RE: why do we enjoy poetry From the perspective of neuroscience?
January 17, 2019 at 7:07 am
(This post was last modified: January 17, 2019 at 7:15 am by Alan V.)
(January 17, 2019 at 12:34 am)bennyboy Wrote: Probabilities are okay so long as they are numerical. "I think this physical system which talks probably has a mind like mine" isn't really talking about probability. It's a stand-in for something like, "I have a strong sense that this physical system has a mind like mine." In other words, strength of impression substitutes for chance.
That's a great example of the perfect being the enemy of the good. What about the application of Occam's Razor? Isn't that a useful means of assessing probabilities in general?
(January 17, 2019 at 3:33 am)Belaqua Wrote:(January 16, 2019 at 11:29 pm)Thoreauvian Wrote: My problem with some philosophers (I should have emphasized) is that they take their skepticism too far. The perfect is the enemy of the good, to paraphrase Voltaire I believe. At a point, such thinking blurs the line between justified true belief and unjustified false belief. We might be brains in vats. A thermostat might have awareness. Science can't study the mind, or whatever. Nothing is good enough to go on. Scientists would waste their grant money if they took the same approach.
But the examples you give aren't cases of skepticism.
No, but they are examples of how skepticism about face-value claims can lead to giving too much weight to what are really unwarranted beliefs.
While I appreciate your critiques of philosophical thought experiments as valid explanations within the philosophical community which understands the words games being played, the effects of such ideas on people at large are not healthy in far too many cases. In the context of arguing with Bennyboy over panpsychism and p-zombies, what I said makes sense.
