Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'Subjectivist's Guide to Objective Chance', 'Brainstorms:Essays on Mind and Psychology' and 'works'

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4 ideas

2. Reason / D. Definition / 1. Definitions

15927	Definition just needs negation, known variables, conjunction, disjunction, substitution and quantification [Weyl, by Lavine]
	Full Idea: For mathematics, Weyl arrived (by 1917) at a satisfactory list of definition principles: negation, identification of variables, conjunction, disjunction, substitution of constants, and existential quantification over the domain.
	From: report of Hermann Weyl (works [1917]) by Shaughan Lavine - Understanding the Infinite V.3
	A reaction: Lavine summarises this as 'first-order logic with parameters'.

15. Nature of Minds / B. Features of Minds / 4. Intentionality / b. Intentionality theories

3158	Theories of intentionality presuppose rationality, so can't explain it [Dennett]
	Full Idea: Intentional theory is vacuous as psychology because it presupposes and does not explain rationality or intelligence.
	From: Daniel C. Dennett (Brainstorms:Essays on Mind and Psychology [1978], p.15?)
	A reaction: Virtually every philosophical theory seems to founder because it presupposes something like the thing it is meant to explain. I agree that 'intentionality' is a slightly airy concept that would probably reduce to something better.

17. Mind and Body / B. Behaviourism / 3. Intentional Stance

3159	Beliefs and desires aren't real; they are prediction techniques [Dennett]
	Full Idea: Intentional systems don't really have beliefs and desires, but one can explain and predict their behaviour by ascribing beliefs and desires to them. This strategy is pragmatic, not right or wrong.
	From: Daniel C. Dennett (Brainstorms:Essays on Mind and Psychology [1978], p.7?)
	A reaction: If the ascription of beliefs and desires explains behaviour, then that is good grounds for thinking they might be real features of the brain, and even if that is not so, they are real enough as abstractions from brain events, like the 'economic climate'.

26. Natural Theory / D. Laws of Nature / 4. Regularities / b. Best system theory

9425	Lewis later proposed the axioms at the intersection of the best theories (which may be few) [Mumford on Lewis]
	Full Idea: Later Lewis said we must choose between the intersection of the axioms of the tied best systems. He chose for laws the axioms that are in all the tied systems (but then there may be few or no axioms in the intersection).
	From: comment on David Lewis (Subjectivist's Guide to Objective Chance [1980], p.124) by Stephen Mumford - Laws in Nature