Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'Natural Kinds and Biological Realism', 'The Problem of Consciousness' and 'Unity of Science as a Working Hypothesis'

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6 ideas

14. Science / D. Explanation / 2. Types of Explanation / j. Explanations by reduction
20653 Six reduction levels: groups, lives, cells, molecules, atoms, particles [Putnam/Oppenheim, by Watson]
     Full Idea: There are six 'reductive levels' in science: social groups, (multicellular) living things, cells, molecules, atoms, and elementary particles.
     From: report of H.Putnam/P.Oppenheim (Unity of Science as a Working Hypothesis [1958]) by Peter Watson - Convergence 10 'Intro'
     A reaction: I have the impression that fields are seen as more fundamental that elementary particles. What is the status of the 'laws' that are supposed to govern these things? What is the status of space and time within this picture?
17. Mind and Body / D. Property Dualism / 6. Mysterianism
7388 McGinn invites surrender, by saying it is hopeless trying to imagine conscious machines [Dennett on McGinn]
     Full Idea: McGinn invites his readers to join him in surrender: It's just impossible to imagine how software could make a conscious robot. Don't even try, he says. Other philosophical experiments (involving China) "work" by dissuading readers from imagining.
     From: comment on Colin McGinn (The Problem of Consciousness [1991]) by Daniel C. Dennett - Consciousness Explained 14.1
     A reaction: I agree with Dennett. If you don't try to imagine how robots might do it, you are also denied the right to try to imagine how brains might manage it. Admittedly this is hard, but good imagination needs study, effort, discussion, time, information...
17. Mind and Body / E. Mind as Physical / 7. Anti-Physicalism / b. Multiple realisability
3185 Multiple realisability rules out hidden essences and experts as the source of water- and gold-concepts [McGinn]
     Full Idea: The multiple realisability emphasised by functionalists rules out the hidden essences (and the 'deferential' move in semantics) that one finds in the cases, for example, of "water" and "gold" emphasised by Kripke and Putnam.
     From: Colin McGinn (The Problem of Consciousness [1991], p.132)
     A reaction: Presumably if they are 'hidden', then the people to whom we 'defer' for our concepts can't actually know about the essences we are supposed to be discussing. You can mean essences without knowing them. Cf. Loch Ness Monster.
26. Natural Theory / B. Natural Kinds / 1. Natural Kinds
17371 Some kinds are very explanatory, but others less so, and some not at all [Devitt]
     Full Idea: Explanatory significance, hence naturalness, comes in degrees: positing some kinds may be very explanatory, positing others, only a little bit explanatory, positing others still, not explanatory at all.
     From: Michael Devitt (Natural Kinds and Biological Realism [2009], 4)
     A reaction: He mentions 'cousin' as a natural kind that is not very explanatory of anything. It interests us as humans, but not at all in other animals, it seems. ...Nice thought, though, that two squirrels might be cousins...
27. Natural Reality / G. Biology / 5. Species
17372 The higher categories are not natural kinds, so the Linnaean hierarchy should be given up [Devitt]
     Full Idea: The signs are that the higher categories are not natural kinds and so the Linnaean hierarchy must be abandoned. ...This is not abandoning a hierarchy altogether, it is not abandoning a tree of life.
     From: Michael Devitt (Natural Kinds and Biological Realism [2009], 6)
     A reaction: Devitt's underlying point is that the higher and more general kinds do not have an essence (a specific nature), which is the qualification to be a natural kind. They explain nothing. Essence is the hallmark of natural kinds. Hmmm.
17373 Species pluralism says there are several good accounts of what a species is [Devitt]
     Full Idea: Species pluralism is the view that there are several equally good accounts of what it is to be a species.
     From: Michael Devitt (Natural Kinds and Biological Realism [2009], 7)
     A reaction: Devitt votes for it, and cites Dupré, among many other. Given the existence of rival accounts, all making good points, it is hard to resist this view.