Putnam on brains in a vat

Epistemic externalists offer many arguments against skepticism. They modify the skeptic’s concept of knowledge, justification and meaning and point out which of his presuppositions we need not accept. Dretske claims that a skeptic wrongly presupposes that we cannot know if we do not know that we know. But knowledge need not be self-conscious (consider small children and animals). According to Nozick a skeptic wrongly presupposes the Principle of Closure (knowledge is closed under logical implication). He says that although we do not know that we are not brains in a vat, a skeptic does not have the right to use this principle to argue that we do not know things that are obvious. According to Putnam the skeptical hypothesis that we are brains in a vat is incoherent when we use the external theory of meaning. If the meaning of our words depends on a causal relation with our environment, the sentence “I am a brain in a vat” is false or meaningless. Similarly, Davidson says that the external theory of perceptual beliefs excludes global skepticism. According to Williams skepticism simply presupposes a stance opposite to externalism, namely internalism (self-consciousness is privileged and all justifying factors must be introspectively accessible). When we reject internalism, no skeptical argument can be formulated.

Brains in a Vat, Subjectivity, and the Causal Theory of Reference

The scenario of the brain in a vat, first aired thirty-five years ago in Hilary Putnam's classic paper, has been deeply influential in philosophy of mind and language, epistemology, and metaphysics. This collection of new essays examines the scenario and its philosophical ramifications and applications, as well as the challenges which it has faced. The essays review historical applications of the brain-in-a-vat scenario and consider its impact on contemporary debates. They explore a diverse range of philosophical issues, from intentionality, external-world scepticism, and the nature of truth, to the extended mind hypothesis, reference magnetism, and new versions of realism. The volume will be a rich and valuable resource for advanced students in metaphysics, epistemology, and philosophy of mind and language, as well as anyone interested in the relations between language, thought and the world.

A prominent class of arguments for external world skepticism rely on the plausible view that knowledge is closed under logical entailment. From the fact that one does not know that one is not a handless brain in a vat it can be inferred that one does not know that one has hands, in virtue of the fact that having hands logically entails that one is not a handless brain in a vat. The complements of knowing-how ascriptions, however, are not—obviously, at least—related by logical entailment to any proposition, and therefore, they resist that skeptical argument. Even if I don’t know that I am not a brain in a vat, it does not follow that I don’t know how to, say, play a drum rudiment. Thus, knowing-how can withstand closure-based skepticism about the external world.

Journal Article If I Am a Brain in a Vat, Then I Am Not a Brain in a Vat Get access ANTHONY BRUECKNER ANTHONY BRUECKNER Department of Philosophy University of California at Santa BarbaraSanta Barbara California 93106 USA Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar Mind, Volume 101, Issue 401, January 1992, Pages 123–128, https://doi.org/10.1093/mind/101.401.123 Published: 01 January 1992

An intuitive view of language is frequently assumed: words are related by competent speakers to descriptions that determine reference. Such a view is generally understood as convention-based in the sense that it emphasises the existence of conventions that determine what descriptions are relevant. However, this descriptivist approach has been shown to be problematic in reconstructing our linguistic practices. In contrast, the Causal Theory of Reference (CTR) provides a plausible account of our use of words. CTR has been understood to be a theory that provides a non-conventionalist approach to language and one that is committed to an implausible version of essentialism. In this chapter, Ramirez-Ludena presents a version of CTR that addresses the criticisms it has normally received. She also shows the advantages of this version of CTR when compared to the traditional descriptivist model. In the legal field, CTR has been associated with non-positivistic conceptions about law. However, since CTR is not committed to essentialism but rather takes account of the way in which the community uses words, Ramirez-Ludena also shows how the proposed model is compatible with conceptions in legal philosophy such as that of Hart, which emphasises the conventional character of law.

Modern-day heirs of the Cartesian revolution have been fascinated by the thought that one could utilize certain hypotheses that one is dreaming, deceived by an evil demon, or a brain in a vat to argue at one fell swoop that one does not know, is not justified in believing, or ought not believe most if not all of what one currently believes about the world. A good part of the interest and mystique of these discussions arises from the contention that the seeds of such arguments lie in our ordinary epistemic practices, so that external world skepticism can arise "from within". But is this contention correct? I doubt it.

In Self-Defeating Character of Skepticism, Douglas C. Long presents a transcendental argument against epistemological skepticism.' The argument has a distinctively Kantian flavor (though Long does not highlight this connection), in that it proceeds from the premise that I have self-knowledge and ends with the conclusion that I have perceptual knowledge of an objective, material subject of mental states. If the skeptic wishes to accept the transcendental argument's premise (as he seems to do), then he must reject his claim that I lack knowledge of all propositions concerning my physical nature, history and environment. The falsity of this skeptical claim is a condition for the possibility of self-knowledge, according to Long's transcendental argument. In this paper, I would like to see whether the argument is really workable. Long's target is the contemporary Cartesian skeptic whose challenge runs as follows. It is metaphysically possible that I am a brain in a vat who is massively mistaken about my own properties and those of the physical world, in virtue of the fact that my experiences are entirely computer-induced and unveridical. But no evidence or reasons are available which allow me to know that this possibility is not actual. Thus, I do not know any of the propositions about the physical world which are false according to the skeptical possibility. Long maintains that there is an epistemological difficulty in holding that I lack all ordinary perceptual knowledge (and thus lack perceptual knowledge of my body) while possessing the knowledge that I am the subject of various mental states (including experiences which may or may not be veridical and thoughts which may or may not bear true contents). Long's argument to establish the difficulty centers around the skeptic's Cartesian method for arriving at the knowledge that I am the subject of mental states in the absence of perceptual knowledge about the external world. The method involves an infer-

Much has been written about epistemological skepticism in the last ten or so years, but there remain some unanswered questions concerning the structure of what has become the canonical Cartesian skeptical argument. In this paper, I would like to take a closer look at this structure in order to determine just which epistemic principles are required by the argument. A standard way of presenting the argument is as follows. Let P be some arbitrary proposition about the external world, such as the proposition that I am now sitting. Let SK be some logically possible proposition which is incompatible with P-a skeptical counterpossibility to P-such as the proposition that I am a brain in a vat with sense experience qualitatively indistinguishable from my actual experience. Let us call the following argument A:

This book introduces students and other interested readers to the philosophical study of skepticism, a central and long-standing subject in philosophy. The first three chapters cover knowledge, providing the necessary foundation for introducing skepticism in the book's final three chapters. Throughout, the volume addresses basic questions in these two areas, such as: What are the differences between the three types of knowledge: direct knowledge, knowledge by ability, and propositional knowledge? What is the Gettier problem and why does it resist easy solutions? Why do philosophers still talk about René Descartes' techniques for raising doubts about what we can know but have largely forgotten Descartes' attempts to answer these doubts? How do we know that we're not just brains in a vat? Is Pyrrhonian skepticism—the idea that we know absolutely nothing—ultimately self-refuting? With a glossary of key terms and suggestions for further reading, Skepticism: The Basics is an ideal starting point for anyone seeking a lively and accessible foray into the study of epistemology. Key Features and Benefits: Cover both traditional topics – like the tripartite conception of knowledge – and emerging issues, like knowledge-first epistemology and concessive responses to inductive skepticism Demystifies an area where beginners frequently get stuck: the difference between common-sense skepticism and philosophical skepticism Clearly explains the important contributions from historical and contemporary thinkers, like Descartes, Hume, Popper, Quine, Dretske, Strawson, Nozick, and Sosa

The causal theory of reference (CTR) provides a well-articulated and widely-accepted account of the reference relation. On CTR the reference of a term is fixed by whatever property causally regulates the competent use of that term. CTR poses a metaethical challenge to realists by demanding an account of the properties that regulate the competent use of normative predicates. CTR might pose a challenge to ethical theorists as well. Long (2012) argues that CTR entails the falsity of any normative ethical theory. First-order theory attempts to specify what purely descriptive property is a fundamental right-making property (FRM). Long contends that the notion that the FRM causally regulates competent use of the predicate ‘right’ leads to a reductio. The failure of this argument is nevertheless instructive concerning a point at which ethics and metaethics overlap.

Symbol Grounding Problem and causal theory of reference

The causal theory of reference is often taken to provide a solution to the problems, such as incomparability and referential discontinuity, that the meaning-change thesis raised. I show that Kuhn successfully questioned the causal theory and Putnam's idea that reference is determined via the sameness relation of essences that holds between a sample and other members of a kind in all possible worlds. Putnam's single ‘essential’ properties may be necessary but not sufficient to determine membership in a kind category. Kuhn argued that extension is fixed by similarity-dissimilarity relations that are liable to change in taxonomic reorganizations of science.

The cognitive linguist John R. Taylor has been a source of my inspiration, although my graduate training was mainly in the areas of sociolin-guistics and linguistic anthropology (e.g., Blount, 1995[1974]; Gumperz and Hymes, 1986[1972]; Wortham and Rymes, 2003). Taylor's oeuvre (e.g., 2002, 2003[1989], 2012) has made me seriously think about meaningful connections among cognitive linguistics (CL), linguistic anthropology (LA), and cognitive anthropology (CA).1 In particular, Taylor's highly acclaimed Linguistic Categorization (2003[1989]) has influenced my thinking and subsequently changed my assumptions of language, culture and cognition. This chapter is an attempt to externalize the positive changes that have been occurring in my assumptions and thoughts. In relation to the broader academic contexts, Taylor's work has been widely read by both linguists and anthropologists. For instance, Michael Silverstein, the eminent linguistic anthropologist, refers to Taylor (2003) as a useful source of information in discussing the 'causal theory of reference', developed by Kripke (1972) and Putnam (1975) (Silverstein, 2005: 10–12; also see Kockelman, 2005: 247–249).

THE REPRESENTATION OF ABSTRACT ENTITIES IN ARTIFICIAL NEURAL NETWORKS