03/27/2009
Frog & Toad: Analysis Vol 56 No 2 April 1996
Underestimating self-control: Analysis Vol 57 No 2 April 1997
Kennett & Smith:
This paper is written about the philosophical problem of self-control, specifically synchronic resistance, which is considered here by the authors as 'not to do what we most want to do' at the same time as we want to do it. This is separate from diachronic self-control, which is taking action now to resist acting on what you anticipate will be your strongest desire in the future (pg67-8). The premise of the problem is that action is produced from intrinsic desires of a certain strength mixing with beliefs, being transmitted rationally over 'the means-ends relation' into extrinsic desires of the same strength, then the strongest extrinsic desire becoming an action. The question is how you could avoid doing your strongest intrinsic desire; how self-control is possible synchronically.
The first explanation (1.) from Kennett & Smith is that there can be a failure in transmitting intrinsic desires into extrinsic ones: thus a stronger intrinsic desire for good health doesn't become a stronger extrinsic desire to avoid eating cookies (compared to a weaker intrinsic desire for sweets becoming the strongest extrinsic desire). This they consider to be a failure in instrumental rationality.
The second explanation (2.) for self-control is to be 'orthonomous', which is a kind of action that results when one is fully rational, not just instrumentally. To be 'fully rational' one needs to have 'knowledge of all the relevant facts' (pg66). Being orthonomous (having orthonomy) means acting according to what your desires would be if you were fully rational. So since it is fully rational to intrinsically desire good health over sweets, even if one had no extrinsic desires for good health, one could override extrinsic desires for sweets. Authors tell a tale for how this might be psychologically possible (pg66).
The next part of the paper (3.) tries to avoid a contradiction of the following form: I want most to eat sweets and want even more (more than most?) to prevent myself from eating treats. The solution is to treat the exercise of self-control as not a contradictory action (or a contradictory trying) but instead as the occurrence of thoughts and dispositions that allow the transmission of the relevant intrinsic desires for health across the means-ends relation (e.g. having thoughts that picture sweets as disgusting things). This 'doing' is not an action because, authors claim, it doesn't satisfy the standard picture that an action is a caused by a desire to x and then beliefs about how to get x. (pg69) Instead, having such thoughts enable orthonomy or a fix to one's instrumental rationality. (pg69-70)
Mele:
This response takes the premise of the Kennett & Smith paper to task as being faulty. The problem is that it's quite difficult to formulate how exactly the connection between intrinsic desires and intentional action is made. Author argues that Kennett & Smith's claim that 'whenever we do something [and whenever we try do to something] we want to do that thing more than we want to do anything else we can do' (K&S pg63) is just false, and gives a counterexample of sipping tea while reading article x. Certainly he wanted to read article x more than article y, but he didn't want to sip tea more than read article y. Yet he sipped tea nonetheless. The key here is that it is tricky to specify when and how desires will conflict in action and when they won't, and the possibility of instrumental irrationality makes any sort of mix possible. (pg120-121) (Here it seems author argues that because instrumental rationality is possible, so is it possible to desire to eat sweets and also desire to reduce that desire.) So it is certainly possible to have an intrinsic desire to reduce the power of the extrinsic desire of eating sweets (this would count as a second-order desire).
Mele also argues that, given instrumental irrationality, one can have a desire to engage in a 'picturing technique' that then enables synchronic self-control. But this desire would have been intentionally actional, a 'trying', and therefore allows that synchronic self-control can also be actional. (pg122)
3/27/09
3/18/09
Weinberg, Steven - Without God
03/20/2009
The New York Review of Books Vol 55 No 14 Sept 25, 2008
A short article for the popular press, the first section discusses the 4 tensions author sees between religion and science, then the second section talks about how we can live without the concept of a deity.
Importantly, author doesn't see a tension in how religion has historically made pronouncements on how natural events work (e.g. world created in 6 days). Instead:
1) Belief in god is often marshaled as the best explanation for mysterious phenomena. As science has had the most success in explaining these phenomena, the appeal of belief in god has receded.
2) Humans' role in the order of the cosmos seems rather contingent and haphazard-- not 'special'-- especially with the advancement of theories of evolution and cosmology. Author argues that that consciousness seems to be the last bastion on specialness.
3) The theory that the world has natural, unbreakable laws (discovered by science) is contrary to god being omnipotent. Author argues this is more a Muslim rather than Christian tension, but also suggests that this argument has significantly affected the Islamic world's interest in religion.
4) Religion relies on authorities for its truth, science on discoveries that follow a formal process. While science has its heroes, the pronouncements of them is open, not closed like they can be in religious discourse.
The second part suggests some ways to live given that there is no belief in god and that 'the worldview of science is rather chilling'. Author suggests humor, 'ordinary pleasures' or the flesh, aesthetic pleasures (though he claims that without religion-inspired art, art wouldn't have as much of a history). Also, he makes the case that moral decline will not result from non-belief. Author argues that the existence of an omnipotent and omniscient god is a non-sequitur to moral theory anyway-- you have to decide whether to do what that god says or not anyway. But the greatest problem we have without god is that there is no afterlife now; author suggests that the possibility of an afterlife was never really that comforting in the first place.
The New York Review of Books Vol 55 No 14 Sept 25, 2008
A short article for the popular press, the first section discusses the 4 tensions author sees between religion and science, then the second section talks about how we can live without the concept of a deity.
Importantly, author doesn't see a tension in how religion has historically made pronouncements on how natural events work (e.g. world created in 6 days). Instead:
1) Belief in god is often marshaled as the best explanation for mysterious phenomena. As science has had the most success in explaining these phenomena, the appeal of belief in god has receded.
2) Humans' role in the order of the cosmos seems rather contingent and haphazard-- not 'special'-- especially with the advancement of theories of evolution and cosmology. Author argues that that consciousness seems to be the last bastion on specialness.
3) The theory that the world has natural, unbreakable laws (discovered by science) is contrary to god being omnipotent. Author argues this is more a Muslim rather than Christian tension, but also suggests that this argument has significantly affected the Islamic world's interest in religion.
4) Religion relies on authorities for its truth, science on discoveries that follow a formal process. While science has its heroes, the pronouncements of them is open, not closed like they can be in religious discourse.
The second part suggests some ways to live given that there is no belief in god and that 'the worldview of science is rather chilling'. Author suggests humor, 'ordinary pleasures' or the flesh, aesthetic pleasures (though he claims that without religion-inspired art, art wouldn't have as much of a history). Also, he makes the case that moral decline will not result from non-belief. Author argues that the existence of an omnipotent and omniscient god is a non-sequitur to moral theory anyway-- you have to decide whether to do what that god says or not anyway. But the greatest problem we have without god is that there is no afterlife now; author suggests that the possibility of an afterlife was never really that comforting in the first place.
3/13/09
Coyne, Jerry - Seeing and Believing: The neverending attempt to reconcile science and religion, and why it is doomed to fail
03/13/2009
The New Republic, Feb 4 2009
This is a book review of two attempts to show how belief in god and evolution are compatible, one by Giberson "Saving Darwin: How to be a Christian and Believe in Evolution" and other by Miller "Only a Theory: Evolution and the Battle for America's Soul". Author believes that these attempts are flawed, as are all attempts to try to have science and religion coexist. The first thing that author discredits is the weak 'god is nature' argument offered by Spinoza, who has a cousin in Einstein's 'god is bewildering wonder' conception. This makes god 'meaningless'-- according to author a true reconciliation must be not through the eyes of liberal theologians but of the common theistic, interactive deity religion.
Author gives his analysis of the 4 traits of creationists:
1) Devout belief in god
2) God miraculously intervened in the development of life
3) One of these interventions was the creation of humans
4) All have some sort of 'irreducible complexity' argument about how evolution couldn't have produced such a complex system incrementally.
Both Miller and Giberson reject the theory of Intelligent Design. They credit the origin of ordinary Americans trying to put this into schools as a type of anti-authoritarian strand in American culture. They also place much of the vehement culture wars around this issue on the virulent atheists like Dawkins and Dennett.
Author claims the biggest part of the argument for compatibility is the evolutionary convergence, the 'niche' that humans occupy-- using a known evolutionary theory that the world constrains practical developments to favor things like wings, eyes, endoskeletons. Yet author argues that humans are a very unlikely convergence, having only evolved 'once, in Africa'.
The other argument for creationists is the 'fine tuning of the universe', which employs the idea that the universe needs to be set up to be 'just right' to allow life to evolve and thrive-- the so-called 'anthropic principle'. Author's reply to this is that science is working on it, and that, so far as we know, it was pretty inefficient to create the entire universe so that 14bn years later, humans would evolve.
Next, author considers Gould's NOMA: Non-Overlapping Magisteria and argues that it would be nice for religion to not make any claims about the natural world, but in practice it does, all the time. Also, if religion offers a type of 'truth', is it falsifiable? Is it anything like the truths offered as explanations for the natural world given by science?
Author believes that both Miller and Giberson eventually display 3/4 of the Creationist tennets: 1-3. The real conflict isn't between religion and science but between religion and 'secular reason'-- the kind of reason that believes that reason has to be shown in most other human pursuits-- and they are 'incompatible' as well. Perhaps they are compatible in the same sense you can commit adultery at the same time as being married, but this just shows that a person can keep contradictory concepts in mind, not that they are compatible, author quips. In the end, author argues that an endeavor that reconciles old-style religion (that includes creationism) is bound to be contradicted and defeated by, science.
The New Republic, Feb 4 2009
This is a book review of two attempts to show how belief in god and evolution are compatible, one by Giberson "Saving Darwin: How to be a Christian and Believe in Evolution" and other by Miller "Only a Theory: Evolution and the Battle for America's Soul". Author believes that these attempts are flawed, as are all attempts to try to have science and religion coexist. The first thing that author discredits is the weak 'god is nature' argument offered by Spinoza, who has a cousin in Einstein's 'god is bewildering wonder' conception. This makes god 'meaningless'-- according to author a true reconciliation must be not through the eyes of liberal theologians but of the common theistic, interactive deity religion.
Author gives his analysis of the 4 traits of creationists:
1) Devout belief in god
2) God miraculously intervened in the development of life
3) One of these interventions was the creation of humans
4) All have some sort of 'irreducible complexity' argument about how evolution couldn't have produced such a complex system incrementally.
Both Miller and Giberson reject the theory of Intelligent Design. They credit the origin of ordinary Americans trying to put this into schools as a type of anti-authoritarian strand in American culture. They also place much of the vehement culture wars around this issue on the virulent atheists like Dawkins and Dennett.
Author claims the biggest part of the argument for compatibility is the evolutionary convergence, the 'niche' that humans occupy-- using a known evolutionary theory that the world constrains practical developments to favor things like wings, eyes, endoskeletons. Yet author argues that humans are a very unlikely convergence, having only evolved 'once, in Africa'.
The other argument for creationists is the 'fine tuning of the universe', which employs the idea that the universe needs to be set up to be 'just right' to allow life to evolve and thrive-- the so-called 'anthropic principle'. Author's reply to this is that science is working on it, and that, so far as we know, it was pretty inefficient to create the entire universe so that 14bn years later, humans would evolve.
Next, author considers Gould's NOMA: Non-Overlapping Magisteria and argues that it would be nice for religion to not make any claims about the natural world, but in practice it does, all the time. Also, if religion offers a type of 'truth', is it falsifiable? Is it anything like the truths offered as explanations for the natural world given by science?
Author believes that both Miller and Giberson eventually display 3/4 of the Creationist tennets: 1-3. The real conflict isn't between religion and science but between religion and 'secular reason'-- the kind of reason that believes that reason has to be shown in most other human pursuits-- and they are 'incompatible' as well. Perhaps they are compatible in the same sense you can commit adultery at the same time as being married, but this just shows that a person can keep contradictory concepts in mind, not that they are compatible, author quips. In the end, author argues that an endeavor that reconciles old-style religion (that includes creationism) is bound to be contradicted and defeated by, science.
3/6/09
Albert, David & Rivka, Galchen - A Quantum Threat
03/06/2009
Scientific American, March 2009
An article in a popular science magazine that gives a history and modern understanding on quantum physics and its relation to the theory of special relativity. The screwiest thing about quantum physics is its 'nonlocality', meaning that particles manage to affect each other without being next to each other, that is, without being local and having no intervening physical connection between them. This spooky action at a distance is what Einstein, Podolsky and Rosen declared, in their EPR argument, was the reason that quantum physics is an incomplete theory, missing part of reality. Bohr responded instead that this part of reality is just plain murky, and that physics should give up its quest to give a complete and finalized picture of the universe. This reply underwrote much of the philosophical approach of physics until the 1990s, when accurate models of the quantum realm began to gain strength. The drawback was that it seemed that Einstein's theory of special relativity was being theoretically threatened. Authors pinpoint Tim Maudlin's 1994 book Quantum Nonlocality and Relativity as one of the strongest challengers: entanglement of particles seems to involve 'absolute simultaneity' of causal or informational transmission, which is incompatible with the impossibility of faster-than-light transmissions postulated by special relativity.
The new science tries either to repair these problems for the two theories or to keep the tension and jettison a third 'primordial' assumption, for instance, that there is an exact physical condition of the world at a certain time.
Scientific American, March 2009
An article in a popular science magazine that gives a history and modern understanding on quantum physics and its relation to the theory of special relativity. The screwiest thing about quantum physics is its 'nonlocality', meaning that particles manage to affect each other without being next to each other, that is, without being local and having no intervening physical connection between them. This spooky action at a distance is what Einstein, Podolsky and Rosen declared, in their EPR argument, was the reason that quantum physics is an incomplete theory, missing part of reality. Bohr responded instead that this part of reality is just plain murky, and that physics should give up its quest to give a complete and finalized picture of the universe. This reply underwrote much of the philosophical approach of physics until the 1990s, when accurate models of the quantum realm began to gain strength. The drawback was that it seemed that Einstein's theory of special relativity was being theoretically threatened. Authors pinpoint Tim Maudlin's 1994 book Quantum Nonlocality and Relativity as one of the strongest challengers: entanglement of particles seems to involve 'absolute simultaneity' of causal or informational transmission, which is incompatible with the impossibility of faster-than-light transmissions postulated by special relativity.
The new science tries either to repair these problems for the two theories or to keep the tension and jettison a third 'primordial' assumption, for instance, that there is an exact physical condition of the world at a certain time.
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