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Metaphysics
1. The Word ‘Metaphysics’ and the Concept of Metaphysics The word ‘metaphysics’ is notoriously hard to define. Twentieth-century coinages like ‘meta-language’ and ‘metaphilosophy’ encourage the impression that metaphysics is a study that somehow “goes beyond” physics, a study devoted to matters that transcend the mundane concerns of Newton and Einstein and Heisenberg. This impression is mistaken. This is the probable meaning of the title because Metaphysics is about things that do not change. Should we assume that ‘metaphysics’ is a name for that “science” which is the subject-matter of Aristotle's Metaphysics? The subject-matter of metaphysics is “being as such” The subject-matter of metaphysics is the first causes of things The subject-matter of metaphysics is that which does not change Any of these three theses might have been regarded as a defensible statement of the subject-matter of what was called ‘metaphysics’ until the seventeenth century. 2. 2.3 Substance 3. 3.1 Modality 4. 5.
Belief
First published Mon Aug 14, 2006; substantive revision Sun Nov 21, 2010 Contemporary analytic philosophers of mind generally use the term “belief” to refer to the attitude we have, roughly, whenever we take something to be the case or regard it as true. To believe something, in this sense, needn't involve actively reflecting on it: Of the vast number of things ordinary adults believe, only a few can be at the fore of the mind at any single time. Nor does the term “belief”, in standard philosophical usage, imply any uncertainty or any extended reflection about the matter in question (as it sometimes does in ordinary English usage). Many of the things we believe, in the relevant sense, are quite mundane: that we have heads, that it's the 21st century, that a coffee mug is on the desk. Most contemporary philosophers characterize belief as a “propositional attitude”. 1. 1.1 Representationalism It is also common to suppose that beliefs play a causal role in the production of behavior. 1.1.1.
Allegory of the Cave
Plato realizes that the general run of humankind can think, and speak, etc., without (so far as they acknowledge) any awareness of his realm of Forms. The allegory of the cave is supposed to explain this. In the allegory, Plato likens people untutored in the Theory of Forms to prisoners chained in a cave, unable to turn their heads. All they can see is the wall of the cave. Behind them burns a fire. Between the fire and the prisoners there is a parapet, along which puppeteers can walk. From Great Dialogues of Plato (Warmington and Rouse, eds.) Here are some students’ illustrations of Plato’s Cave Go back to lecture on the Phaedo Go back to lecture on the “One Over Many” Argument Go to next lecture on Criticism of Forms Need a quick review of the Theory of Forms? Return to the PHIL 320 Home Page Copyright © 2006, S.
The Roots of Consciousness: History, The Age of Enlightenment
The Age of Enlightenment Descartes and Mind-Body Dualism Rene Descartes Rene Descartes (1596-1650), who was certainly not an occult scholar or even a sympathizer, nevertheless attributed all of his philosophic ideas to images that appeared to him either in dreams or when he was in the hypnogogic state just before awakening. (In fact, he had to "prove his visibility" to keep from being associated with the Invisible College. The association of creativity with dreaaming apparently gave rise to public speculation about an actual college, perhaps diabolical, that dreamers visited in their sleep.) Mind body dualism was first formally stated in modern philosophy by Descartes. Leibnitz and Monadology Gottfried Wilhelm Leibnitz Carrying on the Pythagorean-Platonic doctrine of universal harmony, Gottfried Wilhelm Leibnitz, who with Isaac Newton was the co-inventor of calculus, developed an elegant grand philosophy based on the concept of an evolving unit of consciousness called the monad. Idealism . .
The Analysis of Knowledge
1. Knowledge as Justified True Belief There are three components to the traditional (“tripartite”) analysis of knowledge. According to this analysis, justified, true belief is necessary and sufficient for knowledge. The Tripartite Analysis of Knowledge:S knows that p iff p is true; S believes that p; S is justified in believing that p. The tripartite analysis of knowledge is often abbreviated as the “JTB” analysis, for “justified true belief”. Socrates articulates the need for something like a justification condition in Plato's Theaetetus, when he points out that ‘true opinion’ is in general insufficient for knowledge. Before turning to influential twentieth-century arguments against the JTB theory, let us briefly consider the three traditional components of knowledge in turn. 1.1 The Truth Condition Condition (i), the truth condition, is largely uncontroversial. Hazlett (2010) argues that “knows” is not a factive verb, on the basis of the apparent felicity of utterances like: 2. 3. 4. 5.
Epistemic Logic
First published Wed Jan 4, 2006 Epistemic logic is the logic of knowledge and belief. It provides insight into the properties of individual knowers, has provided a means to model complicated scenarios involving groups of knowers and has improved our understanding of the dynamics of inquiry. 1. The Logic of Individual Knowers Epistemic logic gets its start with the recognition that expressions like ‘knows that’ or ‘believes that’ have systematic properties that are amenable to formal study. Modern treatments of the logic of knowledge and belief grow out of the work of a number of philosophers and logicians writing from 1948 through the 1950s. While this article deals with modern developments, epistemic logic has a venerable history. Contemporary epistemic logic may appear quite technical and removed from traditional epistemological reflections. For the most part, epistemic logic focuses on propositional knowledge. and similarly for belief for some arbitrary proposition A. (1) KcA → A, 2. 3.
Maria Trepp » Blog Archive » Het wilde denken van Lévi-Strauss
Claude Lévi-Strauss wordt niet gewaardeerd door brave burgers die hun libido vooral investeren in aanpassing, en die een verkorte rationaliteit prefereren boven zintuiglijkheid. Lévi-Strauss waardeert namelijk het “wilde denken”. Het zogenaamde wilde denken – magie en mythe – ( “La Pensée Sauvage”) is voor de net overleden Lévi-Strauss niet tegengesteld aan het wetenschappelijke denken maar loopt er parallel aan: beide vertalen zintuiglijke indrukken in verstandelijke begrippen en beide geven betekenis aan de culturen waartoe ze behoren. Het ‘wilde denken’ is op de keper beschouwd even rationeel als het wetenschappelijke. Net als Horkheimer en Adorno (en als Walter Benjamin die het Passagenproject de naam heeft gegeven) wil Lévi-Strauss geen tegenstelling construeren tussen het voorwetenschappelijk magische denken en het wetenschappelijke denken, maar laat beide denkvormen in hun waarde. “Het wilde denken” noemt Lemaire het moeilijkste en meest theoretische boek van Lévi-Strauss.
