Liu, Pengbo. / "September 2010." / Thesis (M.Phil.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2010. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 94-96). / Abstracts in English and Chinese. / Chapter Chapter 1 --- Physicalism and its Discontents --- p.1 / Chapter 1.1 --- Physicalism --- p.2 / Chapter 1.1.1 --- "Two Problems in Characterizing ""Physicalism""" --- p.2 / Chapter 1.2 --- The Explanatory Gap --- p.6 / Chapter 1.2.1 --- The First Manifestation of the Explanatory Gap: Mary's New Knowledge --- p.7 / Chapter 1.2.3 --- The Epistemic (Explanatory) Gap and the Ontological Gap --- p.10 / Chapter 1.2.4 --- Levine on the Explanatory Gap --- p.11 / Chapter 1.3 --- The Phenomenal Concept Strategy (PCS): The Basics --- p.16 / Chapter Chapter 2 --- Two Accounts of Phenomenal Concepts --- p.18 / Chapter 2.1 --- The Quotational Account of Phenomenal Concepts --- p.18 / Chapter 2.1.1 --- The Quotation Analogy --- p.18 / Chapter 2.1.2 --- The Fundamental Use and Derived Use --- p.20 / Chapter 2.1.3 --- Why Mental Quotation? --- p.22 / Chapter 2.1.4 --- Problems of the Quotational Account --- p.25 / Chapter 2.2 --- The Recognitional/Demonstrative Account of Phenomenal Concepts --- p.30 / Chapter 2.2.1 --- Type Demonstratives and Token Demonstratives --- p.31 / Chapter 2.2.3 --- "Recognition, Memory, and Imagination" --- p.37 / Chapter 2.2.4 --- The Possession Condition of Recognitional Concepts --- p.40 / Chapter 2.2.5 --- PRC and PC --- p.41 / Chapter 2.2.6 --- Compare the Quotational Account and the Loarian Recognitional Account --- p.45 / Chapter 2.2.7 --- Reply to Balog's Complaint --- p.47 / Chapter 2.3 --- Objections and Replies --- p.49 / Chapter 2.3.1 --- Chalmers' Objection --- p.49 / Chapter 2.3.2 --- Raffman's Objection: --- p.52 / Chapter Chapter 3 --- The Phenomenal Concept Strategy Examined --- p.55 / Chapter 3.1 --- The Phenomenal Concept Strategy: A Brief Review --- p.55 / Chapter 3.2 --- Stoljar's Objections --- p.57 / Chapter 3.2.1 --- Experience Thesis and the A priori/ A priori Synthesizable --- p.58 / Chapter 3.2.3 --- The Immediacy Thesis and Phenomenal Acquaintance --- p.60 / Chapter 3.2.4 --- Conceptual Difference and Conceptual Gap --- p.66 / Chapter 3.2.5 --- Conclusion --- p.72 / Chapter 3.3 --- Chalmers' Objection to PCS --- p.72 / Chapter 3.3.1 --- Chalmers' Master Argument --- p.73 / Chapter 3.3.2 --- Balog's Reply --- p.78 / Chapter 3.3.3 --- A Worry about Balog's Reply --- p.82 / Chapter 3.3.4 --- Epistemic Situation and the Explanatory Gap --- p.84 / Chapter 3.3.5 --- An Alternative Reply: Some Speculations --- p.87 / Chapter 3.3.6 --- Conclusion --- p.92 / Bibliography --- p.94

Inaug.-diss.--Giessen. / Lebenslauf. "Literaturverzeichnis": p. [82].

It is widely agreed that some concepts can be possessed only by those who have undergone a certain type of phenomenal experience. The orthodox view among contemporary philosophers of mind that these phenomenal concepts provide the key to understanding the dispute between physicalists and their opponents. I reject the orthodox view; I defend an externalist conception of mental content according to which there are no phenomenal concepts. But the fact that there are no phenomenal concepts should not worry the physicalist: there are better accounts of the data that phenomenal concepts are used to explain. / text

This thesis examines the epistemological and metaphysical aspects of consciousness or sentience, and how they relate to standards of scientific practice. Historically, orthodox science has denied that there are any real problems of sentience because there is no scientific evidence to support claims regarding its nature and existence. In recent years, however, new approaches to sentience have entered into scientific debate that can be classified by metaphysical frameworks that vary in their conceptions of scientific evidence. In this thesis, four such frameworks are considered and compared: Ordinary Materialism, Property Dualism, Type-F Monism and Phenomenal Representationalism. Many sentience theorists adopt an Ordinary Materialist framework that conceives of scientific observation as the interaction of our physical sensory apparatus with the surrounding physical world. Sentience-friendly theories in this framework fail to present supporting evidence that is acceptable by ordinary scientific standards. There are also contradictions in their claims that we know of conscious events via naturalised introspection, and their claims that these events create no publicly observable physical effects. Theories proposed within Property Dualist and Type-F Monist frameworks suffer from similar problems to Ordinary Materialist theories, especially contradictions between claims of knowledge by direct acquaintance and how this knowledge is stored and processed by publicly observable physical systems. Phenomenal Representationalism is advocated as the most consistent and complete way for science to deal with questions of sentience. In this framework, questions of sentience are part of wider epistemological concerns (regarding publicity, intersubjectivity, realism and scientific observation) that provide presumptions for scientific practice, rather than subjects for scientific investigation.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Texas at Austin, 2008. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references.

Mon objectif dans ce mémoire est d’analyser le concept d’aletheia et ses critères chez Protagoras et Gorgias, les deux plus célèbres figures de la première sophistique. Nous connaissons leurs théories par le biais de leurs détracteurs, le plus célèbre d’entre eux étant Platon, ou, à l’inverse, d’auteurs plutôt sympathiques à leurs égards comme Sextus Empiricus. D’après ces doxographes, les deux sophistes et les sophistes de manière générale passent pour les défenseurs, en philosophie, d’un relativisme, d’un scepticisme, et même dans certains cas, d’un nihilisme. Par l’examen tout aussi minutieux qu’objectif de leurs œuvres on ne peut plus fragmentaires, je tente de dégager, chez les deux penseurs, une théorie de la vérité et de ses critères, qui fait l’économie des miroirs déformants platonicien et sceptique. / With this thesis, I intend to analyze the concept of aletheia and its criteria in Protagoras and Gorgias, the two renowned figures of the original Sophistic movement. We mostly know their theories through their detractors, the most famous of them being Plato. Conversely, many an author sympathetic to them such as Sextus Empiricus has also enlightened us on the matter. According to these doxographers, sophists, essentially, are advocates of relativism, skepticism and even nihilism in some cases. Through an objective and careful analysis of the works of these two scholars – their treatises being quite fragmentary – I will attempt to establish a theory of truth and its criteria while avoiding the pitfalls of a Platonic and skeptical distorted reflection.

La question de l’idéalisme leibnizien, qui permet d’entrer au cœur de la métaphysique de Leibniz, intéresse encore aujourd’hui de nombreux commentateurs. Ceux-ci utilisent les termes « réalisme », « idéalisme », voire « phénoménalisme », pour caractériser la métaphysique leibnizienne et un travail doit être fait pour rassembler et comparer leurs analyses, ce que nous proposons de faire d’abord dans ce mémoire. Ce sont surtout les textes mêmes de Leibniz qui seront abordés dans le présent travail et qui permettront de proposer la lecture suivante : si la métaphysique leibnizienne est réaliste en ce sens qu’elle met en place une entité elle-même « mind-independent », c'est-à-dire la monade, elle peut être considérée comme idéaliste (idéalisme substantiel), puisque cette entité, étant sans partie et sans étendue, est en ce sens idéelle. Et si tout peut se réduire à cette monade, c’est toute la fondation de la métaphysique de Leibniz qui se retrouve à être idéelle. Or, ceci ne règle pas le statut des corps qui peuvent être considérés soit comme de simples phénomènes réductibles aux perceptions des monades (idéalisme matériel), soit comme des êtres ayant une réalité indépendante d’un esprit, lesquels se réduiraient cette fois aux monades qui les composent (réalisme matériel). Face à ces deux possibilités, nous développerons une position mitoyenne qui défend l’idée que les corps sont en effet composés de monades qui leur procurent une certaine réalité, mais qu’ils dépendront toujours de l’action d’un esprit qui lui seul pourra leur procurer une certaine unité. / Many commentators try to read Leibniz either as an idealist or a realist, adding a phenomenalist reading to theses first two analyses. However, those terms are however often used with ambiguities, making Leibniz sometimes an even more complex philosopher. The first purpose of this master’s thesis is to gather and compare all these interpretations in order to clarify Leibniz’s thought. In this study, his writings will be used to defend the following interpretation : Leibniz can be considered as a realist since he develops a theory where monads act as « mind-independent » entities. Nonetheless, these monads are non-extended and without parts. Therefore, we can present an idealistic understanding of Leibniz, for they are the “basic building-blocks” of his metaphysic. Still, clarifications need to be made concerning the body. It can either be “real”, if it is seen as an aggregate of monads. Or, it can be considered a “mind-dependent” phenomenon if seen as the result of monadic perceptions. We will develop, between these two possibilities, an intermediate position stating that bodies are indeed aggregates of monads (matter realism). However they must be considered as phenomena for this same reason (phenomenalism). Corporeal aggregates require the action of the mind which alone can give them unity. On the contrary monads are said to be unum per se. Bodies are therefore phenomena but precisely well founded in the monads that compose them.

In dieser Arbeit schlage ich eine phänomenalistische Interpretation von Kants Idealismus vor, die sich jedoch in einigen Punkten von Standard-phänomenalistischen Interpretationen unterscheidet. Erscheinungen sind in meiner Lesart der Inhalt von Vorstellungen, aber nicht das eigentliche Objekt der Erkenntnis. Denn Erscheinungen sind von den erscheinenden Objekten verschieden. Diese sind vielmehr die Dinge an sich, welche wir zum transzendentalen Gegenstand der Erkenntnis machen. Allerdings erkennen wir sie lediglich, wie sie erscheinen, und nicht, wie sie sind. Somit bleibt die Unerkennbarkeit der Dinge, wie sie an sich sind, gewahrt. Im Verlauf meiner Argumentation diskutiere ich zahlreiche Aspekte von Kants Philosophie. Darunter sind die Unterscheidung zwischen Erscheinungen und Dingen an sich, Kants Verhältnis zur Cartesischen Epistemologie, die Widerlegung des Idealismus, sowie nicht zuletzt seine Theorie der Synthesis zu nennen. Mein Ziel ist dabei nicht nur zu zeigen, dass Kant ein Phänomenalist ist, sondern auch die Art seines Phänomenalismus zu charakterisieren. / This publication defends a phenomenalist interpretation of Kant’s idealism, which, however, deviates from usual phenomenalist interpretations in several respects. According to my reading, appearances are the content of representations, but not the true object of cognition. The object to which our cognition refers is rather the thing itself as the transcendental object. Nonetheless, we only cognize them as they appear and not as they are in themselves. Thus the unknowability of things as they are in themselves is retained. In the course of my presentation, I discuss a number of aspects of Kant’s philosophy, among which are the distinction between appearances and things in themselves, Kant’s relationship to Cartesian epistemology, the refutation of idealism, and not least his theory of synthesis. My aim is not only to show that Kant is a phenomenalist, but also to characterize the kind of his phenomenalism.

La présente thèse a pour objet l’étude d’une partie du vocabulaire hobbesien, que nous définirons ici comme lexique de l’ "apparence". Par le terme d’apparence, que nous utilisons en tant que catégorie conceptuelle, nous nous référons à la problématique philosophique, typique des XVIe-XVIIe siècles, qui met en lumière une conscience nouvelle de la nature de la perception sensible. L’apparence montre, d’un côté, l’existence réelle et objective d’un monde en mesure de déterminer la sensibilité ; de l’autre, la conscience que nos représentations ne nous livrent pas un portrait fidèle du monde. La réflexion de Hobbes s’insère à l’intérieur de ce contexte: considérant la sensation comme le stade initial de la connaissance, dont dérive l’entière vie psychologique du sujet, le philosophe réduit nos représentations à des apparences qui n’ont aucune réalité en dehors de notre esprit. Cette conception détermine l’utilisation d’une terminologie particulière dont Hobbes se sert pour traiter le complexe thème de l’apparence des phénomènes. Notre travail se propose de reconstruire la réflexion hobbesienne sur une telle problématique en privilégiant une approche de type lexicographique, fondée sur la vérification des occurrences et concordances (publiées dans le vol. 2), mais aussi conceptuel, à travers les entrées répertoriées à cet effet. La méthodologie choisie est celle d’un examen des écrits de Hobbes mené dans un sens diachronique, en partant du principe qu’il s’agit là de la seule façon de vérifier la modulation des entrées dans leurs différents contextes (de la physiologie de la vision au rêve) tout en éclairant la pertinence par rapport à Hobbes du thème de phénoménisme. / This thesis aims at studying part of Hobbes’s vocabulary, that I define «lexicon of appearance». The word ‘appearance’, used as a conceptual category, refers to the philosophic problematic, greatly debated in the XVIth and XVIIth century, that highlights a new conscience of the nature of the sensitive perception. On one hand, the image appearance shows the real and objective existence of a world capable of defining sensitivity. On the other hand, it shows us that our representations do not always portray a faithful image of the world. Hobbes’s theory fits perfectly in this context: by considering sensitivity as the initial phase of our knowledge, by which our whole psychological life derives from, he reduces our representations into ‘appearances’ that only exist in our mind.This conception determines the use of a particular terminology that Hobbes uses to deal with the complex theme of the appearances of phenomena. This thesis aims at reconstructing Hobbes’s reflection by favouring a lexicographic approach, checking the material elements (occurrences and concordances, published in Vol. 2) aswell as the conceptual aspects of the entry words. The methodology chosen focuses on examining Hobbes’s lexicon in a diachronic fashion. I will assume that this is the only way to verify the words’ variations in the different contexts (from physiology of vision to dream) and highlight, at the same time, Hobbes’s relevance to ‘phenomenalism’.

While Berkeley's position on the materialism of the world is undoubtedly idealistic, Leibniz's position is somewhat problematic: in metaphysical texts, he seems to be an idealist, while in texts concerned with natural philosophy and physics, he seems more like a dualist similar to Aristotle. We will even see that Leibniz wants to be both an idealist/phenomenalist and a realist. Moreover, in his remarks to Berkeley, he criticizes Berkeley's idealism and his rejection of matter. The aim of this paper is to map Leibniz's idealistic position, compare it with Berkeley's, and decide whether Leibniz's objections to Berkeley are justified and whether their positions are any similar