On Imagination, Belief, and Action I was reminded recently of the importance of my book Mindsight (2004), because it brings the imagination into the center of the philosophy of mind.[1] In that book I make the point that belief presupposes imagination (chapter 10): for you can’t believe something without entertaining it first—imagining the state of […]
Action Explanation The orthodox view of action explanation goes as follows: a desire combines with a belief to cause a bodily movement; citing these explains the action in question.[1] I desire a beer and I believe that moving my body into the kitchen will get me a beer, and these together cause me to act […]
Imagination and Free Will Discussions of free will typically focus on bodily action, trivial or momentous. Is such action compatible with determinism? Is it free in the ordinary compatibilist sense? But that is not the only kind of action that can be described as free: there are also acts of the imagination. About this kind […]
On Trump, Nukes, and Satan The reason Trump gives for his war and threat of annihilation is that the Iranians are “sick” and “disturbed” people, i.e., insane. This is why they must never have a nuclear weapon, though other countries may, some of which are antagonistic towards us. The thought is that the Iranians are […]
Agency and Imagination The topics of agency and imagination are generally treated separately in contemporary philosophy, but they are closely connected. Imagination is implicated in agency and agency is part of imagination. This is not difficult to see: we often imagine what we intend to do, and imagining is an act in its own right. […]
Sexual Enticement in Academia (a Fable) Let’s consider a hypothetical case (I emphasize hypothetical). Suppose we live in a society in which a certain problem is perceived to exist in the universities—the problem of sexual enticement. The problem arises when a student, male or female, entices a professor, male or female, into a sexual relationship […]
Minimalism and Maximalism in Philosophy There are two broad tendencies in philosophy, which I will label minimalism and maximalism. Minimalism tends to minimize the number of entities and kinds in the world; maximalism tends to maximize them. The few versus the many. Occam’s razor characterizes the former tendency; the latter has no established metaphor, so […]
