Undetached Rabbit Parts

Is bopping ever justified?

2007-09-25T21:13:00.000-04:00

A rabbit finds itself hopping through the forest. In order to amuse himself, he begins scooping up the field mice that he finds along the way, and bops them on the head. Is this a right action? Is it justified?

But consider the following alterations to the example: The rabbit is hopping through the forest. In order to amuse himself, he picks up the occasional field mouse. The mouse, being a rather vicious animal, bites the rabbit on the paw. So, in retaliation (and perhaps for his own safety), the rabbit bops the field mouse on the head. Is this now a right action? Is the action justified?

Let us consider yet another possibility: Unbeknownst to anyone (including rabbits and non-rabbits), the field mice have been gathering to plot a massive attack against the rabbits. While field mice are considerably smaller than rabbits, one at a time, they are helpless against the enormous rabbit. However, they, at some point, realized that if they were to all join together, their masses could beat the rabbits rather easily. An agent, call him Bunny Foo-Foo, does not know of the master plan of the field mice. As he hops through the forest, as he usually does, he begins picking up the field mice and bopping them on the head. The number of field mice that he bops before his actions are stopped by the sovereign (call her the Blue Fairy if you will), is sufficient to hold of the attack of the mice (at least until they produce more mice). As Bunny Foo-Foo has now single-handedly saved the rabbits from complete and total destruction, it seems he has now done a good thing. Is the action now right? Even if Bunny Foo-Foo was not privilege to this knowledge? Why or why not?

Discuss.

Folk-psychological belief ascription and idiolectal translations

2007-07-11T01:05:00.000-04:00

I wrote a paper on Quinean empathy qua idiolectal translation manual selection tool recently, and I think that I may be onto something, but Falk seemed to think differently. I submit to you some preliminary thoughts about this topic, and any feedback would be greatly appreciated.
I think that using empathy as a way to help select a (so-to-speak) idiolectal translation manual--being a "manual" that allows one to properly take words or phrases used in the lexical public language and effectively translate them into the idiolect of the original speaker--that will allow us to avoid what seems to be a common problem in the philosophy of language; namely the problem of identity when a speaker is unaware that two terms (or proper names) refer to the same object, makes contradictory statements (not knowing of the contradiction) and a third party seeks to report those beliefs having full knowledge of the co-reference and thus the third party is doomed to contradiction in a way that the original speaker is not. This should bring to mind Frege's "morning star-evening star," or for those of you in Falk's D&B class, his whole book.
Anyway, that's the problem... Here's what I think one can do:

I attempt to show that using empathy may provide us a sort of “back-door” into understanding the idiolect of another person. If we are able to detect idiosyncratic tendencies of another’s language (both verbal and non-verbal) then it may lend credence to our abilities to, so to speak, choose the correct idolectal translation guide and better understand another person. If this is possible, it will provide us a basis to maneuver around a seeming paradox in ascribing rational-but-false beliefs to another person; namely that we ultimately end in self-contradiction. This is a familiar problem to the philosophy of mind, but is posed decisively in Stephen Schiffer’s article, “A Problem for a Direct-Reference Theory of Belief Reports.” The confutation of this problem may not be, necessarily a solution, as much as a way to show that it really is not a problem after all.
I will not provide the entirety of the paper (as that would be a ludicrous abuse of this venue) but I will provide some key definitions to help you help me, I hope.
Empathy, as I shall use it, I mean to be the detection of idiosyncratic behavior (both verbal and non-verbal) and generating the ability to project ourselves into the position of the speaker-actor. Following Falk, I will refer specifically to empathy as a way to understand that attitude, as well as, behavior of another. Empathy, while not being entirely conscious at all times, is not an ability that we have with everyone, all the time. It is, however, imperative to learn a public language, and so is something that we have naturally.
(This is much like the definition outlined by Quine in Pursuit of Truth, §16 (pg. 43) where he states, “We judge what counts as witnessing the occasion… by projecting ourselves into the witness’s position.”) It is important to note, however, that I do not limit my use of empathy to observation sentences in terms of concrete objects; I extend this also to empathy of attitudes and behaviors.
Idiolect I take to be a fairly common term denoting a pseudo-public language that is personal to an individual. By ‘pseudo-public’ I mean that it is a personal reflection of a lexical public language that I happen to prescribe to but that is not exclusive to me. I borrow this notion from Alexander George who described idiolects as, “not something essentially private: you and I could have the same idiolect… An idiolect is idiosyncratic in being that about which a particular speaker at a particular time has some knowledge and not in being something about which only one person could have knowledge.”
In his paper, “Whose Language Is It Anyway? Some Notes on Idiolects,” George explains the idiolect in a way I find quite congenial. He says, “My idiolect is an object about which I have beliefs, in particular those beliefs I possess qua linguistic being. In this respect, one’s idiolect can be compared, for example, to the natural number series… These are abstract structures about which one can have beliefs, some true, some false.”
translation manual is a useful tool that everyone has at their disposal. What I mean by this is that with each person subscribing to an idiolect, there must be some way to get at how the idiolect applies to the public language. Think about this manual in the same way that one would think about one for a foreign language.
Alright. Go to town.

The Value of Possible Universes

2007-06-04T01:05:00.000-04:00

I wanted to see if anybody else had any thoughts about this topic. I did my paper for Phil of Religion on this and it's something I've always wondered about ever since I was little. It's from page 237 and 263 of Quentin and Craig's book Theism, Atheism, and Big Bang Cosmology. I copied this directly from my paper...

For a brief moment during the debate as to whether God’s omni-benevolence constrains It to create animate universes over inanimate universes, both Smith and Craig appeal to differing intuitions regarding the value of animate vs. inanimate universes. Thus, while Smith claims that ‘we must take into account not only that an inanimate universe is better than no universe but also that an animate universe is better than an inanimate universe,’ Craig disagrees with this claim when he states that ‘we can imagine innumerable many worlds of the former [inanimate] type which would exceed in goodness worlds of the latter [animate] type (for example, inanimate worlds of great beauty compared with animate worlds filled with unredeemed and gratuitous evil).’

I defended two theses in the paper, the first was that the worst possible existence or universe is better than non-existence or no universe, and the second was that the worst possible animate existence or universe is better than the best possible inanimate existence or universe. So I disagreed with Craig on the value of possible universes, but I did agree with him that God is not constrained to create animate over inanimate universes, even though I think that animate universes are a better kind of universe than inanimate ones, but that is a blog post for another time. I just want to know what you guys think about my two theses, about the value of these possible universes or non-universe against each other. I am more than intrigued to hear any and all responses!

Updates, Congratulations, and a Plea for more posting

2007-05-01T10:18:00.000-04:00

Hello kiddies!

Our humble blog has finally been nudged up in the world by the fine folks at Blogger. There are only a couple things you may notice: 1) You may have to update your blogger account to post, and 2) we can add labels for the posts. I'm pretty excited about the ability to label our posts now! How great will it be to be able to click on "metaphysics" and find only posts about metaphysics? Imagine the adventure that clicking on a topic such as "misc." will provide! Hooray! Of course, that means that we have to post...

Also, I'd just like to say congratulations to those of you who graduated (or will graduate this summer)! Good luck to all of you! I won't remove anyone from the blog until they request that I do so (at least not at this time).

Since some of us may not have been able to be around for the new faculty candidate on Monday, would someone like to fill us in? Maybe we can do that with all of the candidates? I, of course, would not expect anyone to completely spill all the details, but I think we could benefit from a bit of an overview on the candidate. And for the next two that are coming?

Expanding and Redefining Some 'Everyday' or 'Normal' Concepts

2007-02-18T19:22:00.000-05:00

A friend of mine sent this information to me and I thought that it was interesting enough that it should go on our blog. If nothing else, it will definitely get us all thinking about and maybe even redefining some our ideas about communication, language, thought, personhood, ethics, and probably some other philosophical issues that I haven't even thought of.

The first link is to the blog of the author of the short film piece, an autistic girl living around the detroit area. You can watch the video there or you can go to the second link and see a larger version of it on google. I don't really have any questions to help spark a discussion about the issues related to this film, but I think that in this case, the film speaks for itself and just by watching it people will come up with some questions on their own or at least contemplate these issues a whole lot more. It is most definitely a thought provoking piece of filmaking, or at least it was so for me. Let me know what ya'all think. Talk to you soon!

http://ballastexistenz.autistics.org/?p=287

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=4998359028958016786

About Time (from D & B class)

2007-01-25T22:53:00.000-05:00

The debate about the different theories of time was mentioned the other day in the D & B class; however, I'm going to disagree about how they were presented, since that was a biased presentation based on the views of who presented them. It is not the case that one theory is just about de dicto knowledge of time and the other is about de re knowledge of time. The two different theories say much more than that. There are mentioned A-time and B-time, to represent the two different theories, and despite what was said, I think these two concepts are pretty clear. B-time refers to the B-series, which is best described as what we know as a timeline: it is just moments of time constructed into a series, and the only difference between any two randomly chosen times (moments or temporal intervals) is that one of them is earlier than the other, and thus, the one is later than the other. In the B-series, or B-time, times, and therefore, events in time, are merely earlier than, or later then, or simultaneous with each other. The B-theory claims that this is all there is to time.

What is claimed by the opposing theory, the A-theory, to be missing from that picture of time are the notions of past, present, and future. The A-theory claims that these notions are metaphysically real, in *some* way. There are different A-theories and they do vary on how they flesh those out. The consequence is that for the A-theory, there is always one distinctively privileged time, and that is the present. That is essentially what would be meant by A-time, time consisting of the past, present, and future. On the B-theory, there is no such thing as the present time, there is only the illusion of our relative perception that some time is present to us, but the B-theory claims this has no metaphysical significance. The B-theorist very much makes an analogy between time and space, and the notion of present is like the notion of here: because of my location in space, there is a distinctive here for me, and there is a certain locality that I would include in my here. But that does not mean that here has any metaphysical significance, there is no privileged status of here, for all locations in space have equal metaphysical status. So, claims the B-theorist, do all different times, for they are merely located at different places from when we happen to be, but every single time has the same metaphysical status as any other. The perception of the present is merely indexical just like the perception of here.

A quick explanation of indexicals. An indexical is a word that forces a frame of reference based on the utterance of the sentence in which it appears; in other words, it indexes the reference to the context of utterance. The most obvious indexicals are "I", "here", "now". When "I" is uttered in a sentence, then it automatically refers to the speaker of the sentence (given that there are no abnormalities about the nature of the context). So the context determines the reference of the word. The same goes for both of the other indexicals, as well as any others, and there are others. One of the most significant works on indexicals is David Kaplan's article "Demonstratives", which appears in Themes From Kaplan. (The actual title is much longer, but it's generally referred to as that for short, as it appears as the first word in the title.) The whole article is very long, about 100 pages, but there is a clearly specifiable section on indexicals, and I definitely recommend it. It's difficult reading, so be prepared to spend a lot of time going over it several times, but it's worth it to know this sort of material.

Lastly, I have posted something from a portion of a paper that I wrote, because it provides a quick background to the debate about time. So I offer that to all of you, so that you will be a little more familiar as to what the debate of time is all about. Link:

A Brief History of the A-Theory/B-Theory Debate about Time

Any questions that this stimulates, please, by all means, ask. I will do my best to answer questions. Plus, we can get some discussion going if you like. :)

Deduction... Abduction... Something like God.

2007-01-23T01:16:00.000-05:00

Here is a four step deductive cosmological argument...

1: If time / space infinity is impossible, then the universe began to exist.
2: Time space / infinity is impossible.
3: The universe began to exist.
4: If the universe began to exist, then the begining of the universe was an event.
5: (3).
6: The begining of the universe was an event.
7: All events have causes.
8: (6).
9: The begining of the universe had a cause.
10: If the begining of the universe had a cause, then the begining of the universe was caused by either god, or something analogously powerful to god.
11: (9).
12: The begining of the universe was caused by either god, or something analogously powerful to god.

Now, in one sense, this is a pretty weak conclusion 'something like god caused the universe to exist' ... 'something like god'. Of course, in another sense... this is a signifcantly important idea... as... if it turns out to be true, this says something important about the fundamental nature of the universe.

Of course, being a deductive argument... all one needs to do to remain skeptical of the conclusion is to 'pick off' one of the premises. If a skeptic can do that, they have properly 'defeated' the inference(s). Now, I am not suggesting that there are no premises in this argument that we couldnt raise worries about... there certainly are. Howerver, it seems that the explanation of the denial of these premises, though they will be coherent... they will be significantly more complicated... unnecessarily complicated... than the affirmation of the premise in question. Maybe what I have in mind isnt formally demonstrable... but at least, (for instance) it takes more mind bending to try to imagine time / space infinity than it does to simply affirm 2.

This is just to say... if we employ this deductive, cosmological argument... its not that it is free from attack, just that the attack will be less simple than the premises themselves. ... IF this is the case, then the 'reasonable' thing to do would be to affirm the arguments conclusion.

Upgrade?

2007-01-15T15:11:00.000-05:00

*tap tap* Is this thing on?

Ummm, okay. Well. If anyone's out there, and still checking the blog, I wanted to suggest we (I) go ahead and upgrade the blog to the new blogger, which is finally out of beta. This means we get fancy shmancy post labels that will appear neatly at the side so that each post will be categorized neatly and easily accessible. This means that those of you looking for phil science stuff won't have to scroll through posts on things like ethics...and vice versa. Of course, that means that we'd have to be posting. So, in the (unlikely?) event that someone decides to post, if I make the changes, that means you'll have to enter in a keyword or two towards the bottom of your post. I believe it is specifically called a "label". Also, there will be some technicalities to take care of. See the blogger help page regarding the process of converting to the new system.

2006-12-17T17:10:00.000-05:00

As your Blog Administrator, I just wanted to say Happy Holidays to everyone! I hope that everyone gets some good time off. Good luck to those of you working on PhD applications! For those of you that are going to make it to the APA Eastern Conference, please feel free to post frequently on the happenings there. I'm sure we'd all appreciate the updates. As we all have some free time now, I encourage you to post freely and to make comments and keep checking up on the blog. We're philosophers. It's not like we are going to stop doing what we do just because classes are over. :-)

Have a fantastic break!

The cookies!!

2006-12-04T21:38:00.000-05:00

Yep, cookies are being baked at this very moment!! I have office hours Tuesday 10-11, so all of you in the epistemology class, you might want to stop by and get your cookies before class. :)

ALSO,

I promise I am going to be making some sort of substantive post soon, most likely in either philosophy of language, time, or other metaphysical issues regarding either of those areas. So if those things interest you, or if you are curious to learn a bit about them, keep your eyes open. (I make no promises that it will happen within the next few days, but I do guarantee that eventually it will happen.)

Sorry kids- but you are going to have to register

2006-12-03T01:06:00.000-05:00

Given the fact that spam has recently showed up in our comment sections, you will no longer be able to comment without registering with Blogger first. It should be a fairly simple process, and I hope that it does not dissuade any of you from commenting.*

Unfortunately, I am unable to delete the spam that currently exists in the comment sections. While Blogger gives me some level of power, it certainly does not give me omnipotence.

If this does not seem to help, we have a couple other options, but there seems no need to go that far...yet.

*This does not mean you have to register as a contributor, but merely register your email address with Blogger.

Philosophy v. Film?

2006-11-18T22:07:00.000-05:00

If I proposed some kind of gathering to watch a film, how many of you would actually show up? The film I have in mind is Papillon. If you have not seen it, it is very good, I highly recommend it. (Dustin Hoffman and Steve McQueen!) But why this film? For two reasons:

(1) It is not in any way trying to be philosophical, but it is, and so it achieves that very nicely.
(2) The way in which it is philosophical is that it is existential--at least, I think so, very deeply so--and since it's not trying to be, it does it so well and doesn't come off as being cheesy and superficial.

But, a couple of things about this film:

(a) It is a bit long, 2.5 hours.
(b) It is not an easy film to watch, it's got some tough scenes, and being a film from the 70s, it's not designed to keep you easily entertained at every instant, so it can make it feel like it's even longer than it is. (I personally think such a feature of good films is something that adds to their depth; it forces you to spend time actually thinking about what you are watching, since your eyeballs aren't just be hosed down with visual candy.)

And lastly, a few things about the gathering, if there would be one:

(i) Someone else would have to house it, since I do not own a tv & dvd player, and I have a really tiny apartment.
(ii) Food and drinks are probably a good idea.
(iii) There wouldn't be any requirement for any philosophical discussion after the film or anything like that, not unless anyone desires it; sometimes, watching a film like this requires a lot of contemplation afterwards to really get the philosophical depth out of it.
(iv) Obviously, significant others and friends are welcome.
(v) Essentially, this could replace any bar gathering, and provide for something a bit different and stimulating in a different way.

So, who would actually come? (Please don't just say you would, and then not show up if we actually do it.) And since the department is actually much larger than this little group here, if you are really interested, please do spread the word to others in the department and see who else would come. (Tell them to respond here to say so, it would be nice to get some idea of how many people would actually be into it.) But of course, once a decision is made about it, an email will be sent out to all grad students about it.

On Foolishness

2006-11-17T11:42:00.000-05:00

Undetached Rabbit Parts

Wow, now I see why you all have been begging me to come join the party of undetached proportions. You guys are way too serious. What this place is in need of a little less life and death and a little more sarcasm, paired with a healthy dose of cynicism.

I know what you're thinking; I, like you, have trouble tempering my obsessive compulsive tendency towards contemplating my opinions on the "real" issues of the day. I can hear you crying out to yourselves as you read the words on this page, wanting to free yourselves from this burden, yet wondering how and where to begin balancing your need to recede from your thoughts about politics, pontifs, and procreation.

The best place to start this process is, oddly enough, by rediscovering the place of mind where most philosophers are created. If it's been so long you've forgot where you began, have no fear, you can be brought back by uttering a simple phrase. Repeat after me: "In the beginning, there were people not so smart as me." Good. Now, the people we are concerned with are also known by the moniker "fools." I think the best thing we can do for the bunny at this juncture is to get back to our roots and start talking about foolishness.

As much as I'd love to continue talking about this part of the population, alas, as a result of thinking about my humble beginnings, I'm (gasp)...I'm all verklempt (sniff) talk amongst yourselves...

I'll give you some talking points.

Discuss:

A stupid man's report of what a clever man says can never be accurate, because he unconsciously translates what he hears into something he can understand.
Bertrand Russell

No man is so foolish, but he may sometimes give another good counsel, and no man so wise that he may not easily err if he takes no other counsel than his own. He that is taught only by himself has a fool for a master.
Hunter S. Thompson

Any fool can make a rule, and any fool will mind it.
Henry David Thoreau

He can compress the most words into the smallest ideas of any man I ever met.
Abraham Lincoln

Killing Vs. Letting Die

2006-11-13T23:54:00.000-05:00

yeah yeah yeah- more ethics- I'm just trying to balance Trin's posts :-)

The Church of England recently decided that doctors should be allowed to "let sick newborn babies die". The headline says "calls for severely disabled babies to be killed at birth". Is there a difference? I'm inclined to say yes there is a difference since there seems to be a differing state of mind in walking away as opposed to actively ending someone's life. But what do you guys think?

The Morality of Procreation

2006-11-10T00:38:00.000-05:00

I admit that I do not study much in the way of ethics. Although, I do think that studying enough metaphysics and epistemology would provide one with good enough tools for thinking about morality. But I have this question I would like to ask those who study much more ethics, to get an idea of what people think, because I'm so torn on this issue, as I am with many ethical issues.

The morality of procreation: is it ever immoral, unethical, to procreate? Is procreation is a right of some sort? Or a privilege? Are there circumstances in which it really is wrong to have a child? There are lots of circumstances to consider:

(1) If you know that the child you will have will be born with some disease, or handicap, or whatever, that makes his/her life difficult in a significant way. Would it not be better to not have that child?

(2) If you are in a financial situation that is not conducive to raising a child addressing all of his/her needs to a high enough degree? (Is there some degree that we can decide is high enough, or too low for raising a child and providing enough for his/her needs?)

(3) What about the bias of biology? That is, there are so many children that need to be adopted, so why bother procreating if you can just adopt? Is it not ethically preferable to adopt?

These are only a couple of the questions that can be asked, there are so many more. And I am not limiting this post to only addressing these ones here, I am only trying to provide some food for thought. But I would really like to know what some others' thoughts are about the issues of morality and procreation. I recognize that my views are colored by my own experiences and feelings and decisions about my life, but I would like to know what others think, since others have very different experiences. This is one of those really hard issues for me, because on one hand, I realize that it is very personal, and that most people might want to say that no one has the right to interfere in that. But on the other hand, I feel that procreation, and raising a child is perhaps the heaviest moral act that one can engage in, since it involves not merely interacting with another person, but literally creating, in every way, another person, and being wholly responsible for that person.

So, what do people think of this? Like I said, I'm no ethicist, so I would really like to gett the perspective of someone who is, who has studied ethics.

Where's the Boundary?

2006-11-06T20:52:00.000-05:00

I recall two distinct conversations with fellow philosophy friends on the subject of philosophy and logic, where both have rather interesting implications for philosophers, and what we do:

(1) S mentioned to me that if logic is a part of philosophy, then arguments (as part of logic) fall under philosophy. That said, do we want to consider folks that argue their points (whether or not they do well according to the lights of logic) as doing philosophy? For example, should we call scientists/politicians/scholars, etc., who argue for their views philosophers?

(2) N mentioned to me, where I found a non-philosopher's argument lacking according to the lights of logic (though it isn't relevant here exactly how), that I shouldn't hold non-philosopher's arguments to the same logical standard as that of philosopher's arguments. That is, I should overlook the logical deficiencies, wherever they might be, and remember that the author of the argument wasn't a philosopher, so that this feature takes them off the radar of logical scrutiny, as far as the argument in question goes. But, if N is right, then doesn't this leave logic to the assessment of only philosopher's arguments?

Now for the interesting implications:

In (1) S's argument makes the category of philosopher too broad, for certainly we don't want to admit any person who happens to use the logical rigor of argumentation into the philosophical fold, for there is something more to being a philosopher than simply making (good or bad) arguments. But what might function as a plausible premise for this assertion?

In (2) N's point seems to limit logic to the point of almost trivializing it. Logic should be more than simply the assessment of philosopher's arguments, but all arguments, both good and bad, made by all folks everywhere, which includes the category non-philosopher, whatever that might be. But can an argument be made in support of this without (methodologically or otherwise) begging the question?

It seems to me that we might want to consider defining what philosophers are and what such folks do. I seem to recall calls for papers on such subjects a few years back. Naturally, if we define philosopher broad enough, we can deal with (1) and (2) in one fell swoop, for if we are all philosophers, then logic pertains to all our arguments. But we might want to avoid this conclusion, and opt for some other way, since it would be hard to consider all folks as philosophers. At the same time, though, we need to keep the application of logic on the broadest level possible, so as to pertain to all arguments, not just those belonging to philosophers. So, what should be done about all this?

Structural Realism and the Problem of Interpretation

2006-11-05T13:19:00.000-05:00

Worrall’s particular flavor of structural realism (SR henceforth) seems to point to two possibilities for structural continuity: continuity concerning strict mathematical formalism or continuity concerning structural elements (of reality) that goes significantly beyond mere formalistic conservatism. My problem is this: if the claim of SR is simply that the formalism of physical mathematics is conserved between previous theories and subsequent theories, then: (1) it seems very difficult to counter the critique that this continuity is based on merely pragmatic values, and; (2) there is nothing particularly ‘realist’ about the assertion that equations, formulas, etc, are historically conserved between theories apart from interpretation. So, at least it seem to me, that Worrall was after the more significant interpretation of SR; namely, that the mathematical formalism has ‘latched’ on to quantifiable relations between elements existing in reality and that it is these relations, instantiated by the formalism, that is conserved between theories as opposed to simply the formalist structure of mathematical physics.
But at this point another problem arises for me: mathematics uninterpreted is nothing more than syntactic manipulations of symbols expressing abstract concepts that cannot legitimately be said to be about anything. So it seems that mathematical physics, insofar as the field presupposes that these syntactic manipulations can even successfully capture/represent the relations physics quantifies, is burdening mathematics with an ontology that goes beyond that which is contained within mathematics as an independent enterprise. So, again, it would seem that any attempt to apply mathematics to any given field is going to require superfluous (from the perspective of math) ontological commitments that then stand in need of interpretation (interpretation that cannot be said to be strictly mathematical). And this is where I see Worrall’s problems begin to mount, especially in light of Psillos’ critiques concerning the interpretation of the application of a strictly formal system.
Essentially, so I read Psillos, either the formalism is conserved and SR says nothing interesting about realism, or, the formalism is burdened with extraneous ontological commitments that necessarily stand in need of interpretation, in which case it is not strictly the formalism that is being conserved but implicit theoretical assumptions, background theories, etc., that are snuck in under the radar, as it were, coasting in on the claim that it is just the formalism that is conserved.
I am positive that I am missing some possible interpretations/counterarguments here and I hope to begin discussing these as soon as they are presented…

RE: New Name? Plus More

2006-11-05T03:47:00.000-05:00

H'OKAY: So I ended up touching on several bases here regarding general thoughts about this blog. Sorry that I jump from issue to issue, I just had lots of thoughts come to mind, and could not really hold back sharing them. All thoughts about my thoughts are definitely welcome. (I decided to just make this another entry since I ended up touch on so many different topics. Certainly, if you want to just suggest a new name, for whatever reason, comment on Sarah's post, to separate them off from this one.)

I definitely prefer the new look. :)

As for name, I can't say that I thought it suggested such Quinean love, I thought it was just rather cute. I would be fine with whether it stayed or changed. I'm trying to come up with something witty and clever to suggest.

But before I make any suggestions, I guess there is a question that can be asked about the general nature of this blog:

What sort of impression (or persona) do we wish to express to represent this blog? Perhaps we ought to consider that first, and decide how we'd like others to react to a first impression, based purely on name, and decide from there. One could also question whether that matters at all, but if we have any desire to invite outsiders, then perhaps it does. I mean, there are a few of us who possess some online personas where we can promote the hell out of this blog to at least get it noticed. We can also promote it to our own students--for those of us who teach--for any of them who are serious about getting into some philosophical discussions beyond the classes we teach. So the question that seems needing addressing first is about what sort of first impression presentation we desire to display to the public. Essentially, when it comes to designing to anything, the first thing to consider is the goal one has in mind.

For my own suggestion in that direction, I would push for a less humored and more serious sort of presentation, only because WMU has been gaining in noteworthiness amongst the professional philosophical community, and thus, perhaps we ought to take advantage of that and promote it further.

Here is an even further thought: if we can get this blog to have an overall feel and presentation of professionalness, then we can attempt to promote it amongst the more professional community, which could help get WMU's name get out there even more, and thus, help promote our program, which will of course help us all in the long run. I mean, imagine this scenario: someone is reading a particular book/article by someone, has some questions ideas about it, posts an entry, which doesn't necessarily require everyone to read it, just address some questions and issues, and perhaps the original poster eventually decides to send the author an email saying basically, "Hey, I was reading X by you, I had some questions about it, posted it in the unofficial blog of the graduate program I'm in, if you have some time to spare, I'd really love your input about the discussion that's going on there. Here's where you can find the post..." And so-and-so checks it out, sends an email back, and things start rolling for that grad student. How cool is that? And if s/he never hears back from him/her, meh, so what? You lose nothing except a bit of time writing an email.

And one last thing: I think everyone really needs to realize the amazing potential this blog can be as a resource for ideas and general feedback about papers you all need to write for any of your classes. And perhaps we all need to push this a little on the other students who have yet to jump on here. Seriously, from my experience--and remember, I am going on my 4th year year here at WMU, although I am not a student anymore, still--you can gain so much in the direction of writing papers by talking with other people about your ideas and such. Please take advantage of that! Philosophy is not a conversation with yourself, you don't have all the answers; philosophy makes progress because it is a continued conversation between several intelligent minds. Even if you think that other people don't have enough knowledge in whatever area you are writing about, we all have the basic philosophical tools to think about pretty much any philosophical issue. You might have to explain some things first, but once people have enough information, they can certainly offer up some worthwhile thoughts, questions, ideas, etc.

And hey, you have a great and interesting philosophical discussion with another student: share it! You certainly don't have to mention names, but it could be worthwhile to everyone for you to share it.

Something just confusing the hell out of you? Bothering you? Whatever? Post it, ask everyone, you might get some great worthwhile feedback.

Essentially, more people need to get onto this blog and contribute. We all spend a whole lot of time chatting with each other in the department, spending time with each other, etc., why not let such interactions carry over into here? What is the benefit? Having a typed out log of conversations that you can come back to as frequently as you like; with real life conversations, you have only your memory to rely on. Plus, if you are anything like myself, sometimes you find it much easier to express yourself clearly and thoroughly through the medium of writing, as opposed to speaking. Additionally, if you are posting an entry specifically about something you are thinking of writing a paper about, you can gain some practice here through having to already type out your ideas and such. Trust me, that really does help, the more you have to type it out, or say it, or whatever, the better prepared you will be to type it out in a final draft in the best possible way.

In the end, I'm trying to offer some of my advice to you all that is based on my experience of being here in this department for 3 years, so far--4 when I hopefully finally leave. It has been the best damn 3 years of my life thus far, I have learned way more than I ever expected, and if I can share that so that others can benefit, I'd like to. And I know from experience that having typed out conversations like this, in a blog format, can be extremely beneficial, so of course I'm pushing for that. So, anyway, I guess that's all for now. Cheers to you all.

New Look...New name?

2006-11-02T22:32:00.000-05:00

Hello kiddies! [Hopefully] you noticed the new look of the blog. After much deliberation, this was the most aesthetically pleasing to all involved in the (oddly) extensive process.

While I personally have nothing against Quine (and admittedly am rather sympathetic to him), it has been suggested that the title of our lovely blog shows a little more Quine-love than some would prefer. This is not to say that showing some Quine-love is bad, just that some people would prefer that the Quine-love was a bit more limited-- or at least not so public... So... how do we feel about changing the name of the blog? To make things easier, if you DO want to change the name of the blog, then you should suggest another name. I say we take submissions for the name change until next Friday (11/10), at which point we can attempt to figure out some way to vote on the issue. You can voice your support for the traditional "Undetached Rabbit Parts" if you feel so compelled.

You will also notice I have added more links. Some of the old links no longer worked. If you have a philosophy blog or philosophically interesting webpage that you think should be added, let me know. Or, if you are linked and don't want to be- let me know about that too.

Also, the "Napkin Story" I've been passing around? I was very very wrong- It was Tarski. Read it here

Proboscidea self-identify!

2006-10-31T12:03:00.000-05:00

This is way too awesome to let pass up on some good discussion. A student of mine just a couple of weeks ago said he came across an article talking about some cases in which elephants raised in captivity who were let out into the wild came back to find their trainers much later, after having "kids", and they were specifically bringing the kids back with them. The interpretation was that these elephants were essentially bringing the kids over to meet whom they had identified as a parent, the trainer, the person who raised and took care of them. Now how cool is that? They also mourn the death of their mate, and I think don't ever take up another mate after that; also mourn the death of their children; and it's not uncommon for them to behave in such a way after events like that that suggests, very convincingly, that they are depressed, like, really depressed, as a human would be if he/she lost a loved one. Anyway, onto the article:

Original article

Mirror Test Reflects Well on Elephants

By Rick Weiss

Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, October 31, 2006; Page A01

Elephants can recognize themselves in a mirror and use their reflections to explore hidden parts of themselves, a measure of subjective self-awareness that until now has been shown definitively only in humans and apes, researchers reported yesterday.

The findings confirm a long-standing suspicion among scientists that elephants, with their big brains, complex societies and reputation for helping ill herdmates, have a sufficiently developed sense of identity to pass the challenging "mirror self-recognition test."

The test, which in this case required construction of a huge, "elephant-proof" mirror at the Bronx Zoo, where the experiments were conducted, provides an index of an animal's ability to conceive of itself. It is a quality of self-consciousness that some scientists believe is a prerequisite for the emergence of empathy and altruism.

Such animals, the thinking goes, are in a position to use what they know about themselves to make inferences about other beings and their needs.

"It really is a clue about the evolution of intelligence," said Diana Reiss of the Wildlife Conservation Society in New York, who led the new study on the endangered species with Frans de Waal and Joshua Plotnik of the Yerkes National Primate Research Center in Atlanta.

"It tells us you can come to this same endpoint with very different creatures and with very different brains," said Reiss, who has seen similar but less certain signs of self-recognition among dolphins.

Gordon G. Gallup Jr., a psychology professor at the State University of New York at Albany who developed the mirror test nearly 40 years ago, praised the elephant study as a "very solid, very impressive piece of scientific work."

Some scientists took a more skeptical view, reflecting the controversy that has long engulfed the field of animal intelligence generally and the meaning of the mirror recognition test in particular.

"Far too much has been made of a very trivial task in all these mirror experiments, and it has lately reached some dizzyingly bizarre heights," said Robin Dunbar of the University of Liverpool in England. Dunbar criticized the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the journal that published the new results in its early online edition yesterday, for what he called "poor editorial standards."

Researchers over the years have provided body-size mirrors to hundreds of animals in zoos and other habitats. Almost always, the animals act as though the image they see is of another.

"Most animals seem incapable of learning that their behavior is the source of the behavior in the mirror," Gallup said. "They are incapable of deciphering that dualism."

By contrast, human babies get it by age 2, as do adult chimpanzees, bonobos and orangutans.

Monkeys, which are more distantly related to humans than are apes, never catch on. Indeed, the only non-ape species to come close to passing until now has been the bottlenose dolphin; it lacks the limbs to touch itself (a key part of the mirror test's final challenge) but can use mirrors to examine hidden parts of its body.

The new study involved three female Asian elephants at the zoo, in New York City. Workers built a 64-square-foot acrylic mirror, cemented it to plywood, framed it in steel and bolted it to a stone wall of the elephant enclosure.

"Our primary concern was the safety of the elephants," said Plotnik, a graduate student at Emory University, home to the Yerkes lab. "Our second concern was making sure they don't destroy the mirror. They are very curious animals."

In a series of experiments, the elephants first explored the mirror -- reaching behind it with their trunks, kneeling before it and even trying to climb it -- gathering clues that the mirror image was just that, an image.

That was followed by an eerie sequence in which the animals made slow, rhythmic movements while tracking their reflections. Then, like teenagers, they got hooked.

All three conducted oral self-exams. Maxine, a 35-year-old female, even used the tip of her trunk to get a better look inside her mouth. She also used her trunk to slowly pull her ear in front of the mirror so she could examine it -- "self-directed" behaviors the zookeepers had never seen before.

Moreover, one elephant, Happy, 34, passed the most difficult measure of self-recognition: the mark test. The researchers painted a white X on her left cheek, visible only in the mirror. Later, after moving in and out of view of the mirror, Happy stood directly before the reflective surface and touched the tip of her trunk to the mark repeatedly -- an act that, among other insights, requires an understanding that the mark is not on the mirror but on her body.

The researchers also placed a transparent, "sham" mark that could not be seen in the mirror on Happy's right cheek, to see if the feel of that mark on the skin alone might cause her to touch that spot. It did not.

DeWaal acknowledged that the precise meaning of the test is debatable. In particular, he said, "people who work on animals that don't pass the test get upset" and tend to belittle its meaning.

But he and many others strongly suspect that the rarity of mirror self-recognition -- along with it being more common among animals reported to help other animals in need -- makes the test a good marker for a certain level of consciousness.

"I believe that all animals have some level of self-awareness, but those that pass the mirror test have more of it," de Waal said.

Marc Hauser, a Harvard biologist who has studied self-recognition in cotton-top tamarins, said that the mirror test is valuable but that other tests can also shed light on "what kinds of thoughts animals have about themselves and others."

Monkeys do well on other tests of self-awareness, for example, including some that measure their awareness of gaps in their knowledge. "They're good at knowing what they don't know," Hauser said.

Some birds are especially good at knowing what other animals know about them: Jays will move hidden food if they realize another bird has been watching them hide it.

Whatever the mirror test's real meaning, the fact that few beyond humans can pass it speaks to the need to protect Asian elephants -- which are endangered due to hunting and habitat destruction -- and to continue the search for similarly endowed critters, Reiss said.

Among the leading candidates: orca, or "killer," whales, which are fearsome hunters but are also highly social and intelligent.

And now for something completely different...

2006-10-26T16:22:00.000-04:00

Not that Trin's Phil Science discussion hasn't been interesting...

Tuesday night at reading group there was a discussion regarding the Michigan Civil Rights Initiative. This, of course, led into a discussion regarding affirmative action. Very briefly, for those of you that don't know, the MCRI would end affirmative action in Michigan. The bill was proposed by Ward Connerly, who has already been victorious getting similar measures passed in California in Oregon. Our discussion on Tuesday night centered around what this meant for universities. When California was no longer required to admit a certain number of minorities into its state universities, the percentage of minorities admitted dropped considerably. However, the success rate of minorities that were admitted seems to be higher. (I won't pretend I've looked up all the stats on this, so I'll just stick with weak claims based on hearsay from Fritz, Joe, and Mike.)

What are everyone else's thoughts on this? I'm inclined to say that even though the system of affirmative action is inadequate, we should keep it until we can come up with something better (ie. better public educational systems). I am, however, far from decided on the issue.

More info on the MCRI:
Citizens Research Council of Michigan (MCRI info is down the page a bit)
propaganda in support of the MCRI
Links to propaganda against the MCRI
John Conyers on the MCRI
Editorial from Kazoo Gazette

Theories as Conventions

2006-10-18T21:41:00.000-04:00

I pulled this quote from a blog of a friend of mine. He is a graduate student in economics and interested in the philosophy of science. I have excerpted parts of my responses (numbered 1 and 2) to his question and have left them incomplete in order to initiate what I hope to be a heated debate…

"Philosophers of science *should* match their program theory with past historical instance. It would be important to show that, for instance, validation has worked in the past. That is, philosophers of science should practice their own discipline. That said, it is insufficient to criticize a philosophy of science theory merely on the grounds that it does not align with history. However, it must be shown that any philosophy of science theory in the past has worked, even though it may not explain the entire history of progression in science. A Popperian, for instance, would attempt to falsify other theories in the philosophy of science on the basis of poor empirical support or disconfirmation.”

(1) I would ask that you explain why, if the theory is strictly normative, the theory of science needs to answer to historical validation. I understand the need for validation if the theory is sold as a descriptive/normative account of science, but for a normative account, I would argue that it would be something akin to a category mistake to require empirical justification for some theory that is not making any empirical claims.

(2) For Popper, his theory of falsificationism is supposed to be initially adopted as a convention, to be justified solely according to its consequences (problem-solving magnitude, though he does not use these words). Popper conceptualizes scientific endeavors as essentially problem-solving endeavors (philosophy in general is also based on problem-solving). As such, hypotheses are proposed solutions to these problems and are only useful insofar as they are good at solving the problem that they have been generated to solve. The problem for a theory of science is, for Popper, a means of successfully demarcating scientific claims from non-scientific claims. He suggests that Falsificationism is well equipped to demarcate science and to uphold various other characteristics that must be upheld in order for some enterprise to be called scientific (various empirical strictures, a conception of progress, etc). So his theory of science is conventional, in that, it does not initially come with a full-fledged rational justification-package, but is to be provisionally accepted as a means of solving the problem at hand. If it solves a problem (the problem of demarcation), then we keep it, if it does not, we provide another solution and examine how well it solves the problem. So a methodological theory is not to be critiqued by another theory and its particular methodological processes, but by how well that theory solves the particular problem that it was proposed to solve. For example, Popper didn’t critique the Positivist’s verification criteria of meaning according to whether it is subject to falsification, but because it did not adequately solve that which it was suppose to solve; i.e, the problem of demarcation.

Shall we try this again?

2006-10-15T17:02:00.000-04:00

The torch has been passed.
WMU's philosophy department has new grad students.
Will we be able to keep it going? Perhaps.
Only time will tell...

If you are a current philosophy grad student and want to be added as a contributor, contact me at: sarah . c . stangl [at] wmich . edu

This is The End

2005-12-20T00:18:00.000-05:00

It's been a fun go-round, but it seems that lack of interest and creativity has provided solid evidence that it is time to wrap this blog up. The posts will remain accessible through the archive links, but don't come back looking for new posts. Perhaps another generation of WMU graduate students will carry on the glorious tradition of blogging.

Should I Stay or Should I Go?

2005-12-05T13:06:00.000-05:00

Unfortunately, it seems like our unofficial blog for the grad students at WMU has lost steam. I'm considering closing it down, unless this threat of closure generates a newfound interest among my fellow grad students. I figure it is better to delete the blog, rather than let it stay up as it is. We can say, it was good while it lasted.

Conference Information

2005-08-30T18:46:00.000-04:00

We're going to try and use the department blog to share upcoming calls for papers and conferences that would be of interest to our grad students at WMU. Here's the first shot.

Metaethics Workshop at University of Wisconsin--Madison
We'd like to see how many WMU grad students would be interested in attending a philosophy workshop on metaethics. Don't brush this off if you're not into ethics. Metaethics delves into issues that coincide with metaphysics, epistemology, philosophy of language, and several other philosophical interests. Since this conference is within driving distance, this conference is accessible for our department. Plus, this conference features some of the best philosophers in metaethics explaining the cutting edge material. The dates for the conference cover Sept 16-18, 2005. It would be great to get a group of grad students to attend this event. [FOR MORE DETAILS CLICK HERE.]

I'm interested in attending. If others (from WMU) are interested, send me an e-mail or post a comment to this blog-post.

UPDATE: I've been told that there is no conference fee, and that we are in the works of putting together a way to house grad students for free. Also, some of our professors are planning to attend (e.g., Fritz Allhoff), which means they can help introduce us to other people in the field. Now, you have no excuse for not attending.

Thomas Reid's Argument against Moral Non-Cognitivism

2005-08-12T10:28:00.000-04:00

In Thomas Reid's Essays on the Active Powers of Man, he presents a compelling argument against Hume's moral theory. As I understand Reid's criticism of Hume, this argument may have some relevance on contemporary ethics regarding whether moral claims are cognitive or non-cognitive (if unfamiliar with this issue read this). Reid argues that moral claims must have a cognitive basis. Reid's argument is essential linguistic. He compares the following two claims:

(1) “That man did well and worthily, his conduct is highly approvable”

(2) “The man’s conduct gave me a very agreeable feeling.”

If moral non-cognitivism is true, then these two statements should mean the same thing. But Reid points out that these two statements do not mean the same thing. Reid explains, “The first expresses plainly an opinion or judgment of the conduct of the man, but says nothing of the speaker. The second only testifies a fact concerning the speaker—to wit, that he had such a feeling.”

Reid extends his argument by showing that the contradictories of (1) and (2) also have different meanings, which reinforces his point that (1) and (2) have different meanings. When people hold contradictories over (1), they have a disagreement over a judgment. Whereas when people disagree concerning (2), this results in a personal affront. “[F]or, as every man must know his own feelings,” writes Reid, “to deny that a man had a feeling which affirms he had, is to charge him with falsehood.”

I believe Reid's strategy is instructive. The burden rests on non-cognitivists to find a plausible harmonization of (1) and (2), or to show that (1) is meaningless. Since I find neither of these solutions plausible, I believe Reid's criticism demonstrates a key problem with moral non-cognitivism.

Conceivability

2005-04-05T16:20:00.000-04:00

Descartes famously invokes a conceivability argument for substance dualism in his Meditaions. In this argument he proposes that he can conceive of his mind existing in a universe that consists of no material things. It certainly seems possible to concieve of a universe that consists of no material entities but Descartes proposes that he can conceive of his mind existing in this universe. Of course Descartes proves that his mind is not a material thing since it does not contain any essential properties of material things, namely extension. Descartes concludes that the mind is not identical to the body since the body is a material substance. Granting the fact that conceivability implies logical possibility, Descartes is able to deduce this while sitting in his armchair by the fire. Descartes does not need to go out and do any experimental science in order to come to this conclusion. This was certainly intended due to the circumstances he created with his skeptical arguments.

Descartes of course assumed that since the mind was immaterial it was outside of the realm of science since science exclusively dealt with material things. The appeal of the materialist position was the fact that if the mind could be reduced to a material entity it could be studied under the realm of science. This would solve our intuition that the mind has some mysterious causal effect on our body. The problem now is that immaterial entities are part of the content of science, namely physics. This is what initiated the evolution of materialism to physicalism. Since materialism could only account for extended things it could not account for photons and other entities that are not considered to be extended. Of course we want these entities to be considered part of the content of science so the 'scientific' view of mind evolved into physicalism.

Now since immaterial entities are actually considered within the realm of science, the body can consist of immaterial entities. So the mere fact that the mind is immaterial does not deliver the conclusion that the mind is not identical to the body.

There are some problems at this point that seem to put the mind/body argument on hold. First is that even the best physicists and physicalists cannot pin down an essential property of physical substance. This leads to problems with physicalism because there is no way a physicalist will ever want to concede that fundamental mental entities are within the realm of physics and have causal power. But since there is no essential physical property known at this point, physics has no determinate content (this is one horn of Hempel's Dilemma) and therefore the physicalist cannot rule out fundamental mental entities from being within the realm of physics.

Second, the substance dualist seems to be in a position where he can no longer use the Cartesian conceivability argument in his favor. In order to use this argument he must know an essential property of physical substance in order to demonstrate that the the mind and the body have incompatible properties. The dualist could always say 'Well I can imagine my mind existing in a universe with no physical things, therefore they are not identical.' But in order to do this wouldn't he need to know a priori that his mind is not physical? The way Descartes knew a priori that his mind was not material was because he could imagine material things and from his imagination determine an essential feature of all material things. Is it possible to discover an essential feature of the physical by using our imagination alone? It seems as if this issue is no longer an a priori issue.

Jessica Wilson of U of M presented a paper in which she addressed the problems of Hempel's dilemma and concluded that a physicalist must have a physics-based NFM (no fundamental mentality) account of the physical in spirit of the intentions of the physicalist's position as a solution to the mind-body problem. According to a physics-based NFM account, in order for an entity to be physical it must be within the realm of physics and it must be non-mental.

I just added in this last part as an interesting attempt to solve the problem on the physicalist's side...

I also may be creating a problem for dualists that may not exist. I was just thinking about this today and thought I'd throw it out there.

Nominalistic Truth in Logic

2005-04-01T08:37:00.000-05:00

Hilary Putnam (1971) says a nominalist logician takes the following definition for validity:

(B) "The following turns into a true sentence no matter what words or phrases of the appropriate kind one may substitute for the letters S, M, P: 'if all S are M and all M are P, then all S are P'."

As I blogged earlier, Putnam pointed out a problem with this definition as it related to
any formal language of logic. But this is not the only problem for a nominalist logician.
In addition, Putnam points out some problems with truth in nominalistic validity.

Some conception of truth must be included within any definition of validity. But for the
nominalist logic only refers to symbols within a language. So "true" and "false" must
only relate to the ink on the paper or darkened bits on a computer screen. But this makes
no sense. How can we say that these things are "true" or "false"? They just are. Putnam
reminds us that truth rather relates to what the strings of letters express. But meaning is
just the sort of thing the nominalist wants to get rid of. Putnam wants to argue then that
the conception of truth is unavailable to the nominalist.

The nominalist could try to distinguish the conception to make it more his fit in the following way:

(1) S is true

and

(2) S is true as understood by John at time t

If S is a physical object (1) makes no sense; but (2) can represent a possible relationship which may obtain. Thus a nominalist does have an answer for Putnam.

Also the nominalist can appeal to "ordinary language" as in the following statement:

(3) Jack made a true statement.

But Putnam points out that this could imply one of two things: (a) statements (non-physical entities) exist or (b) statements don't exist. If (b) is true, then nominalism is "futile" since this contradicts one of its main doctrines. If (a) is true then nominalism is false for it contradicts the very words written in the statement.

Putnam does not claim that these arguments against the nominalist are conclusive. But the nominalist is not entitled to the conception of truth without a suitable nominalist explanation. So Putnam concludes that the nominalist conception of truth in validity is unsatisfactory, "at least today."

Nominalistic Validity?

2005-03-25T12:42:00.000-05:00

Hilary Putnam is among the many helpful philosophers who have been informing my thought as of late. His wonderfully and compactly written Philosophy of Logic has been very helpful. Putnam begins his small book by stating some of the generally accepted principles of logic. He includes the principle of validity in the following familiar inference:

All S are M
All M are P
(Therefore) All S are P

He also includes the usual round of suspects: the laws of identity, contradiction, and excluded middle. Putnam notes that each of these general principles have been disputed by more than one contemporary philosopher. Note that this book was written in 1971; but I would imagine that this statement still holds true.

It is obvious from the first pages that Putnam wishes to show that the nominalistic view of the general rules of logic is much mistaken. In reference to the principle of valid inference he states that most logicians are likely to say:

(A) "For all classes S, M, P: if all S are M and all M are P, then all S are P."

A nominalist though is more likely to write:

(B) "The following turns into a true sentence no matter what words or phrases of the appropriate kind one may substitute for the letters S, M, P: 'if all S are M and all M are P, then all S are P'."

For the nominalist, the idea of "sentences" and "words" are much more "concrete" than the entities of "classes". So, based upon (B) we can see that a schema (or wff) is valid for the nominalist "just in case all substitution-instances of S in some particular formalized language L are true." Putnam believes that the logician wants to say more than this though. Validity should "mean that it is correct no matter what class-names may be substituted."

Putnam's desire to adopt (A) becomes more attractive when we see that the nominalist suggestion for validity (B) turns out to have a problem which mushrooms quickly. For if we adopt (B) we will not have one notion of validity but an infinite series of notions: validity in L1, validity in L2, validity in L3, etc. Since validity only relates to a particular formalized language L for the nominalist we must have different notions of validity for every type of language L used in logic. A most unwanted consequence.

We could avoid this maybe by stating "a schema is valid just in case all of its substitution-instances in every language L are true." But, as Putnam notes, it is highly questionable whether the notion of all possible formalized languages is any more "concrete" than the notion of "classes".

Is anybody else familiar with the nominalism-realism debate surrounding logical or mathematical entities? I would appreciate any helpful direction.

The Consequences of Eliminativism

2005-03-01T16:39:00.000-05:00

Eliminative materialists like Stephen Stich and Paul Churchland have proposed a theory of "mind" (mind is in scare quotes because they eliminate its existence; strictly speaking they only have a theory of the brain) that is fascinating, creative, amenable to science, and that challenges the traditional conceptions about the mind. Most significantly, eliminativism proclaims that neuroscience is sufficient to explain the mental life, which has traditionally been understood using folk psychological terms like belief, desire, and intention. While rejecting folk psychology may be most consistent with a physicalistic/scientistic ontology, this rejection of folk psychology has some very strange results.

First, consider the enormous burden of proof that is required to deny that anyone has had a belief, desire, or intention. Lynne Rudder Baker has captured this point soundly in her criticism of physicalism Saving Belief (Princeton, NJ: Princeton UP, 1987):

If no one has ever had a belief or intention, it is unclear how to interpret any inscription to be a claim that such-and-such and, in particular, how to construe as meaningful a claim advancing the view that no one has ever had a belief. In the absence of some indication of how meaning would be possible without beliefs or intentions, one who denies that common-sense conception of the mental is akin to a logician who takes the moral of the semantic and logical paradoxes to be that all logic is wrong and just leaves it at that. Or, to use another of David Austin's suggestive analogies, it is as if someone were to write on a blackboard, "The following sentences have no meaning or interpretation," and then, three or four sentences down, repeat that same sentence. We would be entitled to puzzlement. We can hardly assess a claim that takes away everything we possess to understand it. (page 114)

When one considers that it follows from eliminativism that no one believes in eliminativism and there are no beliefs that confirm or deny eliminativism, this consequence of eliminativism can be downright baffling.

The aforementioned consequence of eliminativism is well known. But what other consequences follow from eliminativism? Consider what Stich himself suggests [From Folk Psychology to Cognitive Science (Cambridge, MA: MIT, 1983), 242], "Might it be the case that ordinary folk psychological ascriptions will turn out, quite generally, not to be true? The answer I have been urging is that this is a serious possibility.... If we had to renounce folk psychology, we should probably have to renounce the notions of personhood and agency as well." Baker draws thirteen consequences that follow if eliminativism is true (Saving Belief, 130-32). (1) The ability to predict others' behavior would become inexplicable. Suppose I call you on the phone and invite you to dinner at 7:00 on Saturday--without any beliefs, intentions, or desires, it would be amazing if I actually prepared dinner for you and you showed up. (2) Commonplace interaction among people and what is said about such interactions would become mysterious. (3) Behavior could never go wrong. Without folk psychological concepts like intention, one could never be said to have done something unintentionally or by accident or by mistake. Without any distinction between intentional and unintentional actions, justifying and excusing behavior cannot be sensibly maintained. (4) Almost every explanation that anyone has ever given would be false. (5) There would be no distinction between what we call lying and an honest mistake. (6) Every moral judgment would be false or senseless. (7) Nothing would ever have mattered to anybody. (8) It would be a total mystery why we say the things we do (though not why we emit the noises we emit) and why we give the explanations of our actions that we do. (9) It would be a miracle that we are able systematically to utter truths. (10) Reports of deliberation and decision would be false. (11) What one does would be totally unrelated to what one reports that she thinks she is doing. (12) Most of applied psychology, from market research to the various psychotherapies, would be bogus. (13) The explananda of psychology would become problematic.

Now this, so far, has not been an argument against eliminativism. Thus far, I have only shown that "if elimantivism is true, then these consequences follow." But I think we can turn this into an argument against eliminativism. Since eliminativism entails the denial of numerous facts most people find more plausible than eliminativism itself, we could employ modus tollens on the eliminativist. In other words, eliminativists want to argue that since eliminativism is true, we must reject folk psychology and accept the 13 consequences noted above. I, on the other hand, want to argue that since we cannot accept the 13 consequences noted above, eliminativism must be false.

Methodology of Philosophy of Perception

2005-02-09T21:54:00.000-05:00

I notice a methodological issue that is common to most philosophy of perception. When one attempts to analyse perception he will typically take one of two apparent routes in doing so. Either he will assume knowledge of how perception works or he will assume knowledge of what we percieve and proceed to explain what is not assumed. One who assumes how perception works will use this to explain what we percieve and one who assumes knowledge of what we percieve will use this to explain how perception works.

For example, James J. Gibson, in his essay "A Theory of Direct Visual Perception", assumes what we percieve are real external objects. Assuming this he proceeds to explain how perception works and concludes that we have direct visual perception.

On the other hand one could for instance assume the nature of the human eye and brain as how perception works. Then from there he could proceed to explain what one percieves as external objects that set our perceptual mechanism in motion.

Either way it seems as if one must assume knowledge of one aspect of perception in an attempt to explain the other aspect. We must know something about perception in order to talk about it. So what do we actually know about the nature of perception? Do we know how we percieve, what we percieve, or neither? In an attempt to avoid begging the question about such matters it seems important to avoid assuming anything we don't yet know for certain about perception. It seems we ought to attempt to get at our most basic intuitions about the nature of perception.

I have been doing some thinking and it seems very intuitive that our perceptions are caused by something. If we have learned anything from Descartes it is that we must not be naive realists and assume that our perceptions are caused by the actual objects that are presumably 'represented' in our perceptions. But even Descartes acknowledges that these perceptions come from somewhere. If not from corresponding external objects then they come from something else, possibly an evil demon. Let's assume our perceptions are being cause by an evil demon. Even if this is true the phenomenal character of the perceptions would remain the same. It should not be assumed that the objects of our perceptions are the actual causes.

On this account it seems like we ought to call dreams perceptions since the phenomenal character of dream-perceptions are strikingly similar to 'awake'-perceptions. For me it is intuitive to say we are percieving when we are dreaming.

So...

Is the phenomenal character of perception all we really know about the nature of perception? Well we know that perceptions are certainly caused by something, assuming something cannot come from nothing. But can we get anywhere about how perception works and what the causes of our perceptions are from this starting point? I think there are some very interesting routes one could take but I don't think merely assuming knowledge of either will get us anywhere but into an informal fallacy. Unfortunately a lot of philosophers of perception, espescially physicalists, seem to be taking the latter route. It may be a very hard place to start but we ought to at least be honest about it. Can a direct realist start from this point and get anywhere?

Gay Marriage

2005-02-09T11:16:00.000-05:00

Here's some applied ethics:

As many of you may have heard Bush's State of the Union Address, I think this is somewhat relevant. I remember attending two discussions by Robert Audi, one at my old undergrad and one here at Western. At both, Audi mentioned his principle of secular rationale. To give my best reinterpretation (I'm sure you can find it in a journal somewhere, perhaps I'll look it up), I will say that his principle basically says that:

We should only endorse a law for which there is a prima facie secular reason for doing so.

So, imagining the abortion debate, we cannot use the claim that a fetus has a soul (if "soul" is to be interpreted as a Christian or otherwise religious term). So, anti-abortionists cannot use this as a reason to outlaw abortion. Note, however, that anti-abortionists can feel this way more strongly than secular reasons, but there must be secular reasons that they put forward (hence the prima facie component). Regarding abortion, the secular reasons put forward are interesting and worth debate, but we should keep that to a different post.

My interest is to talk about homosexual marriage. Perhaps there are secular reasons for keeping homosexuals from having marriage rights, but here is an excerpt from Bush's State of the Union address:

Our second great responsibility to our children and grandchildren is to honor and to pass along the values that sustain a free society. So many of my generation, after a long journey, have come home to family and faith, and are determined to bring up responsible, moral children. Government is not the source of these values, but government should never undermine them.

Because marriage is a sacred institution and the foundation of society, it should not be re-defined by activist judges. For the good of families, children, and society, I support a constitutional amendment to protect the institution of marriage. (Applause.)

Although I think the quote speaks for itself, I think that logical analysis can make clear what Bush is saying.

First off, he seems to separate "many of his generation" from all of his generation (plus the rest of America). I believe it is Bush's duty to defend the rights of all of this nation's citizens.

Second, it seems that by supporting a ban on gay marriage, we are keeping the government from "undermining" our ability to bring up "moral children." What assumptions are we making? Is homosexuality immoral? According to whose standards? I can think of several in particular for our society: the most common versions of Christianity. Keep in mind Audi's principle. I have yet to find a (moderately reasonable) secular reason for thinking that homosexuality is immoral, although I would be interested to hear one. For obviously flawed secular reasons, see further comments.

Third, Bush says that marriage is a sacred institution. It is also, a legal and societal institution. We must not conflate these. Perhaps we should protect marriage as a sacred institution (we can give Church's the right to deny marriage to certain [i.e. homosexual] individuals), but we must also understand the motivations for marriage as a legal and/or societal institution.

As a legal instution, the purpose of marriage is to offer people protection and give them rights for various reasons. It is well known that when people get married, they promise to give up certain rights in the interests of the other (in economics, we can think of marriage as an opportunity cost). For example, a housewife may promise to stay at home and raise children. She is giving up various opportunities for the sake of another individual. That being said, if the other individual should choose to renege on the marriage, he has affected the other in a negative way, and is duly responsible for such negative affects. This can be characterized as a contractual view of marriage. In such instances, the wife (or husband) is entitled to alimony (for a given period of time). Homosexuals, since they are not allowed to have the rights of marriage, are susceptible to a type of abandonment without compensation. This makes a homosexual long-term relationship a higher opportunity cost (legally) than a heterosexual one, which is unfair.

Furthermore, as a Societal institution, marriage can (although often times may not) provide a more stable environment for raising a family. Of course, a male homosexual couple could not have children on their own, but adoption is always an option. For female couples, they can choose to artificially inseminate. Simply because these couples cannot produce a family in a "typical" fashion does not imply that they should not have the right to raise a family so long as they can acquire one by legal means. An obvious counterexample to a rejection of this claim would be infertile couples, or any other family that adopts or artificially inseminates. Furthermore, we allow marriage when no family is intended (or possible), such as older couples or job-oriented couples. Perhaps we should only give benefits to people who have children based in light of this societal view, but that would simply mean that "typical" marriage would not be justified from a society viewpoint, only having children (by any legal means) would.

Anyway, there is more to the debate, but I'll keep it to this for now.

Mental states and propositional content

2005-01-13T11:25:00.000-05:00

Does everything mental have propositional content? Tim Crane, in his "The Intentional Structure of Consciousness," takes as granted that there are plenty of mental states devoid of any propositional element. Arthur Falk, in Chapter 2 of his Desire and Belief, argues that all mental acts have at least some propositional content.

To say that a mental act or attitude, such as belief, have propositional content is simply to say that it is directed toward a proposition and, thus, has a truth value. In wanting a sloop you desire that you have a sloop, in believing what your mother says you are believing that what your mother says is true (to some degree of certainty). It seems clear to me that these sorts of mental attitudes are propositional, but perhaps not emotions or qualia.

Crane believes that all mental states are intentional, but not necessarily propositional. He takes things like being in love or qualia as counterexamples to a view like Falk's.

While reading Crane, I was convinced of his point; surely beliefs about being in love are propositional, but it's difficult to see how the love itself is. On furthur reflection, however, I became tempted to change my mind. Perhaps being in love is, besides the associated feelings, belief that many propositions are so and desire that many propositions be so, etc. There may be able to associate the cause of the feeling with a set of propositional attitudes.

But what of the feeling itself? What of sensation? Falk argues that we cannot feel sensation without believing that we are having a sensation. I initially thought this untenable, until I formulated a thought experiment: While unconscious (knocked out from drugs, say) we won't feel the pain, even though many of our nerves will be firing just as they would if we were conscious. Perhaps the inability to feel comes from our inability to form beliefs about the sensations. A more everyday example might be the following: Suppose I am playing hockey and am very engrossed in the game. My mind may be so occupied with what I should be doing on the ice that I hardly feel it when someone's slapshot ricochets off of my thigh. When my shift is over and I go sit on the bench, however, I may become aware of a dull pain in my leg. Perhaps the sensation can only arise when my mind is ready to form beliefs that I am having a such a sensation.

So now I'm stuck floundering between these two views, wondering if the soreness I feel in my back is in part propositional or not...

Two Free Will Dilemmas

2004-12-12T10:10:00.000-05:00

As I see it, there are two broad positions on free will, under which are various denominations of nuanced positions fall. First, there is determinism. Determinism is the view that sufficient causal conditions exist outside of agents that determine the actions or wills of agents. The second position is indeterminism. Indeterminism is the view that there are some choices where no sufficient causal conditions exist outside free agents that determine the wills or actions of free agents. Both positions have accrued problems that can be called "classic criticisms." I would like to pose just one of these for each position in the form of a dilemma. First, there is the dilemma for indeterminism:

(1) Either our choices have sufficient reasons for their existence or they do not.
(2) All events have sufficient reasons for their existence (PSR).
(3) Therefore, indeterminism must accept there are sufficient causes that explain free choices.

On the other hand, determinists must face this dilemma:

(4) One believes determinism because either it is freely chosen based on rational inferences or one is determined to believe it.
(5) Determinism cannot be freely chosen on the basis of one's own rational inferences.
(6) Thus, if determinism is true, then one has been determined to believe it. [4,5]
(7) If a belief is accepted because it has been determined, then it is not justified.
(8) Thus, if determinism is true, then one cannot be justified in believing it. [6,7]

While I will not pretend to offer a solution that is acceptable to everyone, I believe it is possible to arbitrate among these positions in favor of indeterminism. I believe that indeterminists can accept that there are sufficient conditions for free choices, which weakens the distinction made in (1). The most plausible indeterminist theories do not state that free choices are utterly uncaused and fundamentally random. Rather, they believe the causes and reasons for free choices exist within the agent. Since these causal conditions are within the agent--indeed, they might say that agents are the genesis for their choices, which would sufficiently explain their choices--they can accept one horn of the dilemma without the damning consequences.

As for the determinist's dilemma, I believe the weakest premise is (7), which can be rejected if one finds external "justification" or warrant plausible. I happen to believe that there are fundamental problems with externalism, so I believe that the dilemma holds for determinists. Of course, many people will find externalism very plausible, so they will not have a problem with this form of the dilemma. Like I said, I won't act like this is a non-controversial way to assess these dilemmas, but I think framing the free will debate in terms of these dilemmas is at least interesting, if not useful.

War on Iraq pt. 2

2004-11-21T23:31:00.000-05:00

Allow me to entertain a seemingly similar, yet notably different, anti-war strategy. Rather than questioning our justification, let’s question something that I feel is more important, namely, our obligation. First off, note the trivial truth that justification does not imply obligation. I might be justified in being angry with Fred for kicking my shins, but clearly I am not obligated to be. I will grant something like Vallicella’s argument (clearly a cumulative-case argument is the way to go), thereby admitting that we are justified in going to war, but argue that our obligations (if any) were elsewhere. Nonetheless, I will also grant that we did have an obligation to go to war with Iraq, but I will argue that it was outweighed by a competing obligation that we ignored. An example of competing obligations: I am obligated to get to class on time, but I have a (stronger) competing obligation to not drive recklessly and run over fellow students in order to do so.

(An interesting question I will leave untouched is where our obligations now lie, given all that has already occurred. Here’s an article on that particular subject.)

So, presuming that our actions were justified and obligated, why should we think that our greater obligations were elsewhere? I will use the Golden Rule, which is common to most respectable ethical systems, as my primary justification. I was, as all of you probably were, born into a life of privilege. By privilege I don’t mean exceeding wealth, but simply safety and comfort—never having to worry too much about starving to death, contracting fatal illnesses from the little food or water consumed, dying a violent death as an innocent, etc. Nonetheless I can counterfactually imagine that, if I had been born into a life of poverty, I would want the privileged people to aid me.

The U.S. and ‘western’ European nations consist of about 900 million people. According to this site, there are about 842 million hungry people in the world. This is almost as much as there are in all western nations combined! This means that, given that you are alive now, there is about as much chance that you’re in one of the privileged western nations as there is that you’re hungry. Also, it should be noted that about twenty-four thousand of the hungry die every day, three out of four of which are children under five. (For those of you who are pro-lifers--whom I am not unsympathetic with--compare this to the estimated 3600 abortions occurring daily in the U.S. in 2002.)

According to this site, with the money that the U.S. (not including our allies) has spent on the war on Iraq thus far, we could have fully funded global anti-hunger efforts for 6 years. Imagine how many years that will be when our work in the Middle East is finally complete. If we could fully fund those efforts for about 13-15 years, then by the estimates of the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization we could cut the number of hungry people in half. If you follow the above link to the article on the FAO website, you will see that halving hunger would also have immense benefits for both the national and world economy.

I believe that we should have helped these hungry people instead of engaging in the war on Iraq. I believe we are aiding fewer people by our efforts overseas than we would be aiding through the reduction of hunger. I also believe that reducing world hunger would have resulted in fewer American deaths than our efforts overseas have. Related to the last comment, I believe that this war will cause more violent deaths in general than aiding hunger. And finally, I believe that fewer unnatural deaths simpliciter would have occurred if we had chosen differently. Being someone who is both (a) glad that they are not hungry and (b) glad they have not died an unnatural death, I use the Golden Rule to believe we were obligated to reduce those two things.

If governments and nations have any moral obligations at all, then surely the U.S. had many sets of competing ones. We were obligated to help those being slighted by Saddam’s hand, and we were also obligated to help the hungry. Because our aiding the hungry would have enhanced more lives and harmed fewer, I argue that this was a stronger obligation.

So, even while admitting that the war was justified, and that we had an obligation to help those in Iraq, I claim that we had a competing obligation that was stronger and, therefore, we acted incorrectly.

Four concessions (with competing considerations):
(1) I’m not sure if the figures reporting the cost of war include how much money we make from the taxing of corporations who sell our nation weapons. That is, perhaps our government wouldn’t have been able to afford spending as much money on allaying world hunger as we have on the war, because the war immediately produces government income. Keep in mind, however, that aiding world hunger would also create some extra government income from the people who produce the food.
(2) Of course I can’t be sure that fewer people would have died violent deaths had the war not occurred, but we know that the number of violent deaths in Iraq has increased since our invasion, and certainly more American soldiers have died in the last year and half than the years prior.
(3) I'm sure some of you out there are thinking that we had to go to war because we gave Saddam an ultimatum to which he did not acquiesce. Perhaps not following through on our word would make us look like pansies in the eyes of the world. I ask you: Does it really seem like we have gained respect in the world's eyes through our actions? Did our similar actions in Vietnam gain us respect? Do you think we appear credible, or stubborn?
(4) Spending money on the war is contrary to spending money on hunger, but not contradictory to it. We could be doing both if we had taken even more money away from other government projects. Granting this, you can take my argument as saying that the hungry should have taken a higher priority than the war.

The War on Iraq

2004-11-18T15:25:00.000-05:00

[Preface: Clearly, this post will be based on a personal bias, and isn't really too philosophical per se, but something I think we should all take an interest in.]

Is it justified? I've been thinking about this a lot lately. If the death count has risen so much since our entering, how can it be considered a humanitarian effort? If so many Iraqis want us out, who are we supposed to be helping? At first the war was justified to the American public because of the undeniable proof of WMDs. Since we found out about the lies and exagerations that backed up that claim, the justification has become more humanitarian in nature. I have no definition of humanitarianism, but I never pictured such acts involving so much death against the wishes of those we are purportedly helping. I'm no ethicist or political scholar, but my naive opinions cannot help but be contrary to those of our political leaders. If we were concerned with humanitarianism, why not help those dozens of impoverished nations who don't have such a checkered past with the US (and hence wouldn't be so resistant) by providing their hungry with food and their homeless with shelter? Why not help those in our own nation who have very little? If you're interested, go to http://costofwar.com to see how much we've spent thus far on the war. Over $145 billion. Is there absolutely no way we might've spent that money in a more productive fassion? Yes, the Iraqi government has not been the best friend of the U.S., but does that mean we need to go to these extreme measures? Are these the actions that the great spiritual and ethical leaders--Jesus, Ghandi, Mother Teresa, Dr. Martin Luther King--would have advised us to do?

When we went to war we broke the UN charter--We broke international law.

Terrorism (def.): The unlawful use or threatened use of force or violence by a person or an organized group against people or property with the intention of intimidating or coercing societies or governments, often for ideological or political reasons.

I've heard people in the department say that this war is justified, and I've heard others say that the issue is too convoluted to judge either way. I completely disagree with both of those claims. However, I know that we're all intelligent philosophers here, so I'm confident that you have well thought out arguments for your positions. PLEASE help me understand because right now I can't help but see things from only one side.

DePoe--If this isn't the sort of thing you want on the blog, you have my permission to remove it.

minimalist truth schema

2004-11-09T14:09:00.000-05:00

Tell me what you think of my initial intuition of the minimalist truth schema:

'P' is true iff P. It seems like any further explication of this schema will smuggle in an inflationary theory of truth. And without any further explication this theory is very vague. The compatibility this schema has with all other theories of truth is obvious but it seems like each theory of truth will explain what this schema means in a different way. So when Horwich wants to leave the theory of truth as merely this schema without any inflation, it seems cloudy to me...
Of course this is just off the top of my head and this is why i'm submitting it to the lions. Go at it...if i even explained it good enough. ha! Disregard below post....I just figured out how to edit these.

The Essential Indexical

2004-11-06T13:56:00.000-05:00

John Perry, in "The Problem of the Essential Indexical" (1979), argues that indexical beliefs are necessary for action. That is, if he's walking around the supermarket while sugar slowly leaks from a torn bag in his cart, he may have the belief

(1) John Perry is making a mess.

But, he claims, this is insufficient for action (ie stopping to remedy the problem of the torn sack of sugar) unless he also has the belief

(2) I am John Perry.

or instead has the belief

(3) I am making a mess.

Those in Arthur's class will remember this, and many other similar examples, from section M of the text.

An article by Evan C. Tiffany entitled "What is Essential about Indexicals?" (2000) disagrees with this conclusion. Consider an example (not directly taken from Tiffany) where I hold these four beliefs:

(4) The resident of of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue is responsible for the war.

(5) The President of the United States resides at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

(6) War is wrong.

(7) If one believes that war is wrong, and there is a war occuring, then they should protest the actions of those responsible.

Are these sufficient for explaining my actions of driving to DC to protest the president? Or, must there also be an indexical belief about the here or now hidden within their midst?

Difficult question--At first glance, it seems that these are certainly sufficient, but consider the following beliefs:

(8) The war is occuring now.

(9) I am a citizen of the country perpetuating the war.

(10) I am here and 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. is there.

(11) Protesting is the right thing for me to do.

Are any of these, or something like them, also required for action?

What say you, fellow philosophers?

Why justification?

2004-11-05T19:33:00.000-05:00

While talking to Marc at lunch today, he gave us a quick account of his theory of knowledge. He called it externalist, and said that it required no component of justification. For fear of misrepresentation, I will not attempt to flesh out his view further here.

It's clear that traditional epistemology has been concerned with, if not focused on, the notion of justification as required for knowledge. Is this really the thing to do? Can we analyze 'knowledge' and 'justification' separately, acknowledging their typical correlation, but admitting that neither is a necessary nor sufficient condition for the other? I know some of you out there are probably foaming at the mouth while reading this, and I want to know why.

This may just sound like the internalist/externalist debate, but I want to assure you that it is not. In fact, Marc also gave us a brief account of his notion of justification, which he claims is internalist. What is at issue here is rather: Is justification (either internalist or externalist) at all relevant to having knowledge?

Something I should point out about myself as a philosopher that concerns both this post and the other that I started. Just because I pose these questions does not imply that I stand on either side of the debate. Rather, I find myself playing devil's advocate. For instance, regarding the 'stubborn epistemologists?' post, I tend to agree with Ed that there is a priori knowledge, regardless of whether or not we are hard-wired to think logically. But while pressuring myself into coming up with an argument for holding that belief I was unable to do so. Hence, I found myself holding the position dogmatically, or as I put it earlier, being stubborn. I just don't want people to think that I'm writing these to cause arguments or undermine the beliefs of others--Oftentimes I'm hoping that you folks can help me justify the beliefs that we already share. :-)

Stubborn Epistemologists?

2004-11-03T14:25:00.000-05:00

The naturalized epistemologist and the old school foundational internalist may be stuck in an argument of "nuh-uh" vs. "yes-huh":

(1) We (as philosophers) believe certain rules of deduction to be valid (eg modus ponens) but not others (eg modus morons--the fallacy of affirming the consequent).
(2) We can show through meta-theory why this is so, but even the meta-theory will implicitly depend on our use of the valid rules.
(3) The internalist will account for this by claiming that we can know certain things a priori.
(4) The naturalist will account for this by claiming that we are (as DePoe pointed out) 'hard-wired' to reason in such a way.

Now, for those of you in McGrew's Epistemology class, yesterday you witnessed his argument against 4. For those who were not, or have forgot, here is it's basic form:

What evidence is there to believe that this hard-wiring occurs? As those of us who have taught an introductory logic course will attest, students often commit modus morons fallacies, and have trouble seeing the validity of rules that are, to the trained eye, clearly truth-preserving. Evidence for hard-wiring is minimal at best.

It doesn't obviously follow from the fact that people have trouble grasping the formal rules of logic, that they do not view the world through logical glasses. Even if someone might mistakenly use modus morons in a formal proof, there is a good chance that they will not accept the following argument:

(5) If I'm George W. Bush then I have skin.
(6) I have skin.
Therefore,
(7) I'm George W. Bush.

An analogous occurence might occur when students make the jump from numerical arithmetic to algebraic variable arithmetic, that is, a young student who could easily perform (8) might have difficulty performing (9).

(8) 23 + 36 = ?
(9) 23 + x = 59

Is this proof that we do not see the world quantitatively?

Also, is an evidential argument against hard-wiring a proof for the a priori? Doesn't it make equal trouble for the foundational internalist that students have difficulty seeing the validity of these supposedly foundational beliefs? How can they build up from the foundations without having rules like modus ponens? Certainly my dog didn't work out the logic of MP before making the inference from:

(10) If there is a sound of a can opening, food is placed in my dish shortly thereafter.
and
(11) There is a sound of a can opening.
to
(12) Food will be placed in my dish shortly.

I'm not sure what I'm supposing this post to have demonstrated, other than that there might simply be a question-begging theoretical dispute between the Quinean and the Cartesian.

"Those beliefs are hard-wired."
"Nuh-uh, they're a priori."
"Hard wired!"
"A priori!"
________________________

Somebody show me the arguments and prove me wrong!!

Ad the Atheists

2004-11-02T01:01:00.000-05:00

Regarding the issue of "unabsolved" (or, better, gratuitous) evils, it seems that those in the camp of the atheists have not succeeded in showing (a) that there are, in fact, gratuitous evils and, accordingly, (b) whatever they wished to show about God himself (say, that he does not exist?). After I raised the point that it wasn't clear how it follows from some evil e's being apparently gratuitous that e is in fact gratuitous, I believe that it was John Park (JP) who immediately directed our attention to certain things John DePoe (JD) had said about the afterlife (which implied that apparently gratuitous evils are not in fact gratuitous evils). (The specifics of what JD said have escaped me, but I believe that they concerned there being justice in the afterlife where there was no justice in this life.) What I think JP did was introduce a red herring: true, one might believe that apparently gratuitous evils are not in fact gratuitous evils because of what JD said; but that's not relevant to the issue of it's not being clear how it follows from e's being apparently gratuitous that e is in fact gratuitous. Those in the camp of the atheists, then, still have yet to show that it follows from e's being apparently gratuitous that e is in fact gratuitous--and, indeed, and accordingly, whatever they wished to show about God himself.