On Sunday, September 16, 2012 12:34:47 PM UTC-4, Evgenii Rudnyi wrote: > > Craig, > > You may want to look at > > Galen Strawson, Selves: An Essay in Revisionary Metaphysics > > He proves that selves exist. Interestingly enough he does it based on > the materialist framework. > > p. 11 �For the moment, though, the brief is to show that selves exist, > and that they�re things or objects or �substances� of some sort, and > hence, given materialism, physical objects. One possibility is that > there are in fact no better candidates for the title of �physical > object� than selves � even if there are others that are as good.� > > p. 11 �This last suggestion is likely to strike many as obviously false, > but this reaction may stem in part from a failure to think through what > it is for something to be physical, on a genuine or realistic > materialist view, and, equally, from a failure to think through what it > is for something to be a thing or object.� > > Evgenii > -- > > http://blog.rudnyi.ru/2012/09/selves-an-essay-in-revisionary-metaphysics.html > > > Thanks Evgenii. I have been meaning to check out Strawson for a while actually. I agree that the self is physically and concretely real, but I don't think it is an object. The self is the subject. I see and agree with what Strawson is saying about the necessity of expanding our sense of what is physical, and I understand why he thinks it makes sense to think of the self as more of a 'thing' than anything - and I would agree, except that 'thing' is a term of objectification. I can only see myself as a thing in theory. In fact, who I am has no thingness at all from my own perspective. There is no object here, nothing which can be defined in terms of size, weight, temperature, etc. A subject is made of qualities that have only figurative dimensions, not literal body qualities.
Craig > On 08.09.2012 15:10 Craig Weinberg said the following: > > Here I present another metaphor to encapsulate by view of the > > relation between consciousness, information, and physicality by > > demonstrating the inadequacy of functionalist, computationalist, and > > materialist models and how they paint over the hard problem of > > consciousness with a choice of two flavors of the easy problem. > > > > I came up with this thought exercise in response to this lecture: > > > http://backdoorbroadcasting.net/2012/05/zoe-drayson-the-autonomy-of-the-mental-and-the-personalsubpersonal-distinction/ > > > > > Consider "Alice in Wonderland" > > > > Let's say that Alice is trying to decide whether she can describe > > herself in terms of being composed of the syntax of the letters, > > words, and sentences of the story from which she emerges, or whether > > she is composed of the bleached and pressed wood pulp and ink that > > are considered page parts of the whole book. > > > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msg/everything-list/-/VDrJ9z7gn7kJ. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/everything-list?hl=en.
