Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'Troubles with Functionalism', 'Miscellaneous Observations' and 'works'

expand these ideas     |    start again     |     specify just one area for these texts


27 ideas

2. Reason / A. Nature of Reason / 7. Status of Reason
Foucault originally felt that liberating reason had become an instrument of domination [Foucault, by Gutting]
3. Truth / A. Truth Problems / 3. Value of Truth
If man sacrifices truth he sacrifices himself, by acting against his own convictions [Novalis]
3. Truth / E. Pragmatic Truth / 1. Pragmatic Truth
Delusion and truth differ in their life functions [Novalis]
9. Objects / D. Essence of Objects / 3. Individual Essences
Refinement of senses increasingly distinguishes individuals [Novalis]
12. Knowledge Sources / C. Rationalism / 1. Rationalism
Experiences tests reason, and reason tests experience [Novalis]
13. Knowledge Criteria / E. Relativism / 1. Relativism
Foucault challenges knowledge in psychology and sociology, not in the basic sciences [Foucault, by Gutting]
15. Nature of Minds / B. Features of Minds / 1. Consciousness / a. Consciousness
Unlike Marxists, Foucault explains thought internally, without deference to conscious ideas [Foucault, by Gutting]
15. Nature of Minds / B. Features of Minds / 5. Qualia / a. Nature of qualia
Lobotomised patients can cease to care about a pain [Block]
15. Nature of Minds / B. Features of Minds / 5. Qualia / c. Explaining qualia
A brain looks no more likely than anything else to cause qualia [Block]
17. Mind and Body / B. Behaviourism / 2. Potential Behaviour
Behaviour requires knowledge as well as dispositions [Block]
17. Mind and Body / C. Functionalism / 1. Functionalism
In functionalism, desires are internal states with causal relations [Block]
Functionalism is behaviourism, but with mental states as intermediaries [Block]
You might invert colours, but you can't invert beliefs [Block]
17. Mind and Body / C. Functionalism / 8. Functionalism critique
In functionalism, what are the special inputs and outputs of conscious creatures? [Block]
Could a creature without a brain be in the right functional state for pain? [Block]
Not just any old functional network will have mental states [Block]
17. Mind and Body / E. Mind as Physical / 1. Physical Mind
The seat of the soul is where our inner and outer worlds interpenetrate [Novalis]
17. Mind and Body / E. Mind as Physical / 7. Anti-Physicalism / b. Multiple realisability
Physicalism is prejudiced in favour of our neurology, when other systems might have minds [Block]
18. Thought / B. Mechanics of Thought / 6. Artificial Thought / b. Turing Machines
Simple machine-functionalism says mind just is a Turing machine [Block]
A Turing machine, given a state and input, specifies an output and the next state [Block]
18. Thought / E. Abstraction / 2. Abstracta by Selection
Everything is a chaotic unity, then we abstract, then we reunify the world into a free alliance [Novalis]
19. Language / C. Assigning Meanings / 1. Syntax
Intuition may say that a complex sentence is ungrammatical, but linguistics can show that it is not [Block]
21. Aesthetics / A. Aesthetic Experience / 5. Natural Beauty
Only self-illuminated perfect individuals are beautiful [Novalis]
21. Aesthetics / B. Nature of Art / 8. The Arts / b. Literature
The author function of any text is a plurality of selves [Foucault, by Gutting]
24. Political Theory / A. Basis of a State / 3. Natural Values / c. Natural rights
Nature is not the basis of rights, but the willingness to risk death in asserting them [Foucault]
25. Social Practice / D. Justice / 3. Punishment / d. Reform of offenders
Power is used to create identities and ways of life for other people [Foucault, by Shorten]
29. Religion / D. Religious Issues / 1. Religious Commitment / a. Religious Belief
Religion needs an intermediary, because none of us can connect directly to a godhead [Novalis]