Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'Internalism Exposed', 'Cartesian Meditations' and 'Intention, Plans, and Practical Reason'

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12 ideas

7. Existence / C. Structure of Existence / 6. Fundamentals / c. Monads
Husserl sees the ego as a monad, unifying presence, sense and intentional acts [Husserl, by Velarde-Mayol]
     Full Idea: Husserl's notion of monad expresses a complete inegration of every intentional presence into its sense, and every sense into the intentional acts, ....and finally every intentional act is integrated into the ego.
     From: report of Edmund Husserl (Cartesian Meditations [1931]) by Victor Velarde-Mayol - On Husserl 4.6.2
     A reaction: No, I don't understand that either, but it makes good sense to employ the concept of a 'monad' into the concept of the ego, if you think it embodies perfect unity. That was a main motivation for Leibniz to employ the word.
13. Knowledge Criteria / A. Justification Problems / 3. Internal or External / a. Pro-internalism
We can't only believe things if we are currently conscious of their justification - there are too many [Goldman]
     Full Idea: Strong internalism says only current conscious states can justify beliefs, but this has the problem of Stored Beliefs, that most of our beliefs are stored in memory, and one's conscious state includes nothing that justifies them.
     From: Alvin I. Goldman (Internalism Exposed [1999], §2)
     A reaction: This point seems obviously correct, but one could still have a 'fairly strong' version, which required that you could always call into consciousness the justificiation for any belief that you happened to remember.
Internalism must cover Forgotten Evidence, which is no longer retrievable from memory [Goldman]
     Full Idea: Even weak internalism has the problem of Forgotten Evidence; the agent once had adequate evidence that she subsequently forgot; at the time of epistemic appraisal, she no longer has adequate evidence that is retrievable from memory.
     From: Alvin I. Goldman (Internalism Exposed [1999], §3)
     A reaction: This is certainly a basic problem for any account of justification. It will rule out any strict requirement that there be actual mental states available to support a belief. Internalism may be pushed to include non-conscious parts of the mind.
Internal justification needs both mental stability and time to compute coherence [Goldman]
     Full Idea: The problem for internalists of Doxastic Decision Interval says internal justification must avoid mental change to preserve the justification status, but must also allow enough time to compute the formal relations between beliefs.
     From: Alvin I. Goldman (Internalism Exposed [1999], §4)
     A reaction: The word 'compute' implies a rather odd model of assessing coherence, which seems instantaneous for most of us where everyday beliefs are concerned. In real mental life this does not strike me as a problem.
13. Knowledge Criteria / B. Internal Justification / 5. Coherentism / c. Coherentism critique
Coherent justification seems to require retrieving all our beliefs simultaneously [Goldman]
     Full Idea: The problem of Concurrent Retrieval is a problem for internalism, notably coherentism, because an agent could ascertain coherence of her entire corpus only by concurrently retrieving all of her stored beliefs.
     From: Alvin I. Goldman (Internalism Exposed [1999], §3)
     A reaction: Sounds neat, but not very convincing. Goldman is relying on scepticism about short-term memory, but all belief and knowledge will collapse if we go down that road. We couldn't do simple arithmetic if Goldman's point were right.
13. Knowledge Criteria / C. External Justification / 3. Reliabilism / a. Reliable knowledge
Reliability involves truth, and truth is external [Goldman]
     Full Idea: Reliability involves truth, and truth (on the usual assumption) is external.
     From: Alvin I. Goldman (Internalism Exposed [1999], §6)
     A reaction: As an argument for externalism this seems bogus. I am not sure that truth is either 'internal' or 'external'. How could the truth of 3+2=5 be external? Facts are mostly external, but I take truth to be a relation between internal and external.
15. Nature of Minds / A. Nature of Mind / 4. Other Minds / c. Knowing other minds
Husserl's monads (egos) communicate, through acts of empathy. [Husserl, by Velarde-Mayol]
     Full Idea: For Husserl monads have windows because they communicate with each other. The windows of the monads are the acts of empathy.
     From: report of Edmund Husserl (Cartesian Meditations [1931]) by Victor Velarde-Mayol - On Husserl 4.7.5
     A reaction: Leibniz said his monads (which include minds) have 'no windows'. The mere existence of empathy (or mirror neurons, as we would say) is hardly sufficient to defeat solipsism.
16. Persons / B. Nature of the Self / 4. Presupposition of Self
The psychological ego is worldly, and the pure ego follows transcendental reduction [Husserl, by Velarde-Mayol]
     Full Idea: Husserl distinguishes two sorts of egos or subjects of experience, the psychological ego and the pure ego. The psychological ego is a reality of the world, and the pure ego is a result of transcendental reduction.
     From: report of Edmund Husserl (Cartesian Meditations [1931]) by Victor Velarde-Mayol - On Husserl 4.6.1
     A reaction: The sounds like embracing both the Cartesian and the Kantian egos. This is obviously the source of Sartre's interesting early book on the self. 'Transcendental reduction' is his bracketing or epoché.
20. Action / B. Preliminaries of Action / 1. Intention to Act / a. Nature of intentions
Intentions must be mutually consistent, affirm appropriate means, and fit the agent's beliefs [Bratman, by Wilson/Schpall]
     Full Idea: Bratman's three main norms of intention are 'internal consistency' (between a person's intentions), 'means-end coherence' (the means must fit the end), and 'consistency with the agent's beliefs' (especially intending to do and believing you won't do).
     From: report of Michael Bratman (Intention, Plans, and Practical Reason [1987]) by Wilson,G/Schpall,S - Action 4
     A reaction: These are controversial, but have set the agenda for modern non-reductive discussions of intention.
Intentions are normative, requiring commitment and further plans [Bratman, by Wilson/Schpall]
     Full Idea: Intentions involve normative commitments. We settle on intended courses, if there is no reason to reconsider them, and intentions put pressure on us to form further intentions in order to more efficiently coordinate our actions.
     From: report of Michael Bratman (Intention, Plans, and Practical Reason [1987]) by Wilson,G/Schpall,S - Action 4
     A reaction: [a compression of their summary] This distinguishes them from beliefs and desires, which contain no such normative requirements, even though they may point that way.
20. Action / B. Preliminaries of Action / 1. Intention to Act / b. Types of intention
Intention is either the aim of an action, or a long-term constraint on what we can do [Bratman, by Wilson/Schpall]
     Full Idea: We need to distinguish intention as an aim or goal of actions, and intentions as a distinctive state of commitment to future action, a state that results from and subsequently constrains our practical endeavours as planning agents.
     From: report of Michael Bratman (Intention, Plans, and Practical Reason [1987]) by Wilson,G/Schpall,S - Action 2
     A reaction: I'm not sure how distinct these are, given the obvious possibility of intermediate stages, and the embracing of any available short-cut. If I could mow my lawn with one blink, I'd do it.
20. Action / B. Preliminaries of Action / 1. Intention to Act / c. Reducing intentions
Bratman rejected reducing intentions to belief-desire, because they motivate, and have their own standards [Bratman, by Wilson/Schpall]
     Full Idea: Bratman motivated the idea that intentions are psychologically real and not reducible to desire-belief complexes by observing that they are motivationally distinctive, and subject to their own unique standards of rational appraisal.
     From: report of Michael Bratman (Intention, Plans, and Practical Reason [1987]) by Wilson,G/Schpall,S - Action 4
     A reaction: If I thought my belief was a bit warped, and my desire morally corrupt, my higher self might refuse to form an intention. If so, then Bratman is onto something. But maybe my higher self has its own beliefs and desires.