Why Colour Primitivism?

Primitivism is the view that colors are sui generis properties of physical objects. The basic insight underlying primitivism is that colours are as we see them, i.e. they are categorical properties of physical objects—simple, monadic, constant, etc.—just like shapes. As such, they determine the content of colour experience. Accepting the premise that colours are sui generis properties of physical objects, this paper seeks to show that ascribing primitive properties to objects is, ipso facto, ascribing to objects irreducible dispositions to look coloured, and that anything that primitive redness can do, the non-reductive disposition to look red can do just as well. What makes primitivism suspect is not the commitment to sui generis properties, but instead the claim that colours are more than dispositions. Since, as I show, whatever primitivism appeals to for the purpose of arguing that colours are more than dispositions—objectivity, explanation, causation, phenomenology, constancy, etc.—can also be invoked by non-reductive dispositionalism, the feature that purportedly renders colours more than dispositions remains mysterious.     

DISPOSITIONS,BASES, OVERDETERMINATION AND IDENTITIES1

In this paper I aim to make sense of our pre-theoretic intuitions about dispositions by presenting an argument for the identity of a disposition with its putative categorical base. The various possible ontologies for dispositions are outlined. The possibility of an empirical proof of identity is dismissed. Instead an a priori argument for identity is adapted from arguments in the philosophy of mind. I argue that dispositions occupy, by analytic necessity, the same causal roles that categorical bases occupy contingently and that properties with identical causal roles are identical. The validity of the argument depends upon the possibility of overdetermination of disposition manifestations being rejected. ‘Ungrounded dispositions’ are dismissed as not genuine dispositions. Identity conditions for dispositions and categorical bases are outlined.     

Can 9.5-month-old infants attribute to an agent a disposition to perform a particular action on objects?

The present research examined whether 9.5-month-old infants can attribute to an agent a disposition to perform a particular action on objects, and can then use this disposition to predict which of two new objects - one that can be used to perform the action and one that cannot - the agent is likely to reach for next. The infants first received familiarization trials in which they watched an agent slide either three (Experiments 1 and 3) or six (Experiment 2) different objects forward and backward on an apparatus floor. During test, the infants saw two new identical objects placed side by side: one stood inside a short frame that left little room for sliding, and the other stood inside a longer frame that left ample room for sliding. The infants who saw the agent slide six different objects attributed to her a disposition to slide objects: they expected her to select the "slidable" as opposed to the "unslidable" test object, and they looked reliably longer when she did not. In contrast, the infants who saw the agent slide only three different objects looked about equally when she selected either test object. These results add to recent evidence that infants in the first year of life can attribute dispositions to agents, and can use these dispositions to help predict agents' actions in new contexts.     

Dispositional Theories of the Colours of Things

Dispositional theories of the colours of objects identify an object’s having a certain colour with its being such that it would produce perceptions of certain kinds in perceivers of certain kinds under certain specified conditions. Without doubting that objects have dispositions to produce perceptions of certain kinds, this paper questions whether the relevant kinds of perceptions, perceivers, and conditions can be specified in a way that (i) does not rely on acceptance of any objects as being coloured in a non-dispositional sense and (ii) secures the necessity of the identity between an object’s having the disposition so specified and its having the colour in question. Accepting any theory that looked as if it succeeded on both these counts would require an explanation of why a parallel identity does not hold for an object’s disposition to produce, e.g., perceptions of shape.     

Are Dispositions Reducible?

The traditional analysis of dispositions as conditionals is subject to in-superable difficulties. Recently David Lewis has offered a new, reformed analysis intended to meet objections to the old accounts while remaining reductionist about causal powers. I argue that it succeeds in meeting only some of the objections to its predecessors. For the reductionist programme to succeed, more is needed than the correct analysis of dispositions. If dispositional properties are to be reduced, then the world must contain a reduction base. Prima facie this is not the case: the dispositions of medium-sized objects are only reducible to dispositional properties of the structural parts of the objects. The physically ultimate constituents of matter, sub-atomic particles, are simple, and have no properties that could serve as the grounding of their dispositions. Reductionists make three major responses to this argument, which I evaluate. I conclude that the world does not contain anything to which dispositions could be reduced.     

Perception and masking of wholes and parts

These exerpiments show that the effects of masking on reports of target lines depend on the context in which the target lines appear. Subjects viewed brief presentations of target lines either alone or in drawings of three-dimensional objects, and each target display was preceded and followed by one of several different mask stimuli. There were two main findings: (a) A mask containing a haphazard array of lines interfered more with single lines than it did with lines in objects. (b) A mask containing drawings of the object displays interfered more with lines in objects than did either of two control masks containing relatively flat, less coherent patterns. In a control condition, the object mask interfered slightly less with reports of single lines than either of the control masks did. The discussion considers how the effects obtained here bear on models of the processing of wholistic stimuli and their component parts.     

The Bare Metaphysical Possibility of Bare Dispositions

Many philosophers hold that all dispositions must have independent causal bases. 1 challenge this view, hence defending the possibility of bare dispositions . In part I, I explain more fully what I mean by "disposition,""causal basis," and "bare disposition." In part 2, I consider the claim that the concept of a disposition entails that dispositions are not bare. In part 3. I consider arguments. due to Prior, Pargetter, and Jackson, that dispositions necessarily have distinct causal bases. In part 4, I consider arguments by Smith and Stoljar that there can't be bare dispositions because they would make for unwelcome "barely true" counterfactuals. In the end. I find no reason to deny the possibility of bare dispositions.     

Realism, Functionalism and the Conditional Analysis of Dispositions

The analysis of disposition concepts in terms of conditionals has recently been challenged by C.B. Martin's electro-fink examples, by means of which Martin tries to refute the project of a conditional analysis of dispositions in general, and to defend thereby a realistic account of dispositions. In replying to Martin, D. Lewis has presented a new and complex conditional analysis not subject to Martin's counter-examples. However, according to Lewis' analysis, dispositions are second-order properties and thus not efficacious. I argue that dispositions are efficacious properties, and therefore deserve a different analysis, in terms of counterfactual conditionals; this is not subject to Martin's counter-examples. I show that my analysis is not anti-realistic. On the contrary, my conceptual analysis of dispositions does not imply any ontological reduction that would deprive dispositions of their status as real properties of things.     

Apparent reversals of a rotating mask: A new demonstration of cognition in perception

A mask of a face rotated about its vertical axis of symmetry can appear to oscillate rather than rotate. Do stimulus features (e.g., shape) or cognitive factors (e.g., differential familiarity with convex and concave views of faces) explain this new illusion? In Experiment 1, differential familiarity was varied across stimuli by using familiar and unfamiliar objects rotating at 4 rpm and within stimuli by showing the objects upright and inverted. True motion was seen more with unfamiliar objects than with familiar objects and more with an inverted mask than with an upright mask. The results of Experiment 2, which was done with static views, suggest that the upright and inverted masks present similar structure to the visual system. In Experiment 3, the objects were shown rotating at 8 rpm; the results are similar to those of Experiment 1. These experiments favor a differential familiarity account of this illusory motion. Cognitive constraints on perceived motion and perceived rigidity are discussed.     

Apparent reversals of a rotating mask: a new demonstration of cognition in perception.

A mask of a face rotated about its vertical axis of symmetry can appear to oscillate rather than rotate. Do stimulus features (e.g., shape) or cognitive factors (e.g., differential familiarity with convex and concave views of faces) explain this new illusion? In Experiment 1, differential familiarity was varied across stimuli by using familiar and unfamiliar objects rotating at 4 rpm and within stimuli by showing the objects upright and inverted. True motion was seen more with unfamiliar objects than with familiar objects and more with an inverted mask than with an upright mask. The results of Experiment 2, which was done with static views, suggest that the upright and inverted masks present similar structure to the visual system. In Experiment 3, the objects were shown rotating at 8 rpm; the results are similar to those of Experiment 1. These experiments favor a differential familiarity account of this illusory motion. Cognitive constraints on perceived motion and perceived rigidity are discussed.     

No masking between test and mask components in perceptually different depth planes

2-D cues to perceived depth organization have been used to segregate test and mask stimulus components in a discrimination task. Observers made either spatial-frequency or orientation judgments on a rectangular test component by itself or in the presence of constant rectangular masks. There were two basic masking conditions: same-plane or different-plane. In the same-plane conditions, the test components and masks are perceived as existing in the same depth plane. In the different-plane conditions, the test and mask components are perceived to exist in different depth planes. The perception of different depth planes was achieved by using perceived occlusion, which could place either component closer or further from the observer. The results suggest that when test and mask components are separated into different depth planes they no longer influence one another. This effect could be observed in either depth organization, test components in front of the masks or mask components in front of the test. These results indicate that the figure-ground organization of components is not important. Only the designation as existing in the same or different depth planes affects whether or not a mask is effective.     

Why Colours Do Look Like Dispositions

In recent years philosophers such as Paul Boghossian, David Velleman and Colin McGinn have argued against the view that colours are dispositional properties, on the grounds that they do not look like dispositional properties, and in particular that they are not represented in visual experience as dispositions to present certain kinds of appearances. Rather colours are represented as being these appearances, i.e., simple, non-dispositional properties. I argue that a proper understanding of how visual experiences represent physical objects as being coloured shows that colours do look like dispositions. In particular, I argue that if visual experiences are to represent properties as properties of physical objects, they must distinguish between these properties and their appearances, and thus cannot represent such properties as colours as being identical with their corresponding appearances.     

SIMULTANEITY IN DISPOSITIONAL INTERACTION?

My aim is to question an assumption that is often made in the philosophical literature on dispositions. This is the assumption that, generally, the stimulation (or ‘triggering’) of a disposition temporally precedes the manifesting of that disposition. I will begin by examining precisely what the trigging of a disposition may be thought to consist in, and will identify two plausible views. I will then argue that on either of these views about triggering, a case can be made against the view that the triggering of a disposition always occurs before the manifesting of that disposition. More precisely, if the first view about triggering is accepted, and certain plausible assumptions about dispositions are put into place, a metaphysical argument can be formulated for the claim that the stimulation of a disposition never occurs before that disposition manifests. If the second view about triggering is accepted, the question concerning simultaneity becomes an empirical one. There are, however, examples of dispositional interaction which, on the second view about triggering, clearly seem to involve simultaneity. 1     

Do Extrinsic Dispositions Need Extrinsic Causal Bases?

In this paper, I distinguish two often‐conflated theses—the thesis that all dispositions are intrinsic properties and the thesis that the causal bases of all dispositions are intrinsic properties—and argue that the falsity of the former does not entail the falsity of the latter. In particular, I argue that extrinsic dispositions are a counterexample to first thesis but not necessarily to the second thesis, because an extrinsic disposition does not need to include any extrinsic property in its causal basis. I conclude by drawing some general lessons about the nature of dispositions and their relation to their causal bases.     

Flat intentions – crazy dispositions?

Future-directed intentions, it is widely held, involve behavioral dispositions. But of what kind? Suppose you now intend to Φ at future time t. Are you thereby now disposed to Φ at t no matter what? If so, your intention disposes you to Φ even if around t you will come to believe that Φ-ing would be crazy. And would not that be a crazy intention to have? – Like considerations have led Luca Ferrero and others to believe that only intentions with strong internal conditions are capable of rationality. This paper explores in how far a broadly dispositional view of intention supports their claims. Its first point will come as a surprise: Intentions indeed involve dispositions toward follies in plenty. Natural objections against this bizarre-sounding claim are shown to fail, and standard counterfactual analyses of disposition locutions are shown to underpin it further. However, since the dispositions at issue are pro tanto dispositions, the consequences are not as odd as might be expected: When hedged by reasonable habits to reconsider one’s intentions, dispositions toward follies do not entail any actual crazy behavior. On balance, unconditional intention is therefore found rational after all. Dispositions toward crazy actions need not be crazy dispositions.     

On the masking and disclosure of unconscious elaborate processing. A reply to Van Opstal, Reynvoet, and Verguts (2005)

We have recently argued that unconscious numerical stimuli might activate responses by a match with prespecified action trigger codes (action trigger account) rather than by semantic prime processing (elaborate processing account). [Van Opstal, F., Reynvoet, B., and Verguts, T. (2005). How to trigger elaborate processing? A comment on Kunde, Kiesel, and Hoffmann (2003). Cognition] replicate one piece of evidence for our inference—an inefficiency of primes not presented in target format (verbal or Arabic). But this was found only with letter masks and not with hash masks. The authors conclude that letter masks block unconscious prime processing, and that elaborate processing can account for unconscious priming effects if all its (sometimes subtle) side conditions are considered. We agree that the type of mask in general is an important factor in priming studies but we note that (i) the authors' mask-blocking hypothesis is not well supported by the data, (ii) clear evidence for semantic prime processing in their study is lacking and, (iii) differences in mask efficiency (rather than mask type) might account for the conflicting results. To corroborate this inference we replicate van Opstal et al.'s results with letter masks but reduced mask efficiency. Altogether their data do not challenge the action-trigger account nor do they strongly support the elaborate processing view.     

Dispositions and the Argument from Science

Central to the debate between Humean and anti-Humean metaphysics is the question of whether dispositions can exist in the absence of categorical properties that ground them (that is, where the causal burden is shifted on to categorical properties on which the dispositions would therefore supervene). Dispositional essentialists claim that they can; categoricalists reject the possibility of such ‘baseless’ dispositions, requiring that all dispositions must ultimately have categorical bases. One popular argument, recently dubbed the ‘Argument from Science’, has appeared in one or another form over much of the last century and purports to win the day for the dispositional essentialist. Taking its cue from physical theory, the Argument from Science treats the exclusively dispositional characterizations of the fundamental particles one finds in physical theory as providing a key premise in what has been called a ‘decisive’ argument for baseless dispositions. Despite sharing the intuition that dispositions can be baseless, I argue that the force and significance of the Argument from Science have been greatly overestimated: no version of the argument is close to decisive, and only one version succeeds in scoring points against the categoricalist. Not only is physical theory more ontologically innocent than defenders of baseless dispositions seem to appreciate, most versions of the Argument from Science neglect important ways that dispositions could be grounded by categorical properties.