [Cappelen/Dever] |
| 18420 | We deny that action involves some special class of beliefs [Cappelen/Dever] |
| 6998 | Folk morality does not clearly distinguish between doing and allowing [Jackson] |
| 6997 | Moral functionalism says moral terms get their meaning from their role in folk morality [Jackson] |
| 7000 | Which are prior - thin concepts like right, good, ought; or thick concepts like kindness, equity etc.? [Jackson] |
| 3983 | Learning is evolution in the brain [Dennett] |
| 6999 | It is hard to justify the huge difference in our judgements of abortion and infanticide [Jackson] |
| 4872 | Most people see an abortion differently if the foetus lacks a brain [Dennett] |
| 7368 | Originally there were no reasons, purposes or functions; since there were no interests, there were only causes [Dennett] |
| 3985 | Biology is a type of engineering, not a search for laws of nature [Dennett] |
| 4877 | Maybe plants are very slow (and sentient) animals, overlooked because we are faster? [Dennett] |
| 3804 | Darwin's idea was the best idea ever [Dennett] |