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333Almog on Descartes's Mind and BodyPhilosophy and Phenomenological Research 70 (3): 709-716. 2007.Descartes thought his mind and body could exist apart, and that this attested to a real distinction between them. The challenge as Almog initially describes it is to find a reading of “can exist apart” that is strong enough to establish a real distinction, yet weak enough to be justified by what Descartes offers as evidence: that DM and DB can be conceived apart.
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13Prime Causation1Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 70 (2): 459-467. 2007.No one doubts that mental states can be wide. Why should this seem to prevent them from causing behavior? Tim points to an "internalist line of thought"
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2501Non-catastrophic presupposition failureIn Judith Thomson & Alex Byrne (eds.), Content and Modality: Themes From the Philosophy of Robert Stalnaker, Oxford University Press. 2006.
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125Thoughts: papers on mind, meaning, and modalityOxford University Press. 2008.The real distinction between mind and body -- Is conceivability a guide to possibility? -- Textbook kripkeanism and the open texture of concepts -- Coulda, woulda, shoulda -- No fool's cold : notes on illusions of possibility -- Beyond rigidification : the importance of being really actual -- How in the world? -- Mental causation -- Singling out properties -- Wide causation -- Causal relevance : mental, moral, and epistemic.
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250Carving Content at the JointsCanadian Journal of Philosophy 38 (S1): 145-177. 2008.Here is Frege in Foundations of Arithmetic, § 64:The judgment 'Line a is parallel to line b', in symbols: ab, can be taken as an identity. If we do this, we obtain the concept of direction, and say: 'The direction of line a is equal to the direction of line b.' Thus we replace the symbol by the more generic symbol =, through removing what is specific in the content of the former and dividing it between a and b. We carve up the content in a way different from the original way, and this yields us …Read more
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574Saul Kripke: Philosophical Troubles: Collected Papers, Volume 1 (review)Journal of Philosophy 110 (4): 221-229. 2013.
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1583Advertisement for a sketch of an outline of a proto-theory of causationIn Ned Hall, L. A. Paul & John Collins (eds.), Causation and Counterfactuals, Mit Press. pp. 119-137. 2004.
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55Review: Concepts and Consciousness (review)Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 59 (2). 1999.I. The Conscious Mind is a hugely likable book. Perceptive, candid, and instructive page by page, the work as a whole sets out a large and uplifting vision with cheeringly un-Dover-Beach-ish implications for “our place in the universe.” A book that you can’t helping wanting to believe as much as you can’t help wanting to believe this one doesn’t come along every day. It is with real regret that I proceed to the story of why belief would not come.
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207Parts and differencesPhilosophical Studies 173 (1): 141-157. 2016.Part/whole is said in many ways: the leg is part of the table, the subset is part of the set, rectangularity is part of squareness, and so on. Do the various flavors of part/whole have anything in common? They may be partial orders, but so are lots of non-mereological relations. I propose an “upward difference transmission” principle: x is part of y if and only if x cannot change in specified respects while y stays the same in those respects
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814The Real Distinction Between Mind and BodyCanadian Journal of Philosophy, Supplementary Volume 16 (n/a): 149-201. 1990.….it [is] wholly irrational to regard as doubtful matters that are perceived clearly and distinctly by the understanding in its purity, on account of mere prejudices of the senses and hypotheses in which there is an element of the unknown.Descartes, Geometrical Exposition of the MeditationsSubstance dualism, once a main preoccupation of Western metaphysics, has fallen strangely out of view; today’s mental/physical dualisms are dualisms of fact, property, or event. So if someone claims to find a …Read more
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469Coulda, woulda, shouldaIn Tamar Szabo Gendler & John Hawthorne (eds.), Conceivability and Possibility, Oxford University Press. pp. 441-492. 2002.
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347No Fool's Cold: Notes on Illusions of PossibilityIn Oup (ed.), Thoughts, Oxford University Press. 2009.
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17Superproportionality and Mind-Body RelationsTheoria: Revista de Teoría, Historia y Fundamentos de la Ciencia 16 (1): 65-75. 2001.Mental causes are threatened from two directions: from below, since they would appear to be screened off by lower-order, e.g., neural states; and from within, since they would also appear to be screened off by intrinsic, e.g., syntactical states. A principle needed to parry the first threat -causes should be proportional to their effects- appears to leave us open to the second; for why should unneeded extrinsic detail be any less offensive to proportionality than excess microstructure? I say tha…Read more
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1364A Priority and ExistenceIn Paul Artin Boghossian & Christopher Peacocke (eds.), New Essays on the A Priori, Oxford University Press. pp. 197. 2000.
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