16 ideas
15464 | The distinction between dispositional and 'categorical' properties leads to confusion [Lewis] |
Full Idea: To avoid the danger of claiming that dispositions are their own categorical bases, we do better to eschew the alleged distinction between dispositional and 'categorical' properties altogether. | |
From: David Lewis (Finkish dispositions [1997], II) | |
A reaction: Since I have been unable to form any intuitive notion of what a 'categorical' property is, I like this, though not necessarily for his reason. |
15463 | All dispositions must have causal bases [Lewis] |
Full Idea: Prior, Pargetter and Jackson have argued convincingly for the thesis that all dispositions must have causal bases. | |
From: David Lewis (Finkish dispositions [1997], II) | |
A reaction: [Their paper is 1982] This key thesis is tackled by modern defenders of powers. The question is not who has the best arguments, but who offers the most coherent picture. What is a 'causal basis'? What sort of thing could be primitive or fundamental? |
15461 | A 'finkish' disposition is real, but disappears when the stimulus occurs [Lewis] |
Full Idea: A disposition which would straight away vanish if put to the test is called 'finkish'. A finkishly fragile thing is fragile so long as it is not struck. But if it were struck, it would straight away cease to be fragile, and it would not break. | |
From: David Lewis (Finkish dispositions [1997], I) | |
A reaction: There are also 'antidotes'. Finks kill the disposition, antidotes kill the effect. These cases are problems for the simple conditional analysis of a disposition - because we never achieved the consequent. |
15462 | Backtracking counterfactuals go from supposed events to their required causal antecedents [Lewis] |
Full Idea: 'Backtracking' counterfactual reasoning runs from a counterfactually supposed event to the causal antecedents it would have to have had. | |
From: David Lewis (Finkish dispositions [1997], I) | |
A reaction: Why not call it a 'transcendental' counterfactual? Presumably you go thisworld>> counterfactualevent>> worldneededtocauseit. It conjures up two possible worlds instead of one. |
5806 | Belief is the power of metarepresentation [Dretske] |
Full Idea: Belief is the power of metarepresentation. | |
From: Fred Dretske (Naturalizing the Mind [1997], §2.3) | |
A reaction: Hm. I have always defined belief as 'commitment to truth', and this definition leaves out both parts. Where is the commitment? If hope is another metarepresentation, how does it differ from belief? I imagine things, not believing them to be true. |
5801 | A mouse hearing a piano played does not believe it, because it lacks concepts and understanding [Dretske] |
Full Idea: A mouse can see and hear a piano being played, but believing is something else; it requires the concept of a piano, and understanding. Mice who hear pianos being played do not believe pianos are being played. | |
From: Fred Dretske (Naturalizing the Mind [1997], §1.3) | |
A reaction: Are we to say that when a mouse hears a piano it has no beliefs at all? Might not a belief involve images, so that a mouse calls up appropriate images from previous experiences, which are in a grey area on the edge of belief? |
5802 | Representations are in the head, but their content is not, as stories don't exist in their books [Dretske] |
Full Idea: Representations are in the head, but their content is not; in this sense, the mind isn't in the head any more than stories (i.e. story contents) are in books. | |
From: Fred Dretske (Naturalizing the Mind [1997], §1.6) | |
A reaction: This is the final consequence of Putnam's idea that meanings ain't in the head. Intentionality is an extraordinary bridge between the brain and the external world. The ontology of stories, and musical compositions, is one philosophy's deepest problems. |
5809 | Some activities are performed better without consciousness of them [Dretske] |
Full Idea: Some tasks (playing the piano, speaking foreign languages, playing fast sports) are best performed when the agent is largely unconscious of the details. | |
From: Fred Dretske (Naturalizing the Mind [1997], Ch.4 n16) | |
A reaction: A significant point, but it supports the evolutionary view, which is that what matters is success, and consciousness will switch on or off, whichever promotes the activity best. |
5808 | Qualia are just the properties objects are represented as having [Dretske] |
Full Idea: The Representational Thesis of mind identifies the qualities of experience - qualia - with the properties objects are represented as having. | |
From: Fred Dretske (Naturalizing the Mind [1997], §3.2) | |
A reaction: This seems to challenge the distinction between primary and secondary qualities, of which I am very fond. Is 'looks beautiful' a property of an object? Is the feeling of anger a property of an object? Qualia are properties of brains? |
5807 | Introspection is the same as the experience one is introspecting [Dretske] |
Full Idea: Introspection has no phenomenology or, if it does, it always has the same phenomenology as the experience one is introspecting. | |
From: Fred Dretske (Naturalizing the Mind [1997], §2.4) | |
A reaction: There is a difference between looking at a tree, and being aware of yourself looking at a tree. You can be faintly depressed, and then become aware that you are faintly depressed. He is nearly right. |
5803 | In a representational theory of mind, introspection is displaced perception [Dretske] |
Full Idea: On a representational theory of the mind, introspection becomes an instance of displaced perception - knowledge of internal (mental) facts via an awareness of external (physical) objects. | |
From: Fred Dretske (Naturalizing the Mind [1997], §2) | |
A reaction: This sounds close to a behaviourist (e.g. Ryle) account of introspection, via observing one's own behaviour. The word 'displaced' is an easy one, concealing a multitude of questions. |
5805 | Introspection does not involve looking inwards [Dretske] |
Full Idea: The 'problem' of introspection evaporates once one understands that it is not a process in which one looks inward. | |
From: Fred Dretske (Naturalizing the Mind [1997], §2) | |
A reaction: I take it that when we introspect we look at the contents of thoughts, which are representations of the external world, on the whole. But surely only the connections of those contents with memories can be seen inwardly? |
5804 | A representational theory of the mind is an externalist theory of the mind [Dretske] |
Full Idea: A representational theory of the mind is an externalist theory of the mind. | |
From: Fred Dretske (Naturalizing the Mind [1997], §2) | |
A reaction: Presumably brain events bring the world into the mind, so the world must be mentioned in explaining the mind. Maybe 'externalism' sounds grand, but is stating the boringly obvious. Explanations of mind need no mention of external particulars. |
5800 | All mental facts are representation, which consists of informational functions [Dretske] |
Full Idea: My thesis is that all mental facts are representational facts, and that all representational facts are facts about informational functions. | |
From: Fred Dretske (Naturalizing the Mind [1997], Prol) | |
A reaction: The first half of the thesis seems a bit difficult to disagree with, but that a fact is 'represented' may not be the essence of that fact. The biggest mystery is the content, not its representation. And everything is 'information' about everything else. |
7861 | Libet says the processes initiated in the cortex can still be consciously changed [Libet, by Papineau] |
Full Idea: Libet himself points out that the conscious decisions still have the power to 'endorse' or 'cancel', so to speak, the processes initiated by the earlier cortical activity: no action will result if the action's execution is consciously countermanded. | |
From: report of Benjamin Libet (Unconscious Cerebral Initiative [1985]) by David Papineau - Thinking about Consciousness 1.4 | |
A reaction: This is why Libet's findings do not imply 'epiphenomenalism'. It seems that part of a decisive action is non-conscious, undermining the all-or-nothing view of consciousness. Searle tries to smuggle in free will at this point (Idea 3817). |
6660 | Libet found conscious choice 0.2 secs before movement, well after unconscious 'readiness potential' [Libet, by Lowe] |
Full Idea: Libet found that a subject's conscious choice to move was about a fifth of a second before movement, and thus later than the onset of the brain's so-called 'readiness potential', which seems to imply that unconscious processes initiates action. | |
From: report of Benjamin Libet (Unconscious Cerebral Initiative [1985]) by E.J. Lowe - Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind Ch.9 | |
A reaction: Of great interest to philosophers! It seems to make conscious choices epiphenomenal. The key move, I think, is to give up the idea of consciousness as being all-or-nothing. My actions are still initiated by 'me', but 'me' shades off into unconsciousness. |