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Explaining Content
Explaining Content
상세정보
- 자료유형
- 학위논문 서양
- 최종처리일시
- 20250211151956
- ISBN
- 9798342709736
- DDC
- 100
- 저자명
- Luzon, Bar.
- 서명/저자
- Explaining Content
- 발행사항
- [Sl] : New York University, 2024
- 발행사항
- Ann Arbor : ProQuest Dissertations & Theses, 2024
- 형태사항
- 132 p
- 주기사항
- Source: Dissertations Abstracts International, Volume: 86-04, Section: B.
- 주기사항
- Advisor: Chalmers, David J.
- 학위논문주기
- Thesis (Ph.D.)--New York University, 2024.
- 초록/해제
- 요약Having a mind involves having a perspective on the world. Creatures like us gather information about the world, reason, form opinions, make decisions, and eventually execute some of them. These abilities all depend upon our ability to represent the world-on having the world in mind, so to speak. This ability is not only intrinsically interesting, but it also plays a crucial role in our understanding of ourselves as acting creatures: mental representations are invoked-in ordinary contexts, as well as scientific and philosophical ones-in explaining why we behave the way we do, as well as why our behavior is rational when it is. And 'behavior' here means something quite wide: mental representations help explain not only external behavior, but also why we reason the way we do, why we make the decisions that we make, etc. Crucially, mental representations play these explanatory roles partly in virtue of their contents. Suppose that I sent my brother a birthday card in March because I believed that he was celebrating his birthday then. The explanation of my behavior must appeal to the content of my belief: it's because I believed that my brother, rather than my sister, is celebrating his birthday that I sent him, rather than her, a birthday card. This is also why my behavior was rational.The claim that mental representations explain behavior partly in virtue of their contents might seem obviously true. But this widely accepted, highly plausible claim has major, unnoticed consequences, once we recognize that explanations (even partial ones) are asymmetric-that we can't both explain x by appeal to y and explain y by appeal to x. Call this principle 'the Euthyphro Principle'. It is inspired by the Platonic dialogue, in which Socrates convinces Euthyphro that it can't both be the case that something is pious because the gods love it and that the gods love it because it is pious. In the first chapter of this dissertation, I defend this principle. This chapter has implications well beyond metasemantics, since accepting the Euthyphro Principle puts serious pressure on many quite popular philosophical views, ranging from metaethics to philosophy of mind to metaphysics.In the second chapter, I appeal to this principle and to the explanatory efficacy of mental content in arguing that we must rule out a wide range of leading views about what determines the content of mental representations. In a nutshell, the problem with these views is that they reverse the order of explanation: they explain content by appealing to those facts that content itself explains.Finally, in the third chapter, I offer a novel metasemantic view, which is not only consistent with the explanatory efficacy of content, but is also motivated by it. The view claims that the content of mental representations is determined by what explains their formation. Call this view 'Re-Presentation'. Despite its appeal, Re-Presentation faces a few serious objections, which I tackle in this chapter. In the course of answering those objections, I develop two pieces of new machinery that are of wider philosophical interest. The first piece of machinery is a distinction among causes that can help us solve thorny issues in the philosophy of perception and the philosophy of action. The second piece of machinery is a new way of thinking of the persistence conditions of mental representations, which fits into a more general externalist worldview advanced in different parts of philosophy.To summarize, this dissertation starts from wide-ranging principle about ontic explanation, which has major implications across philosophy. Then, this principle, together with widely accepted claims about the explanatory efficacy of mental content, is shown to undermine major metasemantic positions. Finally, the dissertation offers a novel view about what determines the content of mental representations, which is motivated by the aforementioned widely accepted claims, and thus paves the way for solving notoriously hard problems in philosophy of mind, philosophy of language and metaphysics.
- 일반주제명
- Philosophy
- 일반주제명
- Mental health
- 일반주제명
- Metaphysics
- 키워드
- Causation
- 키워드
- Explanation
- 키워드
- Grounding
- 키워드
- Mental content
- 기타저자
- New York University Philosophy
- 기본자료저록
- Dissertations Abstracts International. 86-04B.
- 전자적 위치 및 접속
- 로그인 후 원문을 볼 수 있습니다.
MARC
008250123s2024 us c eng d■001000017162300
■00520250211151956
■006m o d
■007cr#unu||||||||
■020 ▼a9798342709736
■035 ▼a(MiAaPQ)AAI31329155
■040 ▼aMiAaPQ▼cMiAaPQ
■0820 ▼a100
■1001 ▼aLuzon, Bar.
■24510▼aExplaining Content
■260 ▼a[Sl]▼bNew York University▼c2024
■260 1▼aAnn Arbor▼bProQuest Dissertations & Theses▼c2024
■300 ▼a132 p
■500 ▼aSource: Dissertations Abstracts International, Volume: 86-04, Section: B.
■500 ▼aAdvisor: Chalmers, David J.
■5021 ▼aThesis (Ph.D.)--New York University, 2024.
■520 ▼aHaving a mind involves having a perspective on the world. Creatures like us gather information about the world, reason, form opinions, make decisions, and eventually execute some of them. These abilities all depend upon our ability to represent the world-on having the world in mind, so to speak. This ability is not only intrinsically interesting, but it also plays a crucial role in our understanding of ourselves as acting creatures: mental representations are invoked-in ordinary contexts, as well as scientific and philosophical ones-in explaining why we behave the way we do, as well as why our behavior is rational when it is. And 'behavior' here means something quite wide: mental representations help explain not only external behavior, but also why we reason the way we do, why we make the decisions that we make, etc. Crucially, mental representations play these explanatory roles partly in virtue of their contents. Suppose that I sent my brother a birthday card in March because I believed that he was celebrating his birthday then. The explanation of my behavior must appeal to the content of my belief: it's because I believed that my brother, rather than my sister, is celebrating his birthday that I sent him, rather than her, a birthday card. This is also why my behavior was rational.The claim that mental representations explain behavior partly in virtue of their contents might seem obviously true. But this widely accepted, highly plausible claim has major, unnoticed consequences, once we recognize that explanations (even partial ones) are asymmetric-that we can't both explain x by appeal to y and explain y by appeal to x. Call this principle 'the Euthyphro Principle'. It is inspired by the Platonic dialogue, in which Socrates convinces Euthyphro that it can't both be the case that something is pious because the gods love it and that the gods love it because it is pious. In the first chapter of this dissertation, I defend this principle. This chapter has implications well beyond metasemantics, since accepting the Euthyphro Principle puts serious pressure on many quite popular philosophical views, ranging from metaethics to philosophy of mind to metaphysics.In the second chapter, I appeal to this principle and to the explanatory efficacy of mental content in arguing that we must rule out a wide range of leading views about what determines the content of mental representations. In a nutshell, the problem with these views is that they reverse the order of explanation: they explain content by appealing to those facts that content itself explains.Finally, in the third chapter, I offer a novel metasemantic view, which is not only consistent with the explanatory efficacy of content, but is also motivated by it. The view claims that the content of mental representations is determined by what explains their formation. Call this view 'Re-Presentation'. Despite its appeal, Re-Presentation faces a few serious objections, which I tackle in this chapter. In the course of answering those objections, I develop two pieces of new machinery that are of wider philosophical interest. The first piece of machinery is a distinction among causes that can help us solve thorny issues in the philosophy of perception and the philosophy of action. The second piece of machinery is a new way of thinking of the persistence conditions of mental representations, which fits into a more general externalist worldview advanced in different parts of philosophy.To summarize, this dissertation starts from wide-ranging principle about ontic explanation, which has major implications across philosophy. Then, this principle, together with widely accepted claims about the explanatory efficacy of mental content, is shown to undermine major metasemantic positions. Finally, the dissertation offers a novel view about what determines the content of mental representations, which is motivated by the aforementioned widely accepted claims, and thus paves the way for solving notoriously hard problems in philosophy of mind, philosophy of language and metaphysics.
■590 ▼aSchool code: 0146.
■650 4▼aPhilosophy
■650 4▼aMental health
■650 4▼aMetaphysics
■653 ▼aCausation
■653 ▼aExplanation
■653 ▼aGrounding
■653 ▼aMental content
■653 ▼aMental representation
■690 ▼a0422
■690 ▼a0347
■690 ▼a0396
■71020▼aNew York University▼bPhilosophy.
■7730 ▼tDissertations Abstracts International▼g86-04B.
■790 ▼a0146
■791 ▼aPh.D.
■792 ▼a2024
■793 ▼aEnglish
■85640▼uhttp://www.riss.kr/pdu/ddodLink.do?id=T17162300▼nKERIS▼z이 자료의 원문은 한국교육학술정보원에서 제공합니다.


