I agree with Torin Alter that physicalists should be a priori physicalists. I argue against his rejection of the representationalist response to the knowledge argument.
I agree with Torin Alter that physicalists should be a priori physicalists. I argue against his rejection of the representationalist response to the knowledge argument.
In light of our knowledge about neurodiversity, I argue that the cognitive science framework Miščević uses in Thought Experiments must be broaden to create a pluralistic account of thought experimentation, one able to account for the many ways thought experiments are replicated using not only visual models, but also arguments, conceptual analyses, and images as some of the many instruments used in the laboratory of our mind.
This paper responds to an argument from Botin which claims that Russellian physicalism is committed to the view that either (i) our phenomenal concepts do not reveal anything essential about phenomenal properties (following Goff, Botin calls this the ‘opaque’ account of phenomenal concepts), or that (ii) phenomenal concepts are capable of revealing at least some of the essence of phenomenal properties—making phenomenal concepts ‘translucent’ if some-but-not-all-revealing or ‘transparent’ if all-revealing—but this entails that phenomenal properties are fundamental, which violates physicalism. I argue that Botin is wrong that Russellian physicalists are committed to the view that physical and phenomenal concepts must have similarly qualitative/phenomenal modes of presentation or contents, since Russellian physicalists assume that we do not possess concepts which specifically refer to non-phenomenal categorical properties. If we were to acquire concepts for non-phenomenal categorical properties, they would need to have categorical contents and modes of presentation, but need not have qualitative/phenomenal contents and modes of presentation. Given this, Russellian physicalists can embrace a translucent account of phenomenal concepts, and hold that our phenomenal concepts more-or-less accurately tell us about certain sorts of non-fundamental properties which are both physical and categorical.
Philosophers and cognitive scientists have been debating about the nature of practical knowledge in skilled action. A big challenge is that of establishing whether and how practical knowledge (knowledge-how) is influenced by, or related to propositional knowledge (knowledge-that). This becomes even more challenging when trying to understand how propositional and motor representations may cooperate in making action performance flexible, while also remaining rational. In this paper, we offer an account that explains how practical knowledge leads to the execution of our actions in a way that accounts for its relation to propositional knowledge, and with respect to the possibility of granting flexibility and rationality.