Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'Intro to the Philosophy of Time', 'The Nature of Mental States' and 'Two-Dimensional Semantics'

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63 ideas

2. Reason / F. Fallacies / 2. Infinite Regress
Vicious regresses force you to another level; non-vicious imply another level [Baron/Miller]
5. Theory of Logic / L. Paradox / 7. Paradoxes of Time
A traveller takes a copy of a picture into the past, gives it the artist, who then creates the original! [Baron/Miller]
7. Existence / C. Structure of Existence / 1. Grounding / a. Nature of grounding
Grounding is intended as a relation that fits dependences between things [Baron/Miller]
9. Objects / E. Objects over Time / 2. Objects that Change
How does a changing object retain identity or have incompatible properties over time? [Baron/Miller]
10. Modality / A. Necessity / 3. Types of Necessity
Superficial necessity is true in all worlds; deep necessity is thus true, no matter which world is actual [Schroeter]
10. Modality / D. Knowledge of Modality / 4. Conceivable as Possible / b. Conceivable but impossible
Contradictory claims about a necessary god both seem apriori coherent [Schroeter]
12. Knowledge Sources / A. A Priori Knowledge / 8. A Priori as Analytic
2D semantics gives us apriori knowledge of our own meanings [Schroeter]
17. Mind and Body / B. Behaviourism / 2. Potential Behaviour
Dispositions need mental terms to define them [Putnam]
17. Mind and Body / B. Behaviourism / 4. Behaviourism Critique
Total paralysis would mean that there were mental states but no behaviour at all [Putnam]
17. Mind and Body / C. Functionalism / 1. Functionalism
Is pain a functional state of a complete organism? [Putnam]
Functionalism is compatible with dualism, as pure mind could perform the functions [Putnam]
Functional states correlate with AND explain pain behaviour [Putnam]
17. Mind and Body / D. Property Dualism / 3. Property Dualism
Temperature is mean molecular kinetic energy, but they are two different concepts [Putnam]
17. Mind and Body / E. Mind as Physical / 7. Anti-Physicalism / b. Multiple realisability
Neuroscience does not support multiple realisability, and tends to support identity [Polger on Putnam]
If humans and molluscs both feel pain, it can't be a single biological state [Putnam, by Kim]
18. Thought / C. Content / 5. Twin Earth
Your view of water depends on whether you start from the actual Earth or its counterfactual Twin [Schroeter]
18. Thought / C. Content / 7. Narrow Content
Rationalists say knowing an expression is identifying its extension using an internal cognitive state [Schroeter]
19. Language / A. Nature of Meaning / 1. Meaning
Internalist meaning is about understanding; externalist meaning is about embedding in a situation [Schroeter]
19. Language / C. Assigning Meanings / 2. Semantics
Semantic theory assigns meanings to expressions, and metasemantics explains how this works [Schroeter]
19. Language / C. Assigning Meanings / 4. Compositionality
Semantic theories show how truth of sentences depends on rules for interpreting and joining their parts [Schroeter]
19. Language / C. Assigning Meanings / 7. Extensional Semantics
Simple semantics assigns extensions to names and to predicates [Schroeter]
'Federer' and 'best tennis player' can't mean the same, despite having the same extension [Schroeter]
19. Language / C. Assigning Meanings / 8. Possible Worlds Semantics
Possible worlds semantics uses 'intensions' - functions which assign extensions at each world [Schroeter]
Possible worlds make 'I' and that person's name synonymous, but they have different meanings [Schroeter]
Possible worlds semantics implies a constitutive connection between meanings and modal claims [Schroeter]
In the possible worlds account all necessary truths are same (because they all map to the True) [Schroeter]
19. Language / C. Assigning Meanings / 10. Two-Dimensional Semantics
Array worlds along the horizontal, and contexts (world,person,time) along the vertical [Schroeter]
If we introduce 'actually' into modal talk, we need possible worlds twice to express this [Schroeter]
Do we know apriori how we refer to names and natural kinds, but their modal profiles only a posteriori? [Schroeter]
2D fans defend it for conceptual analysis, for meaning, and for internalist reference [Schroeter]
2D semantics can't respond to contingent apriori claims, since there is no single proposition involved [Schroeter]
26. Natural Theory / C. Causation / 1. Causation
Modern accounts of causation involve either processes or counterfactuals [Baron/Miller]
26. Natural Theory / C. Causation / 4. Naturalised causation
The main process theory of causation says it is transference of mass, energy, momentum or charge [Baron/Miller]
If causes are processes, what is causation by omission? (Distinguish legal from scientific causes?) [Baron/Miller]
26. Natural Theory / C. Causation / 9. General Causation / c. Counterfactual causation
The counterfactual theory of causation handles the problem no matter what causes actually are [Baron/Miller]
Counterfactual theories struggle with pre-emption by a causal back-up system [Baron/Miller]
27. Natural Reality / A. Classical Physics / 2. Thermodynamics / d. Entropy
There is no second 'law' of thermodynamics; it just reflects probabilities of certain microstates [Baron/Miller]
27. Natural Reality / C. Space / 6. Space-Time
In relativity space and time depend on one's motion, but spacetime gives an invariant metric [Baron/Miller]
27. Natural Reality / D. Time / 1. Nature of Time / f. Eternalism
The block universe theory says entities of all times exist, and time is the B-series [Baron/Miller]
27. Natural Reality / D. Time / 1. Nature of Time / g. Growing block
How can we know this is the present moment, if other times are real? [Baron/Miller]
If we are actually in the past then we shouldn't experience time passing [Baron/Miller]
27. Natural Reality / D. Time / 1. Nature of Time / h. Presentism
Erzatz Presentism allows the existence of other times, with only the present 'actualised' [Baron/Miller]
How do presentists explain relations between things existing at different times? [Baron/Miller]
Presentism needs endurantism, because other theories imply most of the object doesn't exist [Baron/Miller]
How can presentists move to the next future moment, if that doesn't exist? [Baron/Miller]
27. Natural Reality / D. Time / 1. Nature of Time / i. Denying time
Most of the sciences depend on the concept of time [Baron/Miller]
27. Natural Reality / D. Time / 2. Passage of Time / a. Experience of time
For abstractionists past times might still exist, althought their objects don't [Baron/Miller]
The error theory of time's passage says it is either a misdescription or a false inference [Baron/Miller]
27. Natural Reality / D. Time / 2. Passage of Time / b. Rate of time
It is meaningless to measure the rate of time using time itself, and without a rate there is no flow [Baron/Miller]
27. Natural Reality / D. Time / 2. Passage of Time / d. Time series
The C-series rejects A and B, and just sees times as order by betweenness, without direction [Baron/Miller]
27. Natural Reality / D. Time / 2. Passage of Time / e. Tensed (A) series
The A-series has to treat being past, present or future as properties [Baron/Miller]
27. Natural Reality / D. Time / 2. Passage of Time / f. Tenseless (B) series
The B-series can have a direction, as long as it does not arise from temporal flow [Baron/Miller]
27. Natural Reality / D. Time / 2. Passage of Time / g. Time's arrow
Static theories cannot account for time's obvious asymmetry, so time must be dynamic [Baron/Miller]
The direction of time is either primitive, or reducible to something else [Baron/Miller]
The kaon does not seem to be time-reversal invariant, unlike the rest of nature [Baron/Miller]
Maybe the past is just the direction of decreasing entropy [Baron/Miller]
We could explain time's direction by causation: past is the direction of causes, future of effects [Baron/Miller]
27. Natural Reality / D. Time / 2. Passage of Time / h. Change in time
Static time theory presents change as one property at t1, and a different property at t2 [Baron/Miller]
27. Natural Reality / D. Time / 2. Passage of Time / j. Time travel
If a time traveller kills his youthful grandfather, he both exists and fails to exist [Baron/Miller]
Presentism means there no existing past for a time traveller to visit [Baron/Miller]
27. Natural Reality / D. Time / 2. Passage of Time / k. Temporal truths
The past (unlike the future) is fixed, along with truths about it, by the existence of past objects [Baron/Miller]
27. Natural Reality / D. Time / 3. Parts of Time / e. Present moment
The moving spotlight says entities can have properties of being present, past or future [Baron/Miller]
The present moment is a matter of existence, not of acquiring a property [Baron/Miller]