Combining Texts

All the ideas for 'Mechanisms', 'Punctual and segmentive Hopi verbs' and 'Representation and Reality'

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30 ideas

1. Philosophy / D. Nature of Philosophy / 5. Aims of Philosophy / a. Philosophy as worldly
The job of the philosopher is to distinguish facts about the world from conventions [Putnam]
3. Truth / F. Semantic Truth / 2. Semantic Truth
Semantic notions do not occur in Tarski's definitions, but assessing their correctness involves translation [Putnam]
3. Truth / H. Deflationary Truth / 1. Redundant Truth
Asserting the truth of an indexical statement is not the same as uttering the statement [Putnam]
7. Existence / D. Theories of Reality / 2. Realism
Realists believe truth is correspondence, independent of humans, is bivalent, and is unique [Putnam]
9. Objects / A. Existence of Objects / 1. Physical Objects
Aristotle says an object (e.g. a lamp) has identity if its parts stay together when it is moved [Putnam]
13. Knowledge Criteria / E. Relativism / 5. Language Relativism
Language arranges sensory experience to form a world-order [Whorf]
14. Science / B. Scientific Theories / 2. Aim of Science
Empiricist theories are sets of laws, which give explanations and reductions [Glennan]
14. Science / D. Explanation / 2. Types of Explanation / i. Explanations by mechanism
Modern mechanism need parts with spatial, temporal and function facts, and diagrams [Glennan]
Mechanistic philosophy of science is an alternative to the empiricist law-based tradition [Glennan]
Mechanisms are either systems of parts or sequences of activities [Glennan]
17th century mechanists explained everything by the kinetic physical fundamentals [Glennan]
Unlike the lawlike approach, mechanistic explanation can allow for exceptions [Glennan]
17. Mind and Body / C. Functionalism / 2. Machine Functionalism
Functionalism says robots and people are the same at one level of abstraction [Putnam]
17. Mind and Body / C. Functionalism / 8. Functionalism critique
If concepts have external meaning, computational states won't explain psychology [Putnam]
Functionalism can't explain reference and truth, which are needed for logic [Putnam]
Is there just one computational state for each specific belief? [Putnam]
17. Mind and Body / E. Mind as Physical / 3. Eliminativism
If we are going to eliminate folk psychology, we must also eliminate folk logic [Putnam]
18. Thought / A. Modes of Thought / 4. Folk Psychology
Can we give a scientific, computational account of folk psychology? [Putnam]
18. Thought / C. Content / 5. Twin Earth
Reference may be different while mental representation is the same [Putnam]
19. Language / A. Nature of Meaning / 1. Meaning
Meaning and translation (which are needed to define truth) both presuppose the notion of reference [Putnam]
19. Language / A. Nature of Meaning / 6. Meaning as Use
"Meaning is use" is not a definition of meaning [Putnam]
19. Language / A. Nature of Meaning / 7. Meaning Holism / b. Language holism
Holism seems to make fixed definition more or less impossible [Putnam]
Meaning holism tried to show that you can't get fixed meanings built out of observation terms [Putnam]
Understanding a sentence involves background knowledge and can't be done in isolation [Putnam]
19. Language / B. Reference / 3. Direct Reference / a. Direct reference
We should separate how the reference of 'gold' is fixed from its conceptual content [Putnam]
Like names, natural kind terms have their meaning fixed by extension and reference [Putnam]
19. Language / B. Reference / 3. Direct Reference / c. Social reference
Aristotle implies that we have the complete concepts of a language in our heads, but we don't [Putnam]
Reference (say to 'elms') is a social phenomenon which we can leave to experts [Putnam]
26. Natural Theory / B. Natural Kinds / 5. Reference to Natural Kinds
"Water" is a natural kind term, but "H2O" is a description [Putnam]
26. Natural Theory / C. Causation / 4. Naturalised causation
Since causal events are related by mechanisms, causation can be analysed in that way [Glennan]