Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'Philosophical Essay on Probability', 'The Status of Content' and 'Instrospection'

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4 ideas

3. Truth / H. Deflationary Truth / 3. Minimalist Truth
Minimalism is incoherent, as it implies that truth both is and is not a property [Boghossian, by Horwich]
     Full Idea: Boghossian argues that minimalism is incoherent because it says truth both is and is not a property; the essence of minimalism is that, unlike traditional theories, truth is not a property, yet properties are needed to explain the theory.
     From: report of Paul Boghossian (The Status of Content [1990]) by Paul Horwich - Truth (2nd edn) Post.8
     A reaction: I doubt whether this is really going to work as a demolition, because it seems to me that no philosophers are even remotely clear about what a property is. If properties are defined causally, it is not quite clear how truth would ever be a property.
13. Knowledge Criteria / C. External Justification / 7. Testimony
The reliability of witnesses depends on whether they benefit from their observations [Laplace, by Hacking]
     Full Idea: The credibility of a witness is in part a function of the story being reported. When the story claims to have infinite value, the temptation to lie for personal benefit is asymptotically infinite.
     From: report of Pierre Simon de Laplace (Philosophical Essay on Probability [1820], Ch.XI) by Ian Hacking - The Emergence of Probability Ch.8
     A reaction: Laplace seems to especially have reports of miracles in mind. This observation certainly dashes any dreams one might have of producing a statistical measure of the reliability of testimony.
16. Persons / C. Self-Awareness / 1. Introspection
Introspection is not perception, because there are no extra qualities apart from the mental events themselves [Rosenthal]
     Full Idea: Introspection cannot be a form of perceiving, since that invariably involves sensory qualities, and no qualities occur in introspection other than those of the sensations and perceptions we introspect; there are no additional qualities.
     From: David M. Rosenthal (Instrospection [1998])
     A reaction: This sounds pretty conclusive. Presumably introspection is best described as meta-thought rather than perception, which means that it involves beliefs and judgements, rather than new perceptual qualities. It has to be conceptual, and probably linguistic.
16. Persons / F. Free Will / 6. Determinism / a. Determinism
If a supreme intellect knew all atoms and movements, it could know all of the past and the future [Laplace]
     Full Idea: An intelligence knowing at an instant the whole universe could know the movement of the largest bodies and atoms in one formula, provided his intellect were powerful enough to subject all data to analysis. Past and future would be present to his eyes.
     From: Pierre Simon de Laplace (Philosophical Essay on Probability [1820]), quoted by Mark Thornton - Do we have free will? p.70