Combining Texts

Ideas for 'works', 'Perception' and 'Identity and Reference'

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2 ideas

18. Thought / A. Modes of Thought / 5. Rationality / c. Animal rationality
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.
18. Thought / B. Mechanics of Thought / 5. Mental Files
An identity statement aims at getting the hearer to merge two mental files [Lockwood]
     Full Idea: The purpose of an identity statement is to get the hearer to merge these files or bodies of information into one.
     From: Michael Lockwood (Identity and Reference [1971], p.209), quoted by François Recanati - Mental Files 4.1
     A reaction: Lockwood is a pioneer, in seeing 'Hesperus is Phosphorus' and 'Scott is the author of 'Waverley'' in terms of how the mind works. Mental files seem to me to explain a huge amount. Recanati proposes 'linking' rather than 'merging'.