Reading Notes: March 1st, 2023

“For in order that something may appear, a being is necessary to whole it appears. This “appearing,” however, has no significance except that of “being experienced.” Now, in order that the cognitive being may experience, sometimes A and sometimes B, it must manifestly pass over from one state, in which it previously was, into another, which previously was not. And we certainly cannot assume that this passing-over is only a variation in the external relations of this being to other beings, but that the being itself would be in no wise affected by such variation. For, in such a case, this being would not really experience anything, but would only appear to a third observer to be experiencing something. This, however, is contrary to the assumption; for we wanted to know, how it is that anything appears to such a being itself, and not how it can seem to a second being as though something were appearing to the first one. From what is said above it follows, therefore, that at least the percipient being must be conceived of as one that undergoes genuine interior changes, in order that the mere appearance of change may originate at all from the changeable relations of other unchangeable beings.” (Lotze, Outlines of Metaphysic, 47-48) 

“The prime motivation behind the identity theory is of course physicalism: one can be driven into some sort of identity theory either because the alternatives are incompatible with thinking in a full blooded way of men and animals as no more than very complex physical mechanisms, or else because (like behaviourism) they are objectionable on other grounds. However it is dangerous to advocate a theory mainly on the grounds of the difficulties in its alternatives. There may well be congenial alternatives which have not been considered.” (Smart, Review of Dennett’s “Content and Consciousness”, 616) 

“In Quine-like fashion Dennett points out that we do not assert the existence of sakes and dints: “for the sake of” and “by dint of” must be taken as unitary expressions which do not therefore imply “there is a dint” or “there is a sake”….As Dennett puts it, we view “sakes” and “voices” as being non-referential: for example we “fuse” the word “sake” in its context “for the sake of” and we fuse “voice” in its various contexts, such as “he has a good tenor voice”. Now this technique will not come as any news to the identity theorist, because he himself employs the technique of fusion. For example, the identity theorist fuses “image” and “sense-datum” in the contexts, “has an image” and “has a sense-datum”, thus avoiding the objection that when we have an after-image which is yellow with greenish and purple spots we do not have anything in our brains which is yellow with greenish and purple spots. Moreover, in denying that sense-data or images, as opposed to the having of them, exist, he makes use of such arguments as those marshalled by Ryle and other contemporary analytic philosophers, who have argued convincingly that sense-data and images are not like ghostly picture postcards.” (Smart, Review of Dennett’s “Content and Consciousness”, 617-618) 

“The so-called “identity theory” may be characterized roughly as the theory that the mind is the brain, or more concretely that mental events, states and processes are brain events, states and processes. This is put forward as a contingent identification: it is not held to be part of (or at least the main part of) the meaning of “mental entity” that it entails “brain entity”. Otherwise the theory would have little plausibility, because quite clearly a materialist can talk quite happily about his aches, pains, itches, desires, emotions, perceptions, images, thoughts, and so on, with someone who does not know anything at all about brains, or who perhaps, like Aristotle, thinks that it is an organ for cooling the blood.” (Smart, Further Thoughts on the Identity Theory, 150)