Intuitively, it seems that some belief-forming practices have the following three properties: 1. They are rational practices, and the beliefs that we form by means of these practices are themselves rational or justified beliefs. 2. Even if in most cases these practices reliably lead to correct beliefs (i.e., beliefs in true propositions), they are not infallible: it is possible for beliefs that are formed by means of these practices to be incorrect (i.e., to be beliefs in false propositions). 3. The (...) rationality of these practices is basic or primitive. That is, the rationality of these practices is not due simply to the availability, by means of some process of reasoning that relies purely on other practices, of a rational or justified belief in the reliability of these practices. -/- How can there be such practices? This paper offers an answer to that question. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to summarize a particular approach of doing metaphysics through physics - the primitive ontology approach. The idea is that any fundamental physical theory has a well-defined architecture, to the foundation of which there is the primitive ontology, which represents matter. According to the framework provided by this approach when applied to quantum mechanics, the wave function is not suitable to represent matter. Rather, the wave function has a nomological character, given that its (...) role in the theory is to implement the law of evolution for the primitive ontology. (shrink)

The paper explains in what sense the GRW matter density theory is a primitive ontology theory of quantum mechanics and why, thus conceived, the standard objections against the GRW formalism do not apply to GRWm. We consider the different options for conceiving the quantum state in GRWm and argue that dispositionalism is the most attractive one.

This paper rigorously examines the primitive foundations of economic reasoning through a framework based on symbolic logic. Extending previous work, it formalizes economic conceptions (\(\mathbb{C}\)), symbols (\(s_i\)), and introduces a structured language (\(\mathcal{L_{\mathbb{C}}}\)) to define their formation and interpretation. Organized as a continuous chain of declarations and illustrations, the paper offers a concise, systematic approach to understanding the philosophy of economic reasoning through formal symbolic representations.

Primitive ontology is a recently much discussed approach to the ontology of quantum theory according to which the theory is ultimately about entities in 3-dimensional space and their temporal evolution. This paper critically discusses the primitive ontologies that have been suggested within the Bohmian approach to quantum field theory in the light of the existence of unitarily inequivalent representations. These primitive ontologies rely either on a Fock space representation or a wave functional representation, which are strictly speaking (...) unambiguously available only for free systems in flat spacetime. As a consequence, it is argued that they do not constitute fundamental ontologies for quantum field theory, in contrast to the case of the Bohmian approach to quantum mechanics. (shrink)

In this paper I present the common structure of quantum theories with a primitive ontology, and discuss in what sense the classical world emerges from quantum theories as understood in this framework. In addition, I argue that the primitive ontology approach is better at answering this question than the rival wave function ontology approach or any other approach in which the classical world is nonreductively ‘emergent:’ even if the classical limit within this framework needs to be fully developed, (...) the difficulties are technical rather than conceptual, while this is not true for the alternatives. (shrink)

One reason to posit governing laws is to explain the uniformity of nature. Explanatory power can be purchased by accepting new primitives, and scientists invoke laws in their explanations without providing any supporting metaphysics. For these reasons, one might suspect that we can treat laws as wholly unanalyzable primitives. (John Carroll’s *Laws of Nature* (1994) and Tim Maudlin’s *The Metaphysics Within Physics* (2007) offer recent defenses of primitivism about laws.) Whatever defects primitive laws might have, explanatory weakness should not (...) be one of them. However, in this essay I’ll argue that wholly primitive laws cannot explain the uniformity of nature. The basic argument is based on the following idea: though a primitive law that P makes P likely, the primitive status of the law provides no reason to think that P must describe (or otherwise give rise to) a natural regularity. After identifying the problem for primitive laws, I consider an extension of the objection to all theories of governing laws and suggest that it may be avoided by a version of the Dretske/Tooley/Armstrong theory according to which laws are relations between universals. (shrink)

We give a new and elementary construction of primitive positive decomposition of higher arity relations into binary relations on finite domains. Such decompositions come up in applications to constraint satisfaction problems, clone theory and relational databases. The construction exploits functional completeness of 2-input functions in many-valued logic by interpreting relations as graphs of partially defined multivalued ‘functions’. The ‘functions’ are then composed from ordinary functions in the usual sense. The construction is computationally effective and relies on well-developed methods of (...) functional decomposition, but reduces relations only to ternary relations. An additional construction then decomposes ternary into binary relations, also effectively, by converting certain disjunctions into existential quantifications. The result gives a uniform proof of Peirce’s reduction thesis on finite domains, and shows that the graph of any Sheffer function composes all relations there. (shrink)

Eternalists believe that there is no ontological difference between the past, present and future. Thus, a challenge arises: in virtue of what does time have a direction? Some eternalists, Oaklander and Tegtmeier ) argue that the direction of time is primitive. A natural response to positing primitive directionality is the suspicion that said posit is too mysterious to do any explanatory work. The aim of this paper is to relieve primitive directionality of some of its mystery by (...) offering a novel way to understand the phenomenon in terms of the recently popularised notion of grounding. (shrink)

For a long time it was believed that it was impossible to be realist about quantum mechanics. It took quite a while for the researchers in the foundations of physics, beginning with John Stuart Bell [Bell 1987], to convince others that such an alleged impossibility had no foundation. Nowadays there are several quantum theories that can be interpreted realistically, among which Bohmian mechanics, the GRW theory, and the many-worlds theory. The debate, though, is far from being over: in what respect (...) should we be realist regarding these theories? Two diff erent proposals have been made: on the one hand, there are those who insist on a direct ontological interpretation of the wave function as representing physical bodies, and on the other hand there are those who claim that quantum mechanics is not really about the wave function. In this paper we will present and discuss one proposal of the latter kind that focuses on the notion of primitive ontology. (shrink)

Primitive ontology is a program which seeks to make explicit the ontological commitments of physical theories in terms of a distribution of matter in ordinary space-time. This program targets wave-function realism, which interprets the high-dimensional configuration space on which wave-functions are defined as our fundamental physical space. Wave-function realism allegedly fails to account for a correspondence between the ontology it postulates and the ‘manifest image’ of the world in which experimental tests of the theory are performed, and therefore the (...) wave-function must be completed with an additional structure which describes what fundamentally exists in ordinary space-time: the ‘primitive ontology’. However primitive ontologies face some difficulties, in particular concerning the ontological status of the wave-function. In this paper, I defend a realist interpretation of the wave-function as describing objects in ordinary space-time, which does not require supplementing the theory with additional structure. The main difference between this proposal and other primitive ontology proposals is that the fundamental constituents of reality are not conceived of as localised objects, but as primitive relations. This interpretation purports to share the advantages of both wave-function realism and primitive ontologies without facing the same difficulties. I argue that the need for an additional structure stems from a commitment to the locality of the fundamental constituents of reality, and that such commitment is unnecessary for recovering the manifest image of the world. (shrink)

Metaphysical theories heavily rely on the use of primitives to which they typically appeal. I will start by examining and evaluating some traditional well-known theories and I will discuss the role of primitives in metaphysical theories in general. I will then turn to a discussion of claims of between theories that, I think, depend on equivalences of primitives, and I will explore the nature of primitives. I will then claim that almost all explanatory power of metaphysical theories comes from their (...) primitives, and so I will turn to scrutinize the notion of "power" and "explanatory". (shrink)

Joshua Gert presents an original account of color properties, and of our perception of them. He employs a general philosophical strategy - neo-pragmatism - which challenges an assumption made by virtually all other theories of color: he argues that colors are primitive properties of objects, irreducible to physical or dispositional properties.

David Lewis's account of the de se has two parts. The first part involves treating the objects of the attitudes, not as propositions but as properties. The second part involves treating our attitude to these properties as that of self‐ascription. In particular, much recent literature has tried to incorporate his account simply by treating the objects of the attitudes as centered worlds, where a centered world is an ordered pair of a possible world together with a spatiotemporal location. The explanation (...) of the account in terms of centered worlds originates with Lewis himself, in his development of some comments from Quine. This chapter examines some of other potential costs of Lewis's approach, those that stem from the idea of primitive self‐ascription. Lewis's account of the de se is both more radical, and more unintuitive, than has been appreciated. (shrink)

I argue that McDowell-style disjunctivism, as the position is often cashed out, goes wrong because it takes the good epistemic standing of veridical perception to be grounded in “manifest” facts which do not necessarily satisfy any epistemic constraints. A better form of disjunctivism explains the difference between good and bad cases in terms of epistemic constraints that the states satisfy. This view allows us to preserve McDowell’s thesis that good cases make facts manifest, as long as manifest facts must satisfy (...) epistemic constraints. (shrink)

The relation between primitive and derivative forces may be the hardest problem about the relation between Leibniz's physics and his metaphysics. He holds that derivative forces are modifications of primitive forces, but also that physical forces, which he classifies as derivative forces, belong to bodies, which are aggregates, whereas primitive forces belong to unextended perceiving substances and constitute their essence. This chapter addresses this problem, arguing that a major part of it can be solved on the supposition (...) that physical events are only phenomena, and hence ultimately determined by modifications of the primitive forces of perceiving substances. (shrink)

Primitives are both important and unavoidable, and which set of primitives we endorse will greatly shape our theories and how those theories provide solutions to the problems that we take to be important. After introducing the notion of a primitive posit, I discuss the different kinds of primitives that we might posit. Following Cowling (2013), I distinguish between ontological and ideological primitives, and, following Benovsky (2013) between functional and content views of primitives. I then propose that these two distinctions (...) cut across each other leading to four types of primitive posits. I then argue that theoretical virtues should be taken to be meta-theoretical ideological primitives. I close with some reflections on the global nature of comparing sets of primitives. (shrink)

If $\mathcal{A}$ (V) is a net of local von Neumann algebras satisfying standard axioms of algebraic relativistic quantum field theory and V 1 and V 2 are spacelike separated spacetime regions, then the system ( $\mathcal{A}$ (V 1 ), $\mathcal{A}$ (V 2 ), φ) is said to satisfy the Weak Reichenbach's Common Cause Principle iff for every pair of projections A∈ $\mathcal{A}$ (V 1 ), B∈ $\mathcal{A}$ (V 2 ) correlated in the normal state φ there exists a projection C (...) belonging to a von Neumann algebra associated with a spacetime region V contained in the union of the backward light cones of V 1 and V 2 and disjoint from both V 1 and V 2 , a projection having the properties of a Reichenbachian common cause of the correlation between A and B. It is shown that if the net has the local primitive causality property then every local system ( $\mathcal{A}$ (V 1 ), $\mathcal{A}$ (V 2 ), φ) with a locally normal and locally faithful state φ and suitable bounded V 1 and V 2 satisfies the Weak Reichenbach's Common Cause Principle. (shrink)

This paper develops a statistical approach to the problem of primitive representation. Representation of the kind commonly attributed to litmus paper, fuel gauges and tree rings occurs when, so to speak, there is a sufficiently good correlation between two variables. The fundamental distinction between misrepresentation and non-representation is explained in terms of the notion of an informationally useful correlation. The paper further argues that the statistical approach satisfactorily resolves well known puzzles such as Fodor's disjunction problem.

A major disagreement between different views about the foundations of quantum mechanics concerns whether for a theory to be intelligible as a fundamental physical theory it must involve a ‘primitive ontology’ (PO), i.e. variables describing the distribution of matter in four-dimensional space–time. In this article, we illustrate the value of having a PO. We do so by focusing on the role that the PO plays for extracting predictions from a given theory and discuss valid and invalid derivations of predictions. (...) To this end, we investigate a number of examples based on toy models built from the elements of familiar interpretations of quantum theory. (shrink)

We show that—unlike products of ‘transitive’ modal logics which are usually undecidable—their ‘expanding domain’ relativisations can be decidable, though not in primitive recursive time. In particular, we prove the decidability and the finite expanding product model property of bimodal logics interpreted in two-dimensional structures where one component—call it the ‘flow of time’—is • a finite linear order or a finite transitive tree and the other is composed of structures like • transitive trees/partial orders/quasi-orders/linear orders or only finite such structures (...) expanding over time. The decidability proof is based on Kruskal’s tree theorem, and the proof of non-primitive recursiveness is by reduction of the reachability problem for lossy channel systems. The result is used to show that the dynamic topological logic interpreted in topological spaces with continuous functions is decidable if the number of function iterations is assumed to be finite. (shrink)

It has recently been alleged that expressivism cannot account for the obvious fact that normative sentences and their negations express inconsistent kinds of attitudes. I explain how the expressivist can respond to this objection. I offer an account of attitudinal inconsistency that takes it to be a combination of descriptive and normative relations. The account I offer to explain these relations relies on a combination of functionalism about normative judgments and expressivism about the norms governing them. It holds that the (...) inconsistency of normative judgments is primitive. One potential problem for this view is that the large number of normative primitives that the expressivist will allegedly need to accept will render the view grossly unparsimonious. In defending this thesis, I suggest that it is a mistake to hold the lack of normative parsimony of expressivism against its core psychological claims. (shrink)

A critical examination of the history of theories and uses of concepts such as ‘primitive’ and ‘savage’ in the academic study of religion in imperial, colonial and postcolonial contexts is particularly urgent in our time with its demands to decolonise Western models of knowledge production. In Savage Systems (1996) and Empire of Religion (2014), David Chidester has contributed to this project by relating the invention and use of terms such as ‘religion’, ‘primitive’ and ‘savage’ by theorists of religion (...) in European imperial metropoles to South African colonial and indigenous contexts. This article intends to take Chidester’s project further by relating Gerardus Van der Leeuw’s phenomenological analysis of ‘primitive mentality’ (particularly in De primitieve mensch en de religie, 1937) to Chidester’s analysis and postcolonial critique of imperial theories of religion. By taking animism and dreams in Chidester’s and Van der Leeuw’s works as example, it is argued that in spite of the latter’s decontextualised use of ethnological material, a fundamental shift occurred in the judgement of ‘primitive’ religion from Tylor’s evolutionary to Van der Leeuw’s phenomenological analysis, which is contrary to claims according to which modern theories are unanimously denigratory of indigenous religions. (shrink)

Recent work in moral theory has seen the refinement of theories of moral standing, which increasingly recognize a position of intermediate standing between fully self-conscious entities and those which are merely conscious. Among the most sophisticated concepts now used to denote such intermediate standing is that of primitive self-consciousness, which has been used to more precisely elucidate the moral standing of human newborns. New research into the structure of the avian brain offers a revised view of the cognitive abilities (...) of birds. When this research is approached with a species-specific focus, it appears likely that one familiar species, the chicken (Gallus gallus domesticus), also exhibits primitive self-consciousness. Given the likelihood that they are primitively self-consciousness, chickens warrant a degree of moral standing that falls short of that enjoyed by persons, but which exceeds the minimal standing of merely conscious entities. (shrink)

The paper seeks to make progress from stating primitive ontology theories of quantum physics – notably Bohmian mechanics, the GRW matter density theory and the GRW flash theory – to assessing these theories. Four criteria are set out: internal coherence; empirical adequacy; relationship to other theories; explanatory value. The paper argues that the stock objections against these theories do not withstand scrutiny. Its focus then is on their explanatory value: they pursue different strategies to ground the textbook formalism of (...) quantum mechanics, and they develop different explanations of quantum non-locality. In conclusion, it is argued that Bohmian mechanics offers a better prospect for making quantum non-locality intelligible than the GRW matter density theory and the GRW flash theory. (shrink)

When discussing quantum ontology, the debate has recently focused on comparing and contrasting wavefunction realism and its rivals. Among them one finds the primitive ontology approach, which is often conflated with the local beables program. In this paper I wish to clarify what I take to be the distinction between the notion of primitive ontology and the one of local beable. I argue that the primitive ontology is the local beable which allows for a dynamical, constructive explanation (...) which preserves symmetries. (shrink)

Rational agents seem more confident in any possible event than in an impossible event. But if rational credences are real-valued, then there are some possible events that are assigned 0 credence nonetheless. How do we differentiate these events from impossible events then when we order events? de Finetti (1975), Hájek (2012) and Easwaran (2014) suggest that when ordering events, conditional credences and subset relations are as relevant as unconditional credences. I present a counterexample to all their proposals in this paper. (...) While their proposals order possible and impossible events correctly, they deliver the wrong verdict for disjoint possible events assigned equal positive credence. (shrink)

There is an important debate in the philosophy of mind that has roots in the phenomenological tradition, namely: what are the primitive forms of consciousness, that is, what are the fundamental ingredients or aspects of consciousness. This paper wants to contribute to partially answering this general question by providing an answer to a required sub-question within this question: is emotional phenomenology fundamental? I will answer in the affirmative and will offer an argument focused on contemplative emotions elicited by fiction. (...) Another type of contemplative emotions, namely, esthetic emotions, have been invoked in the literature but I will argue that the phenomenology of emotions elicited by fiction, given their continuity and sameness in kind with the phenomenology of garden variety emotions, are more dialectically efficient vis-à-vis the debate on the irreducibility of emotional phenomenology. (shrink)

In this influential work, first published in English in 1963, Durkheim and Mauss claim that the individual mind is capable of classification and they seek the origin of the ‘classificatory function’ in society. On the basis of an intensive examination of forms and principles of symbolic classification reported from the Australian aborigines, the Zuñi and traditional China, they try to establish a formal correspondence between social and symbolic classification. From this they argue that the mode of classification is determined by (...) the form of society and that the notions of space, time, hierarchy, number, class and other such cognitive categories are products of society. Dr Needham’s introduction assesses the validity of Durkhiem and Mauss’s argument, traces its continued influence in various disciplines, and indicates its analytical value for future researches in social anthropology. (shrink)

Theories of collective intentions must distinguish genuinely collective intentions from coincidentally harmonized ones. Two apparently equally apt ways of doing so are the ‘neo-reductionism’ of Bacharach (2006) and Gold and Sugden (2007a) and the ‘non-reductionism’ of Searle (1990, 1995). Here, we present findings from theoretical linguistics that show that we is not a cognitive primitive, but is composed of notions of I and grouphood. The ramifications of this finding on the structure both of grammatical and lexical systems suggests that (...) an understanding of collective intentionality does not require a primitive we-intention, but the notion of grouphood implicit in team reasoning, coupled with the individual concept I. This, we argue, supports neo-reductionism but poses difficulties for non-reductionism. (shrink)

In this article, we study some new characterizations of primitive recursive functions based on restricted forms of primitive recursion, improving the pioneering work of R. M. Robinson and M. D. Gladstone. We reduce certain recursion schemes (mixed/pure iteration without parameters) and we characterize one-argument primitive recursive functions as the closure under substitution and iteration of certain optimal sets.

Although Peano arithmetic is necessarily incomplete, Isaacson argued that it is in a sense conceptually complete: proving a statement of the language of PA that is independent of PA will require conceptual resources beyond those needed to understand PA. This paper gives a test of Isaacon’s thesis. Understanding PA requires understanding the functions of addition and multiplication. It is argued that grasping these primitive recursive functions involves grasping the double ancestral, a generalized version of the ancestral operator. Thus, we (...) can test Isaacon’s thesis by seeing whether when we phrase arithmetic in a context with the double ancestral operator, the result is conservative over PA. This is a stronger version of the test given by Smith, who argued that understanding the predicate “natural number” requires understanding the ancestral operator, but did not investigate what is required to understand the arithmetic functions. (shrink)

According to Hutto and Satne, 521–536, 2015), an “essential tension” plagues contemporary neo-Pragmatist accounts of mental contents: their explanation of the emergence and constitution of intentional mental contents is circular. After identifying the problem, they also propose a solution: what neo-Pragmatists need to do, to overcome circularity, is to appeal to a primitive content-free variety of intentionality, different from the full-blown intentionality of propositional attitudes. In this paper, I will argue that, in addition to the problem of circularity, there (...) is another important problem that both neo-Pragmatist accounts, and Hutto and Satnes’s refinement of them, should also deal with: their difficulty to accommodate a host of recent empirical evidence and theoretical developments on the interdisciplinary field of animal cognition. I will call this difficulty the objection from animal minds, and I will present several arguments designed to show that, even though the notion of primitive intentionality, introduced by Hutto and Satne, may be useful to account for some of the most basic ways of dealing with the environment of nonhuman animals, it falls short of providing an adequate explanation of the full-range of cognitive capacities and behavioral dispositions that many animal species display. Thus, their proposal ends up being insufficient to help neo-Pragmatist approaches to overcome the problem of animal minds. Finally, I will suggest that overcoming this objection requires attributing to non-human animals some basic, yet content involving, kinds of intentional mental states. (shrink)

Let the chain antichain principle (CAC) be the statement that each partial order on $\mathbb{N}$ possesses an infinite chain or an infinite antichain. Chong, Slaman, and Yang recently proved using forcing over nonstandard models of arithmetic that CAC is $\Pi^1_1$-conservative over $\text{RCA}_0+\Pi^0_1\text{-CP}$ and so in particular that CAC does not imply $\Sigma^0_2$-induction. We provide here a different purely syntactical and constructive proof of the statement that CAC (even together with WKL) does not imply $\Sigma^0_2$-induction. In detail we show using a (...) refinement of Howard's ordinal analysis of bar recursion that $\text{WKL}_0^\omega+\text{CAC}$ is $\Pi^0_2$-conservative over PRA and that one can extract primitive recursive realizers for such statements. Moreover, our proof is finitary in the sense of Hilbert's program. CAC implies that every sequence of $\mathbb{R}$ has a monotone subsequence. This Bolzano-Weierstraß}-like principle is commonly used in proofs. Our result makes it possible to extract primitive recursive terms from such proofs. We also discuss the Erdős-Moser principle, which—taken together with CAC—is equivalent to $\text{RT}^2_2$. (shrink)

In this paper I wish to connect the recent debate in the philosophy of quantum mechanics concerning the nature of the wave function to the historical debate in the philosophy of science regarding the tenability of scientific realism. Being realist about quantum mechanics is particularly challenging when focusing on the wave function. According to the wave function ontology approach, the wave function is a concrete physical entity. In contrast, according to an alternative viewpoint, namely the primitive ontology approach, the (...) wave function does not represent physical entities. In this paper, I argue that the primitive ontology approach can naturally be interpreted as an instance of the so-called ‘explanationism’ realism, which has been proposed as a response to the pessimistic-meta induction argument against scientific realism. If my arguments are sound, then one could conclude that: (1) contrarily to what is commonly though, if explanationism realism is a good response to the pessimistic-meta induction argument, it can be straightforwardly extended also to the quantum domain; (2) the primitive ontology approach is in better shape than the wave function ontology approach in resisting the pessimistic-meta induction argument against scientific realism. (shrink)

Ignoring primitive terms leads to an infinite regress. The alternative is to account for an intuitive understanding into the meaning of such terms. The current investigation proceeds on the basis of an idea of the structure of the various modes of being within which concrete entities function. Examples of primtive terms are given from disciplines such as mathematics, physics and logic and they are related to the general idea of a modal aspect. It is argued that primitive terms (...) are not isolated but reveal their meaning only through their interconnections with other primitive terms that are embedded in other modal aspects. However, although primitive terms are found within the various aspects, the meaning of an aspect only comes to expression through its coherence with other aspects, evinced in modal analogies that are qualified by the core meaning of an aspect. There appears to be two options, either reduce what is irreducible or merely provide synonymous terms for given primitives. The former happens when other unique terms are used to define a specific one and the latter when the attempted ‘definitions’ revert to terms with which the original terms could be meaningfully replaced. It is been pointed out that the coherence between primitives invites every academic discipline to account for the meaning attached to the analogies of primitive terms it is employing, without exploring this additional theme any further. (shrink)

This scarce antiquarian book is a facsimile reprint of the original. Due to its age, it may contain imperfections such as marks, notations, marginalia and flawed pages. Because we believe this work is culturally important, we have made it available as part of our commitment for protecting, preserving, and promoting the world's literature in affordable, high quality, modern editions that are true to the original work.

Many metaphysicians posit primitives. These vary with respect to the theoretical work that they perform, but are all undefinable in more basic terms. I argue against the existence of metaphysical primitives on the grounds that, if they existed, they would be essentially primitive. However, if primitives were essentially primitive, then they would have an essence. Because they are primitive, they lack an essence, which undermines the original supposition that they are primitive. I close by mentioning some (...) implications this has both for metaphysicians and for metaphysics more generally. (shrink)

In her ‘Primitive Normativity and Scepticism about Rules’ (2011b), Hannah Ginsborg proposes a novel solution to Kripke’s sceptical challenge to factualists about meaning (those who think that there is some fact about what you mean or meant by your utterances). According to Ginsborg, the fact in virtue of which you mean, say, addition by ‘plus’ is the fact that ‘you are disposed to respond to a query about (say) “68 plus 57” with “125,” where, in responding in that way, (...) you take that response to be primitively appropriate in light of your previous uses of “plus”’ (Ginsborg 2011b, 244). Ginsborg’s account is at its most compelling when considering what we might call unsophisticated cases of meaning, cases in which a subject means something by their words without their being in a position to identify the relevant rule or provide any sort of justification for their using the term as they do. In this paper, I raise doubts about whether Ginsborg’s account is extendable to sophisticated cases of meaning. Reflection on those cases which generate the doubts brings it into question whether the dispositions that Ginsborg identifies are necessary and jointly sufficient for one’s meaning that p even in unsophisticated cases. (shrink)

The notion of strictly primitive recursive realizability is further investigated, and the realizable prenex sentences, which coincide with primitive recursive truths of classical arithmetic, are characterized as precisely those provable in transfinite progressions over a fragment of intuitionistic arithmetic. The progressions are based on uniform reflection principles of bounded complexity iterated along initial segments of a primitive recursively formulated system of notations for constructive ordinals. A semiformal system closed under a primitive recursively restricted -rule is described (...) and proved equivalent to the transfinite progressions with respect to the prenex sentences. (shrink)

Some variants of Object-Oriented Ontology define entities in terms of their powers. Such variants are rooted in Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari’s theory of “machinic assemblages”. This article asks whether such entities can be metaphysical primitives with regard to similarity and change. This is the case if no further existents are needed to account for these two features of reality. According to Levi Bryant’s machine-oriented ontology, entities defined in terms of powers are such primitives. According to Manuel DeLanda’s assemblage theory, (...) they are not. DeLanda therefore holds that further metaphysical primitives must exist. After reconstructing the key features of the theories involved, I argue that Bryant’s position is ultimately more parsimonious, and that DeLanda’s theory confuses epistemological models with ontological realities. (shrink)

Are emotion-producing processes modular? Jerry Fodor, in his classic introduction of the notion of modularity, holds that its most important feature is cognitive impenetrability or information encapsulation. If a process possesses this feature, then, as standardly understood, “what we want or believe makes no difference to how [it] works”.In this paper, we will start with the issue of the cognitive impenetrability of emotion-producing processes. It turns out that, while there is abundant evidence of emotion-producing processes that are not cognitively impenetrable, (...) some nonetheless are. We will look at two sorts of case. The first concerns emotional reactions to observed faces, and the second involves what we can call “primitive emotions,” emotions that can be activated by non-doxastic input into regions of the brain we share with more primitive animals.In seeing how some emotion-producing processes can be cognitively impenetrable while others are not, we need to use two commonsensical theses. First, a discussion of modularity must in general operate with a taxonomy that allows for sub-processes or stages of processes. (shrink)

In this influential work, first published in English in 1963, Durkheim and Mauss claim that the individual mind is capable of classification and they seek the origin of the ‘classificatory function’ in society. On the basis of an intensive examination of forms and principles of symbolic classification reported from the Australian aborigines, the Zuñi and traditional China, they try to establish a formal correspondence between social and symbolic classification. From this they argue that the mode of classification is determined by (...) the form of society and that the notions of space, time, hierarchy, number, class and other such cognitive categories are products of society. Dr Needham’s introduction assesses the validity of Durkhiem and Mauss’s argument, traces its continued influence in various disciplines, and indicates its analytical value for future researches in social anthropology. (shrink)

[opening paragraph]: If we think intuitively and non-professionally about the evolution of consciousness, the following is a compelling thought. What the emergence of consciousness made possible, uniquely in the natural world, was the capacity for representing the world, and, hence, for acquiring knowledge about it. This is the kind of thought that surfaces when, for example, we make explicit what lies behind wondering whether a frog, as compared to a dog, say, is conscious. The thought that it might not be (...) is closely bound up with doubts about whether there is a world out there for it. Such doubts are reinforced by neurophysiological and psychological theories to the effect that its purpose-specific, bug-detecting input does not provide for a connected spatial representation of the environment. Or rather there is no need to postulate such a representation in order to explain its tongue lashing out to catch the bug. Reflecting further, it seems that something else critical is lacking, or not necessarily present, in the explanation of the movement of the frog's tongue, namely the kind of appeal we normally make to another major feature we think consciousness introduced into world -- wants, emotions, desires, or, more generally, affective states and events. Without their existence, the intuition is, all we have are, at most, non-conscious information processing mechanisms. And when we ask what is required for desires and the like to be in play, we seem to come full circle. For whether or not it is correct to speak of individual desires for specific things in the world seems to have some kind of dependence on whether the organism in question is capable of representing those things, which in turn seems to depend on whether there is a world out there for it. And finally we tend to think that it is only when we have in play this kind of explanation of movement that action and agency appear on the scene. (shrink)

We consider the claim by Dorato and Morganti 591–610) that primitive individuality should be attributed to the entities dealt with by non-relativistic quantum mechanics. There are two central ingredients in the proposal: in the case of non-relativistic quantum mechanics, individuality should be taken as a primitive notion and primitive individuality is naturalistically acceptable. We argue that, strictly understood, naturalism faces difficulties in helping to provide a theory with a unique principle of individuation. We also hold that even (...) when taken in a loose sense, naturalism does not provide any sense in which one could hold that quantum mechanics endorses primitive individuality over non-individuality. Rather, we argue that non-individuality should be preferred based on the grounds that such a view fits better the claims of the theory. (shrink)