Phil 101 Final
Why did Sartre think the question of God's existence was largely irrelevant to the question of how to live?
• God or no God you still have to decide what to believe, how to live your life, what's true o You can't escape responsibility for your life and choices o You are condemned to freedom • "it declares that even if God did exist, that would change nothing"
What are two objections to the Identity theory (Mind = Body/brain), and what is Nagel's famous article supposed to illustrate?
Identity theory = mental states are effected by changes in brain states If two things are identical, then they must have the same properties. If minds are just brains, so much for non-carbon based intelligence, too limited in scope because it rules out the possibility of other kinds of minds Misses qualitative experience. Minds and brains don't seem to have exactly the same properties. The subjective character of conscious experience, what it is like to be you at this moment is not capturable by describing some brain state even if the brain state and conscious experience are strictly correlated Thomas Nagel: What's it like to be a bat? No non-bat will ever know what it's like to experience echo-location no matter how much we learn about a bat's brain
How might one respond to the claim we are all hardwired to be egoists?
If the theory is not falsifiable, if it is consistent with any state of affairs (no matter what you do you are being selfish if you act voluntarily) then it does not tell us anything about the world If it's true by definition, it masks an important ordinary language distinction we want to make between selfish and unselfish behavior. For example, pick the selfish person you would rather be around Mother Theresa or Hitler
What is Sidney Shoemaker's example involving "Brownson" supposed to show regarding a revised body theory of identity?
Revised body theory - Identical people are both psychologically continuous and have their psychology caused by and realized in the same body Mr. Brown's brain gets put in the skull/body of Mr. Robinson, creating "Brownson". Mr. Brown's body doesn't survive. Upon waking, Brownson see's Brown's body. Assume Brownson's memories, mannerisms, personality, etc are all identical to what Brown's had been, for it is still the same brain, just different body. Brownson is psychologically continuous with Brown. So is Brownson identical to Brown, that is, the same self.
What was the main different between Mill's version of utilitarianism, and Bentham's?
Says it is important to consider quality when estimating pleasures
Why does Camus think Sisyphus is the absurd hero?
• Humans want Meaning. They can't help but quest for it. • Universe will never grant it o ABSURD • Life is repetition with no ultimate meaning and no lasting results • We are all Sisyphus rolling our rock up the hill
What was the argument made in the reading that the Bible does not appear to promote Cartesian dualism, despite it being the most popular view among Christians today?
The bible does not appear to promote Cartesian dualism, the biblical picture of a person is non-dualistic, soul-body unity; Jesus' death is portrayed as complete and total death, not just the death of a mortal body while his soul survives
What are some of the complications of the Soul Theory of identity?
What features of a person are determined by their soul How would you recognize a soul in the afterlife Could you undergo a soul switch and we would never know it as long as you retain the same consciousness Occam's razor, does postulating a soul do any explanatory work in helping us understand what makes someone one and the same person (we recognize the same person the way we see them) so why believe in soul?
What is traditional utilitarianism (act-utilitarianism)?
The right action is the one that maximizes happiness for everyone affected by the act. Basic intuition: seek to maximize the total amount of happiness in the world
What was Nietzsche trying to say with his parable of the madman?
• If the belief of God was given up, Meaning would have to come from elsewhere • "God is dead" not the actual existence of any deity, but our collective belief in a deity
Compare and contrast Camus and Nagel's views on what gives rise to the feeling of absurdity in human existence. (ESSAY POSSIBILITY)
• Nagel: Clash is not between us and a meaningless world, but between us and any conceivable world that contained us o As long as we are human, our questions will always outrun our answers ♣ The essence of the absurdity of our lives lies in "...the collision between the seriousness with which we take our lives and the perpetual possibility of regarding everything about which we are serious as arbitrary or open to doubt." • Camus: Humans want Meaning o Can't help but quest for it o Universe will never grant it ♣ Absurdity is created o Life is repetition with no ultimate meaning, and no lasting results • Contrast: o C universe withholds Meaning from us o N Human: our questions outrun answers ♣ Everything we take seriously is actually not serious because it is open to doubt (nothing is technically 100% serious) • Compare: o Absurdity is real when trying to find Meaning o Can never find true Meaning for whatever reason
What was Gilligan's critique of Kohlberg's six stages of moral development, and what was her alternative? (essay)
• Women tend to make ethical decisions differently o Kohlberg's system was based entirely off interviews with boys and men o Women rarely advance to stage 5 or 6 of moral development ♣ Social contract and universal ethical principles • Kohlberg's descriptive work is NOT an argument for the normative claim that the last stages are best o How men and how we should development moral reasoning may be two different things • Men rights and responsibilities, justice served • Women compassion and care, preserving and nurturing relationships • Little difference between the sexes in moral reasoning if age differences and educational level are taken into account
What was the point in the reading of the except from Bertrand Russell's "It was a Good Play"?
• Your purpose may not involve immortality • Why assume God and goodness and your mattering and immortality all go together?
What did Max mean by making the claim that this might be the age of missing information
We have lost tons of things our ancestors knew. o Grow food, read the weather, sew your clothes, recognize flora and fauna in your region? What knowledge is most worth having?
Why might Parfit's Transporter tale (readings) spell trouble for a Psychological Continuity Theory of Identity?
What if we could duplicate you, atom for atom, giving rise to a being with an identical consciousness at the moment of creation. Are there two yous? What if we could give you immortality by downloading your mind into a robot?
What leads David Hume to doubt the existence of a self?
When I enter most intimately into what I call myself, I always stumble on some particular perception or other of heat or cold, light or shade, love or hatred, pain or pleasure. I never can catch myself at any time without a perception and never can observe anything but the perception.
What are some of the main problems for utilitarianism?
Who determines the quality of happiness? How can you calculate on the spot? How do you know your calculation is any good? How far out into the future do you consider potential consequences? An act that produces little happiness in the short term may produce a great deal of happiness in the future What about animals? What maximizes happiness may violate someone's rights? Does not take into account the importance of distributive justice what if we maximize happiness by distributing it unequally
What is epiphenomenalism with regards to the theory of the mind?
Yes, there are Cartesian minds, but they have no causal powers, the mind arises out of and is caused by the brain and it is merely an ineffective byproduct of physical processes, very counterintuitive to conscious experience
What are some of the "bizarre consequences" of Individual Relativism?
You can never be wrong (assuming you fully know the situation and have thought it through) you are morally infallible by definition You make an action right (for you) simply by agreeing with it Moral disagreement is reduced to persuasion and matter of opionion, nothing objective Most importantly, if take to its logical conclusion, it leads to judgements no one would accept E.g. If Hitler thought what murdering Jews was right, then (for him) it was right.
Know the major philosophical objections to relying on Divine Command Theory.
Divine Command Theory - Morally right actions are those decreed by God. Would seem to imply that morality has an inescapable arbitrary element to it. If god had decreed that murder was OK then it would be? Assumes there is a God Which God? Which Religion? Still leaves us the task of figuring out what God decrees. How can you know? Even if there is no God, isn't murder still wrong? Would imply morality ultimately does not rest on there being a supernatural being.
Why might the principle of using Occam's razor lead one to cast doubt on the soul theory of identity?
Does postulating a soul do any explanatory work in helping us understand what makes someone one and the same person. We recognize the person by how we see them. Why believe in soul?
Explain the idea that technology does not give you more choices, just different choices, using examples not given in the lecture (essay)
• Examples in lecture can't live in a world o With no cars o Where a grade school education is enough o Without time pieces o Free of the threat of nuclear annihilation o Only know what's going on in your immediate neighborhood • Examples out of lecture can't live in a world o Without celebrities o Without the threat of global warming o without cell phones without the need for money or sometime of currency
What are the three main principles of a just society Rawls thinks people would agree to when constructing a social contract from behind a veil of ignorance?
1. The principle of equal liberty, each person has an equal right to the most extensive basic liberties compatible with similar liberties for all (prior to 2) 2. The principle of fair equality of opportunity, offices and positions are to be open to all under conditions of fair equality and opportunity (prior to 3) 3. The difference principle, social and economic inequalities are to be arranged so that they are to the greatest benefit of the least advantaged persons
What are Kant's two formulations of the categorical imperative?
1: An action is right if it meets two conditions, universalizability and reversibility. Universalizability is everyone can act on the principle and reversible is you would be willing to have everyone act on it 2: Act in such a way that you always treat humanity never simply as a means but always at the same time as an end, treat people as ends in themselves by treating them as being valuable for their own sakes, versus a value for the sake of something else.
What are the two "nuclear options" for dealing with doubts about the continuity or very existence of the self, one expressed by Hume, the other Heraclitus? (essay)
1: Giving up the cherished belief in the self. A la Hume. There are no continuous substances. Everything is constantly changing there is nothing for your thoughts or your mind to belong to. There is no thinking beyond the thought. 2: Im not the same person. Continuity of the self is a myth. No man ever steps into the same river twice, for its not the same river and he is not the same man. Heraclitus. I have a self but it is in constant flux.
Explain Searle's Chinese Room thought experiment, and how it was supposed to cast doubt on the validity of the Turing test.
A person (or machine) in the room with a very detailed rule book could successfully imitate speaking and understanding Chinese enough to fool real speakers of Chinese but we would not say the being in the room speaks Chinese. The being is manipulating symbols solely on the basis of their physical features or forms but no on the basis of their meaning. There is more to thinking than just running a program of successful input and outputs, mental states have intentionality
What is the version of relativism about aesthetics judgments known as emotivism?
Aesthetic judgment varies with the individual, and there are no objective truths between individuals. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Extreme is Emotivism: value judgments are nothing more than expressions of feeling of attitudes on the part of the subject toward the work in question, and are not objective reports about any inherent properties of the work itself
Understand what Max meant by saying "humans have a history because of technology"
Animals have no history in the sense that humans do. The story of humanity is the story of changing our environment, which is the story of technology. Everything humans have every made from the stone tool is technology
What is the double aspect theory of the mental states, and what makes it different from all the other theories we considered? (essay)
Another version of property dualism that doesn't appeal to soul stuff. Mental properties are not emergent. They are not properties of material object rather mental and physical properties are two different aspects of a single underlying substance that is neither physical or mental. Viewed one way, it appears mental but viewed another way it appears physical. It differs from all of the theories by not taking a stance (mind or body).
What are the two main criticisms we covered regarding considering ethical egoism as a MORAL theory?
As an ethical theory it would seem to condone evil acts so long as they are in the egoist's best interest You cant preach what you practice Ethical theories are generally regarded on principles of equality, that equals deserve equal treatment. But it is not in the egoist's interest to try to universalize her theory. The clever egoist will not openly act like one, and will encourage other to act altruistically.
Be able to explain Descartes' inconceivability and indivisibility arguments against the mind being the body, and the objections we considered in class.
Cartesian dualism argument #1: The conceivability argument. An attribute is essential to something if and only if it's inconceivable that the thing exists without it, it is conceivable for me to exist and not have a body, therefore my body is not essential to me, it is inconceivable for me to exist and not have a mind therefore my mind is essential to me. Objection: can you imagine your mind existing without a body? Cartesian dualism argument #2: Indivisibility argument. If minds are identical to bodies, then whatever is true of minds is true of bodies and vice versa, minds are indivisible and bodies are divisible, therefore, minds are not identical to bodies Objection: Even if Descartes is right and minds are indivisible, it doesn't follow necessarily that they are independent from bodies and can exist apart from them, voices are not vocal chords (losing your voice is not the same as losing your vocal chords it is losing the capacity which isn't divisible yet it is fully dependent on vocal chords)
What is the basic difference between individual and cultural relativism?
Cultural relativism- moral rights and wrongs are relative to a culture, more sophisticated and progressive kind of relativism
What is the difference between a teleological moral theory and a deontological moral theory?
Deontological theory is the rightness of an act is determined not by it's consequences, but its form, by the kind of action it is, good will. To have good will is to desire to do the right thing because its right not because you or others benefit.
What is the emergent materialism theory of the mind, and how does it differ from Cartesian dualism?
Emergent Materialism, non-reductive materialism: Mental properties are emergent properties that arise out of sufficiently complex properties, but are not reducible to those physical properties. An Emergent property comes into being when things which lack property interact in certain ways. An Emergent property is one that is had by a whole, but not any of its parts. So while a neuron can not have a mental state, a number of them, interacting in the right way, can. Consciousness emerges from a certain level of physical complexity.Cartesian dualism is the idea that the mind is not physical whatsoever
What is the difference between psychological egoism and ethical egoism?
Ethical Egoism is what makes an action right for an ethical egoist is that it promotes one's own best interests and psychological egoism is we can't help but act in our own self-interest, we can't help but be selfish
What is an ethics of care, and how does it differ from all other moral theories surveyed so far?
Ethics of Care emphasizes an aspect of our moral lives that the traditional (male philosopher created) moral theories tend to overlook. If an action 1) promotes the common good 2) doesn't violate anyone's rights 3) treats people fairly and 4) exhibits appropriate care, then it is morally permissible
What were some of the metrics Bentham felt should be taken into consideration in employing his "hedonic calculus"?
Intensity, duration, probability, propinquity (nearness in times), Fecundity (probability it will produce more happiness in the future), impurity (probability that it will produce less happiness in the future)
What do philosophers mean by the "intentionality" of mental states, and which theory of mind is especially lacking in accounting for it?
Intentionality is the power of mind to be about, to represent, or to stand for, thing, properties and states of affairs. This idea rejects Functionalism because any adequate theory of the mind must account for the intentionality of mental states. It must explain how it is possible for us to think about things. For example, I could be functionally equivalent to a Chinese speaker and still not understand a word of it.
What are some of the main problems for Kant's duty based theory of ethics
Isn't it possible that some ppl would be willing to have everyone act on certain principles that are clearly wrong? Are there really any "perfect duties," ones that admit of no exceptions Moral dilemmas where it seems we have to consider consequences o See ppl as a means to end to avoid greater evil o Evil to be avoided is great enough, no duty is absolutely inviolable o i.e. Trolley example
What is the Extended Mind Thesis?
It claims that our mind and associated cognitive processes are neither skull or body bound but extend into the surrounding environment via objects and technologies that help us negotiate reality, where does the mind stop and the rest of the world begin
How can we motivate approaching ethics in terms of virtues?
It is in everyone's interest to cooperate with others and have mutual constraints on pursuing one's self-interest, through threats of punishment, and people who develop virtues like compassion and sympathy want to do good and will feel guilt their motivation comes from within
Be able to explain the last theory of identity we looked at, the self not as a "thing", but a self-organizing process.
Not everything that has a mind has a self (because it takes self-consciouness). And maybe having a self can be a matter of degree, not an all or nothing affair, like a child on the way to acquiring a robust self, or an elderly person with Alzheimers slowly losing their self. Perhaps the unity of the self consists in self-organizing processes, and nothing beyond experience, or underlying it. It's not about the stuff (soul, brain, mind) that comprises you, but a state of being or a set of properties that emerge from that stuff.
What are some of the possible "virtues" of cultural relativism?
Promotes tolerance and acceptance of differences, leading to more empathy and compassion, diffuses belief in the superiority of one's way of doing things. Counteracts black and white thinking. Good antidote to ethnocentrism. Encourages us to try to understand a culture's beliefs and practices from within that culture's point of view
What is the difference between a teleological moral theory and a deontological moral theory
T - Rightness of an act is determined by it's consequences. Right acts maximize good consequences (ethical egoism - maximize good for oneself, utilitarianism - maximize the good for most people Deontological theory is the rightness of an act is determined not by it's consequences, but its form, by the kind of action it is, good will. To have good will is to desire to do the right thing because its right not because you or others benefit.
What are some of the complications of grounding personal identity in a Memory Theory of Personal Identity?
The inconsistency objection: what if you lose all memory of some part of your life? Do you stop being the same person as the person you were at that time of your life? Indirect memory via III to II to I Total amnesia? Does the person's identity change? The memory theory would imply yes. False memories? Foggy memories? Do you gradually become a different person? What if we get to the point where we can download and share someone else's experience memories?
Understand Pang's concept of the monkey mind, and how media technology caters to it.
The monkey mind leaps about and never stays in one place, attracted to today's infinite and ever changing buffet of information choices and devices it thrives on overload and doesn't distinguish between good and bad technologies or choices
What is Rawl's "veil of ignorance", and what is it suppose to show? (essay)
The parties to the social contract are in an original position of being behind a veil of ignorance with regard to their natures or position in society. They are bargaining on a social contract while not knowing anything about who they will be in terms of their race. Shows behind a veil of ignorance any rational and self interested person will only agree to a contract that protects the least among society and discriminates against no particular group.
What was the point of the slide showing Maslow's hierarchy of needs
The point of this was to show where does technology fit into this hierarchy? • Identifies the stages to a meaningful life o Physiological needs, safety needs, love and belonging, esteem, and self-actualization o Does technology better one's life in any of these aspects? not really
What was the standard version of the original Turing test, and what was it designed to show?
Turing Test - The imitation game, if player C can't tell which player is a human and which is a computer then the machine can think suppose to show machine intelligence
What problems do we run into when we try to apply the concept of being a virtuous person to Utilitarianism or Kantianism?
Utilitarianism - a virtuous person would be one who always tries to maximize happiness, this asks too much, we lose the distinction between doing one's moral duty and going about and beyond what is required, it clashes with our moral intuitions about what a moral life requires, requires too much self-sacrifice. Kantianism - In obeying the categorical imperative, Kantianism requires us to always act out of a sense of duty, but that isn't always enough, a virtuous person will perform her duties, but not out of a sense of duty, but also for reasons of love and compassion