mit department of linguistics and philosophy

 

INSTRUCTOR: Alex Byrne; 32-D929; 8-6106; abyrne@mit.edu.

TIMES AND PLACES: Tuesday 2-5; 32-D461.

GRADING: twenty page term paper.

BOOKS: It will be useful to have a copy of: Chalmers, The Conscious Mind, Ludlow et al., There's Something About Mary, Prinz, Gut Reactions, Thau, Consciousness and Cognition, Noë, Action in Perception, and Williamson, Knowledge and Its Limits.

ASSIGNED READINGS: either available via this page, or else in the 9th floor filing cabinet.

NEXT MEETING TUESDAY 5/15 2-5 32-D461 Reading: Magnus and Cohen, Williamson on knowledge and psychological explanation; Noe, Experience without the head

SYLLABUS This is an initial list of possible topics and readings. We certainly won't get to discuss everything, and deletions will be made in due course.

1. Mary

Ludlow et al., There's Something About Mary; Stalnaker's Whitehead lectures; selections from Thau, Consciousness and Cognition.

2. The Two-Dimensional Argument Against Materialism

Chalmers, The Conscious Mind, "The Two-Dimensional Argument Against Materialism"; papers by Block and Stalnaker, Yablo, etc.

3. Non-Conceptual Content

Papers by Brewer, Peacocke, Kelly, Heck, McDowell, etc.; selections from McDowell, Mind and World.

4. Perceptual Content

Papers by Peacocke, Siegel, Alston, Travis, etc.; selections from Thau, Consciousness and Cognition.

5. Emotion

Prinz, Gut Reactions.

6. Externalism, Primeness, Mental Causation

Williamson, Knowledge and Its Limits; Yablo, "Causal Relevance"; Stalnaker, "On What's in the Head", etc.

7. Neo-Gibsonianism, Perception and Action

Noë, Action in Perception; Block, review of Action in Perception.

8. Disjunctivism

Papers by Martin, Snowdon, Hinton, McDowell, Brewer, Thau, etc.; selections from Campbell, Reference and Consciousness

9. Stoljar's forthcoming Ignorance and Imagination

Stoljar's MS.

10. Mark Johnston's forthcoming Hempel Lectures

Johnston's MS.


URL: http://mit.edu/abyrne/www/24500.html
updated: 15 may 06