tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26951738.post7388174974904119891..comments2024-03-25T11:49:21.281-07:00Comments on The Splintered Mind: Science Fiction as PhilosophyEric Schwitzgebelhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11541402189204286449noreply@blogger.comBlogger9125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26951738.post-52283858119182925302019-06-06T05:57:05.386-07:002019-06-06T05:57:05.386-07:00Thanks, Bence! I’ve read a bit on this (esp Nussb...Thanks, Bence! I’ve read a bit on this (esp Nussbaum) but I plan to read more this summer as I get ready to write the intro to an anthology I’m co-editing with Helen De Cruz and Johan De Smedt, Philosophy Through Science Fiction Stories. Your article looks right up my alley.Eric Schwitzgebelhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16274774112862434865noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26951738.post-33111186708682840892019-06-06T00:45:48.371-07:002019-06-06T00:45:48.371-07:00Eric, this is a big topic in aesthetics (can liter...Eric, this is a big topic in aesthetics (can literature count as genuine philosophy) - see my own contribution to that debate here: https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/pdf/10.1111/jaac.12033Bence Nanayhttp://uahost.uantwerpen.be/bence.nanaynoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26951738.post-2436738390980568492019-05-31T07:54:55.777-07:002019-05-31T07:54:55.777-07:00" I'm not sure about the characterization..." I'm not sure about the characterization of rationality as binary and discrete..."<br /><br /><br />I think you conflate reasoning and rationality as being the same thing. Maybe you should do a post on it someday. There is an ontological distinction separating reasoning from rationality, and it's a big one. In short, I liken rationality to the famous phrase: The pen is mightier than the sword, and I liken reasoning to the phrase: The pencil is mightier than the pen because it has an erasure. <br /><br />Reasoning is a continuous linear system that is passive, and that passivity it what makes it linear. As soon as reasoning reaches a conclusion and rules on that decision, it is no longer passive reasoning, it becomes rationality, because that active action of ruling creates an intellectual construct which has a beginning, i.e. discreteness. Because reasoning is a linear continuous system reasoning can be understood as power, and the discrete binary system of rationality is the expression of that power.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26951738.post-79199328955029355622019-05-31T04:40:27.417-07:002019-05-31T04:40:27.417-07:00Thanks for the continuing comments, folks!
chinap...Thanks for the continuing comments, folks!<br /><br />chinaphil: That seems like a helpful way of thinking -- though maybe things are somewhat less tidy underneath, since fiction can also be a kind of argumentative or quasi-argumentative persuasion, yes?<br /><br />Lee: I'm not sure about the characterization of rationality as binary and discrete, but I like your thought that in both explicit argumentation and fiction the new idea is evaluated against a background of what is already known (or assumed) -- and that fiction usually is somewhat friendlier, in a way, to ideas that contrast with that background.<br /><br />Anon: Yes! Ted Chiang is one of my favorite writers!Eric Schwitzgebelhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16274774112862434865noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26951738.post-41913940524783018642019-05-30T13:33:24.891-07:002019-05-30T13:33:24.891-07:00Fantastic post. If you have not already read it, T...Fantastic post. If you have not already read it, Ted Chiang's <i>Story of Your Life</i> is an amazingly thought-provoking short story on Free Will, Determinism, Causation and the perception of time. I can't think of a better piece of sci-fi to start students thinking about some of these topics. Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26951738.post-51780297070102000152019-05-30T07:46:40.876-07:002019-05-30T07:46:40.876-07:00The real problem lies with rationality. Rationali...The real problem lies with rationality. Rationality is a discrete binary system wherein the multiplicity of the appearances which make up our phenomenal realm are contrasted against each other to formulate meaning of some kind. When a new idea is presented, rationality takes that unknown and contrasts it against what it already known to see how it conforms to the current paradigm. The current model is therefore the reference point by which anything new is contrasted against. If a new ideas does not correspond to the current model of how one perceives the world, there is no other reference point with which to make a correlation, so things that are new and unknown are easily dismissed. <br /><br />Fictional narratives provide more of a benign environment where the new idea, which is an unknown is at least entertained, wherein dialectic is a more hostile environment. Neither platform is an effective venue unless one is at least willing to entertain a new, otherwise unknown concept. Entertainment and fantasy opens an otherwise closed and extremely defensive mind to new, otherwise unknown concepts.Anonymousnoreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26951738.post-77035871535080891652019-05-30T00:59:34.041-07:002019-05-30T00:59:34.041-07:00I think you can break it down into creation and ar...I think you can break it down into creation and argumentation. Philosophy does stuff with ideas, either figuring out how they fit together (argumentation) or making new ones (creation). And the creating of new ideas can be done in a lot of different ways, of course including narrative.<br /><br />I wonder if the problem with argumentation for changing minds is that most people actually know the arguments. They may not know how to explain or express their disagreement with certain arguments (because it's difficult!), but they have heard and processed them. It takes a genuinely new idea (which might come from a story, movie, experience, dream, or philosophy book) to rearrange what they think.chinaphilhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/14572591745611690731noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26951738.post-50985821960439455912019-05-28T07:18:17.541-07:002019-05-28T07:18:17.541-07:00Yes, Eric -- I've been thinking a lot about th...Yes, Eric -- I've been thinking a lot about the extent to which philosophical arguments can change people's minds, and under what conditions. With Chris McVey, I've been thinking about the extent to which narrative might be more powerful as a mind-changer.Eric Schwitzgebelhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/16274774112862434865noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-26951738.post-67969875386987251662019-05-25T18:13:41.173-07:002019-05-25T18:13:41.173-07:00Thank you for this post. I was recently talking wi...Thank you for this post. I was recently talking with a new graduate student who I had as a (very promising) undergraduate student. He was telling me that he might want to quit because argument isn't a very good way to get people to change their minds. That might be true, and it is also true that in graduate school it makes a lot of sense to require people to develop the ability to craft and defend arguments, but philosophy is not the same thing as argument, and recognizing that basic fact is very important. It is the love of wisdom, and it seems to me as clear as anything can be that wisdom and argument are not the same thing. <br /><br />And though there are arguments in Nietzsche, there is also, as you suggest, a great deal of philosophical insight delivered nonargumentatively!<br /><br />That is a great episode of Star Trek! Another movie I find valuable in phil mind: Ex Machina.<br /><br />Eric Campbellhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02062516206539344271noreply@blogger.com