tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8310450667755637519.post7338194760607188310..comments2023-10-14T09:40:06.690-05:00Comments on Jean Kazez: The Power of "How?"Jean Kazezhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00592593002719828153noreply@blogger.comBlogger16125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8310450667755637519.post-65284198868976549752011-12-03T11:24:23.964-06:002011-12-03T11:24:23.964-06:00» Jean Kazez:
I can't say how, since there are...» Jean Kazez:<br /><i>I can't say how, since there are too many miles to traverse, and too many presents to bring, and the chimneys are too narrow, and some houses don't even have chimneys.</i><br /><br />The equivalent to that is to say, ‘I <i>can</i> say how I got to the kitchen, switched on the coffee machine and filled a cup with coffee’. There simply is no problem.<br /><br /><i>But Peter Beattienoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8310450667755637519.post-26633482878247221912011-11-28T13:30:32.189-06:002011-11-28T13:30:32.189-06:00Interestingly the discussion above simply recapitu...Interestingly the discussion above simply recapitulates the final paragraph of the very SEP article that Jean links to: <br /><br /><i>One possibility is that truthmakers for psychological truths include irreducibly mental properties. This is not the only possibility, however. Another is that psychological assertions are made true by physical states and properties, states and properties answeringFaustnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8310450667755637519.post-84692641174164542192011-11-28T13:18:35.880-06:002011-11-28T13:18:35.880-06:00It seems to me that the spookiness of the link bet...It seems to me that the spookiness of the link between our thoughts and their apparent effects IS a good reason to be skeptical about it. It seems far more plausible that your conscious thoughts about coffee and the actual cup of coffee are both consequences of chemical events occuring throughout your body than that your conscious thought actually causes anything.<br /><br />For one thing, it'GroovyJnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8310450667755637519.post-86280250905571348232011-11-28T11:41:18.616-06:002011-11-28T11:41:18.616-06:00Yes, I accept that most philosophers of mind don’t...Yes, I accept that most philosophers of mind don’t agree with those assumptions – but I’m just giving you my opinion. I would argue that most philosophers of mind have failed to grasp the deep significance of the later Wittgenstein, or the pragmatism of philosophers such as Dennett and Davidson. They key insight, in my view, is that the contents of mental states are <i>assigned</i> by adopting anJeremy Bowmannoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8310450667755637519.post-39481024732160516612011-11-28T11:27:48.844-06:002011-11-28T11:27:48.844-06:00There are several reasons why the "how" ...There are several reasons why the "how" question is more conclusive about Santa than it can be about God as creator:<br /><br />Santa would have to violate a number of physical laws, and to do so here and now where the violations would be observable. God's creation would happen at or before the Big Bang, and our current theories of physics aren't reliable at that point.<br /><brDavid Evansnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8310450667755637519.post-30330433723434943602011-11-28T08:14:29.023-06:002011-11-28T08:14:29.023-06:00Jeremy, Most philosophers of mind wouldn't acc...Jeremy, Most philosophers of mind wouldn't accept all those assumptions, which is why they don't think the problem about the role of content can disappear so easily.<br /><br />All, I think in philosophy it's often half the work just to appreciate the shape of a problem. To appreciate the shape of the problem about content, you first have to think a lot about content--what it is, Jean Kazeznoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8310450667755637519.post-75073831876800937202011-11-28T08:00:46.596-06:002011-11-28T08:00:46.596-06:00We should not always be skeptical just because we ...We should not always be skeptical just because we don't understand 'how' or the 'how' doesn't fit into our medium scale experiences. That time is related to motion, or any of the quantum effects, is not easily (if at all) comprehensible by me does not mean I should necessarily be skeptical of them, and certainly not dismissive.<br /><br />As our general understanding March Harehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13116034158087704885noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8310450667755637519.post-59346989341613342172011-11-28T07:53:40.910-06:002011-11-28T07:53:40.910-06:00I admit ignorance of the literature but there appe...I admit ignorance of the literature but there appears to be an automatic assumption that thoughts exist and have causal effects. Is it not possible that the 'coffee desire' thought is actually a side effect (or mental representation) of one, or many, interactions which could include tiredness and a desire for caffeine? In this way thoughts would not be causal but merely reporting on March Harehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13116034158087704885noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8310450667755637519.post-31827467200294737552011-11-28T05:19:02.017-06:002011-11-28T05:19:02.017-06:00"The real issue I was trying to raise is--why..."The real issue I was trying to raise is--why does the absence of a "how?" give us reason for skepticism in some cases (Santa distributing presents, God creating light), but not in others (the explanatory role of content)?"<br /><br />Such as gravity, atoms, immunisation, inheritance with modification in evolution, classical thermodynamics... All these concepts had no David Duffyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12142997170025811780noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8310450667755637519.post-5671510019273604122011-11-28T04:06:28.784-06:002011-11-28T04:06:28.784-06:00Mental content is purely physical.
How a physical...Mental content is purely physical.<br /><br />How a physical state that manifests as a conscious yen for coffee leads to a physical state involving a mug of coffee in hand is not fundamentally mysterious. It's pure physics, with an intractable number of interactions. Each individual interaction, if it could be observed, would be entirely predictable using the models we presently have.<br />Thannynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8310450667755637519.post-61995228454656283092011-11-27T15:44:28.490-06:002011-11-27T15:44:28.490-06:00For what it's worth, I don't think it'...For what it's worth, I don't think it's complicated at all. I think the apparent complication is an artefact of our own muddy understandings. We are confused because we have failed to learn a lesson taught by the later Wittgenstein.<br /><br />If like Descartes (or Wittgenstein's chosen equivalent Augustine) we think that mental content is a matter of introspection -- of "Jeremy Bowmannoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8310450667755637519.post-60661795321383905522011-11-27T14:11:28.258-06:002011-11-27T14:11:28.258-06:00Jeremy, What you say makes sense, but there are lo...Jeremy, What you say makes sense, but there are lots and lots of things to be said about mental content, and which things you say will generate different puzzles about mental causation. I didn't intend to get into that huge can of worms with this post, so that's why I just linked to SEP. The message was supposed to be "it's complicated".<br /><br />The real issue I was Jean Kazeznoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8310450667755637519.post-9195034811531654682011-11-27T13:02:02.443-06:002011-11-27T13:02:02.443-06:00I think you may have missed my point. When we adop...I think you may have missed my point. When we adopt (what Dennett calls) the intentional stance to assign mental content, the content-bearing states we assign have causal connections "built into" them.<br /><br />Davidson made a similar point in arguing that most belief have to be true. The nature of this sort of interpretation is such that the content has to "match the world"Jeremy Bowmannoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8310450667755637519.post-15171747843843838112011-11-27T12:26:46.445-06:002011-11-27T12:26:46.445-06:00"The underlying processes in the Santa and Go..."The underlying processes in the Santa and God cases are too wildly at odds with the way we know the world works."<br />Santa -- check<br />God -- groan <br />One can't use the laws of nature to prove that only nature exists. I call that "Dawkins' Circle".<br />At least, that's how it looks to me. What am I missing?Aeolushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/15772583359516799143noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8310450667755637519.post-26387573000293451582011-11-27T12:25:17.660-06:002011-11-27T12:25:17.660-06:00"If there is a mystery here "
There are..."If there is a mystery here "<br /><br />There are actually lots of mysteries here. SEP is a good place to start--<br /><br />http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/mental-causation/<br /><br />Also, the entries on narrow content and content externalism.Jean Kazeznoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8310450667755637519.post-46060442052058232172011-11-27T12:10:37.712-06:002011-11-27T12:10:37.712-06:00I'd say that beliefs and desires get their con...I'd say that beliefs and desires get their content because of the way they causally interact with the world. The content of my belief that there's a coffee cup in my hand is sort of "woven" by interpretation, which takes account of what normally causes the belief. Same with desires except with the causal flow reversed: my desire to catch a bus normally causes my catching a bus, Jeremy Bowmannoreply@blogger.com