An old philosophical chestnut discussed in The Atlantic. Words and concepts used by a brain in a vat can’t be meaningfully applied to real objects outside of the brain’s experience, because the ability to have causal interaction with the specific things that words name is inherently how such words acquire meaning, Putnam argued. Artificial intelligenceCognitive…
Galen Strawson revisits Frank Jackson’s thought experiment in a final draft made available here. For those not familiar with this thought experiment, Galen sets it up quickly and clearly. If this line of thought is right, the mistake on both sides is—to repeat—to confuse materialism or physicalism with physics-alism. The mistake is a mistake whether…
Interesting paper. Archangel of Fire – Uriel – by Simon Berger Counterfactual historyEpistemologyphilosophical literaturesituated cognitionsocial epistemologyspeculative fictionStorytellingthought experiments
Some artistic representations of classic thought experiments. ArtDerek ParfitDescartesevil demonfrank jacksongrueLaPlacenelson goodmanPhilosophythought experimentsWilliam Lycan
3:AM Magazine: Dennett plugging his latest. See also Real People: Personal Identity without Thought Experiments. CognitionCognitive neuroscienceconsciousnessDaniel DennettIntuition pumpnaturalismphilosophical psychologyPhilosophyPhilosophy of mindReligionsciencethought experiments
A year old but no less amusing. Saul Kripke resigned yesterday from his position as Distinguished Professor of Philosophy at the CUNY Graduate Center. While similar allegations have been circulating in unpublished form for years, a team of philosophers from Oxford University has just released a damning report claiming that they were systematically unable to…
Kathy Wilkes: a plaque for an honorary citizen of Dubrovnik. Some five and a half years ago I first mentioned Kathy. DubrovnikfreedomKathy WilkesLibertymetaphysicspersonal identitythought experiments
manwithoutqualities 