A popular defense of physicalist theories of consciousness against anti-physicalist arguments invokes the existence of ‘phenomenal concepts’. These are concepts that designate conscious experiences from a first person perspective, and hence differ from physicalistic concepts; but not in a way that precludes co-referentiality with them. On one version of this strategy phenomenal concepts are seen as (1) type demonstratives that have (2) no mode of presentation. However, 2 is possible without 1-call this the ‘bare recognitional concept’ view-and I will argue (...) that this avoids certain recent criticisms while retaining the virtue of finessing the ‘mode of presentation’ problem for phenomenal concepts. But construing phenomenal concepts this way seems to not do justice to the phenomenology of conscious experience. In this paper I examine whether or not this impression can be borne out by a good argument. As it turns out, it is harder to do so than one might think. It can be done, but it involves somewhat more convoluted reasoning than one might have supposed necessary. Having shown that, I will end with a few brief remarks on what my argument means for attempts to preserve a physicalist account of consciousness. (shrink)

Not so long ago, the idea that analytic philosophers would be taking panpsychism seriously would have been hard to believe. That is because in its early, logical positivist, stage, the analytic movement earned the reputation of being militantly anti-metaphysical. But analytic philosophy has come a long way since the heyday of logical positivism; and, in fact, the dialectic of recent debates on the mind–body problem among analytic philosophers has pushed many of them in the direction of panpsychism. In this paper, (...) I want to explain how this has come about and take a look at some of the versions of panpsychism that have emerged. This will involve running through a quick history of debates on the mind–body problem since about 1960, focusing on how panpsychism has been proposed as a promising, though not unproblematic, way of breaking an apparent impasse that has emerged between more standard physicalist and dualist theories of mind. Along the way, I will also have occasion to comment on the prospects of panpsychism as a respectable scientific theory and how a number of scientists stand on this. (shrink)

(1981). Intension, identity, and the Colourless Physical World: A revision and further discussion. Australasian Journal of Philosophy: Vol. 59, No. 2, pp. 203-205.

Anyone who is a color eliminativist‐i.e., believes that the physical world is colorless‐must explain how our sense experience of color can be so systematically illusory. As it turns out, it is difficult to do this without committing oneself to dualism. In this paper I explore the options available to the color eliminativist in this regard, and argue that his/her prospects are more promising, though still far from certain, if s/he adopts the position that sense experience is strictly intentional.

Frank Jackson formulated his knowledge argument as an argument for dualism. In this paper I show how the argument can be modified to also establish the irreducibility of the secondary qualities to the properties of physical theory, and ultimately "secondary quality eliminativism"- the view that the secondary qualities are physically uninstantiated.

In a recent article, Grover Maxwell presents a case for a kind of mind-brain identity theory which he claims precludes materialism. His case is based on some views about meaning which I find plausible. However, I will argue that, by adopting certain assumptions about the nature of sensory experience, and extending some of Maxwell's views about meaning in a plausible way, the issue of a materialistic identity theory is reopened. Ultimately, I will agree that such a theory is not true, (...) but more is needed to show this than Maxwell gives us. But the question of materialism is not thereby closed, because it has become axiomatic these days that materialism does not require an identity theory. So I will go on to consider if all forms of materialism have been ruled out by Maxwell's theory, as extended by me. I will end with a tentative affirmative answer but also with a proposal which, if it can be worked out, would reverse the decision. (shrink)

The subjectivity of consciousness is widely regarded as a major stumbling block for materialist theories of mind. In this paper I show how Kripkean arguments against identity theories , and in particular a Kripkean argument against qualia-material property identity developed by Frank Jackson are a way of highlighting this problem. As such, Kripkean arguments are akin to recent discussions of subjectivity by Thomas Nagel and Frank Jackson . I then consider some recent attempts to refute Kripkean arguments or otherwise show (...) that subjectivity is not an insurmountable problem for identity theory. The most promising attempt is one that I myself develop, based on some ideas by Keith Gunderson . But I contend that even it, let alone any of the others, is not without problems. Thus, tentatively, Kripkean arguments against property identity succeed. (shrink)

A popular defense of physicalist theories of consciousness against anti-physicalist arguments is the “phenomenal concept strategy”. According to PCS there are phenomenal concepts that designate phenomenal properties, and whose use requires adopting the first person perspective with respect to those properties, thus allowing an epistemic gap between the phenomenal and the physical without requiring a metaphysical gap. One version of PCS is the quotational version, according to which phenomenal concepts are in part constituted by the very properties they designate. The (...) advertising for this version of PCS is that it does better justice to the phenomenology of consciousness than alternative versions. But in doing so, I argue, it threatens to reintroduce dualism. This can be avoided by adopting a Russellian account of physical concepts, but even with this we seem to be committed to a non-physicalist Russellian account of consciousness, and perhaps even a Russellian panpsychism. This can be avoided only by holding that, even though we now cannot see how the phenomenal supervenes on the physical, it does anyway, and perhaps future developments will make this clear. Thus, what starts out as a Type B physicalist strategy becomes a Type C strategy. (shrink)

This is an enormously ambitious book. The author not only develops a theory of empirical knowledge, but also develops a theory of reference, argues for both metaphysical and scientific realism, and deals with numerous subsidiary issues. He is extremely thorough in considering and critically discussing alternative views, and very careful and meticulous in the presentation and defense of his own. The book is also rich in interesting and occasionally ingenious ideas. It will make rewarding reading for anyone interested in these (...) issues. It might also make an ideal starting point for someone who has been away from these fields for, say, a couple of decades, and wants to catch up on the state of the art. (shrink)

This is a work in the ordinary language tradition that develops what the author regards as a neo-Wittgensteinian account of truth. While conceding to P. F. Strawson that the term 'true' is sometimes used non-descriptively, Hallett is more interested in elucidating its descriptive use. His centerpiece for doing this, arrived at about midway through the book, is his "principle of relative similarity" : "for a statement of fact, or informative utterance, to be true it suffices that its use of terms (...) resemble more closely the established used of those terms than it does those of rival, incompatible terms". (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Russell's Naturalistic Turn 37 INTRODUCTION L RUSSELL'S NATURALISTIC TURN RUSSELI.?S NATURALISTIC TURN NED S. GARVIN Philosophy I Albion College Albion, MI 49224 I Quine, Ontological Relativity (New York: Columbia U. P., 1969), p. 83. 1 Russell advocated this hypothetical acceptance of science much earlier, e.g., in AMa, pp. 398-9. Here we have many of the hallmarks of naturalized epistemology: (I) fallibilism, (2) the "best theory" account of science, (...) (3) the view that "knowing" is a natural phenomenon not confined to humans, and (4) the embedding of epistemology in behavioural psychology. But in 1940 Russell was a foundationalist (though an increasingly moderate one) who insisted that normative, or as he called it, "critical" epistemology must be distinguished from natural epistemology, and that critical epistemology is philosophically more important: "Within its limitations, theory of knowledge of the above sort is legitimate and In the nrst form of theory of knowledge, we accept the scientific account of the world, not as certainly true, but as the best at present available. The world, as presented by science, contains a phenomenon caIled "knowing", and theory of knowledge, in its first form, has to consider what sort of phenomenon this is. Viewed from the outside, it is, to begin with, a characteristic of living organisms, which is (broadly speaking) increasingly displayed as the organism becomes more complex. (Pp. 12-13)2 Both knowledge and error, at this stage, are observable relations between the behaviour of the organism and the facts of the environment. (P. 14) Quine argued that traditional justification requires non-scientific propositions that are more secure than scientific propositions, and we see there are none: science is providing the best account of the world and our knowledge of it. Though we abandon the attempt to justify science, we still attempt to understand it for nearly the same reasons that always motivated epistemology: "in order to see how evidence relates to theory, and in what ways one's theory of nature transcends any available evidence".I Russell contemplated a naturalistic turn of his own in 1943, shortly after writing An Inquiry into Meaning and Truth and nearly twentyfive years before Quine's landmark address. In the introduction to his Inquiry Russell claims that there are "two different inquiries, both important, and each having a right to the name 'theory of knowledge '" (IM~, p. 12). The first is recognizably natural epistemology: n.s. 11 (summer 1991): 36-S1.SSN 0036-016p ru•••II: the Journal of the Bertrand Russell Archives McMaster University Library Press w. V. Quine's address to the Fourteenth International Congress of Philosophy in 1968, published a year later as "Epistemology Naturalized " in Ontological Relativity and Other Essays, is a landmark of recent epistemology, marking the turn from traditional critical epistemology to a descriptive epistemology firmly embedded within natural science. I n 1943 Bertrand Russell wrote a little-known, three-page document he titled "Project of Future Work". It outlines the descriptive project of examining non-demonstrative inference that eventually becomes the focal point of Human Knowledge: Its Scope and Limits. More remarkably, this document anticipates many salient features of naturalized epistemology, e.g., Russell argues that (I) an answer to scepticism is futile, we cannot justify scientific method; (2) the Humean Predicament arises from a traditional insistence on an unrealistic, demonstrative canon of justification; (3) non-demonstrative, fallible inference is already firmly embedded in scientific practice as a canon of inference, and should augment the demonstrative canon; and (4) the primary epistemic· problem is descriptive: in what circumstances does scientific method allow us to infer the existence of something unobserved from what we observe. These claims, in the wake of An Inquiry into Meaning and Truth, suggest that Russell was on the verge of his own naturalistic turn. I argue that, despite striking anticipations of naturalized epistemology, Russell develops his descriptive project within a more traditional, critical epistemic perspective. 38 NED S. GARVIN important. But there is another kind of theory of knowledge which goes deeper and has, I think, much greater importance" (IMT;., p. 14). Russell observes that behavioural psychologists omit that they are fallible observers, and this fallibility introduces doubt into their results. Further, naive... (shrink)

Critics of contemporary metaphysics argue that it attempts to do the hard work of science from the ease of the armchair. Physics, not metaphysics, tells us about the fundamental facts of the world, and empirical psychology is best placed to reveal the content of our concepts about the world. Exploring and understanding the world through metaphysical reflection is obsolete. In this paper, I will show why this critique of metaphysics fails, arguing that metaphysical methods used to make claims about the (...) world are similar to scientific methods used to make claims about the world, but that the subjects of metaphysics are not the subjects of science. Those who argue that metaphysics uses a problematic methodology to make claims about subjects better covered by natural science get the situation exactly the wrong way around: metaphysics has a distinctive subject matter, not a distinctive methodology. The questions metaphysicians address are different from those of scientists, but the methods employed to develop and select theories are similar. In the first section of the paper, I will describe the sort of subject matter that metaphysics tends to engage with. In the second section of the paper, I will show how metaphysical theories are classes of models and discuss the roles of experience, common sense and thought experiments in the construction and evaluation of such models. Finally, in the last section I will discuss the way these methodological points help us to understand the metaphysical project. Getting the right account of the metaphysical method allows us to better understand the relationship between science and metaphysics, to explain why doing metaphysics successfully involves having a range of different theories, to understand the role of thought experiments involving fictional worlds, and to situate metaphysical realism in a scientifically realist context. (shrink)

Legal decision-support systems have the potential to improve access to justice, administrative efficiency, and judicial consistency, but broad adoption of such systems is contingent on development of technologies with low knowledge-engineering, validation, and maintenance costs. This paper describes two approaches to an important form of legal decision support—explainable outcome prediction—that obviate both annotation of an entire decision corpus and manual processing of new cases. The first approach, which uses an attention network for prediction and attention weights to highlight salient case (...) text, was shown to be capable of predicting decisions, but attention-weight-based text highlighting did not demonstrably improve human decision speed or accuracy in an evaluation with 61 human subjects. The second approach, termed semi-supervised case annotation for legal explanations, exploits structural and semantic regularities in case corpora to identify textual patterns that have both predictable relationships to case decisions and explanatory value. (shrink)

Les États cheminent entre concurrence et convergence, les entreprises trans-nationales entre opportunisme et autorégulation. Il est futile d’imaginer qu’un ordre unifié et stable émerge de cette tension. Le monde normatif des entreprises transnationales doit plutôt être compris en appréhendant la direction de ses changements, et non pas en cher-chant à trouver un état d’équilibre. Pour l’auteur, les convections essentielles relèvent tant des efforts des États pour ajuster leur pouvoir normatif et promouvoir leur attractivité dans un monde globalisé, que de la (...) perméabilité croissante des entreprises et de leurs dirigeants à certains objectifs sociétaux qui vont au-delà du juridique et qui viennent se rajouter à la performance financière comme indicateurs complémentaires de la vitalité d’une entreprise. (shrink)

Biography of Habermas -- Critical theory -- Habermas and his works -- An assessment of the impact of Habermas -- Conclusion.

This paper continues a discussion concerning the distinction between disability and handicap initiated in this volume by Steven D. Edwards. Edwards argues that the reasons advanced by the WHO for this distinction in its International Classification of Impairments, Disabilities and Handicaps (ICIDH) are not valid. Edwards also criticizes my own quite different grounds for distinguishing between the two concepts. His general conclusion is that the distinction is superfluous. In this paper I claim that Edwards's reasoning is invalid. I present five (...) arguments for my case, viz., the arguments from: a) practical necessity, b) cost-effectiveness, c) clinical practice, d) the subject's vital goals, and e) the universal presence of some basic action. My own conclusion thus is that there is a need within health care for a distinction between disabilities and handicaps. I also indicate that there may be a need for further distinctions along the dimension of action-generation which is presented in the paper. (shrink)

We critically revisit the definition of thermal equilibrium, in its operational formulation, provided by standard thermodynamics. We show that it refers to experimental conditions which break the covariance of the theory at a fundamental level and that, therefore, it cannot be applied to the case of moving bodies. We propose an extension of this definition which is manifestly covariant and can be applied to the study of isolated systems in special relativity. The zeroth law of thermodynamics is, then, proven to (...) establish an equivalence relation among bodies which have not only the same temperature, but also the same center of mass four-velocity. (shrink)

While central to the Christian religion, the act of faith has been notoriously difficult to define. This essay is an attempt to illuminate, with the aid of insights from cognitive science and process philosophy, what it means for a Christian to have faith, specifically in God. In doing so, the apriori and aposteriori aspects of faith are explored, along with its connections to science and empirical evidence, revelation, knowledge, doubt, morality, and additional Christian beliefs.

At the turn of the century, Gottlob Frege and Edmund Husserl both participated in the discussion concerning the foundations of logic and mathematics. Since the 1960s, comparisons have been made between Frege's semantic views and Husserl's theory of intentional acts. In quite recent years, new approaches to the two philosophers' views have appeared. This collection of articles opens with the first English translation of Dagfinn Føllesdal's early classic on Husserl and Frege of 1958. The book brings together a number of (...) new contributions by well-known authors and gives a survey of recent developments in the field. It shows that Husserl's thought is coming to occupy a central role in the philosophy of logic and mathematics, as well as in the philosophy of mind and cognitive science. The work is primarily meant for philosophers, especially for those working on the problems of language, logic, mathematics, and mind. It can also be used as a textbook in advanced courses in philosophy. (shrink)

Активні сучасні протестантські течії створюють до своїх найгірших мінусів. Однієї з найбільших пізньопротестантських спільнот в сучасній Україні є євангельські християни-баптисти. Ця течія існує на українських землях, вже існує сто років. На думку Радянського Союзу і на сучасному етапі громадського життя євангельські християни і баптистів дотримуються спільної діяльності церкви. На перших етапах це було дуже успішно, і вони були складені в склад. Зауважимо, що й ніні на польських нечісній громаді громади євангельських християн діють окремо від баптистів. В Україні та упродовж 1992 (...) року, коли вони спровокували спільноту євангельських християн у рамках Собору незалежних євангельських церков в Україні та Союзу церковних євангельських християн у світі. Незважаючи на те, що основна частина «історичних» громадських євангельських християн не виявляє бажання визнати приєднатись до баптистів, тенденції до відродження ідей євангельського християнства існують і на сьогоднішній день. (shrink)

v. 1. De l'ineffable et de l'Un -- v. 2. De la triade et de l'unifié -- v. 3. De la procession.

After a time of scientific discoveries, technological revolutions and cultural upheavals, after a time of elevation of the human genius to the highest peaks, it was time for deep anxiety for his own fragile future and the realization of the rather fragile state of many seemingly settled things. The development of the information space leads to the practice of mass indignation of the population, especially of children and adolescents, misunderstandings on the basis of economic and social achievements give rise to (...) protracted interethnic conflicts. Breakthroughs in the field of medicine often lead to repeated explosive effects in society. In addition, rapid environmental pollution has resulted from the intensive development of human activity. It should be noted that not only nature has become contaminated, but human and soul bodies and bodies become more polluted. (shrink)

A selection of lively debates in the philosophy of time that outline, defend and object to contemporary issues in metaphysics, consciousness and God.