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{\it The following are three varieties of Relativism.}
\begin{itemize}
\item ``x ought to verb'' means ``members of x's society approve of x's verbing''
\item ``x ought to verb'' means ``members of my society approve of x's verbing''
\item ``x ought to verb'' means ``Bill Clinton approves of x's verbing''
\end{itemize}
{\it Explain why one cannot consistently accept more than one.  Are any of them plausible?}\\\\
J.L. Mackie, page 789, and Sept. 12-16

Each of these statements describes how the moral beliefs of a certain sub-section of the human race reflect upon x's verbing.  We are given three different sub-sections, each of which is taken to be different.  The first group are those people who come from the same background and region as x, while the second group is those people who come from the same background and region as myself.  And finally, the third group is merely Bill Clinton himself.  Now, each of these groups is following some moral code, which it is applying to x's verbing.  In order to accept more than one of these statements and not be contradicting oneself, the moral codes of two or more of the groups would have to be identical.  However, unless my society and x's society are identical, this is impossible.  Although it may be true that all societies share some common moral values, any two societies that are not identical cannot have identical value systems.  This is because no two individuals are identical (an assumption we have taken to be true throughout the class), and thus their personal morals are different.  Thus, the collective morals of the society must be slightly different, because we have decided that morals of society are {\bf NOT} determined by majority rules.  If this were the case, society's would consistently alienate their own members, and split up (I'll have to expand upon this).

The first of these statements seems the most plausible to me, based upon my beliefs concerning morals.  I do not believe in a universal set of morals that everyone must follow.  Nor do I believe that morality is entirely subject to personal or societal decisions, because some actions seem covered by a universal morality (such as murder, etc.)  

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{\it What would Kant say about Mill's Hedonistic Act Utilitarianism?}\\\\
Kant p 575 Sept 26-30, HAU p 530 Sept 21-23, 1 page of my notes

Kant-- An act is good \underline{only if} it is in accord with duty.  ``Act only on that maxim through which you can at the same time will that it should become a universal law.''

HAU-- for all X and t, X ought to verb at t if and only if of all the acts it is possible for X to perform at t, X's verbing would ``maximize intrinsic value''.

p534r  HAU doesn't tell you out of what motive or intention you must act; it only tells you what you {\bf must} do.  motive irrelevant to ``the morality of the action''.

Therefore, Kant would say that a persons following HAU tells nothing about whether their actions were good.  A person following HAU can act under whatever motives they like, as long as the end result is best for everyone.  According to Kant, it is the motive that counts in determining the goodness, and if motive can vary under HAU, then it says nothing.

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{\it Is it sufficient for a state to be just that it's citizens prefer remaining in it to leaving it?  What would Plato say?   What would Rawls say?}\\\\
Plato p723-738 Oct 3-7, Rawls p640-648 Oct 3-8, 1 page of my notes

Merely preferring to remain in a state rather than leave is faint praise for the state.  While it is true of good states, it is also true of horrendous ones that happen to be surrounded by things even more horrendous.  (examples are easy to find).  Thus, this situation says nothing about conditions inside.

Thus, Plato would disagree with it, because it is easy to envision a state in which people are not doing those jobs they are not fitted, thus breaking the Principle of Specialization, but still better than the presumed death outside the city.  Indeed, the state could break all of Plato's rules, and still be better than some ``outsides'' that can be imagined.

Rawls would certainly say that such a state was certainly not just.  He was in favor of almost ultimate individual rights, such that none of them could be taken away for any reason, including the welfare of society.  Thus, it is even easier under these criteria to envision a city where this principle is broken, and yet the citizens prefer to remain.  Indeed, the negative connotation of the original statements makes it likely that in any such city, Rawls would find it unjust.

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{\it Hume said:  ``Nothing is ever really present to the mind, besides its own perceptions''.  What might he have meant by that?  Why might a person think it true?  Is it true?}\\\\
Hume p177-184 Sept 17-21, Ayer p215-218 Oct 24-28, 2 pages of my notes

Quote is from 178R.  In sum, we never even perceive our own bodies: we only perceive our own perceptions.  Perceptions defined 184L.

Ayer claims that we at most indirectly perceive physical objects.  What we directly percieve is only entities of a different kind (non-physical) customarily called sense-data (same things as ``impressions or perceptions'' from Hume).  

This is a very difficult argument to disprove.  It questions our basic knowledge of the world, and most of our basis comes from common sense rather than actual proofs.  Without being able to directly percieve anything, all of our common sense becomes questionable, and thus it is impossible to argue against the proof without first assuming it is incorrect.  If it is correct, then it is obviously impossible to disprove :-)  

Given that I can't prove Hume's statement is false, I can't that it is true.  However, intuition seems to say that the statement is false.  I have no evidence or proof to back this up, but I feel the statement is false none-the-less.

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{\it Descartes said:  ``It's certain, then, that I am really distinct from my body and can exist without it....[I am] an understanding substance.....''  Why did he think this?  Was his argument for it a good argument?}\\\\
Descartes p 115-132 Nov 7-9.

p132L (in Med 6): ``my essence consists solely in the fact that I am a thinking thing.''  That is not true of my body.  Therefore, I am not my body.  My body is one substance, I am another.  Comes from Cogito, ergo sum.  

This assumes that he and his body are different can be separated.  If he adn his body are same from the beginning, then it is impossible for him to be something without his body being it also.  He thinks, therefore he exists.  If he can exist without a body, then no problems.  Howevever, if this is false, then his existence also entails the existence of his body.  Since he thinks, his body thinks also.  In general, Descartes argument is a good one, because of the argument that body can exist without essence (dead body), but possible this is an exception, because no proof of essence without body.  However, this can be explained by essence's inability to communicate.

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{\it A travel agent advertises two ways to get to Mars: the expensive trip, by space-ship, and the cheap trip, which consists of the agent's radioing information about all your cells to Mars and construction there of a new body according to that information.  You would like to get to Mars, and are not very rich; do you sign on for the cheap trip?}\\\\
Stems from Locke p396-401 Oct 31-Nov 4 + back of Nov 7-9, 1 page of my notes.

Yes, dependent upon the condition that my body here is destroyed, and body is copied back exactly from Mars.  I believe Mental Thesis, in that x and y are psychologically continuos if y has same memories and experiences and beliefs as x.  Thus, my original body on earth has to be destroyed immediately, because if x and y were to co-exist even for a second, they would have non-continuous memories.  If my original body (x) is destroyed exactly as (y) is created, then it can be said x == y.  Again, when I return to earth, y must be destroyed as x is created, again leaving y == x.  Thus, I did experience Mars, for my body on Mars experienced it, and I have all the memories of my body there.  

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{\it What is what Turing calls ``The Argument from Consciousness'' against the acceptability of the Turing Test?  Is Turing's response to it successful?}\\\\
Turing p364r Nov 14.

Extreme form of the argument presented by Professor Jefferson would be ``the only way by which once could be sure that a machine thinks is to {\it} be the machine and to fell oneself thinking.  One could then describe these feelings to the world''.  This is the solipsist point of view, which holds that the self is the only existent thing.  Turing says that this probably isn't exactly what Prof. Jefferson was talking about, but sorta reasonable.  Instead, he would accept an oral exam to see whether subject understands subject or ``learned it parrot fashion.''  Turing gives example, then supposes that Prof. Jefferson would deem passing this exam to be ``an easy contrivance.''  This exam of comprehension of poetry is merely one facet of the general Turing Test.  Most proponents of ``The Argument from Consciousness'' would prefer to accept the Turing Test to being forced into solipsist point of view (which makes even ordinary conversation difficult to conduct).  

I believe Turing is successful in defending his test.  ``The Argument from Consciousness'' holds that a computer must be able to have emotions and feelings and be able to prove to others that it has both.  Now, this seems reasonable criteria, but how can you prove it.  As Turing points out, we cannot ``become the machine and think its thoughts'', so we must provide some way for it to express them.  The Turing Test is as reasonable a method as any of doing so.  Turing doesn't mention whether a computer can or cannot have consciousness, only how to prove whether it can think.  

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{\it What exactly does Searle conclude from his story about the 'Chinese Room'?  Is he right to draw that conclusion?''}\\\\
Searle p372

Searle concludes that a computer solely with the right sort of program {\bf cannot} think, understand, etc.  This is because such a machine can only manipulate symbols according to preset rules, but it can't comprehend the symbols.

``The aim of the Chinese room example was to try to show this by showing that as soon as we put something inot the system taht really does have intentionality (the man), and we program him with the formal program, you can see that the fromal program carries no additional intentionality.  It adds nothing, for example, to a man's ability to understand Chinese.''

According to the way the Chinese room is set up, Searle's conclusion is correct.  I feel that is impossible to create a program that will feed out correct answers to all questions without it being a thinking program.  Therefore, the Chinese room argument completely fails.

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{\it Is acting freely compatible with the thesis of universal causation?  Have you ever acted freely?}\\\\
Campbell , Hume p 447 Nov 28-Dec 2.

It is possible to accept universal causation and still accept freedom of action, as Hume has done.  He claims taht ``the uniformity observable in the operations of nature, where similar objects are constantly conjoined together, and the mind is determined by custom t infer the one from the appearance of the other.''  Since this is where we get universal causation from, no event is really {\it caused} by any other.  all on 447L, tad bit on 451L.  However, this is only with Hume's description of universal causation.  If one uses the traditional definition of universal causation, in which every act is directly created and neccessitated by prior acts, then the two are indeed incompatible.  If all actions are caused, and human decisions are actions, then human decisions are caused, and so we never really make decisions, and so we never act freely.

I believe I have acted freely, because I reject universal causation.  It strikes me that if there were ever even one random event, it would throw off all of universal causation.  While you might argue that a coin toss is not a random event, it seems that there are some events that are not dependent upon other events, although they are caused (in that they did not come from nothing).  An example is radioactive decay, where a particle decomposes into energy after a random amount of time.  We can predict when {\bf on average} a particle will decay, but there seems to be no constraints on when an individual particle will decompose.  Because we are made up of trillions of such particles, there is an element of randomness in us, and thus we are not completely controlled by universal causation (although we are obviously heavily affected).

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{\it Philosophy is in some ways like and in some ways unlike chemistry and physics.  Describe the similarities and differences.}\\\\
All three of the mentioned subjects aim at finding the truth, which is there strongest and perhaps most important connection between them.  Although the methods they use are different, all are trying to find universal truths.  While physics and chemistry aim towards finding these truths about the physical world we live in, philosophy aims more towards the metaphysical, where objects are much less solid.

This provides a basis for why philosophy is so much harder to {\bf prove} than physics or chemistry.  It is possible with physics and chemistry to conduct experiments on the world and measure the outcome.  Any theory that matches the outcomes has a pretty good chance of being correct.  With philosophy, we cannot conduct such experiments, and thus have a much harder time proving theories.  However, even phyiscs and chemistry and math face similar difficulties when you deal with them on their lowest levels.  Math, for example, is based on inferences and axioms.   No one can prove these statements, because of their metaphysical nature, showing a even closer relationship between philosophy and these subjects.

Because it deals with the metaphysical, philosophy involves using intuition a lot.  This is where philosophers get their starting ideas from, and how they begin to reject one anothers arguments.  This again is not too unlike how physicists and chemists get their original theories, using a ``feel of the subject'' rather than physical evidence to formulate their theories.  They then go about using logic to proove their intuitive answer.  However, physicists and chemists can check their work later to see if matches the real world.  Philosophers on the other hand are never able to have their intuitions completely proven.

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