Eliminativist View Research Articles

Naïve Realism and the Conception of Hallucination as Non-Sensory Phenomena

Abstract In defence of naïve realism, Fish has advocated an eliminativist view of hallucination, according to which hallucinations lack visual phenomenology. Logue, and Dokic and Martin, respectively, have developed the eliminativist view in different manners. Logue claims that hallucination is a non-phenomenal, perceptual representational state. Dokic and Martin maintain that hallucinations consist in the confusion of monitoring mechanisms, which generates an affective feeling in the hallucinating subject. This paper aims to critically examine these views of hallucination. By doing so, I shall point out what theoretical requirements are imposed on naïve realists who characterize hallucinations as non-visual-sensory phenomena.

Self-defense: Deflecting Deflationary and Eliminativist Critiques of the Sense of Ownership.

I defend a phenomenological account of the sense of ownership as part of a minimal sense of self from those critics who propose either a deflationary or eliminativist critique. Specifically, I block the deflationary critique by showing that in fact the phenomenological account is itself a deflationary account insofar as it takes the sense of ownership to be implicit or intrinsic to experience and bodily action. I address the eliminativist view by considering empirical evidence that supports the concept of pre-reflective self-awareness, which underpins the sense of ownership. Finally, I respond to claims that phenomenology does not offer a positive account of the sense of ownership by showing the role it plays in an enactivist (action-oriented) view of embodied cognition.

Moral property eliminativism

This paper argues that there is significant motivation for contemporary ethicists to affirm a view I call “moral property eliminativism.” On this eliminativist view, there are no moral properties, but there are moral truths that are made true by only nonmoral entities. Moral property eliminativism parallels eliminativist views defended in other domains of philosophical inquiry, but has gone nearly entirely overlooked by contemporary ethicists. I argue that moral property eliminativism is motivated by the claim that there cannot be differences in moral truths without differences in nonmoral ontology—a claim widely endorsed by contemporary ethicists. Engaging with a variety of ways whereby one might resist the motivation I cite for moral property eliminativism, I argue that alternative contemporary metaethical views tend to purchase moral properties at the price of unnecessary theoretical complexity.

Found Guilty by Association: In Defence of the Quinean Criterion

AbstractMuch recent work in metaontology challenges the so‐called ‘Quinean tradition’ in metaphysics. Especially prominently, Amie Thomasson argues for a highly permissive ontology over ontologies which eliminate many entities. I am concerned with disputing not her ontological claim, but the methodology behind her rejection of eliminativism – I focus on ordinary objects. Thomasson thinks that by endorsing the Quinean criterion of ontological commitment eliminativism goes wrong; a theory eschewing quantification over a kind may nonetheless be committed to its existence. I argue that, contrary to Thomasson's claims, we should retain the Quinean criterion. Her arguments show that many eliminativist positions are flawed, but their flaws lie elsewhere: the Quinean criterion is innocent. Showing why reveals the importance of pragmatism in ontology.In §1 I compare Thomasson's account and the eliminativist views to which it stands in opposition. In §2 I re‐construct Thomasson's reasons for rejecting the Quinean criterion. In §3 I defend the Quinean criterion, showing that the eliminativists’ flaws are not consequences of applying the Quinean criterion, before explaining the criterion's importance when properly understood. I conclude that Thomasson, though right to criticise the methodology of ordinary‐object eliminativists, is wrong to identify the Quinean criterion as the source of their mistake.

Rule Following, Error Theory and Eliminativism

In this paper, I argue for three main claims. First, that there are two broad sorts of error theory about a particular region of thought and talk, eliminativist error theories and non-eliminativist error theories. Second, that an error theory about rule following can only be an eliminativist view of rule following, and therefore an eliminativist view of meaning and content on a par with Paul Churchland’s prima facie implausible eliminativism about the propositional attitudes. Third, that despite some superficial appearances to the contrary, non-eliminativist error theory does not provide a plausible vehicle for understanding the ‘sceptical solution’ to the sceptical paradox about rule-following developed in Saul Kripke’s Wittgenstein on Rules and Private Language.

Fictionalism versus Deflationism

Fictionalism has long presented an attractive alternative to both heavy-duty realist and simple eliminativist views about entities such as properties, propositions, numbers, and possible worlds. More recently, a different alternative to these traditional views has been gaining popularity: a form of deflationism that holds that trivial arguments may lead us from uncontroversial premisses to conclude that the relevant entities exist � but where commitment to the entities is a trivial consequence of other claims we accept, not a posit to explain what makes the relevant claims true. The deflationist�s trivial arguments, however, have been attacked by fictionalists, who suggest that the ontological conclusions we get from these arguments should not be taken as serious ontological assertions at all, but rather as implicitly in the context of a fiction or simulation. This paper examines the fictionalist�s criticisms of �easy� arguments for numbers, properties, and other entities, and concludes that they beg the question against the deflationist and so do not undermine the deflationist�s position. Close attention to the argument also reveals a crucial disanalogy between overtly fictional discourse and discourse about numbers, properties, and so on, which undermines the case for fictionalism. Finally, I argue that the motivations for fictionalism (particularly those based in its ability to offer a good account of the discourse) are served as well or better by deflationism. Overall, this gives us reason to think that deflationism may provide a preferable approach for those looking for an alternative to both traditional realism and traditional eliminativism.

Mental Fictionalism As an Undermotivated Theory

ABSTRACTOur paper consists of three parts. In the first part we explain the concept of mental fictionalism. In the second part, we present the various versions of fictionalism and their main sources of motivation. We do this because in the third part we argue that mental fictionalism, as opposed to other versions of fictionalism, is a highly undermotivated theory.1. What is Mental Fictionalism?We can distinguish between realist and antirealist approaches regarding each type of entity. You are a realist if you think that the entities of the type in question exist, and you are an antirealist if you think that they do not. You can be a realist about universals, physical objects, abstract entities and so on, while you remain an antirealist for example about God, scattered objects, or finkish dispositions.However, we need to distinguish how the realist or the antirealist approaches the ontological-metaphysical issues from how he approaches discourse. The focus of this latter distinction is not on the existence or non-existence of some entities, but on the features of our mode of speech about these entities.According to Kalderon (2005, 95-113), three distinct conditions have to be satisfied in order to be a realist about a discourse. (1) The sentences of the discourse express propositions about the putative subject matter of the discourse. (2) In uttering these sentences, we assert the truthconditions of the appropriate propositions. (3) At least most of these propositions are true-you are justified in accepting them.In accordance with orthodoxy, we call the discourse about the mental 'folk psychology'. So, the three conditions of discourse about folk psychology are the following: (1) Sentences of folk psychology express propositions about mental facts. (2) In uttering sentences of folk psychology, we assert the truth-conditions of the appropriate propositions, namely the obtaining of mental facts. (3) Most of these propositions represent mental facts correctly, so they are mostly true.'You are antirealist about folk psychology if you deny the satisfaction of at least one of the above conditions. Consequently, there are three possible antirealist positions.Mental nonfactualism denies the first criterion. According to this position, sentences of folk psychology do not express propositions. One could argue for this claim from some semantic and ontological considerations. Maybe you accept some form of verificationism, and you think there are no exact verificational criteria in the case of these sentences, so they are meaningless. Or maybe, you simply think there are no mental entities and consequently, the referring terms of folk psychology are empty, which means that a component of the putative proposition is missing, and therefore, there is no proposition. Again, you can think the same about the predicates of folk psychology: since mental properties are not instantiated, there are no semantic counterparts of these predicates.Eliminativism denies the third criterion. In contrast to the nonfactualist view, eliminativism says that the sentences of folk psychology express propositions, but these propositions are systematically false. In other words, propositions of folk psychology have representational content, but this content represents our minds falsely. So, eliminativism is an error theory of mind; it renders our beliefs about the mental definitely incorrect. Eliminativism is obviously not ontologically innocent either; it is committed to the nonexistence of mental facts posited by folk psychology.It seems to us that the difference between the nonfactualist and the eliminativist view heavily depends on some shaky semantic intuitions. Consider the famous debate between Bertrand Russell (1905) and Peter Strawson ( 1950) about sentences containing empty names or definite descriptions. If you have a Russellian intuition, you will claim that these sentences express false propositions, but if you have Strawsonian ones, you will take these sentences as expressing no propositions at all, because their existential presupposition is not satisfied. …

Race: a social destruction of a biological concept

It is nowadays a dominant opinion in a number of disciplines (anthro- pology, genetics, psychology, philosophy of science) that the taxonomy of human races does not make much biological sense. My aim is to challenge the arguments that are usually thought to invalidate the biological concept of race. I will try to show that the way ''race'' was defined by biologists several decades ago (by Dobzhansky and others) is in no way discredited by conceptual criticisms that are now fashionable and widely regarded as cogent. These criticisms often arbitrarily burden the biological category of race with some implausible connotations, which then opens the path for a quick eliminative move. However, when properly understood, the biological notion of race proves remarkably resistant to these deconstructive attempts. Moreover, by analyzing statements of some leading con- temporary scholars who support social constructivism about race, I hope to dem- onstrate that their eliminativist views are actually in conflict with what the best contemporary science tells us about human genetic variation.

Négation, contrariété et contradiction

L’auteur discerne trois intuitions majeures dans la théorie éliminativiste de la négation développée par les idéalistes anglais, d’après laquelle une négation est l’élimination d’une alternative au sein d’un ensemble complet d’alternatives disjonctivement affirmées du sujet de la négation : premièrement, la détermination du sens d’une proposition est l’assignation à une proposition de coordonnées logiques dans un espace logique ; deuxièmement, le sens d’une proposition entretient une relation interne avec le sens de sa négation ; troisièmement, l’espace logique dans lequel une négation acquiert un sens dépend du contexte. Il est montré que la théorie éliminativiste de la négation échoue à composer adéquatement les deux premiers aperçus en essayant de faire droit au troisième. A l’inverse, le Tractatus de Wittgenstein les combine adéquatement mais passe à côté du troisième. Une théorie adéquate de la négation devrait, minimalement, satisfaire simultanément les trois contraintes.

Resolving Russell’s Anti-Realism About Causation

In “On the Notion of Cause,”1 Bertrand Russell expressed an eliminativist view about causation driven by an examination of the contents of mathematical physics. Russell's primary reason for thinking that the notion of causation is absent in physics was that laws of nature are mere “functional dependencies” and not “causal laws.” In this paper, I show that several ordinary notions of causation can be found within the functional dependencies of physics. Not only does this show that Russell's eliminitivism was misguided, but it shows that Russell's opponents, such as Nancy Cartwright, who think that mere functional dependencies cannot capture causal claims, also underestimate the causal content of such equations.

Eliminative Induction and Bayesian Confirmation Theory

In his recent book The Advancement of Science, Philip Kitcher endorses eliminative induction, or the view that confirmation of hypotheses proceeds by the elimination of alternatives. My intention here is to critically examine Kitcher's eliminativist view of confirmation, and his rejection of the widely held Bayesian position, according to which an hypothesis H is confirmed by evidence E just in case the probability of H conditional on E is greater than the simple unconditional probability of H [i.e. p(H/E) > p(H)]. Here, I will maintain that while there are aspects of the eliminative approach which Bayesianism must incorporate, as has been argued by John Earman, the eliminativism advocated by Kitcher is unsatisfactory. In addition, I will suggest that Kitcher's reasons for rejecting Bayesian confirmation theory are unconvincing and depend on an overly restrictive version of the position and that indeed Bayesianism has resources needed by an eliminativist account of confirmation.

Verificationism, scepticism, and consciousness

I argue that Daniel Dennett's latest book, Consciousness Explained, presents a radically eliminativist view of conscious experience in which experience or, in Dennett's own words, actual phenomenology, becomes a merely intentional object of our own and others’ judgments ‘about’ experience. This strategy of ‘intentionalizing’ consciousness dovetails nicely with Dennett's background model of brain function: cognitive pandemonium, but does not follow from it. Thus Dennett is driven to a series of independent attacks on the notion of conscious experience, many of which depend upon verificationist premises. I do not directly dispute the appeal to verificationism (though many would, I am sure) but rather aim to show that the sort of verificationist arguments that Dennett employs are fundamentally similar to classical sceptical arguments. The philosophical status of such arguments remains perennially unclear, but none of them produce conviction in their ostensible conclusions. I argue that Dennett's verificationist strategy suffers the same fate.

Why the Anti-reductionist Consensus Won’t Survive the Case of Classical Mendelian Genetics

Philosophers now treat the relationship between Classical Mendelian Genetics and molecular biology as a paradigm of nonreduction and this example is playing an increasingly prominent role in debates about the reducibility of theories ranging from macrosocial science to folk psychology. Patricia Churchland (1986), for example, draws an analogy between the alleged elimination of the “causal mainstay” of classical genetics and her view that today’s psychological theory will be eliminated by neuroscience. Patricia Kitcher takes an autonomous rather than eliminativist view of the reported nonreduction in genetics and reasons that psychology will retain a similar autonomy from lower level sciences (1980 and 1982). Although Churchland and Kitcher offer different interpretations of the apparent failure of molecular biology to reduce classical genetics, they agree that this failure will help illuminate theoretical relations between psychology and lower level sciences. The appearance of the Mendelian example along side the usual ones from physics and chemistry marks a turning point in philosophy of science.