11 ideas
2546 | Philosophy is a magnificent failure in its attempt to overstep the limits of our knowledge [McGinn] |
Full Idea: Philosophy marks the limits of human theoretical intelligence. Philosophy is an attempt to overstep our cognitive bounds, a kind of magnificent failure. | |
From: Colin McGinn (The Mysterious Flame [1999], p.209) | |
A reaction: No one attempts to overstep boundaries once they are confirmed as such. The magnificent attempts persist because failure is impossible to demonstrate (except, perhaps, by Gödel's Theorem). |
2544 | Thoughts have a dual aspect: as they seem to introspection, and their underlying logical reality [McGinn] |
Full Idea: Our thoughts have a kind of duality, corresponding to their surface appearance to introspection and their underlying logical reality. | |
From: Colin McGinn (The Mysterious Flame [1999], p.147) |
17697 | The existence of an arbitrarily large number refutes the idea that numbers come from experience [Hilbert] |
Full Idea: The standpoint of pure experience seems to me to be refuted by the objection that the existence, possible or actual, of an arbitrarily large number can never be derived through experience, that is, through experiment. | |
From: David Hilbert (On the Foundations of Logic and Arithmetic [1904], p.130) | |
A reaction: Alternatively, empiricism refutes infinite numbers! No modern mathematician will accept that, but you wonder in what sense the proposed entities qualify as 'numbers'. |
17698 | Logic already contains some arithmetic, so the two must be developed together [Hilbert] |
Full Idea: In the traditional exposition of the laws of logic certain fundamental arithmetic notions are already used, for example in the notion of set, and to some extent also of number. Thus we turn in a circle, and a partly simultaneous development is required. | |
From: David Hilbert (On the Foundations of Logic and Arithmetic [1904], p.131) | |
A reaction: If the Axiom of Infinity is meant, it may be possible to purge the arithmetic from the logic. Then the challenge to derive arithmetic from it becomes rather tougher. |
2539 | Mental modules for language, social, action, theory, space, emotion [McGinn] |
Full Idea: The prevailing view in cognitive psychology is that the mind consists of separate faculties, each with a certain cognitive task: linguistic, social, practical, theoretical, abstract, spatial and emotional. | |
From: Colin McGinn (The Mysterious Flame [1999], p.40) | |
A reaction: 'Faculties' are not quite the same as 'modules', and this list mostly involves more higher-order activities than a modules list (e.g. Idea 2495). The idea that emotion is a 'faculty' sounds old-fashioned. |
2545 | Free will is mental causation in action [McGinn] |
Full Idea: Free will is mental causation in action. | |
From: Colin McGinn (The Mysterious Flame [1999], p.167) |
2543 | Brains aren't made of anything special, suggesting panpsychism [McGinn] |
Full Idea: All matter must contain the potential to underlie consciousness, since there is nothing special about the matter that composes brain tissue. | |
From: Colin McGinn (The Mysterious Flame [1999], p.100) | |
A reaction: This seems to me one of the most basic assumptions which we should all make about the mind. The mind is made of the brain, and the brain is made of food. However, there must be something 'special' about the brain. |
2540 | Examining mind sees no brain; examining brain sees no mind [McGinn] |
Full Idea: You can look into your mind until you burst and not discover neurons and synapses, and you can stare at someone's brain from dawn till dusk and not perceive the consciousness that is so apparent to the person whose brain it is. | |
From: Colin McGinn (The Mysterious Flame [1999], p.47) | |
A reaction: This is a striking symmetry of ignorance, though hardly enough to justify McGinn's pessimism about understanding the mind. 'When you are in the grass you can't see the whole of England; if you can see the whole of England, you won't see the grass'. |
2547 | There is information if there are symbols which refer, and which can combine into a truth or falsehood [McGinn] |
Full Idea: There is information in a system if there are symbols in it that refer to things and that together form strings that can be true or false. | |
From: Colin McGinn (The Mysterious Flame [1999], p.225) | |
A reaction: We can also directly apprehend information by perception. Are facts identical with correct information? Can a universal generalisation be information? |
7903 | The six perfections are giving, morality, patience, vigour, meditation, and wisdom [Nagarjuna] |
Full Idea: The six perfections are of giving, morality, patience, vigour, meditation, and wisdom. | |
From: Nagarjuna (Mahaprajnaparamitashastra [c.120], 88) | |
A reaction: What is 'morality', if giving is not part of it? I like patience and vigour being two of the virtues, which immediately implies an Aristotelian mean (which is always what is 'appropriate'). |
2542 | Causation in the material world is energy-transfer, of motion, electricity or gravity [McGinn] |
Full Idea: Causation in the material world works by energy transfer of some sort: transfer of motion, of electrical energy, of gravitational force. | |
From: Colin McGinn (The Mysterious Flame [1999], p.92) |