scholarly journals The Possibility of Emergent Conscious Causal Powers

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-7
Author(s):  
Lok-Chi Chan ◽  
Andrew James Latham
Keyword(s):  
Causal Powers

The Social Furniture of Virtual Worlds

Disputatio ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 11 (55) ◽  
pp. 345-369
Author(s):  
Peter Ludlow
Keyword(s):  
Large Class ◽  
Data Structures ◽  
Virtual Worlds ◽  
Causal Powers ◽  
Virtual Objects ◽  
David Chalmers ◽  
The Social

AbstractDavid Chalmers argues that virtual objects exist in the form of data structures that have causal powers. I argue that there is a large class of virtual objects that are social objects and that do not depend upon data structures for their existence. I also argue that data structures are themselves fundamentally social objects. Thus, virtual objects are fundamentally social objects.

Must Functionalists Be Aristotelians?

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert C. Koons ◽  
Alexander Pruss
Keyword(s):  
Theory Of Mind ◽  
Computing System ◽  
Proper Function ◽  
Causal Powers ◽  
Normative Language ◽  
Functionalist Theory ◽  
Mental Properties ◽  
Argument Proceeds ◽  
Aristotelian Tradition

Functionalism in the theory of mind requires an account of function that has a normative component—mere conditional connection (whether indicative or sub-junctive) is not enough. For instance, a component of a computing system isn’t an adder just in case its output is always or would always be the sum of the inputs, since any computing system in a world with as much indeterminism as ours can err or malfunction. Two general reductions of normative language have been proposed that one might wish to apply to the problem of defining proper function: the evolutionary reduction (Wright, Millikan) and the agential reduction (Plantinga). We argue that whatever the merits of the reductions in other contexts, a functionalist theory of mind that defines proper function in either of these ways must fail. The argument proceeds by first showing the agential reduction is viciously circular in the context of a functionalist theory of agency. Second, if functionalism about mind is true and proper function is reducible evolutionarily, then it is possible to have a situation in which the presence or absence of mental properties depends in an implausibly spooky, acausal way on remote facts. It is plausible that the only currently avail-able way for the functionalist to meet these challenges is to accept irreducible end-directed causal powers of minds and/or their functional parts, in accordance with a broadly Aristotelian tradition.

Causal Powers

2017 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Philosophy Of Science ◽  
Philosophy Of Mind ◽  
Scientific Practice ◽  
Laws Of Nature ◽  
Causal Powers ◽  
Important Work ◽  
Space And Time ◽  
Metaphysics Of Mind

This collection brings together new and important work by both emerging scholars and those who helped shape the field on the nature of causal powers, and the connections between causal powers and other phenomena within metaphysics, philosophy of science, and philosophy of mind. Contributors discuss how one who takes causal powers to be in some sense irreducible should think about laws of nature, scientific practice, causation, modality, space and time, persistence, and the metaphysics of mind.

scholarly journals Reflections on the Ontology of Money

2021 ◽  
Vol 0 (0) ◽  
Author(s):  
Uskali Mäki
Keyword(s):  
Institutional Structure ◽  
Causal Powers ◽  
Social Convention ◽  
Institutional Facts ◽  
Collective Belief

Abstract The suggestions outlined here include the following. Money is a bundle of institutionally sustained causal powers. Money is an institutional universal instantiated in generic currencies and particular money tokens. John Searle’s account of institutional facts is not helpful for understanding the nature of money as an institution (while it may help to illuminate aspects of the nature of currencies and money particulars). The money universal is not a social convention in David Lewis’s sense (while currencies and money particulars are characterized by high degrees of conventionality). The existence of the money universal is dependent on a larger institutional structure and cannot be understood in terms of collective belief or acceptance or agreement separately focusing on money. These claims have important implications for realism about money.

A gradual reformation: empirical character and causal powers in Kant

2018 ◽  
Vol 48 (5) ◽  
pp. 662-683 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jonas Jervell Indregard
Keyword(s):  
Free Choice ◽  
Weakness Of Will ◽  
Causal Powers ◽  
Moral Change ◽  
Causal Laws

AbstractAccording to Kant each person has an empirical character, which is ultimately grounded in one’s free choice. The popular Causal Laws interpretation of empirical character holds that it consists of the causal laws governing our psychology. I argue that this reading has difficulties explaining moral change, the ‘gradual reformation’ of our empirical character: Causal laws cannot change and hence cannot be gradually reformed. I propose an alternative Causal Powers interpretation of empirical character, where our empirical character consists of our mind’s causal powers. The resulting picture of empirical character allows for moral change and Kantian weakness of will.

scholarly journals Natural Meanings and Cultural Values

2019 ◽  
Vol 41 (1) ◽  
pp. 3-16 ◽  
Author(s):  
Simon P. James ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Standard Model ◽  
Cultural Values ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Causal Powers ◽  
New Model ◽  
Service Value ◽  
Natural Entities ◽  
The Standard Model ◽  
To Come

In many cases, rivers, mountains, forests, and other so-called natural entities have value for us because they contribute to our well-being. According to the standard model of such value, they have instrumental or “service” value for us on account of their causal powers. That model tends, however, to come up short when applied to cases when nature contributes to our well-being by virtue of the religious, political, historical, personal, or mythic meanings it bears. To make sense of such cases, a new model of nature’s value is needed, one that registers the fact that nature can have constitutive value for us on account of the role it plays in certain meaningful wholes, such as a person’s sense of who he or she is.

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