[Wittrs] Re: Dennett's Intentional Stance
- From: "SWM" <SWMirsky@xxxxxxx>
- To: wittrsamr@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
- Date: Tue, 20 Apr 2010 01:16:28 -0000
--- In Wittrs@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, "BruceD" <blroadies@...> wrote:
> --- In Wittrs@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx, "SWM" <SWMirsky@> wrote:
>
> > Cars do exist in the physical world as the aggregate of all the
> individual cars
>
> Aggregates, are abstractions, and don't exist in the physical world.
> Actually "cars" don't exist in the physical world.
If someone says there are cars in the world, would you say no, cars don't
exist???
>Only molecules or
> perhaps even smaller, more obscure entities.
That's not consistent with ordinary language where words like "exist" find
their basic uses.
> But certain organization of
> molecules (human beings we call them) have evolved whose molecules
> interact with these other molecules and, as a consequence, conceive of
> certain collection of molecules as a Volvo.
>
My Volvo (now departed) certainly existed at one time and if it was an
aggregate of molecules that wasn't how it was known to me nor to anyone who had
occasion to reference it. It's a mistake to suppose that talk of molecules,
etc., is more basic and more real than talk of the things we encounter in our
lives.
> The trick is to interact with another collection of molecules (called an
> independent mechanic who loves Volvos and the people who buy them) and
> hence keeps them going for thousands of miles at low cost.
>
If you had to speak in terms of different molecular aggregates it would be much
harder to communicate. Moreover, the idea of such aggregates actually is
derivative of ordinary language which is more basic and the source of all such
specialized languages, whether real or imagined as in your talk of molecular
aggregates!
> Notice I can't tell you how to purchase and keep a Volvo running well at
> a reasonable price at the molecular level.
There you go. The mistake you're making, though, is to suggest that, despite
this obvious problem, such talk is somehow more basic. It isn't.
> I know that is no surprise to
> you. But what you do not see (yet?) is that when I switch to the human
> level, I abandon the notion of cause for he notion of intent and
> purpose.
>
Who says I don't see it? However I would not agree that we abandon the notion
of cause in all cases, both because "cause" has more than one meaning and
because causal factors still affect humans both in terms of what they see and
describe and in terms of their behavior. The intense heat of that pot caused me
to withdraw my hand. I didn't think about it, consider my options, make a
deliberate decision. I yanked my hand away without thinking!
> If I try to say that my brain molecules caused me to search and find an
> honest Volvo dealer/mechanic, I feel I've stopped making sense.
>
And you have but that says nothing about whether we can account for the
occurrence of a mental life in an entity by describing the operations of its
brain, etc.
> The next paragraph I'll leave for latter. For some reason, I can't seem
> to get my point across.
>
Yes, that is true.
<snip>
> bruce
SWM
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