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8842
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The best argument for immediate justification is not the Regress Argument, but considering examples [Pryor]
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Full Idea:
The best argument for immediate justification is not the Regress Argument, but from considering examples, such as I have a headache, I am raising my arm, I am imagining my grandmother, or seeing how dominoes could fill a chessboard.
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From:
James Pryor (There is immediate Justification [2005], §3)
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A reaction:
Most of his examples depend on the fact that they cannot be challenged by anyone else, because they are within his own mind. The dominoes require complex thought. The first two could be erroneous if he was dreaming.
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8843
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Impure coherentists accept that perceptions can justify, unlike pure coherentists [Pryor]
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Full Idea:
Pure coherentists claim that a belief can only be justified by its relations to other beliefs; impure coherentists are willing to give some non-beliefs, such as perceptual experiences, a justifying role.
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From:
James Pryor (There is immediate Justification [2005], §4)
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A reaction:
I think I would vote for the pure version. The distinction that is needed, I think, is between justification and evidence. You have to surmise causal links and explanations before you can see an experience as evidence, and then justification.
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8846
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Reasons for beliefs can be cited to others, unlike a raw headache experience [Pryor]
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Full Idea:
If you have reasons for your belief, they should be considerations you could in principle cite, or give, to someone who doubted or challenged the belief. You can't give some else a non-propositional state like a headache.
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From:
James Pryor (There is immediate Justification [2005], §6)
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A reaction:
On the whole I agree, but if someone asked you to justify your claim that there is a beautiful sunset over the harbour, you could just say 'Look!'. Headaches are too private. The person must still see that the sunset is red, and not the window.
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7657
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Intelligent agents are composed of nested homunculi, of decreasing intelligence, ending in machines [Dennett]
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Full Idea:
As long as your homunculi are more stupid and ignorant than the intelligent agent they compose, the nesting of homunculi within homunculi can be finite, bottoming out, eventually, with agents so unimpressive they can be replaced by machines.
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From:
Daniel C. Dennett (Sweet Dreams [2005], Ch.6)
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A reaction:
[Dennett first proposed this in 'Brainstorms' 1978]. This view was developed well by Lycan. I rate it as one of the most illuminating ideas in the modern philosophy of mind. All complex systems (like aeroplanes) have this structure.
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7656
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I don't deny consciousness; it just isn't what people think it is [Dennett]
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Full Idea:
I don't maintain, of course, that human consciousness does not exist; I maintain that it is not what people often think it is.
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From:
Daniel C. Dennett (Sweet Dreams [2005], Ch.3)
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A reaction:
I consider Dennett to be as near as you can get to an eliminativist, but he is not stupid. As far as I can see, the modern philosopher's bogey-man, the true total eliminativist, simply doesn't exist. Eliminativists usually deny propositional attitudes.
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16697
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Time is independent of motion, because God could stop everything for a short or long time [Crathorn, by Pasnau]
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Full Idea:
Suppose God annihilates everything, and then creates something new. The vacant interval could last a shorter or longer time, so there are facts about time independent of facts about motion.
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From:
report of William Crathorn (Sentences [1335], I.16, concl.2) by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 18.2
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A reaction:
Not very persuasive if God is in some way 'timeless'. Crathorn would have loved Shoemaker's argument, where motionless time is the best explanation, rather than a possible explanation.
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