94 ideas
3600 | Slow and accurate thought makes the greatest progress [Descartes] |
3601 | Most things in human life seem vain and useless [Descartes] |
3602 | Almost every daft idea has been expressed by some philosopher [Descartes] |
3603 | Methodical thinking is cautious, analytical, systematic, and panoramic [Descartes, by PG] |
3426 | If one theory is reduced to another, we make fewer independent assumptions about the world [Kim] |
3612 | Clear and distinct conceptions are true because a perfect God exists [Descartes] |
3610 | Truth is clear and distinct conception - of which it is hard to be sure [Descartes] |
3431 | Supervenience suggest dependence without reduction (e.g. beauty) [Kim] |
3437 | 'Physical facts determine all the facts' is the physicalists' slogan [Kim] |
3430 | Resemblance or similarity is the core of our concept of a property [Kim] |
3432 | Is weight a 'resultant' property of water, but transparency an 'emergent' property? [Kim] |
3434 | Emergent properties are 'brute facts' (inexplicable), but still cause things [Kim] |
3436 | Should properties be individuated by their causal powers? [Kim] |
3626 | Knowing the attributes is enough to reveal a substance [Descartes] |
3406 | Counterfactuals are either based on laws, or on nearby possible worlds [Kim, by PG] |
3605 | We can believe a thing without knowing we believe it [Descartes] |
1583 | In morals Descartes accepts the conventional, but rejects it in epistemology [Roochnik on Descartes] |
3607 | In thinking everything else false, my own existence remains totally certain [Descartes] |
3630 | Our thinking about external things doesn't disprove the existence of innate ideas [Descartes] |
3617 | I aim to find the principles and causes of everything, using the seeds within my mind [Descartes] |
3611 | Understanding, rather than imagination or senses, gives knowledge [Descartes] |
3606 | I was searching for reliable rock under the shifting sand [Descartes] |
3604 | When rebuilding a house, one needs alternative lodgings [Descartes] |
3618 | Only experiments can settle disagreements between rival explanations [Descartes] |
3368 | Mind is basically qualities and intentionality, but how do they connect? [Kim] |
3392 | Mind is only interesting if it has causal powers [Kim] |
3396 | Experiment requires mental causation [Kim] |
3397 | Beliefs cause other beliefs [Kim] |
3615 | Little reason is needed to speak, so animals have no reason at all [Descartes] |
3367 | Both thought and language have intentionality [Kim] |
3365 | Intentionality involves both reference and content [Kim] |
3360 | Are pains pure qualia, or do they motivate? [Kim] |
3366 | Pain has no reference or content [Kim] |
3389 | Inverted qualia and zombies suggest experience isn't just functional [Kim] |
3391 | Crosswiring would show that pain and its function are separate [Kim, by PG] |
3609 | I am a thinking substance, which doesn't need a place or material support [Descartes] |
3422 | Externalism about content makes introspection depend on external evidence [Kim] |
3363 | We often can't decide what emotion, or even sensation, we are experiencing [Kim] |
3412 | How do we distinguish our anger from embarrassment? [Kim] |
3608 | I can deny my body and the world, but not my own existence [Descartes] |
3613 | Reason is universal in its responses, but a physical machine is constrained by its organs [Descartes] |
3616 | The soul must unite with the body to have appetites and sensations [Descartes] |
3409 | Mental substance causation makes physics incomplete [Kim] |
3399 | If epiphenomenalism were true, we couldn't report consciousness [Kim] |
3390 | Are inverted or absent qualia coherent ideas? [Kim] |
3414 | What could demonstrate that zombies and inversion are impossible? [Kim] |
3359 | Cartesian dualism fails because it can't explain mental causation [Kim] |
3369 | Logical behaviourism translates mental language to behavioural [Kim] |
3428 | Behaviourism reduces mind to behaviour via bridging principles [Kim] |
3380 | Are dispositions real, or just a type of explanation? [Kim] |
3370 | What behaviour goes with mathematical beliefs? [Kim] |
3371 | Behaviour depends on lots of mental states together [Kim] |
3372 | Behaviour is determined by society as well as mental states [Kim] |
3373 | Snakes have different pain behaviour from us [Kim] |
3379 | Neurons seem to be very similar and interchangeable [Kim] |
3388 | Machine functionalism requires a Turing machine, causal-theoretical version doesn't [Kim] |
3384 | The person couldn't run Searle's Chinese Room without understanding Chinese [Kim] |
3393 | How do functional states give rise to mental causation? [Kim] |
3439 | Reductionism gets stuck with qualia [Kim] |
3427 | Reductionism is impossible if there aren't any 'bridge laws' between mental and physical [Kim] |
3376 | We can't assess evidence about mind without acknowledging phenomenal properties [Kim] |
3424 | Most modern physicalists are non-reductive property dualists [Kim] |
3362 | Supervenience says all souls are identical, being physically indiscernible [Kim] |
3413 | Zombies and inversion suggest non-reducible supervenience [Kim] |
3374 | Token physicalism isn't reductive; it just says all mental events have some physical properties [Kim] |
3433 | The core of the puzzle is the bridge laws between mind and brain [Kim] |
3377 | Elimination can either be by translation or by causal explanation [Kim] |
3438 | Reductionists deny new causal powers at the higher level [Kim] |
3440 | Without reductionism, mental causation is baffling [Kim] |
3375 | If an orange image is a brain state, are some parts of the brain orange? [Kim] |
3411 | How do we distinguish our attitudes from one another? [Kim] |
3386 | Folk psychology has been remarkably durable [Kim] |
3394 | Maybe folk psychology is a simulation, not a theory [Kim] |
3387 | A culture without our folk psychology would be quite baffling [Kim] |
3410 | Folk psychology has adapted to Freudianism [Kim] |
3614 | A machine could speak in response to physical stimulus, but not hold a conversation [Descartes] |
3382 | A machine with a mind might still fail the Turing Test [Kim] |
3383 | The Turing Test is too specifically human in its requirements [Kim] |
3408 | Two identical brain states could have different contents in different worlds [Kim] |
3420 | Two types of water are irrelevant to accounts of behaviour [Kim] |
3416 | Content may match several things in the environment [Kim] |
3418 | 'Arthritis in my thigh' requires a social context for its content to be meaningful [Kim] |
3421 | Content is best thought of as truth conditions [Kim] |
3419 | Pain, our own existence, and negative existentials, are not external [Kim] |
3417 | Content depends on other content as well as the facts [Kim] |
3631 | A blind man may still contain the idea of colour [Descartes] |
3403 | We assume people believe the obvious logical consequences of their known beliefs [Kim] |
3402 | If someone says "I do and don't like x", we don't assume a contradiction [Kim] |
1581 | Greeks elevate virtues enormously, but never explain them [Descartes] |
3401 | A common view is that causal connections must be instances of a law [Kim] |
3407 | Laws are either 'strict', or they involve a 'ceteris paribus' clause [Kim] |
16686 | God has established laws throughout nature, and implanted ideas of them within us [Descartes] |
3639 | Necessary existence is a property which is uniquely part of God's essence [Descartes] |
3640 | Possible existence is a perfection in the idea of a triangle [Descartes] |