Studies in No-Self Physicalism

Description

This book demonstrates how a radical version of physicalism (‘No-Self Physicalism’) can offer an internally coherent and comprehensive philosophical worldview. It first argues that a coherent physicalist should explicitly treat a cognitive subject merely as a physical thing and should not vaguely assume an amorphous or even soul-like subject or self. This approach forces the physicalist to re-examine traditional core philosophical notions such as truth, analyticity, modality, apriority because our traditional understandings of them appear to be predicated on a cognitive subject that is not literally just a physical thing. In turn, working on the assumption that a cognitive subject is itself completely physical, namely a neural network-based robot programmed by evolution (hence the term ‘No-Self’), the book proposes physicalistic theories on conceptual representation, truth, analyticity, modality, the nature of mathematics, epistemic justification, knowledge, apriority and intuition, as well as a physicalistic ontology. These are meant to show that this No-Self Physicalism, perhaps the most minimalistic and radical version of physicalism proposed to date, can accommodate many aspects that have traditionally interested philosophers. Given its refreshingly radical approach and painstakingly developed content, the book is of interest to anyone who is seeking a coherent philosophical worldview in this age of science. Preface Contents 1 Introduction: Steps Toward No-Self Physicalism 1.1 PCS: Physicalism About Human Cognitive Subjects 1.1.1 What is PCS? 1.1.2 Reasons Supporting PCS 1.1.3 Who Should Accept PCS? 1.2 The Problem of Subject in Contemporary Philosophy 1.2.1 The Subject in Contemporary Philosophy 1.2.2 Implications of PCS and Their Clash with Traditional Philosophy 1.2.3 On Some Attempted Reconciliations 1.2.4 The Grip of an Illusory Self 1.3 No-Self Physicalism 1.3.1 What is No-Self Physicalism? 1.3.2 Defending Eliminative Physicalism on Phenomenal Experiences 1.3.3 The Content, Method and Some Other Aspects of No-Self Physicalism References 2 The Subject in Carnap, Quine and Others 2.1 The Fictitious Subject in Carnap’s Philosophy 2.2 The Subject in Quine’s Philosophy 2.2.1 Preliminary Explanations 2.2.2 From the Beginning to Reifying Physical Objects 2.2.3 Reifying Abstract Objects 2.2.4 Holism 2.2.5 Disquotational Reference and Truth 2.2.6 Indeterminacy of Reference and Ontological Relativity 2.2.7 Can Non-reductive Physicalism Save Quine? 2.3 The Subject in Other Philosophical Concepts and Views 2.3.1 The Subject in ‘You Can’t Jump Out of Your Language’ 2.3.2 The Subject in the Notions of Objectivity and Subjectivity 2.3.3 The Subject in Realism Versus Anti-realism Debates 2.3.4 The Subject in Analyticity, Modality and Logical Truth References 3 Concepts and Conceptual Representation 3.1 Background and Overview 3.1.1 Ontological Assumptions 3.1.2 Concepts and Their Linguistic Expressions 3.1.3 Types of Concepts 3.1.4 Structural Constituents of a Simple Material Concept 3.1.5 Semantic Types 3.1.6 Characterizing Conceptual Representation 3.1.7 Social Phenomena of Concepts 3.1.8 Some Clarifications 3.2 Perceptual Images 3.2.1 What are Perceptual Images? 3.2.2 Identifying the Representation Relation for Perceptual Images 3.2.3 Some Features of Perceptual Images 3.3 A Weight Accumulation Model 3.4 Exemplars and Exemplified Properties 3.4.1 The Representation Relation for Exemplars 3.4.2 Exemplified Properties: The Simple Cases 3.4.3 Exemplified Properties: The Cases of Mixed Semantic Types 3.5 Conceptual Representation 3.5.1 General Conditions for Conceptual Representation 3.5.2 Weight Distributions for Non-Deferential Concepts 3.5.3 Public Referents and Deferential Concepts 3.5.4 Some Clarifications 3.6 Resolving the Puzzles 3.6.1 Frege’s Puzzle 3.6.2 The Twin-Earth Puzzle 3.6.3 The Swampman Puzzle 3.6.4 The Puzzle of Conceptual Changes 3.6.5 The Puzzle of Disjunctive Concepts 3.6.6 The Puzzle of Vacuous Concepts 3.6.7 The Puzzle of Representing Oneself 3.7 Social Phenomena About Concepts 3.7.1 Concept Individuation 3.7.2 Public Meanings of Words 3.8 Composite Concepts References 4 Thoughts and Truth 4.1 Thoughts in Individual Brains 4.1.1 Structures of Thoughts 4.1.2 Thoughts as Bearers of Cognitive Attitudes 4.1.3 Testing Procedures for Thoughts 4.1.4 Inferential Roles of Thoughts 4.2 Truth 4.2.1 Truth Conditions for Thoughts 4.2.2 The Nature of Truth Under Physicalism 4.2.3 Truth and Usefulness 4.3 Social Phenomena About Thoughts 4.3.1 Thought Individuation 4.3.2 Public Meanings and Truth Values of Sentences 4.4 Belief Ascription 4.4.1 Introduction 4.4.2 De Re Belief Ascriptions 4.4.3 De Dicto Belief Ascriptions 4.4.4 De Dicto Belief Ascriptions Modulo Translations 4.4.5 The Priority Rule 4.4.6 De Se Belief Ascriptions 4.5 Analyticity 4.5.1 Introduction 4.5.2 Analyticity at the Individual Level 4.5.3 Social-Level Analyticity 4.5.4 Universal Analyticity 4.5.5 Resolving Puzzles About Analyticity 4.6 Modality 4.6.1 Modality Under Physicalism 4.6.2 Scenario Descriptions and Their Constraints 4.6.3 Defining Naturalized Notions of Modality 4.6.4 The Relation Between Analyticity, Necessity and Apriority References 5 Mathematical Concepts and Thoughts 5.1 Mathematical Theories as Fictions 5.1.1 A Physicalistic Account of Fictions 5.1.2 Mathematical Theories as Fictions: An Argument 5.1.3 Mathematical Theories as Fictions: Some Other Evidence 5.1.4 The Real Differences Between Mathematics and Fictions 5.1.5 Looking Ahead 5.2 Structures and Functions of Mathematical Concepts 5.2.1 Elementary Mathematical Concepts 5.2.2 Mathematical Concepts in Axiomatized Theories 5.3 Resolving Philosophical Puzzles 5.3.1 Understanding, Knowledge and Intuitions in Mathematics 5.3.2 ‘Truth’ in Mathematics 5.3.3 Objectivity in Mathematics 5.3.4 Infinity in Mathematics and the Problem of Consistency 5.4 Explaining the Applicability of Mathematics 5.4.1 Characterizing the Problem of Applicability 5.4.2 A Strategy for Explaining Applicability 5.4.3 Strict Finitism (SF): A Brief Introduction References 6 Epistemology and Methodology 6.1 Cognitive Procedures and Cognitive Process Tokens 6.1.1 The Cognitive Module 6.1.2 Cognitive Procedures 6.1.3 Cognitive Process Tokens 6.2 Reliability of Cognitive Procedures 6.2.1 An Engineering Example 6.2.2 Defining Reliability for Cognitive Procedures 6.2.3 The Generality Problem 6.3 Epistemic Properties of Cognitive Process Tokens 6.3.1 An Engineering Example (Again) 6.3.2 Classifying Cognitive Process Tokens 6.3.3 Epistemic Values of Cognitive Process Tokens 6.3.4 Folk Epistemic Notions: Knowledge and Justification 6.3.5 Examples 6.4 Apriority 6.4.1 Why Naturalizing Apriority? 6.4.2 Defining Apriority 6.4.3 Defending the a Priori Entailment Thesis 6.5 Intuition and Other Methodological Issues 6.5.1 Introduction: The Problem of Intuition for Physicalism 6.5.2 A Methodological Principle for Physicalists 6.5.3 Intuitions as Complex Pattern Recognition Abilities 6.5.4 Intuitions Versus Hard-Scientific Methods Under Physicalism References 7 A Physicalistic Ontology 7.1 Introduction: The Ground and the Scope 7.1.1 An Answer to Hempel’s Dilemma 7.1.2 Classical Versus Quantum Ontology 7.2 Against the Object-Property Framework 7.2.1 Problems with the Notion ‘Individual Physical Object’ 7.2.2 Problems with the Notion ‘Mereological Fusion’ 7.2.3 Problems with the Notion ‘Property’ 7.3 The Ontology of Physical Systems 7.3.1 The Constitution and Identity of a Physical System 7.3.2 The Structure and Structural Aspects of a Physical System 7.3.3 Describing Physical Systems 7.4 The Mental-Physical Relationship 7.4.1 The Semantics of Mental Predicates 7.4.2 On Reducibility or Irreducibility of the Mental References 8 A Physicalistic Characterization of No-Self Physicalism 8.1 The Basic Tenets of No-Self Physicalism 8.2 Responses to Well-Known Arguments Against Physicalism 8.2.1 The Knowledge Argument 8.2.2 The Conceivability (Or Modal, Zombie) Argument 8.2.3 The Explanation Gap Argument References 9 Conclusions Index