Tweet
Tweet

Slide 1

Slide 1 text

Consciousness #2

Slide 2

Slide 2 text

No content

Slide 3

Slide 3 text

Seminar 2 1. Recap: physicalism, materialism & naturalism

Slide 4

Slide 4 text

Seminar 2 1. Recap: physicalism, materialism & naturalism 2. Reductionism

Slide 5

Slide 5 text

Seminar 2 1. Recap: physicalism, materialism & naturalism 2. Reductionism 3. Emergence

Slide 6

Slide 6 text

Physicalism and materialism

Slide 7

Slide 7 text

Physicalism and materialism • Physical means: the subject-matter of physics

Slide 8

Slide 8 text

Physicalism and materialism • Physical means: the subject-matter of physics • Everything is physical

Slide 9

Slide 9 text

Physicalism and materialism • Physical means: the subject-matter of physics • Everything is physical • Everything is determined by the physical

Slide 10

Slide 10 text

Physicalism and materialism • Physical means: the subject-matter of physics • Everything is physical • Everything is determined by the physical • There are non-physical things but they are entirely fixed by fixing the physical things

Slide 11

Slide 11 text

What would God have to do to create this world?

Slide 12

Slide 12 text

Supervenience

Slide 13

Slide 13 text

Supervenience • Global supervenience claim: Any world that is a minimal physical duplicate of the actual world is a duplicate simpliciter (a duplicate in every respect)

Slide 14

Slide 14 text

Supervenience • Global supervenience claim: Any world that is a minimal physical duplicate of the actual world is a duplicate simpliciter (a duplicate in every respect) • David Lewis, ‘Reduction of Mind’ in Phil Papers vol. 3; Frank Jackson, From Metaphysics to Ethics ch.1

Slide 15

Slide 15 text

Supervenience • Global supervenience claim: Any world that is a minimal physical duplicate of the actual world is a duplicate simpliciter (a duplicate in every respect) • David Lewis, ‘Reduction of Mind’ in Phil Papers vol. 3; Frank Jackson, From Metaphysics to Ethics ch.1 • See also Stephan Leuenberger, ‘Ceteris Absentibus Physicalism’ Oxford Studies in Metaphysics 2008

Slide 16

Slide 16 text

Supervenience and necessity • Supervenience says that the physical necessitates everything else (including the mental) but the supervenience thesis is not a necessary truth • Compare determinism: the past and the laws necessitate the future, but other futures than the actual one are possible

Slide 17

Slide 17 text

A problem with global supervenience

Slide 18

Slide 18 text

A problem with global supervenience • What is the connection between mental and physical properties according to supervenience?

Slide 19

Slide 19 text

A problem with global supervenience • What is the connection between mental and physical properties according to supervenience? • How does the physical ‘underpin’ the mental?

Slide 20

Slide 20 text

A problem with global supervenience • What is the connection between mental and physical properties according to supervenience? • How does the physical ‘underpin’ the mental? • The problem of irrelevant physical differences

Slide 21

Slide 21 text

No content

Slide 22

Slide 22 text

Irrelevant physical differences

Slide 23

Slide 23 text

Irrelevant physical differences • Is the solution to make the supervenience claim about properties rather than worlds?

Slide 24

Slide 24 text

Irrelevant physical differences • Is the solution to make the supervenience claim about properties rather than worlds? • Jaegwon Kim’s ‘Strong supervenience’: A family of properties A supervenes on a family B iff:
 
 Necessarily, if anything has property F in A, then there is some property G in B such that the thing has G, and necessarily whatever has G has F

Slide 25

Slide 25 text

A further problem with supervenience: mere correlation

Slide 26

Slide 26 text

A further problem with supervenience: mere correlation • Supervenience of properties is compatible with a dualistic parallelism or ‘pre-established harmony’

Slide 27

Slide 27 text

A further problem with supervenience: mere correlation • Supervenience of properties is compatible with a dualistic parallelism or ‘pre-established harmony’ • The mental properties could be wholly distinct from anything physical

Slide 28

Slide 28 text

The essential issue

Slide 29

Slide 29 text

The essential issue • Supervenience does not establish a close enough connection between the mental and the physical, or between the supervenient properties and the ‘subjacent’ base

Slide 30

Slide 30 text

The essential issue • Supervenience does not establish a close enough connection between the mental and the physical, or between the supervenient properties and the ‘subjacent’ base • What should the connection be?

Slide 31

Slide 31 text

Supervenience + … Conceptual analysis

Slide 32

Slide 32 text

Supervenience + … Conceptual analysis • Jackson: conceptual analysis of the supervenient concepts

Slide 33

Slide 33 text

Supervenience + … Conceptual analysis • Jackson: conceptual analysis of the supervenient concepts • The conceptual analysis explains the supervenience

Slide 34

Slide 34 text

Supervenience + … Conceptual analysis • Jackson: conceptual analysis of the supervenient concepts • The conceptual analysis explains the supervenience • Necessitation is explained by entailment

Slide 35

Slide 35 text

Example

Slide 36

Slide 36 text

Example (Premise 1) H2O covers most of the earth
 
 Suppose we analyse the concept of water as ‘the watery stuff’. This plus our knowledge of physics and chemistry gives us:

Slide 37

Slide 37 text

Example (Premise 1) H2O covers most of the earth
 
 Suppose we analyse the concept of water as ‘the watery stuff’. This plus our knowledge of physics and chemistry gives us: (Premise 2) H2O = the watery stuff

Slide 38

Slide 38 text

Example (Premise 1) H2O covers most of the earth
 
 Suppose we analyse the concept of water as ‘the watery stuff’. This plus our knowledge of physics and chemistry gives us: (Premise 2) H2O = the watery stuff We can then deduce, without any need for any further empirical investigation:

Slide 39

Slide 39 text

Example (Premise 1) H2O covers most of the earth
 
 Suppose we analyse the concept of water as ‘the watery stuff’. This plus our knowledge of physics and chemistry gives us: (Premise 2) H2O = the watery stuff We can then deduce, without any need for any further empirical investigation: (Conclusion) Water covers most of the earth

Slide 40

Slide 40 text

Example (Premise 1) H2O covers most of the earth
 
 Suppose we analyse the concept of water as ‘the watery stuff’. This plus our knowledge of physics and chemistry gives us: (Premise 2) H2O = the watery stuff We can then deduce, without any need for any further empirical investigation: (Conclusion) Water covers most of the earth

Slide 41

Slide 41 text

‘A priori physicalism’

Slide 42

Slide 42 text

‘A priori physicalism’ • This version of physicalism is ‘a priori’ in the sense that the deduction from the physical truths to the other truths is a priori

Slide 43

Slide 43 text

‘A priori physicalism’ • This version of physicalism is ‘a priori’ in the sense that the deduction from the physical truths to the other truths is a priori • Not: we know physicalism is true a priori

Slide 44

Slide 44 text

Key texts • David Chalmers and Frank Jackson, ‘Conceptual Analysis and Reductive Explanation’ Philosophical Review 2001 • Ned Block and Robert Stalnaker, ‘Conceptual Analysis, Dualism and the Explanatory Gap’ Philosophical Review 1999

Slide 45

Slide 45 text

Supervenience + …. other proposals

Slide 46

Slide 46 text

Supervenience + …. other proposals • Identity of properties

Slide 47

Slide 47 text

Supervenience + …. other proposals • Identity of properties • Some stronger metaphysical relation between properties: ‘constitution’, ‘realisation’ etc.

Slide 48

Slide 48 text

Reduction

Slide 49

Slide 49 text

Reduction • Two notions of reduction

Slide 50

Slide 50 text

Reduction • Two notions of reduction • Ontological reduction - the ‘reduction’ of entities

Slide 51

Slide 51 text

Reduction • Two notions of reduction • Ontological reduction - the ‘reduction’ of entities • Explanatory reduction - the ‘reduction’ of theories

Slide 52

Slide 52 text

Ontological reduction

Slide 53

Slide 53 text

Ontological reduction • What is the relation between reduction and identity? • An ontological reduction “identifies the entities of one domain with a subclass of entities of another” Huw Price ‘Ramsey, Reference and Reductionism’ • The mental ‘reduces to the physical’

Slide 54

Slide 54 text

Explanatory reduction

Slide 55

Slide 55 text

Explanatory reduction • A relation between theories

Slide 56

Slide 56 text

Explanatory reduction • A relation between theories • One theory explains why another is true

Slide 57

Slide 57 text

Explanatory reduction • A relation between theories • One theory explains why another is true • NB relation to ‘grounding’

Slide 58

Slide 58 text

Emergence

Slide 59

Slide 59 text

Emergence • Reduction is sometimes contrasted with emergence

Slide 60

Slide 60 text

Emergence • Reduction is sometimes contrasted with emergence • What is emergence?

Slide 61

Slide 61 text

Emergence • Some say (e.g. Kim) emergence is just supervenience • But then what is the difference between emergence and ‘non-reductive’ physicalism?

Slide 62

Slide 62 text

Strong and weak emergence • Weak emergence: novelty with an explanation • Strong emergence: novelty without an explanation