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An Explanation of Complete Colocation of Indiscernibles
Get PDFThe Principle of the Identity of Indiscernibles (PII) claims that objects that share all of the same properties are the same object. If this claim is denied, then, as is commonly believed, the denier must accept the possibility of objects completely overlapping in space. Michael Della Rocca argues that this possibility is absurd, and therefore PII should be accepted. He claims that the problem with colocated objects lies in the inexplicability of the distinctness of the objects. This inexplicability, he argues, is contrary to the brute fact method of demonstrating the distinctness of objects in counterexamples to PII. Without any other method for demonstrating distinctness of qualitatively indiscernible objects deniers of PII are simply begging the question when they posit the possibility of distinct indiscernibles. I argue in this paper that a clear understanding of the different ways that objects can be colocated removes the counterintuitiveness of colocation, and thereby supports the denial of PII
Can We Believe Without Sufficient Evidence? The James/Clifford Quarrel and the Response of Alvin Plantinga
Get PDFThis paper aims to be a brief discussion about the character of “evidentialism” in the discussion between William Clifford and William James. Known under the topic “the ethics of belief,” it discusses the problem of religious epistemology, specifically the status of the rationality of religious beliefs. After such discussion, we shall adduce in an introductory way Alvin Plantinga’s so-called “reformed epistemology” as a proper response to the problem of evidentialism
The Panopticon of the Public Protest: Technology and Surveillance
Get PDFThis paper deals with the issue of surveillance as it applies to recent technological advancements. Specifically, advancements in video capturing and social media have made public events into spectacles that are observed and shared online by the public. Public protest and discourse loosens itself from the bounds of state authority and enters the arena of the public. This phenomenon reconsiders Foucault’s conception of the panopticon. Foucault’s panopticon is useful as a tool for understanding the way power operates through surveillance in a state-to-public direction, but technological advancements have allowed for a reversal of this surveillance. With real examples like the pepper spraying of student protesters at UC Davis, the public now has surveillance over the state (in this example police officers) from its multitude of citizen perspectives that can be shared and disseminated online. This is an important development because it increases the autonomy and safe power of individuals who wish to speak out against excessive use of power by the state over the public. People can do so without fear of greater police suppression of real events. Issues with this development are discussed, like the chance for the state, or other sites of power (like corporations) to develop the copyrighting of public pace, making any event the property of power structures. This would be a problem, as it would lessen the autonomy of individuals in public spaces
Looking Past the Web to See the Garden: An Exploration of Epistemological Metaphors
Get PDFIn their paper Identity, Oppression, and Power: Feminism and Intersectionality Theory, Samuels and Ross-Sheriff present those who engage with intersectionality with three challenges: avoid essentializing any one expression of identity (race, sexual orientation, class) over another, acknowledge interconnected privileges as well as oppressions, and pay mind to the changes in context that shift the designation of social identity and status. These challenges serve as an unpacking of the more general definition and purpose of intersectionality that “proposes that gender cannot be used as a single analytic frame without also exploring how issues of race, migration status, history, and social class, in particular, come to bear on one’s experience as a woman.” In this paper, dissatisfaction with intersectionality is taken to be a symptom of an insufficient epistemological picture. I very briefly touch on the epistemological setting offered to us by Descartes and move on to examine that provided by Quine at somewhat greater length and show how neither offers us sufficient tools to interact with people in a manner that would satisfy the intersectionalist. I then present a metaphor that I suggest our epistemology would need to grow out of for us to sufficiently deal with intersectionality
Hume in the Light of Bayes: Towards a Unified Cognitive Science of Human Nature
Get PDFDavid Hume hoped future advances would bring his nascent science of human nature nearer to perfection. He conjectured that since it is probable one operation and principle of the mind depends on another it might someday be possible to subsume all mental operations under one absolutely general and universal principle. I argue that the day Hume hoped for may now be upon us, as an increasing number of theorists suspect that predictive Bayesian models of cognitive architecture provide the best clue yet as to the shape of a unified theory of mind. A theory in which the manifold operations of perception, imagination, and belief formation may all be explained in terms of the same cognitive processes that implement causal inference. I show the fundamental mechanism behind such architectures, the notion of a generative model, comprises a functional analogue to Hume’s faculty of the imagination. I apply the ideas outlined to construct a theoretical model of speech perception which is able to explain perceptual illusions, such as phonemic restoration and Ganong effects as artifacts of Bayesian inference. If the unitary view spelled out in this paper is correct perception, action, understanding, and the imagination all co-emerge from the same neural and computational resources that implement error correction and causal inference. I thus conclude that predictive Bayesian models comprise a sound methodology with which to continue Hume’s project of constructing a genuinely unified cognitive science of human nature
Explanation in Science and Technology
Get PDFThis article seeks to emphasize the fact that technology, like science, can also offer us explanations about the world. The article begins by adopting a definition of technology as knowledge, thus establishing a continuity between science and technology that allows us to extend the work done on the issue of scientific explanation. Three proposals are analyzed for defining the concept of scientific explanation, with emphasis on Wesley Salmon’s causal mechanical model. Next, the case of the pressure and volume indicator diagram in the steam engine is analyzed, in which, despite the lack of a competent scientific theory to interpret the data obtained through a new instrument, our technological knowledge allowed for the generation of the explanations that the scientific theory of the time was unable to provide. The example meets the demands stipulated by the causal mechanical model of explanation but differs in that here the explanation was not the result of scientific knowledge. Rather, it was the technological knowledge provided by the indicator what generated a new explanation of the steam engine’s efficiency and functioning. Note: A correction to this article has been published as of June 1, 2015: An acknowledgements section has been added
Political Epistemology and the Subject: Epistemic Injustice as a Primary Mode for Oppression
Get PDFIn this paper I explore the notion of epistemic injustice in relation to privilege, marginalization, and oppression. I define epistemic injustice as anytime marginalized bodies are denied credibility based solely on their status as that Other. Conversely, epistemic privilege occurs whenever those in power are given credibility based solely on their elevated or authoritative status within society. It is my claim that epistemic injustice is not just a problem of knowing and that it reaches far beyond the scope of traditional epistemology and roots itself in both the social and political. It is, at a fundamental level, a tool used to control and oppresses already marginalized populations. I utilize the Puerto Rican Pill Trials that took place from 1952-1960 in order to expand upon the notion of epistemic injustice and the destruction of word-of-mouth testimony among groups of marginalized bodies. Along with this I assert that epistemic injustice has drastic consequences and is not just a problem of knowing. These consequences are two-fold. One, the denial of recognition from oneself and one’s peers, and two, the inability to engage in the introspective process of creating one’s subjecthood
Knowledge is Happiness: is The End—An Inquiry Concerning Stoic Philosophy
Get PDFI argue that the validity of the Stoic conception of the singular soul, empirically and psychologically, creates a view that is paradoxical: if being happy is the end for the sake of which everything is done, and if this consists in living according to virtue, using only right reasoning, one cannot obtain happiness. Why? Because selecting using right reasoning is the only virtue leading to the end, obtaining things that right reasoning is aimed at is ethically insignificant. I reconstruct fragments of text written by the outlaw Stoic philosopher, Posidonius, and interpret them to show how one can obtain the end while preserving Stoic ethics, through a radical connection between the soul consisting as parts and the passions. In this paper, I quote and try to interpret passages drawn from Plato’s Republic IV and connect them to the Stoics
Substance Dualism or Eliminativism
Get PDFPhysicalism (P) entails minimal physicalism (MP), MP entails minimal supervenience (MS), and MS is the thesis that there is covariance between the supervenient and the subvenient stuff. Therefore, if the (alleged) supervenient and subvenient stuff do not covary, then MS is false, and if MS is false then MP is false, and if MP is false then P is false. Put differently: if MS is false then P is false—P stands and falls with MS. In this essay, I begin by showing what the minimal physicalist thesis is: MP is, essentially, MS. Next, I look at qualia and the trouble they pose to MS and hence MP: if it is possible that qualia can be inverted without a behavioral change, then it follows that MS, MP, and P are false. In other words, the possibility of inverted qualia show that P is false. Seeing that this possibility does not establish a very robust dualism, I turn to the issue of inverted selves: if inverted selves are possible, then full-blown substance dualism follows. I argue that inverted selves are possible
The Phenomenology of Temporal Experience
Get PDFIn this paper, I will explore the dissonance between “physical explanation” and “human experience,” while focusing on the experience of temporal passage. As a starting point, I will introduce J.E. McTaggart’s A-Series theory of time and BSeries theory of time. The A-Series illustrates how humans intuitively experience time; the past is fixed and expired, while the present moment seamlessly unfolds forward into an open future. On the other hand, the B-Series is very unlike the intuitive experience of time; “time” is merely the culmination of “static snapshots,” where each snapshot possesses different properties than the preceding snapshot and succeeding snapshot. Furthermore, there is no present moment or direction of time. For the purposes of this paper, and in agreement with McTaggart’s thesis, I will assume that the B-Series theory of time is true. Second, I will consider two problematic implications of the B-Series, i.e. the knowledge asymmetry and the experience asymmetry. If the past and future are equally real and fixed, why do we only possess knowledge about the past, and know nothing of the future? Moreover, why do we exclusively experience time as unfolding in the direction of the future, and never toward the past? Third, I will consider four possible explanations, which are grounded in physical mechanics or neural architecture, that aim to reconcile physical explanation with human experience, i.e. the static snapshot world of the B-Series with the dynamic present as we experience it. These four theories are the Specious Present Theory, Retention Theory, Neuron Theory, and Blind Spot Theory. I will argue that no physical explanation can provide the reconciliation that I am looking for. Fourth, I will consider cases that highlight the inconsistent and subjective nature of temporal flow to further motivate the peculiarity of and explanatory gap between physical explanation and human experience. Finally, in section V, I will argue that the puzzle of temporal experience, i.e. the explanatory gap between physical explanation and human experience, boils down to a problem of qualia, and thus, is a result of the “hard problem of consciousness.