Society,self, and mind in moral philosophy: The scottish moralists as precursors of symbolic interactionism

Many of the concepts central to symbolic interactionism were anticipated by the eighteenth century Scottish moralists. The symbolic-interactionist and Scottish moralist orientations both hold that society alone engenders uniquely human qualities, self arises through sympathetic interaction, and mind and self reconstruct their environments. George H. Mead's conception of thought as internal dialogue between the “I” and “me” aspects of the self and his notion of the “generalized other” were foreshadowed by some of the Scottish moralists, particularly Adam Smith. These schools differ, though, in their treatments of emotion, communication, political structures, and the origin of sympathy.     

Kant and experimental philosophy

While Kant introduces his critical philosophy in continuity with the experimental tradition begun by Francis Bacon, it is widely accepted that his Copernican revolution places experimental physics outside the bounds of science. Yet scholars have recently contested this view. They argue that in Critique of the Power of Judgment Kant’s engagement with the growing influence of vitalism in the 1780s leads to an account of nature’s formative power that returns experimental physics within scientific parameters. Several critics are sceptical of this revised reading. They argue that Kant’s third Critique serves precisely to deflate the epistemological status of experimental physics, thereby protecting science from the threat of vitalism. In this paper I examine Kant’s account of science in the context of the experimental tradition of philosophy, particularly in relation to the generation dilemma of the eighteenth century. I argue that Kant does not deflate the epistemological status of experimental physics but rather introduces systematicity to the experimental tradition. By identifying the reflective use of reason to organize laws of experience into a systematic whole, Kant aims to ground experimental inquiry on the secure course of a science, opening a conception of science as a research programme.     

Kant and the transparency of the mind

ABSTRACT

It has become standard to treat Kant’s characterization of pure apperception as involving the claim that questions about what I think are transparent to questions about the world. By contrast, empirical apperception is thought to be non-transparent, since it involves a kind of inner observation of my mental states. I propose a reading that reverses this: pure apperception is non-transparent, because conscious only of itself, whereas empirical apperception is transparent to the world. The reading I offer, unlike the standard one, can accommodate Kant’s claim that the I of pure apperception is the same as the I of empirical apperception.     

Kant: constitutivism as capacities-first philosophy

Over the last two decades, Kant’s name has become closely associated with the “constitutivist” program within metaethics.¹1 The association of Kant and constitutivism is due above all to the work of Korsgaard – see for example Korsgaard (1996 Korsgaard, Christine. 1996. The Sources of Normativity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.[Crossref] , [Google Scholar], 2008 Korsgaard, Christine. 2008. The Constitution of Agency: Essays on Practical Reason and Moral Psychology. Oxford: Oxford University Press.[Crossref] , [Google Scholar], 2009 Korsgaard, Christine. 2009. Self-Constitution: Agency, Identity, and Integrity. Oxford: Oxford University Press.[Crossref] , [Google Scholar]). A close second in significance in this regard is Velleman (2000 Velleman, David. 2000. The Possibility of Practical Reason. Oxford: Clarendon Press. [Google Scholar], 2009 Velleman, David. 2009. How We Get Along. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.[Crossref] , [Google Scholar]). For some of the other (Kantian and anti-Kantian) variants on the constitutivist idea, see Foot (2003 Foot, Philippa. 2003. Natural Goodness. Oxford: Oxford University Press. [Google Scholar]), O'Neill (1989 O’Neill, Onora. 1989. Constructions of Reason. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. [Google Scholar]), Thomson (2008 Thomson, J. J. 2008. Normativity. New York: Open Court. [Google Scholar]), Thompson (2008 Thompson, Michael. 2008. Life and Action: Elementary Structures of Practice and Practical Thought. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.[Crossref] , [Google Scholar]), Smith (2012 Smith, Michael. 2012. “Agents and Patients, or: What We Learn About Reasons for Action by Reflecting on Our Choices in Process-of-Thought Cases.” Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 112 (3): 309–331. doi: 10.1111/j.1467-9264.2012.00337.x[Crossref] , [Google Scholar], 2013 Smith, Michael. 2013. “A Constitutivist Theory of Reasons: Its Promise and Parts.” LEAP: Law, Ethics, and Philosophy 1: 9–30. [Google Scholar]), James (2012 James, Aaron. 2012. “Constructing Protagorean Objectivity.” In Constructivism in Practical Philosophy, edited by J. Lenman, and Y. Shemmer, 60–80. Oxford: Oxford University Press.[Crossref] , [Google Scholar]), Walden (2012 Walden, Kenny. 2012. “Laws of Nature, Laws of Freedom, and the Social Construction of Normativity.” Oxford Studies in Metaethics 7: 37–79. doi: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780199653492.003.0002[Crossref] , [Google Scholar]), Katsafanas (2013 Katsafanas, Paul. 2013. Agency and the Foundations of Ethics: Nietzschean Constitutivism. Oxford: Oxford University Press.[Crossref] , [Google Scholar]), Setiya (2013 Setiya, Kieran. 2013. Knowing Right from Wrong. Oxford: Oxford University Press. [Google Scholar]), and Lavin (forthcoming Lavin, Doug. forthcoming. “Pluralism about Agency”. [Google Scholar]). But is Kant best read as pursuing a constitutivist approach to meta-normative questions? And if so, in what sense?²2 I’ve discussed this question previously (with a contemporary focus) in Schafer (2015a Schafer, Karl. 2015a. “Realism and Constructivism in Kantian Metaethics 1.” Philosophy Compass 10: 690–701. doi: 10.1111/phc3.12253[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar], 2015b Schafer, Karl. 2015b. “Realism and Constructivism in Kantian Metaethics 2.” Philosophy Compass 10: 702–713. doi: 10.1111/phc3.12252[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar], 2018a Schafer, Karl. 2018a. “Constitutivism About Reasons: Autonomy and Understanding.” In The Many Moral Rationalisms, edited by K. Jones, and F. Schroeter, 70–90. Oxford: Oxford University Press. [Google Scholar]). See also the discussion of Sensen (2013 Sensen, Oliver. 2013. “Kant’s Constructisivm.” In Constructivism in Ethics, edited by Carla Bagnoli, 63–81. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.[Crossref] , [Google Scholar]), which arrives at a somewhat similar conclusion, albeit in a different systematic context. In this essay, I argue that we can best answer these questions by considering them in the context of how Kant understands the proper methodology for philosophy in general. The result of this investigation will be that, while Kant can indeed be read as a sort of constitutivist, his constitutivism is ultimately one instance of a more general approach to philosophy, which treats as fundamental our basic, self-conscious rational capacities. Thus, to truly understand why and how Kant is a constitutivist, we need to consider this question within the context of his more fundamental commitment to “capacities-first philosophy”.     

What philosophy of mind can tell us about the morality of abortion: personhood, materialism, and the existence of self

I attempt to show that, under materialist assumptions about the nature of mind, it is a necessary condition for fetal personhood that electrical activity has begun in the brain. First, I argue that it is a necessary condition for a thing to be a moral person that it is (or has) a self--understood as something that is capable of serving as the subject of a mental experience. Second, I argue that it is a necessary condition for a fetus to be (or have) a self that some form of electrical brain activity occurs. Third, I argue that since the beginning of brain activity typically occurs at around 10 weeks of gestational age, most fetuses are not persons during the first 10 weeks of pregnancy and hence that abortion of most fetuses during this period does not rise to the moral level of murder.     

Interpretation, psychoanalysis, and the philosophy of mind

I suggest that a conflict between two philosophical models of the mind so far unremarked in discussions of psychoanalysis is at the heart of questions about its status as a science, the objectivity of psychoanalytic interpretations, and the nature of the unconscious. In philosophy one model is embodied in the tradition of Descartes, Hobbes, Locke, Kant, among many others, which construes thought as prior to and independent of language. According to this tradition the mind is self-contained and mental contents or "ideas" are essentially subjective phenomena. It follows that knowledge of other minds and the material world is radically problematic. In the second and more contemporary model the phenomenon of meaning is dependent on interactions between minds, and between mind and the world. Since meaning is understood to be intrinsically social, so in an important sense is mind. I develop this second philosophic model, indicating its relevance for psychoanalysis. I also point out some of the contributions of psychoanalysis to philosophy of mind.     

Wittgenstein,Kant and Husserl on the dialectical temptations of reason

There is an interesting sense in which philosophical reflection in the transcendental tradition is thought to be unnatural. Kant claims that metaphysical speculation is as natural as breathing and that transcendental critique is necessary to prevent reason from lapsing into a natural dialectic of dogmatism and skepticism. Husserl argues that the critique of theoretical reason is grounded upon a transcending of the natural attitude in which we are at first unjustifiably and naïvely directed toward objects as separate from consciousness. A perfectly sensible question arises: Why do we need to effect a change in our natural cognitive orientation to both ourselves and the world in order to know each respectively? Why does a sort of dialectical self-deception come so naturally to us, and why is an effort so great as to seem unnatural necessary for philosophical self-knowledge? The aim of this paper is threefold: first, to argue that seemingly compulsory philosophical assumptions are inevitably generated from within reason itself and thus remain resistant to a complete therapy; second, to show how Kant diagnoses reason’s dialectical tendencies as inevitable and ever-recurring without transcendental vigilance; finally, to argue that the early Husserl’s appropriation of a transcendental epistemology is influenced decisively by Kant’s transcendental reflection in order to combat the reigning naturalism of his day. My overall claim is that by thematizing the natural dialectic of reason best articulated in the first Critique, we can disclose the Kantian way in which Husserl conceives of the natural temptation to naturalize consciousness. We first turn, however, to an influential contemporary account of a decidedly non-transcendental philosophy, what has come to be known as “therapeutic Wittgensteinianism.”     

Traumatic stress,neural self and the spiritual mind

According to recent findings stressful experiences may influence various physiological disturbances and also neuroanatomical changes and some studies also show that psychotherapy and meditation may influence brain functions. Traumatic stress is frequently related to a dissociative response that disintegrates conscious experience. In this context, self-reflection is an essential principle in the process of posttraumatic growth related to spiritual experiences and meditation states that enable mental integration and create the novel integrated self. According to recent findings there is no widely accepted evidence about specific neural mechanisms of processes related to mental integration linked to the spiritual experiences and meditation. Nevertheless there is growing evidence that these integrative experiences are related to various alterations in the brain’s physiology and morphology. These findings provide a new paradigm for understanding of mental disorders and emphasize the fundamental role of mental integration and integrated self in the therapy of psychiatric disorders.     

C. I. Lewis,Kant, and the reflective method of philosophy

ABSTRACT

If it seems unquestionable that C. I. Lewis is a Kantian in important respects, it is more difficult to determine what, if anything, is original about his Kantianism. For it might be argued that Lewis’ Kantianism simply reflects an approach to the a priori which was very common in the first half of the twentieth century, namely, the effort to make the a priori relative. In this paper, I will argue that Lewis’ Kantianism does present original features. The latter can be detected by focusing on Lewis’ account of the method of philosophy in the first chapter of Mind and the World Order. In that context, Lewis argues that the method of philosophy should be reflective and critical. It will be my contention that this understanding of philosophy involves a therapeutic perspective, which bears important resemblances to Kant’s account of transcendental reflection in the Amphiboly of the Critique of Pure Reason. I will illustrate how this therapeutic application of reflection works in Lewis’ metaphysics. In this context, reflection can correct errors of reasoning that occur when we are operating within a particular conceptual scheme and use the criteria of reality that are appropriate in another.     

The emerging self: the convergence of mind,personality and thinking styles

This paper aims to integrate research and theorizing about problem solving, self and personality into a comprehensive theory. With this purpose, the paper attempts to answer three questions: how do humans become aware of themselves and how do the products of self-awareness interrelate to produce an integrated self-system, which includes the domains of cognition and personality? How do persons know and influence each other? How do these processes change with development? The answers given to these questions by self, personality and cognitive developmental psychology are critically examined. It is concluded that an overarching model would have to assume a multilevel and multidimensional architecture. This would involve three main levels: the first includes general-purpose processes and functions, such as processing efficiency and working memory, which define current cognitive potentials; the second includes several domain-specific systems directed to different aspects of the environment; the third includes self-oriented processes that register, represent and regulate processes at the other two levels. Each person’s self-concepts result from the application of the third level on the other two and they differentially reflect their condition. Personality reflects the interaction between these self-concepts and dispositions to act in particular ways. Because humans share this architecture they can negotiate and affect each other’s self- and reflected representations. Thus, the formation of mind, self and personality results from a continuous flow of interactions between the levels and domains of mind within and across persons. The article summarizes a series of studies lending support to this general model.     

列维纳斯面对康德、黑格尔、海德格尔——当代哲学关于"存在论"的争论

Levinas subverts the traditional “ontology-epistemology,” and creates a “realm of difference,” the realm of “value,” “ethic,” and “religion,” maintaining that ethics is real metaphysics. According to him, it is not that “being” contains the “other” but the other way round. In this way, the issues of ethics are promoted greatly in the realm of philosophy. Nonetheless, he does not intend to deny “ontology” completely, but reversed the relationship between “ontology (theory of truth)” and “ethics (axiology),” placing the former under the “constraint” of the latter. Different from general empirical science, philosophy focuses more on issues irrelevant to ordinary empirical objects; it does have “objects,” though. More often than not, the issues of philosophy cannot be conceptualized into “propositions”; nevertheless, it absolutely has its “theme.” As a discipline, philosophy continuously takes “being” as its “theme” and “object” of thinking. The point is that this “being” should not be understood as an “object” completely. Rather, it is still a “theme-subject.” In addition to an “object,” “being” also manifests itself in an “attribute” and a kind of “meaning” as well. In a word, it is the temporal, historical, and free “being” rather than “various beings” that is the “theme-subject” of philosophy. Translated by Zhang Lin from Wen Shi Zhe 文史哲 (Journal of Literature, History and Philosophy), 2007, (1): 61–70     

Seeing and believing: perception,belief formation and the divided mind

On many of the idealized models of human cognition and behavior in use by philosophers, agents are represented as having a single corpus of beliefs which (a) is consistent and deductively closed, and (b) guides all of their (rational, deliberate, intentional) actions all the time. In graded-belief frameworks, agents are represented as having a single, coherent distribution of credences, which guides all of their (rational, deliberate, intentional) actions all of the time. It’s clear that actual human beings don’t live up to this idealization. The systems of belief that we in fact have are fragmented. Rather than having a single system of beliefs that guides all of our behavior all of the time, we have a number of distinct, compartmentalized systems of belief, different ones of which drive different aspects of our behavior in different contexts. It’s tempting to think that, while of course people are fragmented, it would be better (from the perspective of rationality) if they weren’t, and the only reason why our fragmentation is excusable is that we have limited cognitive resources, which prevents us from holding too much information before our minds at a time. Give us enough additional processing capacity, and there’d be no justification for any continued fragmentation. I argue that this is not so. There are good reasons to be fragmented rather than unified, independent of the limitations on our available processing power. In particular, there are ways our belief-forming mechanisms—including our perceptual systems—could be constructed that would make it better to be fragmented than to be unified. And there are reasons to think that some of our belief-forming mechanisms really are constructed that way.