Peter Slezak

The “Cartesian Theater” is Dennett’s metaphor for the error of positing a homunculus or “little man” who watches an inner screen on which our thoughts appear – “the most tenacious bad idea bedevilling our attempts to think about consciousness.” However, I suggest Dennett’s analysis must be modified to avoid two significant mistakes. First, I show that, contrary to much academic teaching and scholarship, Descartes was not guilty of the homunculus or Cartesian Theater fallacy, as he explains in his physiological writings La Dioptrique and Traité de L’homme neglected by philosophers. Second, I argue that the Theater metaphor must be understood quite differently from the way it has been conceived by Dennett. Indeed, following Descartes, I suggest that the pseudo-explanation arises not from what is included in our theory to do the “clever work” but rather from what is missing. The temptation is not “to imagine an inner agent” but rather it is the failure to notice that a model can’t work without “an intelligent and comprehending reader” – the theorist. Finally, I argue that, once the error is properly understood in this way, we can see that it is implicated in several controversial theories in philosophy.

This dissertation is concerned with issues which have been discussed as distinct philosophical problems and attempts to demonstrate that they have a deep underlying commonality. The disparate philosophical problems include that of action, the alleged implications of Goedel's Theorem for the mind, and Descartes's 'Cogito' argument. The various independent problems are discussed in detail, however, the dissertation also attempts to show that the independently argued positions can be seen to converge with the others, specifically implicating the notions of self and self-reference. ;In the first chapter on actions, I try to sketch the outlines of naturalized account of actions and suggest that the philosophy of action has been left behind in the cognitive revolution which has come to dominate philosophy of mind generally. In particular, using the vehicle of Danto's notion of basic action, I argue that the traditional concern with causality is misplaced and arises from certain inherent perplexities concerning one's own movements. ;In the second chapter I attempt to give an analysis of Lucas's notorious argument against mechanism from the supposed implications of Goedel's Theorem. I suggest that among the fatal flaws in Lucas's argument is the failure to take into account the self-referential or 'diagonal' character of Goedel's proof. ;The third and fourth chapters consider the debates surrounding Descartes's Cogito argument. I offer a novel analysis which is nevertheless textually faithful and, indeed, permits a charitable construal of Descartes which is in contrast to the usual accounts. Moreover, my reconstruction of the Cogito derives strong support from its quite independent philosophical plausibility as an account of mind. Specifically, I argue that the Cogito can be seen as a variant of the Liar paradox. Attention is also given to Kant's closely related arguments concerning the unity of apperception

A fully adequate solution to Newcomb’s Problem (Nozick 1969) should reveal the source of its extraordinary elusiveness and persistent intractability. Recently, a few accounts have independently sought to meet this criterion of adequacy by exposing the underlying source of the problem’s profound puzzlement. Thus, Sorensen (1987), Slezak (1998), Priest (2002) and Maitzen and Wilson (2003) share the ‘no box’ view according to which the very idea that there is a right choice is misconceived since the problem is ill-formed or incoherent in some way. Among proponents of this view, Richard Jeffrey (2004) recently declared that he renounces his earlier position that accepted Newcomb problems as genuine decision problems. Significantly, Jeffrey suggests that “Newcomb problems are like Escher’s famous staircase on which an unbroken ascent takes you back where you started” (Jeffrey (2004; 113)). Jeffrey’s analogy is apt for a puzzle whose specific logical features can be precisely articulated. Along the lines of these related approaches, I propose to improve and clarify them by providing such a deeper analysis that elucidates their essential, related insights