scholarly journals FUNKCIONALIZMAS SĄMONĖS FILOSOFIJOJE: METODOLOGIJA AR ONTOLOGIJA?

Problemos ◽  
2006 ◽  
Vol 70 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jonas Dagys
Keyword(s):  
Functional State ◽  
Philosophy Of Mind ◽  
Actual World ◽  
David Lewis ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Contemporary Philosophy ◽  
Theories Of Mind ◽  
Computational Functionalism ◽  
David Armstrong ◽  
The Mind

Straipsnyje tiriamos dvi XX a. viduryje išplėtotos funkcionalistinio sąmonės aiškinimo kryptys: D. Armstrongo ir D. Lewiso analitinis funkcionalizmas ir H. Putnamo komputacinis funkcionalizmas. Siekiama parodyti, kad šios dvi kryptys iš esmės sutampa metodologiniu požiūriu, tačiau jų atstovai suteikia savųjų teorijų metodologiniam pagrindui skirtingas ontologines interpretacijas. Sutardami, kad fizikinio būvio ir funkcinio būvio sąvokos skiriasi, jie nesutaria dėl to, ar funkcinio būvio sąvoką reikia laikyti išskiriančia atskirą ontologinę būvių kategoriją, ar ši sąvoka išreiškia tik skirtingą tų pačių fizikinių būvių identifikavimo realiame pasaulyje būdą. Šiame nesutarime iš esmės užsimezga šiuolaikinei sąmonės filosofijai būdinga kontroversija klausimu: savybių ontologija turi būti rekonstruojama intensiniu ar ekstensiniu pagrindu? Pagrindiniai žodžiai: funkcionalizmas, materializmas, įvairiopa realizacija, reduktyvistinės sąmonės teorijos. FUNCTIONALISM IN PHILOSOPHY OF MIND: METHODOLOGY OR ONTOLOGY?Jonas Dagys SummaryThe article investigates two functionalist accounts of the mind developed in the middle of the 20th century: analytical functionalism of David Armstrong and David Lewis and computational functionalism of Hilary Putnam. The aim is to show that the two accounts are identical from the methodological point of view, but their proponents give different ontological interpretations to the methodological base of their theories. While they agree that the concept of ‘functional state’ is different from the concept of ‘physical state’, they nevertheless disagree on whether ‘functional state’ should be taken to designate a distinct ontological kind of states or it should be taken as expressing a different way of identifying the same physical states in the actual world. This disagreement could be taken to mark the beginning of the controversy characteristic of contemporary philosophy of mind regarding the question whether the ontology of properties should be reconstructed on the intensive or extensive basis.Keywords: functionalism, materialism, multiple realizability, reductive theories of mind.

The Fragmented Mind

2021 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Philosophy Of Mind ◽  
Philosophy Of Language ◽  
Implicit Attitudes ◽  
David Lewis ◽  
Belief System ◽  
Belief State ◽  
Current Debate ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
The Mind ◽  
The Relationship

Mental fragmentation is the thesis that the mind is fragmented, or compartmentalized. Roughly, this means that an agent’s overall belief state is divided into several sub-states—fragments. These fragments need not make for a consistent and deductively closed belief system. The thesis of mental fragmentation became popular through the work of philosophers like Christopher Cherniak, David Lewis, and Robert Stalnaker in the 1980s. Recently, it has attracted great attention again. This volume is the first collection of essays devoted to the topic of mental fragmentation. It features important new contributions by leading experts in the philosophy of mind, epistemology, and philosophy of language. Opening with an accessible Introduction providing a systematic overview of the current debate, the fourteen essays cover a wide range of issues: foundational issues and motivations for fragmentation, the rationality or irrationality of fragmentation, fragmentation’s role in language, the relationship between fragmentation and mental files, and the implications of fragmentation for the analysis of implicit attitudes.

Еnactivist Criticism of the Neurobiological Theory of Consciousness

2021 ◽  
pp. 76-80
Author(s):  
Anastasia O. Shabalina ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Philosophy Of Mind ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Science Methods ◽  
Neural Processes ◽  
Neural Substrate ◽  
Critical Revision ◽  
Concept Of Information ◽  
The Mind ◽  
The Brain ◽  
Person Experience

The article considers the main arguments against the neurobiological theory of consciousness from the point of view of the enactivist approach within the philosophy of mind. The neurobiological theory of consciousness, which reduces consciousness to neural activity, is currently the dominant approach to the mind-body problem. The neurobiological theory emerged as a result of advances in research on the phenomena of consciousness and through the development of technologies for visualizing the internal processes of mind. However, at the very heart of this theory, there is a number of logical contradictions. The non-reductive enactivist approach to consciousness, introduced in this article, contributes to the existing argumentation against the reduction of consciousness to neural processes with remonstrations that take into account the modern neuroscientific data. The article analyzes the argumentation of the sensorimotor enactivism developed by A. Noe and offers the account of the teleosemantic approach to the concept of information provided by R. Cao. The key problems of the neurobiological theory of consciousness are highlighted, and the objections emerging within the framework of the enactivist approach are analyzed. Since the main concepts on which the neural theory is based are the concepts of neural substrate, cognition as representation, and information as a unit of cognition, the author of the article presents three key enactivist ideas that oppose them. First, the enactivist concept of cognition as action allows us to consider the first-person experience as a mode of action, and not as a state of the brain substrate. Second, the article deals with the “explanatory externalism” argument proposed by Noe, who refutes the image of cognition as a representation in the brain. Finally, in order to critically revise the concept of information as a unit of cognition, the author analyzes Cao’s idea, which represents a teleosemantic approach, but is in line with the general enactivist argumentation. Cao shows that the application of the concept “information” to neural processes is problematic: no naturalized information is found in the brain as a physical substrate. A critical revision of beliefs associated with the neural theory of consciousness leads us to recognize that there are not enough grounds for reducing consciousness to processes that take place in the brain. That is why Noe calls expectations that the visualization of processes taking place in the brain with the help of the modern equipment will be able to depict the experience of consciousness the “new phrenology”, thus indicating the naive character of neural reduction. The article concludes that natural science methods are insufficient for the study of consciousness.

scholarly journals Becoming Animal: Karma and the Animal Realm Envisioned through an Early Yogācāra Lens

Religions ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 10 (6) ◽  
pp. 363
Author(s):  
Daniel M. Stuart
Keyword(s):  
South Asian ◽  
Animal Behavior ◽  
Philosophy Of Mind ◽  
Human Mind ◽  
Third Century ◽  
Sanskrit Text ◽  
Middle Period ◽  
Theories Of Mind ◽  
The Mind ◽  
The Buddha

In an early discourse from the Saṃyuttanikāya, the Buddha states: “I do not see any other order of living beings so diversified as those in the animal realm. Even those beings in the animal realm have been diversified by the mind, yet the mind is even more diverse than those beings in the animal realm.” This paper explores how this key early Buddhist idea gets elaborated in various layers of Buddhist discourse during a millennium of historical development. I focus in particular on a middle period Buddhist sūtra, the Saddharmasmṛtyupasthānasūtra, which serves as a bridge between early Buddhist theories of mind and karma, and later more developed theories. This third-century South Asian Buddhist Sanskrit text on meditation practice, karma theory, and cosmology psychologizes animal behavior and places it on a spectrum with the behavior of humans and divine beings. It allows for an exploration of the conceptual interstices of Buddhist philosophy of mind and contemporary theories of embodied cognition. Exploring animal embodiments—and their karmic limitations—becomes a means to exploring all beings, an exploration that can’t be separated from the human mind among beings.

scholarly journals [MIND AND BRAIN IN PHILOSOPHY AND NEUROSCIENCES]

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sandro Nannini
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Psychology ◽  
Philosophy Of Mind ◽  
Folk Psychology ◽  
Body Problem ◽  
Higher Order ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Brain Dynamics ◽  
Mind And Brain ◽  
Mind Body Problem ◽  
The Mind

[After a brief review of the solutions given to the mind-body problem by philosophers I propose a naturalistic-materialistic solution that is based on a collaboration between the philosophy of mind and neurosciences. According to this solution the three fundamental characteristics of every human state of consciousness – that is, having a content and being conscious and self-conscious - are identified with three higher order properties of brain dynamics from an ontological point of view, although each of them can be described and explained in the language of neuroscience, cognitive psychology and folk-psychology.]

scholarly journals Mente, consciencia y cuerpo en la obra de Friedrich Nietzsche / Mind, Consciousness and the Body in Friedrich Nietzsche’s Opus

2016 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 75-82
Author(s):  
Mario Colon
Keyword(s):  
Friedrich Nietzsche ◽  
Philosophy Of Mind ◽  
The Body ◽  
Contemporary Philosophy ◽  
Causal Determinism ◽  
German Philosopher ◽  
The Mind

ABSTRACTThe study of consciousness possess considerable relevance in contemporary philosophy of mind. However, the “scientistic” approach that dominates the aforementioned discipline, although of undisputed usefulness, contributes to the rejection of other approaches whose explanatory value has proven to be illuminating in the study of mind, consciousness and the body. One of these approaches can be found in the philosophical works of Friedrich Nietzsche. The causal determinism of the mind-body relation proposed by the german philosopher has been posited through similar proposals for renowned neuroscientists and philosophers. Nevertheless, the historical and theoretical importance of Nietzsche’s contributions hasn’t been recognized as such. The purpose of this article is to show the subtleties of the causal determination in the mind-body relation and its implications in the actual discussions about the nature of consciousness.RESUMENEl estudio de la conciencia es de considerable relevancia en la filosofía de la mente contemporánea. Sin embargo, el enfoque “cientificista” imperante en esta disciplina, aunque de indiscutible utilidad, ha contribuido al rechazo de perspectivas cuyo valor explicativo resulta revelador en la investigación sobre la mente, la consciencia y el cuerpo. Una de estas perspectivas la podemos encontrar en la obra filosófica de Friedrich Nietzsche. El determinismo causal de la relación mente-cuerpo que propuso el filósofo alemán ha sido defendido por medio de propuestas similares de neurocientíficos y filósofos de probada pericia. No obstante, la relevancia de la aportación nietzscheana no ha sido reconocida en su importancia histórica y teórica. El propósito de este artículo es señalar las particularidades sobre la determinación causal de la relación mente/cuerpo y sus implicaciones en los debates actuales sobre la naturaleza de la consciencia.

scholarly journals What's in a Concept? Conceptualizing the Nonconceptual in Buddhist Philosophy and Cognitive Science

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Evan Thompson
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Science ◽  
Philosophy Of Mind ◽  
Concept Formation ◽  
Full Range ◽  
Buddhist Philosophy ◽  
Comprehensive Treatment ◽  
Contemporary Philosophy ◽  
Philosophical Perspective ◽  
The World ◽  
The Mind

A recurrent problem in the philosophical debates over whether there is or can be nonconceptual experience or whether all experience is conceptually structured or mediated is the lack of a generally accepted account of what concepts are. Without a precise specification of what a concept is, the notion of nonconceptuality is equally ill defined. This problem cuts across contemporary philosophy and cognitive science as well as classical Indian philosophy, and it affects how we go about philosophically engaging Buddhism. Buddhist philosophers generally argue that our everyday experience of the world is conceptually constructed, whereas “nonconceptual cognition” (nirvikalpa jñāna) marks the limits of conceptuality. But what precisely do “conceptual” and “nonconceptual” mean? Consider that “concept” is routinely used to translate the Sanskrit term vikalpa; nirvikalpa is accordingly rendered as “nonconceptual.” But vikalpa has also been rendered as “imagination,” “discriminative construction,” “discursive thought,” and “discrimination.” Related terms, such as kalpanā (conceptualization/mental construction) and kalpanāpoḍha (devoid of conceptualization/mental construction), have also been rendered in various ways. Besides the question of how to translate these terms in any given Buddhist philosophical text, how should we relate them to current philosophical or cognitive scientific uses of the term “concept”? More generally, given that the relationship between the conceptual and the nonconceptual has been one of the central and recurring issues for the Buddhist philosophical tradition altogether, can Buddhist philosophy bring fresh insights to our contemporary debates about whether experience has nonconceptual content? And can contemporary philosophy and cognitive science help to illuminate or even resolve some older Buddhist philosophical controversies? A comprehensive treatment of these questions across the full range of Buddhist philosophy and contemporary philosophy of mind and cognitive science would be impossible. I restrict my focus to certain core ideas from Abhidharma, Dharmakīrti’s apoha theory, and Yogācāra, as refracted through current philosophical and cognitive science views of concepts. I argue for the following five general theses. First, cognitive science can help us to clarify Abhidharma issues about the relation between nonconceptual sense perception and conceptual cognition. Second, we can resolve these Abhidharma issues using a model of concept formation based on reading Dharmakīrti through cognitive science glasses. Third, this model of concept formation offers a new perspective on the contemporary conceptualist versus nonconceptualist debate. Fourth, Yogācāra offers a conception of nonconceptual experience absent from this debate. In many Yogācāra texts, awareness that is said to be free from the duality of “grasper” (grāhaka) and “grasped” (grāhya) is nonconceptual. None of the contemporary philosophical arguments for nonconceptualism is adequate or suitable for explicating this unique kind of nonconceptuality. Thus, Yogācāra is relevant to what has been called the problem of the “scope of the conceptual,” that is, how the conceptual/nonconceptual distinction should be drawn. For this reason, among others, Yogācāra has something to offer philosophy of mind. Moreover, using cognitive science, we may be able to render some of the Yogācāra ideas in a new way, while in turn recasting ideas from cognitive science. Fifth, in pursuing these aims, I hope to show the value of thinking about the mind from a cross-cultural philosophical perspective. Sixth, from an enactive cognitive science perspective informed by Buddhist philosophy, a concept is not a mental entity by which an independent subject grasps or represents independent objects, but rather one aspect of a complex dynamic process in which the mind and the world are interdependent and co-emergent poles.

Meaningful Relations

2021 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Science ◽  
Media Studies ◽  
Philosophy Of Mind ◽  
Body Problem ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Sense Making ◽  
Critical View ◽  
Enactive Cognitive Science ◽  
Mind And Body ◽  
The Mind

This collection of works is a contribution to the current debates on the mind-body-problem. It discusses how mind and body make contact in sense-making processes from the point of view of enactive cognitive science and 4E approaches to cognition. It also offers a critical view on non-representational approaches to cognition. The book covers sociology, philosophy of mind, aesthetics, computer science and HRI, media studies, literature and cognitive science. It offers cutting-edge research both for students and for junior and senior researchers in the fields mentioned above.

Powers in Contemporary Philosophy

2021 ◽  
pp. 271-294
Author(s):  
Jennifer McKitrick
Keyword(s):  
20Th Century ◽  
David Lewis ◽  
Conditional Analysis ◽  
Substantial Part ◽  
Contemporary Philosophy ◽  
Natural Laws ◽  
Fundamental Particles ◽  
Temporal Properties ◽  
Conditional Statements ◽  
David Armstrong

Four metaphysicians, Charlie Martin, David Lewis, David Armstrong, and George Molnar, offer distinctive approaches to understanding powers. Martin challenges the widely held view that disposition statements can be eliminated in favor of conditional statements. The apparent failure of the conditional analysis clears the path for Martin’s idea that all properties have some degree of irreducible dispositionality. Lewis takes on Martin’s challenge and offers his reformed conditional analysis. This analysis does not purport to eliminate talk of dispositions, but instead metaphysically reduces dispositions to their causal bases. Armstrong also reduces dispositions, but he reduces them to categorical universals governed by natural laws. Molnar argues that each of the aforementioned views falters when confronted with the powers of fundamental particles, which are said to be ungrounded pure powers. Molnar holds that both fundamental and derivative powers exist alongside non-power spatial and temporal properties. Debates among these four philosophers in the latter half of the 20th century constitute a substantial part of the reemergence of discussion of powers in contemporary metaphysics.

scholarly journals DEKARTIŠKAS DUALIZMO ĮRODYMAS ŠIUOLAIKINĖJE SĄMONĖS FILOSOFIJOJE

Problemos ◽  
2006 ◽  
Vol 69 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jonas Dagys
Keyword(s):  
Philosophy Of Mind ◽  
Semantic Analysis ◽  
Contemporary Philosophy ◽  
Analytical Philosophy ◽  
Dimensional Theory ◽  
Conceptual Content ◽  
David Chalmers ◽  
Zombie Argument ◽  
The Mind ◽  
Modal Semantic

Straipsnyje analitinės filosofijos požiūriu analizuojamas Descartes’o sąmonės ir kūno skirtingumo įrodymas, siekiant atskleisti jo panašumus su šiuolaikinėje sąmonės filosofijoje populiariu Davido Chalmerso pateiktu „zombio“ mintiniu eksperimentu ir juo grindžiamu dualizmo įrodymu. Siekiama parodyti, kad šiuolaikinis modaline semantikos analize grindžiamas įrodymo variantas yra techniškai sudėtingesnis ir atsparesnis fizikalistinei kritikai, tačiau jis paremtas nutylėta ir nepagrįsta episteminio sąvokų skaidrumo prielaida, kuri išskirstina kaip viena originalaus dekartiško įrodymo silpnybių. Tai leidžia tvirtinti, kad Antoine’o Arnauld kritika, pateikta Descartes’o įrodymui, lygiai taip pat sėkmingai taikytina ir Chalmerso antifizikalistiniams samprotavimams.Reikšminiai žodžiai: sąmonės filosofija, dualizmo įrodymai, „zombio“ mintinis eksperimentas, fizikalizmas. DESCARTES’ ARGUMENT FOR DUALISM IN CONTEMPORARY PHILOSOPHY OF MINDJonas Dagys Summary The paper analizes Descartes’ argument for the mind–body dualism from the perspective of contemporary analytical philosophy of mind. It attempts to show that the popular zombie argument, mostly due to David Chalmers, is reminescent of this Cartesian proof of dualism. The intended conclusion is that although the contemporary argument invokes modal semantic analysis and two-dimensional theory of conceptual content and so is technically more difficult and resistant to certain physicalist criticism, it neverhteless rests on an unstated and unjustified assumption. This assumption is that of epistemic transparency and completeness of at least some of our concepts. It was the same assumption that had been identified as one of the weaknesses of the original Cartesian argument for dualism. Therefore, one could argue that Arnauld’s objections to Descartes are well applicable to Chalmers’ antiphysicalist arguments without substantial modification.Keywords: philosophy of mind, arguments for dualism, zombie argument, physicalism.

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