In the seventeenth century, “consciousness” began to take on a uniquely modern sense. This transition was sparked by new theories of mind and ideas, and it connected with other important issues of debate during the seventeenth century, including debates over the transparency of the mental, animal consciousness, and innate ideas. Additionally, consciousness was tied closely to moral identity, with both French and Latin lacking even a linguistic distinction between consciousness and conscience (i.e., a moral sensibility). This semantic shift marked a philosophical division between the psychological or phenomenal aspects of thought and a moral sensibility as well. The discussions on all of these topics were rich and varied in the seventeenth century—the article below provides a view from forty thousand feet.
Friday, July 30, 2010
Seventeenth-Century Theories of Consciousness (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
Seventeenth-Century Theories of Consciousness (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy):
Wednesday, July 28, 2010
A Judge's Guide to Neuroscience
A Judge's Guide to Neuroscience: "
The Law and Neuroscience Project (along with the SAGE Center at UCSB) recently published A Judge's Guide to Neuroscience: A Concise Introduction. The useful manual contains articles by Marcus Raichle, Michael Gazzaniga, Adina Roskies, Read Montague, Scott Grafton, and others. And while it is aimed at judges, I think it might be useful for philosophers interested in these issues as well.
"
Tuesday, July 27, 2010
Cephalove: Do octopuses play?
Nice article expressing skepticism about claims of octopus play. It seems, though, that an overly important role is played in the author's argument by the flawed argument-by-analogy approach to the problem of other minds.
Cephalove: Do octopuses play?
Cephalove: Do octopuses play?
Thursday, July 22, 2010
first-order representationalism
From Key Terms in Philosophy of Mind (Continuum, 2010):
first-order representationalism, a theory of CONSCIOUSNESS that explains state consciousness (see CONSCIOUSNESS, STATE) in terms of having a certain kind of MENTAL REPRESENTATION (crucially, a representation that need not be represented by any other representation, thus “first-order”) and explains QUALIA or the “WHAT IT IS LIKE” aspects of consciousness (see CONSCIOUSNESS, PHENOMENAL) in terms of the CONTENT of the relevant mental representation. The main distinctive feature of first-order representationalism is that unlike higher-order representationalisms, such as the HIGHER-ORDER THOUGHT THEORY OF CONSCIOUSNESS or the higher-order PERCEPTION theory of consciousness, it does not make it a requirement on a state’s being conscious that it be represented by itself or any other state. One consideration that first-order representationalists raise in support of this part of their view is that it appears, or so it is claimed, that we cannot become aware of the features of an EXPERIENCE itself as opposed to features of what the experience is an experience of. For example, when I attend to my experience of a blue rectangle, it seems that I am only aware of the blueness and the rectangularity—properties presumably instantiated not by my experience but by some physical object in the external world: a blue rectangle. See TRANSPARENCY (OF EXPERIENCE).
first-order representationalism, a theory of CONSCIOUSNESS that explains state consciousness (see CONSCIOUSNESS, STATE) in terms of having a certain kind of MENTAL REPRESENTATION (crucially, a representation that need not be represented by any other representation, thus “first-order”) and explains QUALIA or the “WHAT IT IS LIKE” aspects of consciousness (see CONSCIOUSNESS, PHENOMENAL) in terms of the CONTENT of the relevant mental representation. The main distinctive feature of first-order representationalism is that unlike higher-order representationalisms, such as the HIGHER-ORDER THOUGHT THEORY OF CONSCIOUSNESS or the higher-order PERCEPTION theory of consciousness, it does not make it a requirement on a state’s being conscious that it be represented by itself or any other state. One consideration that first-order representationalists raise in support of this part of their view is that it appears, or so it is claimed, that we cannot become aware of the features of an EXPERIENCE itself as opposed to features of what the experience is an experience of. For example, when I attend to my experience of a blue rectangle, it seems that I am only aware of the blueness and the rectangularity—properties presumably instantiated not by my experience but by some physical object in the external world: a blue rectangle. See TRANSPARENCY (OF EXPERIENCE).
Figdor: "Is Mechanistic Explanation of Mind Possible?"
Today in the CUNY Grad Center Cognitive Science Speaker Series:
Carrie Figdor, University of Iowa: "Is Mechanistic Explanation of Mind Possible?"
2:00 pm, Room 7102, CUNY Graduate Center
Carrie Figdor, University of Iowa: "Is Mechanistic Explanation of Mind Possible?"
2:00 pm, Room 7102, CUNY Graduate Center
Wednesday, July 14, 2010
Monday, July 12, 2010
Saturday, July 10, 2010
Friday, July 9, 2010
Thursday, July 8, 2010
Sebastián on The Subjective Character of the Experience
Today in the CUNY Grad Center Cognitive Science Speaker Series:
Miguel Ángel Sebastián University of Barcelona "The Subjective Character of the Experience: Against HOR and SOR Theories"
2:00 pm, Room 7102, CUNY Graduate Center
Miguel Ángel Sebastián University of Barcelona "The Subjective Character of the Experience: Against HOR and SOR Theories"
2:00 pm, Room 7102, CUNY Graduate Center
Tuesday, July 6, 2010
Abstract: The Slow-switching Slowdown Showdown
Spiral clock
Originally uploaded by catmachine
The Slow-switching Slowdown Showdown
Abstract:
The point of this paper is to raise a puzzle for cognitive content externalism. Central to the kind of externalism I wish to raise a puzzle for is a commitment to a thesis of slow switching: were Oscar stealthily transplanted on Twin Earth, replacing Twin Oscar, the thought contents expressed by Oscar’s “water” utterances would switch slowly from being thoughts of H2O to being thoughts of XYZ. The puzzle I want to raise centers on the question of how the externalist can account for the rate of slow switching. What’s especially puzzling about this question of rate is best brought out by considering certain natural extensions of externalism to contents concerning time and a modification of the Twin Earth thought experiment involving Slow Earth—a version of XYZ-covered Twin Earth where (just about) everything takes hundred times longer to occur on Slow Earth. It is a natural extension of externalism to time concepts to hold that Oscar and his counterpart on Slow Earth, Slow Oscar, express different thoughts by utterances employing temporal vocabulary such as “day,” “hour,” and “minute.” A further natural extension of externalism is to hold that if Oscar were stealthily transplanted to Slow Earth, not just his “water”-related concepts would slowly switch their contents, so would, e.g., his “hour”-related concepts. The question at the heart of my puzzle for the externalist is this: How long would slow switching take on Slow Earth? If everything is a hundred times slower on Slow Earth compared to non-slowed Twin Earth, then if slow switching takes a year on Twin Earth, it takes 100 years on Slow Earth (which is, of course, just one Slow Earth year). However, as I shall argue, it raises certain problems for externalists to hold that even slow switching is slowed down on Slow Earth. The core problem raised, I will argue, is that the externalist, in holding that slow switching slows on Slow Earth, is led to embrace a contradictory account of what the supervenience base is for wide-content temporal thoughts.
Summer Seminar in Philosophy of Mind, Cognitive Science, and Neuroethics
Next week, I'll be heading out to Arlington, Texas where I'll be keynote speaker at a workshop organized by Ken Williford. The talk I'll be giving is based on a project of mine concerning conceptual content, externalism, and time. My talk is "The Slow-switching Slowdown Showdown" and I'll be blogging some more about it the rest of the week or so.
Here's the schedule for workshop:
The 2010 UTA Summer Seminar in Mind, Cognition, and Neuroethics
Here's the schedule for workshop:
The 2010 UTA Summer Seminar in Mind, Cognition, and Neuroethics
July 13-15, UTA Campus, 303 CPB
The Department of Philosophy and Humanities
The College of Liberal Arts
The Office of the Vice President for Research
Schedule
DAY ONE—Tuesday, July 13
9:30—“Continental” Breakfast in 303 CPB
9:45 Beth S. Wright, Dean of the College of Liberal Arts
Opening remarks
10:00 Dan Levine (UTA, Psychology)
It’s Not Just “Survival and Reproduction, Stupid”
11:15—Break
11:30 Daniel C. Krawczyk (UTD, Center for Brain Health, UTSW, Psychiatry)
What can Neuroscience tell us about Reasoning?
1:15-3:00—Lunch at Potager
315 S Mesquite St. Arlington, TX (817) 861-2292
3:30 Heekyeong Park (UTA, Psychology)
Neural Correlates of Encoding Within- and Across-Domain Inter-Item Associations
4:45—Break
5:00 Erik Nylen (University of Iowa, Biomedical Engineering, NYU, Center for Neural Science)
How much can a Diseased Eye See?
6:00—Break
6:15 Fabrice Jotterand (UTSW, Departments of Clinical Sciences and Psychiatry/Philosophy and Bioethics)
Please Engineer My Brain…I Was Born a Criminal!: Neuroimaging Technologies, Psychopathy and Moral Neuro-enhancement
8:00—Dinner at The Blue Danube
2230-A W Park Row Dr, Pantego, TX (817) 861-5900
DAY TWO—Wednesday, July 14
9:30—“Continental” Breakfast in 303 CPB
10:00 Nathanial Blower (University of Iowa, Philosophy)
Dennett vs. Hacker: Mind, Metaphor and the Mereological Fallacy
11:15—Break
11:30 Jeremy Shipley (University of Iowa, Philosophy)
Varying Variance (Invariantly)
1:15-3:00—Lunch at Beirut Rock Café
1201 S Cooper St Arlington, TX (817) 860-5499
3:30 Peter LeGrant (Kirkwood College, Philosophy) and Kenneth Williford (UTA, Philosophy)
Spinoza and Functionalism
4:45—Break
5:00 Harry P. Reeder (UTA, Philosophy)
The Role of Language in Phenomenological Description
6:00—Break
6:15 Adam Briggle (UNT, Philosophy)
What Bioethics can Teach Neuroethics
8:00—Dinner at The Istanbul Grill
6204 S.Cooper St. Arlington, TX (817) 557-3377
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Arlington-TX/ISTANBUL-GRILL-TURKISH-MEDITERRANEAN-CUISINE/131433256039
DAY 3—Thursday, July 15
9:30—“Continental” Breakfast in 303 CPB
10:00 Matthew J. Brown (UTD, Philosophy, Center for Values in Science, Technology, and Medicine)
Love Slaves and Wonder Women: Values and Popular Culture in the Psychology of W.M. Marston
11:15—Break
11:30 Justin Fisher (SMU, Philosophy)
The Challenge of Syntactic Typing
1:15-3:00—Lunch at The University Club
Lower level of Davis Hall, UTA Campus (817) 272-5999 http://www.uta.edu/provost/newfaculty/docs/NFO%2009%20-%20Online-University%20Club.pdf
3:30 Charles Nussbaum (UTA, Philosophy)
Can Natural Necessity Be Naturalized?
4:45—Break
5:00 Timothy Odegard (UTA, Psychology)
Diachronic Disunity: The Severing of the Self across Time
6:00—Break
6:15 KEYNOTE ADDRESS: Pete Mandik (William Paterson University of New Jersey, Philosophy)
The Slow-switching Slowdown Showdown
Saturday, July 3, 2010
Thursday, July 1, 2010
Synthese Submission Option on Neuroscience and Its Philosophy
Synthese Submission Option on Neuroscience and Its Philosophy: Gualtiero Piccinini says:
Following up on a previous post on this topic: The journal Synthese has added a submission option on 'neuroscience and its philosophy' to its online submission system. If you select that option, the system should to put me (qua editor of the yearly issue on neuroscience and its philosophy) in charge of the paper.
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