Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'Leibniz: Guide for the Perplexed', 'What is it like to be a bat?' and 'On Aristotle's 'Metaphysics''

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7 ideas

7. Existence / E. Categories / 4. Category Realism

16655	Different genera are delimited by modes of predication, which rest on modes of being [Aquinas]
	Full Idea: Being is delimited into different genera in accord with different modes of predicating, which depend on different modes of being.
	From: Thomas Aquinas (On Aristotle's 'Metaphysics' [1266], V.9.890), quoted by Robert Pasnau - Metaphysical Themes 1274-1671 12.3
	A reaction: I like this. When people say that predication is the way we divide things up, and go all linguistic-relativist about things, they forget how closely language not only describes reality, but arises out of, or is even caused by, reality. 'Grue' is silly.

9. Objects / B. Unity of Objects / 2. Substance / d. Substance defined

19347	Substance needs independence, unity, and stability (for individuation); also it is a subject, for predicates [Perkins]
	Full Idea: For individuation, substance needs three properties: independence, to separate it from other things; unity, to call it one thing, rather than an aggregate; and permanence or stability over time. Its other role is as subject for predicates.
	From: Franklin Perkins (Leibniz: Guide for the Perplexed [2007], 3.1)
	A reaction: Perkins is describing the Aristotelian view, which is taken up by Leibniz. 'Substance' is not a controversial idea, if we see that it only means that the world is full of 'things'. It is an unusual philosopher wholly totally denies that.

15. Nature of Minds / B. Features of Minds / 1. Consciousness / b. Essence of consciousness

3286	An organism is conscious if and only if there is something it is like to be that organism [Nagel]
	Full Idea: An organism only has conscious mental states if and only if there is something that it is like to be that organism.
	From: Thomas Nagel (What is it like to be a bat? [1974], p.166)
	A reaction: It is hard to argue with this, but one should push on and ask what features of its consciousness make it such that there is a 'what it is like'. What is it like to have a subconscious mind, or be deeply asleep, or drive while daydreaming?

17. Mind and Body / A. Mind-Body Dualism / 7. Zombies

3288	Can we describe our experiences to zombies? [Nagel]
	Full Idea: The goal of an objective phenomenology would be to describe, at least in part, the subjective character of experiences in a form comprehensible to beings incapable of having those experiences.
	From: Thomas Nagel (What is it like to be a bat? [1974], p.179)
	A reaction: This seems a bizarre expectation. We can already explain visual experience to the blind up to a point, but no one is dreaming of an "objective phenomenology" which will give blind people total understanding, just by reading about it in braille.

17. Mind and Body / D. Property Dualism / 6. Mysterianism

4883	Nagel's title creates an impenetrable mystery, by ignoring a bat's ways that may not be "like" anything [Dennett on Nagel]
	Full Idea: Nagel's title invites us to ignore all the different ways in which bats might accomplish their cunning feats without its "being like" anything for them. We create an impenetrable mystery for ourselves if we assume that Nagel's title makes sense.
	From: comment on Thomas Nagel (What is it like to be a bat? [1974]) by Daniel C. Dennett - Kinds of Minds Ch.6
	A reaction: This could well be correct about bats, but the question applies to humans as well, and we can't deny that "what it is like" is a feature of some creatures' realities. On the fringes of our own consciousness there are mental events that are "like" nothing.

3287	We can't be objective about experience [Nagel]
	Full Idea: If the subjective character of experience is fully comprehensible only from one point of view, then any shift to greater objectivity does not take us nearer to the real nature of the phenomenon: it takes us further away from it.
	From: Thomas Nagel (What is it like to be a bat? [1974], p.174)
	A reaction: We can, however, talk to one another about our subjectivity, and compare notes, and such 'inter-subjectivity' may be one approach to objectivity. We must concede Nagel's point, but we also miss something about a stone if we must remain outside of it.

17. Mind and Body / E. Mind as Physical / 7. Anti-Physicalism / d. Explanatory gap

4989	Physicalism should explain how subjective experience is possible, but not 'what it is like' [Kirk,R on Nagel]
	Full Idea: A physicalist account of conscious experience must explain how it is possible for a physical system to be a conscious subject, but not 'what it is like' for some organism.
	From: comment on Thomas Nagel (What is it like to be a bat? [1974]) by Robert Kirk - Mind and Body §4.2
	A reaction: You can't entirely evade Nagel's challenge. We are trying to discover the 'neural correlate of consciousness', which will explain why we are conscious, but we also want to know why we experience green for one wavelength, and red for another.