John F Symons http://johnfsymons.com Just another WordPress weblog Sat, 01 May 2010 02:54:24 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.2 en hourly 1 The individuality of artifacts and organisms. http://johnfsymons.com/2010/04/the-individuality-of-artifacts-and-organisms/ http://johnfsymons.com/2010/04/the-individuality-of-artifacts-and-organisms/#comments Sat, 01 May 2010 02:52:40 +0000 johnsymons http://johnfsymons.com/?p=208 Symons – the individuality of organisms and artifacts

]]> http://johnfsymons.com/2010/04/the-individuality-of-artifacts-and-organisms/feed/ 2 Some Comments on Susana Badiola’s “Necessity and the A priori: a Traditional Link Revisited” http://johnfsymons.com/2010/03/some-comments-on-susana-badiola%e2%80%99s-%e2%80%9cnecessity-and-the-a-priori-a-traditional-link-revisited%e2%80%9d/ http://johnfsymons.com/2010/03/some-comments-on-susana-badiola%e2%80%99s-%e2%80%9cnecessity-and-the-a-priori-a-traditional-link-revisited%e2%80%9d/#comments Wed, 24 Mar 2010 21:44:42 +0000 johnsymons http://johnfsymons.com/?p=204 Comments on Susana Badiola’s paper for NMWT 2010

]]> http://johnfsymons.com/2010/03/some-comments-on-susana-badiola%e2%80%99s-%e2%80%9cnecessity-and-the-a-priori-a-traditional-link-revisited%e2%80%9d/feed/ 0 Game Theoretical Semantics as the Basis of a General Logic (With Jaakko Hintikka) http://johnfsymons.com/2010/03/game-theoretical-semantics-as-the-basis-of-a-general-logic-with-jaakko-hintikka/ http://johnfsymons.com/2010/03/game-theoretical-semantics-as-the-basis-of-a-general-logic-with-jaakko-hintikka/#comments Tue, 16 Mar 2010 04:28:54 +0000 johnsymons http://johnfsymons.com/?p=199 Game theoretical semantics as the basis of a general logic march15 2010

]]> http://johnfsymons.com/2010/03/game-theoretical-semantics-as-the-basis-of-a-general-logic-with-jaakko-hintikka/feed/ 1 Logic and formal semantics for epistemology http://johnfsymons.com/2010/02/logic-and-formal-semantics-for-epistemology/ http://johnfsymons.com/2010/02/logic-and-formal-semantics-for-epistemology/#comments Wed, 24 Feb 2010 04:51:42 +0000 johnsymons http://johnfsymons.com/?p=194 LogicandFormalSemanticsforEpistemologyLongversion

]]> http://johnfsymons.com/2010/02/logic-and-formal-semantics-for-epistemology/feed/ 1 Lehigh faculty seminar in philosophy – The completeness of metaphysical fundamentalism http://johnfsymons.com/2010/02/lehigh-faculty-seminar-in-philosophy-the-completeness-of-metaphysical-fundamentalism/ http://johnfsymons.com/2010/02/lehigh-faculty-seminar-in-philosophy-the-completeness-of-metaphysical-fundamentalism/#comments Fri, 19 Feb 2010 02:49:41 +0000 johnsymons http://johnfsymons.com/?p=187 This was a talk I gave on February 12th 2010 to the Lehigh philosophy department’s faculty seminar.
Lehigh Faculty Seminar Audio

]]> http://johnfsymons.com/2010/02/lehigh-faculty-seminar-in-philosophy-the-completeness-of-metaphysical-fundamentalism/feed/ 2 The Individuality of Organisms and Artifacts http://johnfsymons.com/2010/02/the-individuality-of-organisms-and-artifacts/ http://johnfsymons.com/2010/02/the-individuality-of-organisms-and-artifacts/#comments Thu, 18 Feb 2010 23:45:05 +0000 johnsymons http://johnfsymons.com/?p=182 In recent decades, advances in molecular biology have made the artificial selection of biological functions a familiar part of contemporary civilization: Just as we can whittle a stick into a spear, biologists can now modify an organism to become a factory for fuel or pharmaceuticals. The success of genetic engineering may encourage us to see the distinction between artifacts and organisms as a vestige of our benighted vitalist past. However, in spite of the impressive power of contemporary bio-engineering, our old intuitions concerning the difference between organisms and artifacts still have some content. This paper argues that there is a meaningful difference between organisms and artifacts, that this difference involves the character of their individuality.

]]> http://johnfsymons.com/2010/02/the-individuality-of-organisms-and-artifacts/feed/ 0 The Routledge Companion to Philosophy of Psychology http://johnfsymons.com/2010/02/the-routledge-companion-to-philosophy-of-psychology/ http://johnfsymons.com/2010/02/the-routledge-companion-to-philosophy-of-psychology/#comments Thu, 18 Feb 2010 04:53:46 +0000 brandonon http://johnfsymons.adobetree.com/?p=24 The Routledge Companion to Philosophy of Psychology is an invaluable guide and major reference source to the major topics, problems, concepts and debates in philosophy of psychology and is the first companion of its kind. A team of renowned international contributors provide forty-two chapters organised into six clear parts

  • I. Historical background to the philosophy of psychology

    II. Psychological explanation

    III. Cognition and representation

    IV. The biological basis of psychology

    V. Perceptual experience

    VI. Personhood

The Companion covers key topics such as the origins of experimental psychology; folk psychology; behaviorism and functionalism; philosophy, psychology and neuroscience; the language of thought, modularity, nativism and representational theories of mind; consciousness and the senses; personal identity; the philosophy of psychopathology and dreams, emotion and temporality.

Essential reading for all students of philosophy of mind, science and psychology, The Routledge Companion to Philosophy of Psychology will also be of interest to anyone studying psychology and its related disciplines.

Review from PsycCritiques: Contemporary Psychology: APA Review of Books (American Psychological Association) here

]]> http://johnfsymons.com/2010/02/the-routledge-companion-to-philosophy-of-psychology/feed/ 0 A Computational Modeling Strategy for Levels http://johnfsymons.com/2009/12/a-computational-modeling-strategy-for-levels/ http://johnfsymons.com/2009/12/a-computational-modeling-strategy-for-levels/#comments Mon, 14 Dec 2009 05:46:56 +0000 brandonon http://johnfsymons.adobetree.com/?p=43 Rather than taking the ontological fundamentality of an ideal microphysics as a starting point, this paper sketches an approach to the problem of levels which swaps assumptions about ontology for assumptions about inquiry. These assumptions can be implemented formally via computational modeling techniques which will be described below. It is argued that these models offer a way to save some of our prominent common sense intuitions concerning levels. This strategy offers a way of exploring the individuation of higher-level properties in a systematic and formally constrained manner.

1. Physicalist approaches to levels. The notion that the world is divided into levels is a vague but prominent feature of our commonsense intellectual apparatus. It also serves as the central presupposition of most attempts to articulate a metaphysical framework for non-reductive physicalism. In addition to its role in discussions concerning the ontological status of higher-level properties, the notion of levels regularly figures in debates concerning the character of the special sciences. So-called higher-level sciences like economics and psychology are generally regarded as less authoritative than lower-level sciences like physics and chemistry. This relative inferiority of the soft or special sciences over the hard and maximally general sciences has been a matter of ongoing discussion in philosophy of science for decades.

]]> http://johnfsymons.com/2009/12/a-computational-modeling-strategy-for-levels/feed/ 0 On Dennett http://johnfsymons.com/2009/12/on-dennett/ http://johnfsymons.com/2009/12/on-dennett/#comments Mon, 14 Dec 2009 05:15:47 +0000 brandonon http://johnfsymons.adobetree.com/?p=40 Sample chapters: Chapter 3, The status of folk psychology Chapter 4, Patterns and stances Chapter 5, Consciousness

]]> http://johnfsymons.com/2009/12/on-dennett/feed/ 0 Logic, Epistemology and the Unity of Science http://johnfsymons.com/2009/12/logic-epistemology-and-the-unity-of-science/ http://johnfsymons.com/2009/12/logic-epistemology-and-the-unity-of-science/#comments Mon, 14 Dec 2009 05:13:48 +0000 brandonon http://johnfsymons.adobetree.com/?p=38 http://johnfsymons.com/2009/12/logic-epistemology-and-the-unity-of-science/feed/ 0