imascholar

1/10/2006
Lec1: Berkeley

Knowledge begins with experience
Berkely, ideas in the mind, Locke/Hume, experience objects in the world

For rationalists We need god to guarantee that our ideas correspond to reality. For empiricist we can’t know that world corresponds to ideas produced in the mind, we have no guarantee (God). Unless we involve god we are left with skepticism in both cases, concerning connection b/w real world and our experience (ideas).

Rationalists, innate ideas -> (God) world

Empiricists, experience -> ideas, impressions in the mind

- Kant’s Theocentric view of knowledge (God’s eye view)
- it presupposes that there is a thing called a world that is completely independent of me and ways I can come to know it. External world and perceivers (cognisers), independent world,
- THING IN ITSELF, it has qualities that is not related to kind of conceptualization that we employ to understand the world.
- Why should world correspond to any theoretical framework? Can we ever have certain knowledge? Can we bridge this gap?

- Kant’s Copernican Revolution. Invert the picture about nature of knowledge and physical reality. Interactive model that implies interactive relation b/w mind the world which allows us to know some things about the world with certainty, to bridge the gap b/w mind and world.
- We come to world with certain kind of conceptual apparatus that allows us to gain knowledge about the world in a particular way. The world is structured such that there is connection b/w structure of the world and conceptual framework that we bring. What do we need to presuppose to make sense of fact that we distinguish in our experience b/w objective and subjective? This distinction creates skepticism. We always make distinctions but we resolve them at some later point.

- Kant looks for justification of Newtonian physics and theory of ethics, rightness of moral judgments. Kant believe that appealing to supernatural does not give truth about our world. Reason always pushes us beyond the bounds of knowledge. When we cross the line, we can’t answer any questions. Reason doesn’t see the line of boundary. Understanding knows and operates w/in limits of knowledge. Reason pushes us to extend knowledge.
- General structural level of experience, law of causality etc, regular stable features are necessary truths, we exp it in the same way.

- Level of particulars, color of table (colorblind) it varies, individual particular exp differ from person to person.

p686

- Berkeley's Dialogues
- Hylas, materialist
- Philonous, immaterialist (Berkley)

- Immediate objects of perception are ideas, what is the source? Other ideas or empirical objects that cause these ideas?
- B wants to deny existence of material objects, ideas are all that exist.
- What is wrong with materialist notion of objects, primary and secondary qualities distinction.

- For P material things can’t be perceived, thus are not real. Only ideas are real because they can be perceived by human mind. Real things are what is immediately perceived (ideas), thus only they are real.
- Philors introduce problem by means of introducing objects that can’t be directly perceived. It creates skepticism.

- Argument from relativity of sensible qualities, different ppl perceive qualities of objects differently,
- so are they real w/o stability?

- Second argument from inability of abstract, We can’t differentiate qualities from objects, so we can’t attribute reality to qualities and thus to objects.

Those 2 arguments are not successful ag materialist, yes we perceive ideas immediately not material objects but they are causes of ideas. What else is source of ideas?

- Argument, no ideas exist w/o mind. All things like ideas, are ideas, therefore, no things like ideas exist w/o the mind

- Another argument, all things like ideas must be compared. All things compared must be perceived. All things perceived are ideas, therefore, all things like ideas are ideas. He gives this ar to justify second premise of prev ar.


1/17/2006
Lec2: Berkeley ctnd

Is matter an ultimate foundation for reality? Place of god in explanation of phys reality, is he immediate cause of reality that we perceive or was he replaced by matter? Until Scientific revolution God played active role in the works of the world.
- If matter becomes the ultimate explanatory mechanism then what is god’s role? Berkeley wants to restore the proper place of god in context of phys explanation.

- Two versions of materialism.
1. primary qualities were real, resided in material bodies, ideas were copies of those primary qualities
2. neither primary qualities nor bodies are immediately perceivable, but ideas are, but they cause ideas

B argues against both version of materialism. We don’t get access to these objects and qualities so how can we talk about them, name them as causes of our ideas. To show that material bodies don’t exist, B says:
"that everything that resembles and idea must be an idea, so material bodies don’t do any work. Notion of material bodies defined in terms of primary qualities are unperceivable and impossible"

If our ideas resemble material objects and only ideas resemble other ideas than correspondence b/w material objects and ideas is undermined.

- Ideas don’t resemble material objects but only ideas.
- Ok, still mo are causes of ideas.
- What reason we have for saying that something that is unperceivable is cause of ideas that we have? We have no evidence for their existence.
- 2 arguments. From resemblance and resemblance.

B brings god into play as a guarantee stability of our ideas when we do not perceive them. “to be is to be perceived”.

- 3 problems with materialist position.
§ 1. belief in existence of matter entails skepticism, but we have no way of knowing that ideas resemble real objects, we don’t perceive it.
§ 2. belief in matter is a source of paradoxes, qualities that we perceive are in object so we mustn’t believe our senses (ideas tells us about things that we cannot perceive.
§ 3. belief in matter leaves God w/out an immediate presence, he becomes remote and unnecessary.

Argument in 2nd dialog. Matter is useless as a working hypothesis. Relation of similarity and relation of causation, two relations materialist appeals two in connection of ideas to material objects.

- Against matter as causal
§ 1). matter is an inadequate scientific hypothesis
§ 2) entities like mathematical hypothesis Don’t exist in nature
§ 3) materialist confuse the physical with metaphysical

i. distinction b/w useful things like laws of nature (Newton, empiricist) and math hypothesis (Descartes) (ex. There is infinite # of points on the line) they don’t function in real world, they have no relation to real world, no guaranteed reference and quality of measurement. B wants to equate things and ideas, whole world in our head, the whole world that we perceive is one of our ideas. We perceive external objects that are in themselves ideas. Things are not distinct from ideas – Immaterialism vs Materialism, things distinct from ideas.

How do we get new ideas, infinite existence of ideas = infinite mind. Only minds and ideas exist, ideas has to be perceived, so there has to be somebody else, mind greater than ours that perceives ideas and causes new ideas, infinite mind. Cause has to be efficient and active. Ideas are passive, they can’t be a cause of other ideas. Material objects are also passive, thus they can’t explain and produce ideas.

i. sensible world exists only if perceived by mind
ii. (troublesome) sensible world exists unperceived by human minds
iii. thus, sensible world must be perceived by an infinite mind.

- There is no guarantee that world is stable unless we introduce an infinite mind.

1/24/2006
Lec3: Berkeley last

- Immaterialism is not crazy, but only view that is consistent with common sense
- By 3rd dialog Hylos succumbed to immaterialism
- He begins doubting everything, complete skeptic
- Phylonus sees reason for this his prior belief in material objects, by which he created a dichotomy b/w ideas and things, mind and the world
- The rout of all skepticism is belief in material objects
- Immaterialist accepts testimony of the senses and he doesn’t try to draw inferences about how things can be, but he accepts world as he sees it
- Berkley equates being with perception, so it makes no sense to question reality of what you perceive “esse est percipi” or “to be is to be perceived”
- Common sense it that it makes no sense that what you perceive is ideas
- Being a good Christian implies being an immaterialist who sees god as cause of our ideas and mind instead of material objects
- God is the explanatory mechanism for knowledge and everything
- P4 (handout), about “Idea”: ideas are actually things, attempt to unite immaterialism with common sense, we are not giving up of things, rather things are ideas, rather than external material objects, immaterialism is [ things = ideas ] (!), other wise you don’t get agreement with common sense.
- 10 Objections to immaterialism, 3 strategies for answering objections to 3 types of objections
- we get idea of God upon reflection on my soul (?)
- what we indirectly perceive are copies of original divine ideas, we indirectly perceive ideas in God’s mind, looks like god has all of the ideas

1/31/2006
Lec4: Hume (God is “beep”)

- Hume’s argument about induction – opening – refocus ideas on human nature to understand human understanding
- All philosophy = moral (history, ethic and politics) phil or natural phil’
- Relation of ideas – conclusions about ideas
- Matter of fact
- a is b, b is c, then a is c -> deduction
- the sun rose yesterday and every day before it, so it will rise tomorrow – induction, probabilistic argument, experience
- we seem to be able to cause and justify our inferences on the baiss of experience
- what is the nature of our minds in general
- diff between perceptions
- Perceptions:
o impressions - sensations (colors etc), feelings (sadness, love);
o ideas – copies of impressions – less vivid and lively
- To think, I combine, enlarge and diminish ideas, I transpose them and abstract them
- Copy principles – all ideas are copies of impressions, so then what is the example of the missing shade of blue? Presence of counter example does not mean that we are not justified in believing in this principles, all things are probable in fact, not certain
- So whence idea of god?
- Not only perceptions are in the mind but also associative mechanisms (principles) – ways in which ideas are linked and follow one another
- Such as: resemblance, contiguity (closeness in space/time), causation (cause & effect)
- We draw conclusions (one idea following another) based on relations between ideas and matters of fact*
- Deductive reasoning have nothing to do with matter of fact
- [Disgust linked to sexual attraction/repulsion]
- What is the nature of the conclusions I draw on the basis of matters of fact
o Present testimony of the senses
o Memory
- Why should we trust our senses? Because of cause & effect, the world causes impressions
- How do we get knowledge of relationship of Cause & Effect?
- Entirely from my experience from constant conjunction of objects or events
- We think that future will resemble the past -> that’s how we think of the world, principle of uniformity of nature
- My belief in causation is just custom or habit to draw these inferences
- What gives authority to my experience?
- There is principle of human nature that causes me to habitually make this inference from effect to cause or that the world is uniform and future will resemble the past
- Belief is a manner of conception more vivid and lively that an ordinary idea
- Is then everything that happens is due to chance? NO! its not chance, its not a priori but all is probabilistic arguments (!) how much we expect the outcome given the information we have, and that’s how probable the outcome is

2/7/2006
Lec5: Hume ctnd

Nature of Causation and Necessity d its relation to Liberty

- diff b/w fiction and belief is important, cause belief is placing the mind in certain kind of circumstance, customs give in large part birth to our beliefs (u see fire d assume that its hot)
- we can’t just believe sumthing
- fiction is sumthing we don’t believe
- difference b/w fiction and belief depends on how aspects of nature affects us in certain way, not our will,
- if we get thru sense a more vivid and lovely conception the more prone we r to believe it
- things that we imagine are not as lively thus not as believable, they are fiction
- knowledge
o relations of ideas – math, combinations of ideas we already have
o matters of fact – everything else, that stems from experience, such as
§ impressions -> ideas, connections (liveliness of ideas) result from: resemblance [pictures], contiguity [distance diminishes liveliness of ideas], causalism [cause d effect is basis of our everyday exp, but its not very reliable]
- Cause d effect is ground for all matters of fact
- Discussed in terms of “power” to produce a particular effect
- Whence impression of power? It happens over many instances, repetition of the event is necessary for us to conclude that particular event involves a notion of power
- We can’t expl connection b/w willing and acting in terms of our bodily movement, what is connection b/w will and motion? We don’t get clear idea of notion of power, understanding is beyond our comprehension, cause we never have an impression of power. All we experience is willing something and then doing it, the actual power that produce connection b/w willing d doing is not something we exp
- Newtonian laws give explanation of connections b/w causes d effects, forces d motion
- If we don’t have an impression of power, connetion b/w cause d effect then why did we start thinking in such terms
- Is there and what is the nature of necessary connetion?
- Constant conjunction of two events results in our psyche making a leap from impression of constant conjunction to the idea of necessary connetion
- We never get impression of necc connection only impression of constant conjunction
- Origin of idea of necessary connection is subjective psychological trait in us
- Reasoning about cause d effect has to do with constant conjuction in the world and our psychological trait
- Probability of chances ex coin, dice
- Probability of causes ex recovery with help of medication
- There is no dif b/w those two things, everything is contingent, in both cases force of custom makes u expect certain things
- Less options lead to more vivid belief, ie. 50% chance vs 2%
- There is some connection b/w motifs and outcomes that allows us to make inferences
- Liberty is acting in accordance with determination of the will
- Matter
o No necessity w.r.t. material objects
o Cause-> effect
- Human action
o Motives, strategies -> actions, outcomes
o Does absence of liberty entail necessity?
- notion of necessity is same in cause->effect and motives, strategies ->actions, outcomes
- but there is no such thing as absolute necessity in both cases
- there is only contingency, probability allows us to live in the world
- idea of necessity is subjective feature of our minds, necessity is an IDEA

2/14/2006
Lec6: Hume

- argument ag cause and effect does not effect connection b/w actions and motives and our moral behavior
- religion can be source of some kind of certainty
- What about Miracles? And Religion in general? How our skepticism works with it?
- Does existence of Humian skepticism undermine our knowledge and methods of acquiring it; problem of induction etc, how u live with such uncertainty?
- Hume has suggestions how to deal with it
- Certainty is something we can neva attain in this world
- Hume starts his discus of miracles with saying that evidence for xtian religion (& others) is less than evidence 4 t truth of our senses
- Zere was neva zat kind of certainty attributed 2 religion
- Its always contrary 2 reason to assert 2 a weaker claim, ze one we have less evidence for so that religion goes ag demands of reason, it should be weaker than ordinary xperience
- We should always belief in what we have more evidence for (our sense) rather than the opposite (religion)
- Hume says we don’t have certainty, but we have probabilities based on our senses,
- Strength of our belief should be directly proportional to the probability of ze evidence
- People have witnessed miracles!
- We believe more in testimony of witnesses if other people also tell the same story
- What is more probable, that witness is lying or that miracle happened?
- miracle is violation of laws of nature, what we came to expect based on our experience
- we have more certainty in things like laws of nature than one time occurrences
- miracles entail violation of laws of nature
- if we believe miracles that meant we trust more a one time occurrence than uniformity of physical laws, its contrary to reason!
- Miracles are attributed to events that shouldn’t be classified as such! Miracles have to be violations of laws of nature, of uniformity
- Miracles are true when chance of testimony is false is greater than chance that miracle has occurred
- In other words, what is more probable: testimony is false or laws of nature are violated
- The answer is clear
- We usually trust what makes sense most, not anomalies, but religion requires us to belief in anomalous, improbable things
- Fight b/w reason and senses, whence skepticism when reason pushes us to certainty and senses prove us wrong
- Our belief in miracles is founded on prior belief in religion & scriptures
- We can believe miracles ‘cause we attribute them to GOD, but inference about god is also not knowable and different from empirical world, how we connect God to the event of the miracle?
- Epicurus, pursuer pleasure for sake of enjoyment and not any kind of inherit virtue, he denied virtue, and rewards in heaven
- Hume tried to justify his skeptical inquiry
- Our belief in God is grounded on some kind of association of uniformity of nature, design argument
- Uniformity of world is due to a Designer! To justify this argument you need causation to say that god caused uniformity of nature
- Design argument is kind of causal argument
- Cause must be proportional to the effect, cause is only known by the effect so we can only infer as much power in the cause as we xperience in effect
- If we assume that god is cause of uniformity in nature and that god is cause of everything, we attribute more power to cause than we observe in effect
- We attribute attributes to deity, attributes which we have no xperience of
- Religion allows us to explain things we can’t explain in other ways, religion doesn’t allow us to predict things as science can
- To have legitimate claim of causal relations one instance is not enough, only when we see number of similar effects preceded by similar causes
- We don’t undermine fabric of society if we undermine religions belief, morality survives the criticism, idea that we should connect our moral behavior in this world to happiness in afterlife is crazy, moral actions are good in themselves, by breaking connection b/w morality and god, we can find real basis of justice and stuff, based on facts, real world
- Morality loose supernatural quality
- Another problem w/ design argument, we assume there is cause for footprint in the sand, when we see house we assume it was designed by somebody, we make inferences all the time, when we do that we do it on basis of past xp and number of reasons that have accumulated as result of past xp
- Check last 5 min of rec!!!

2/14/2006
Lec7: Hume end

- argument ag cause and effect does not effect connection b/w actions and motives and our moral behavior
- religion can be source of some kind of certainty
- What about Miracles? And Religion in general? How our skepticism works with it?
- Does existence of Humian skepticism undermine our knowledge and methods of acquiring it; problem of induction etc, how u live with such uncertainty?
- Hume has suggestions how to deal with it
- Certainty is something we can neva attain in this world
- Hume starts his discus of miracles with saying that evidence for xtian religion (& others) is less than evidence 4 t truth of our senses
- Zere was neva zat kind of certainty attributed 2 religion
- Its always contrary 2 reason to assert 2 a weaker claim, ze one we have less evidence for so that religion goes ag demands of reason, it should be weaker than ordinary xperience
- We should always belief in what we have more evidence for (our sense) rather than the opposite (religion)
- Hume says we don’t have certainty, but we have probabilities based on our senses,
- Strength of our belief should be directly proportional to the probability of ze evidence
- People have witnessed miracles!
- We believe more in testimony of witnesses if other people also tell the same story
- What is more probable, that witness is lying or that miracle happened?
- miracle is violation of laws of nature, what we came to expect based on our experience
- we have more certainty in things like laws of nature than one time occurrences
- miracles entail violation of laws of nature
- if we believe miracles that meant we trust more a one time occurrence than uniformity of physical laws, its contrary to reason!
- Miracles are attributed to events that shouldn’t be classified as such! Miracles have to be violations of laws of nature, of uniformity
- Miracles are true when chance of testimony is false is greater than chance that miracle has occurred
- In other words, what is more probable: testimony is false or laws of nature are violated
- The answer is clear
- We usually trust what makes sense most, not anomalies, but religion requires us to belief in anomalous, improbable things
- Fight b/w reason and senses, whence skepticism when reason pushes us to certainty and senses prove us wrong
- Our belief in miracles is founded on prior belief in religion & scriptures
- We can believe miracles ‘cause we attribute them to GOD, but inference about god is also not knowable and different from empirical world, how we connect God to the event of the miracle?
- Epicurus, pursuer pleasure for sake of enjoyment and not any kind of inherit virtue, he denied virtue, and rewards in heaven
- Hume tried to justify his skeptical inquiry
- Our belief in God is grounded on some kind of association of uniformity of nature, design argument
- Uniformity of world is due to a Designer! To justify this argument you need causation to say that god caused uniformity of nature
- Design argument is kind of causal argument
- Cause must be proportional to the effect, cause is only known by the effect so we can only infer as much power in the cause as we xperience in effect
- If we assume that god is cause of uniformity in nature and that god is cause of everything, we attribute more power to cause than we observe in effect
- We attribute attributes to deity, attributes which we have no xperience of
- Religion allows us to explain things we can’t explain in other ways, religion doesn’t allow us to predict things as science can
- To have legitimate claim of causal relations one instance is not enough, only when we see number of similar effects preceded by similar causes
- We don’t undermine fabric of society if we undermine religions belief, morality survives the criticism, idea that we should connect our moral behavior in this world to happiness in afterlife is crazy, moral actions are good in themselves, by breaking connection b/w morality and god, we can find real basis of justice and stuff, based on facts, real world
- Morality loose supernatural quality
- Another problem w/ design argument, we assume there is cause for footprint in the sand, when we see house we assume it was designed by somebody, we make inferences all the time, when we do that we do it on basis of past xp and number of reasons that have accumulated as result of past xp
- Check last 5 min of rec!!! (lol i didn't do it)