Tem

September 28

Second Thoughts

Is there a conflict between 1st person and 3rd person consciousness and reality?

After thinking about it a bit more, i wonder what the nature of 1st and 3rd person consciousness in regards to reality is. While Dennett seems to want to advocate for a monist position that these two perspective occupy the same reality, i'm not fully convinced of that myself. By this i mean, is it possible to reconcile 1st and 3rd person perspectives with a dualistic view of reality?

If you consider 1st person to be subjective and 3rd person to be objective, it seems plausible that each of these perspectives can be in themselves their own reality. The subjective can represent a reality that is completely contingent on individual biographical experience and states of mind. Objective can refer to a reality that is independent of human experience. When thinking about the possibility of this dual reality explanation, i imagine a scenario in which someone has phantom limb syndrome (the same example offered by Descartes in his meditations). The objective reality is that the person is missing a limb. However, the subjective reality of the person is that they still feel sensation and pain in the missing limb. The implication here is that the subjective reality of the individual with phantom limb pain is clearly different from the objective reality representing the limb as nonexistent.

...just some thoughts Kobywarren 05:44, 27 September 2010 (UTC)

Is Evolution a "game changer" in the history of philosophy

(by, for example, "ending" "mind first" views and dualism?)

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Kant

I found the article on Kant interesting in relation to our discussions last week of the effect of the science behind evolution on philosophy, because the beginning of the article talks about how Kant was influenced by the scientific developments of his day and the scientific method in his views of how we can determine what is real. He wanted to use scientific discoveries as fact and it seems like he did a very good job of proving that you can , and so it was interesting to me that the article ended with Kant rejecting the idea that rational theology (and so to him a concept of God?) could work, just as Dennet's article about Darwin contained the idea that religion is made much less important and perhaps irrevelant by Darwin's theories. I'm wondering what answers theologians had to Kant's ideas, and if they were similar to responses to Dennet? This relationship between philosophers dealing with scientific advancement and arguing that God does not exist may not hold true in all cases but its an interesting pattern we're seeing. Skolmes 04:49, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

I knew that Immanuel Kant was a Christian so I found it quite surprising that he argued against many of the theories that concluded that there is a God. Seeing as he was a definite believer in God and even went so far as to claim that “God cannot be separated from the relation of happiness with morality as the ‘ideal of the supreme good." However, I came to realize that the end of the reading by Scruton was not claiming that Kant was against people believing that God existed, he was simply proving that many of the arguments used to prove the existence of God are fallacious because “The argument turns on the premise that existence is not a predicate…” and therefore it is impossible to claim that the concept of God leads to the existence of God. Kant is not the first example of people who believe in the existence of God and have combated some of the proofs for the existence of God such as the ontological argument. Two examples would be St. Thomas Aquinas and Gaunilo of Marmoutiers. User:Daniel

Liebniz on Evil

So I know this wasn't addressed all that much in the packet (hardly at all) but this really caught my eye and interested me. First of all I want to apologize if this becomes convoluted or slightly turns into rambling or my thoughts seem disconnected, my mind has a tendency to jump around a bit! These are just a bunch of questions that I thought of when I read the short bit about Leibniz’s thoughts concerning evil (which I am sure are extremely condensed in this section, since there are only a few sentences mentioning it) On Leibniz’s logic about evil (pg 191 in pkt)

According to Higgins and Solomon, Leibniz says “what we see as evil is due only to our limited vision, our failure to understand the sum total of the possibilities.” (pg 191 in packet, from excerpt from “Between Science and Religion”)

Why would God create humans with such a limited vision that would make them conceive the concept of “evil” if he loves us and picks the best world (according to Leibniz, communicated via the authors)? If God really loved us wouldn’t he want us to recognize that nothing is bad, if that is the case? If we were to recognize nothing is bad, people might doubt God’s existence less. This is based off of the premise that when bad things happen to people, people doubt God cares about them, and therefore doubt God’s existence (A “If God existed and cares about me he wouldn’t let this happen to me” mentality) .

This brings to mind another point – what, then would happen to society if humans suddenly had an “unlimited vision” and were able to understand the “sum total of possibilities”? If nothing is evil, then should we have no laws? There would be no need for a justice system: since everything happens for a reason, and nothing is really bad, there is no injustice ever committed by anyone towards anyone (correct me if I am wrong). If no action is unjust, and no action is inherently or socially acknowledged as evil, then our need for vengeance would be demolished. The honor code on which vengeance is based upon would crumble. Honor is no longer necessary. If honor is no longer necessary, then will people still behave honorably? Once honor is deemed no longer necessary for society to function, will people then start to feel other virtues (if we are to say honor is a virtue and things similar to honor are virtues) are no longer part of the moral code society has influenced on us? And if more morals, following honor/acting honorably, seem to be tossed out, what would happen to the world? Would it become complete anarchy, social chaos? If this were an imminent cause of events then wouldn’t evil, in fact, be a necessary thing for society to stay intact? The God would have created evil (or at least evil would exist) in mind of almost saving humanity from itself. I have a feeling that turned into a garbled mess at the end…thoughts anyone though? --Scobb 23:13, 27 September 2010 (UTC)

I think the questions that you bring up here on Leibniz are definitely interesting. It seems like many of the questions that you raise about evil and "limited vision" are at least to some degree addressed in the first few sections of Leibniz's work: Discourse on Metaphysics. However, i tend to agree with you that it seems like his concept of God and evil is a bit contradictory. As an example of this, i would refer to the problem of Judas Iscariot. If when God created Judas, he encapsulated within Judas all his past, present, and future. This would seem to have very negative implications to Leibniz's system.

Im not asserting anything here because i have yet to finish reading the second half of Leibniz's major works. I just thought I would add this in... Kobywarren 01:09, 28 September 2010 (UTC)

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Background on Matthew B Crawford

Matthew B Crawford studied physics when he was an undergraduate and then turn his sights to political philosophy. He received his Ph. D. from the University of Chicago.

Today, Crawford is a “fellow at the Institute for Advanced Studies in Culture at the University of Virginia.” He also owns a small motorcycle repair shop ( Shockoe Moto) in Richmond, Virginia. A person might wonder why Crawford who had a Ph. D. is working on motorcycles. What I got out of listening to the interviews and reading a few articles, is that Crawford did this because he was not challenged enough in the jobs that he did get after college. He seemed to say that he was expecting to have jobs that challenged his mind, and the ones that he had were not fulfilling. This made him to start a motorcycle repair shop and use his philosophical education to write a book “Shop Class as Soulcraft.”

For those than are interested in the book, here is the summary that is printed on the back of the book: “Those of us who sit in an office often feel a lack of connection to the material world and find it difficult to say exactly what we do all day. For those who felt hustled off to college, then to the cubicle, Shop Class as Soulcraft seeks to restore the honor of the manual trades as a life worth choosing. Based on his own experience as an electrician and mechanic, Matthew Crawford makes a case for the kind of work that requires mastery of real things. Surprisingly, such work can be more intellectually demanding than the sort that deals in abstractions. Maintenance and repair work also cultivate certain ethnical virtues, fostering habits of individual responsibility. Shop Class as Soulcraft rouses us from the passivity and dependence of consumer culture with a bracing call for self-reliance. It is a moving reflection on how we can live concretely in an ever more abstract world."

With this link, there is a list of interviews with Crawford. I think the best one is the one under radio titles “All Things Considered”. This interview is from NPR. If you have time listening to all of them was interesting to me because I listened to them before doing the reading. {http://matthewbcrawford.com/interviews.html}

This link is a long video of Matthew Crawford talking about his book “Shop Class as Soulcraft”. It is about how Crawford came up with the idea for the book as well as topics from the book. {http://fora.tv/2009/08/04/Shop_Class_as_Soulcraft_Matthew_B_Crawford#fullprogram}

Please add more to this if anyone finds anything else. --Jjohnson9 17:09, 23 September 2010 (UTC)