Power Structuralism in Ancient Ontologies

Mark Sinclair (Manchester Metropolitan) gives a talk for the Power Structualism in Ancient Ontologies series In Getting Causes from Powers, Steven Mumford and Rani Lil Anjum have argued that all dispositions are to be thought as tendencies or inclinations; that such tendencies or inclinations have a sui generis modality, irreducible to traditional ideas of necessity or possibility; and that we have direct experience of such inclinations in our subjective experience of agency. In this paper, I critically assess these arguments in the light of 19th-century French philosophy. I turn to the work of Pierre Maine de Biran and Félix Ravaisson in order to develop the claim that a particular and irreducible modality of dispositions is indeed available to us in subjective experience – but in the particular phenomena of habit rather than within agency in general. Ravaisson’s 1838 De l’habitude provides a phenomenology of habit as inclination and a metaphysics that makes the phenomenological fact of inclination intelligible; and both this phenomenology and this metaphysics, I contend, have much to teach contemporary work in the metaphysics of powers.

Claudine Tiercelin (Collège de France) gives a talk for the Power Structuralism in Ancient Ontologies series. Abstract 'I will examine the conditions of possibility and the nature of metaphysical “knowledge”: 1) as compared with other types (mathematical, physical, ethical, philosophical knowledge; 2) from the point of view of its methods (conceptual analysis, thought experiments, empirical intuitions, a posteriori inferences, economy of research); 3) in relation to other traditional models of knowledge itself (justified true beliefs, reliabilism, or various virtue epistemology based strategies). Relying on the views I have defended in Le Doute en Question, Le Ciment des Choses or more recently, in La connaissance métaphysique, I will argue that metaphysical “knowledge” can indeed be achieved, provided 1) it relies on conceptual analysis and on the continuous massaging of our folk intuitions, 2) it trusts the a posteriori results of science without indulging into some kind of naturalized or scientistic metaphysics, and 3) it still aims, within the framework of a basically pragmatist and realistic strategy of knowledge viewed as inquiry, at the fixation of true beliefs and at the determination of the real nature of properties and things. In so doing, we should be able to avoid both excessive boldness and excessive humility.'

Nick Denyer (Cambridge) gives a talk for the Power Structuralism in Ancient Ontologies podcast series Abstract: Stilpo engaged triumphantly in repartee with the great dialectician Diodorus Cronus, with the celebrated courtesan Glycera, with the king Demetrius Poliorcetes, and even with Poseidon and the Mother of the Gods. He also put his talents to use in devising consolatory arguments, to fortify us in the face of exile, bereavement, and unchaste daughters. In this talk, I will attempt to bring together the different aspects of Stilpo's intellectual activities: the guiding thread will be domination by superiority in argument. Those who wish to read up in advance will find the sources for Stilpo collected in two editions: Klaus Döring, Die Megariker (Amsterdam, 1972) 46-51, and Gabriele Giannantoni, Socratis et Socraticorum Reliquiae (Naples, 1990) i.449-468

Christopher Gill (Exeter) gives a talk on Marcus Aurelius' Meditations and asks How Stoic are They? Abstract: In this paper I address the longstanding question whether the Meditations present orthodox Stoic philosophy or a personal or eclectic selection of themes. In approaching this question I stress the importance of taking into account what seems to be Marcus’ core project in the Meditations (namely, promoting his own ethical self-development) and also of taking full note of the themes which recur most commonly in the work before focusing on the more exceptional and puzzling features. I suggest that Marcus’ core project in the work and many specific points made in the Meditations reflect key standard ideas in Stoic ethics, especially the distinctive account of development as oikeiōsis (Marcus, like us, seems especially familiar with Cicero’s presentations of this in de Finibus 3.17-22, 62-8). As in many other Stoic writings, the significance of the interface of ethics with logic/dialectic or physics is stressed by Marcus; standard themes that are evoked repeatedly include the ideal of wisdom as ‘dialectical virtue’ (D.L. 7.46-8 = LS 31 B) and the definition of the goal of life as bringing your daimōn into line with the rational direction of the whole (D.L. 7.88 = LS 63C(3-4)). Within this interface area, certainly, there are some unexpected motifs, including rather Platonic-looking mind-body dualism and (at least in a few cases) seemingly inappropriate use of the ‘providence or atoms’ disjunction. However, the best explanation for these features is, I think, premature or over-hasty moralisation within a fundamentally Stoic framework, rather than philosophical amateurishness or eclecticism.

Steve Makin, (Sheffield) gives a talk for the Power Structualism in Ancient Ontologies podcast series Abstract: Aristotle emphasises the role of habituation in our acquiring moral virtues, as well as other abilities. I discuss an independently engaging problem concerning the acquisition of abilities through practice, formulated in the context of Aristotle’s account of virtue development. The problem consists in a tension between two plausible claims, one [A] concerning what is required for an agent to be acting on a decision, the other [B] concerning the view a novice should have of whether they could ever possible be making the decisions required for moral development. I recommend a solution: the self-blind novice response. That solution implies that self-blindness should be pervasive among Aristotelian moral developers. And that implication is confirmed by the fact that the necessarily rare state of self-aware expertise is an important part of the Aristotelian virtue of magnanimity.

Richard Sorabji gives a talk for the Power Structuralism in Ancient Ontolgies podcast series

Stephen Butterfill gives a talk on philosophy and collective agency and other people's minds When friends walk together, they typically exercise collective agency. By contrast, two strangers walking side by side exercise parallel but merely individual agency. This and other contrasts invite the question, What distinguishes collective agency from parallel but merely individual agency? To answer this question, philosophers standardly appeal to a special kind of intention or structure of intention, knowledge or commitment often called ‘collective intention’. The idea is that exercises of collective agency stand to collective intention much as exercises of ordinary, individual agency stand to ordinary, individual intention. In this talk I shall use this parallel between individual and collective intention to argue that some forms of collective agency are grounded in representations and processes more primitive than those associated with collective intention. Collective agency is not always a matter of what we intend: sometimes it constitutively involves certain structures of motor representation. One consequence is concerns a role for collective agency in explaining knowledge of others’ minds. Reflection on what is involved in sharing a smile suggests that there is a route to knowledge of others’ mental states that is neither straightforwardly perceptual nor inferential but hinges on interaction

Mika Perala gives a talk on Aristotle's philosophy Aristotle states in the De Memoria et Reminiscentia that we have memories of individuals such as Koriscus. In line with this, he assumes in many contexts (e.g. logical and ethical) that we can make singular propositions on the basis of such perceptual states. However, commentators have been puzzled about whether singular propositions (and thoughts) can be given an adequate account in Aristotle’s psychological theory. The purpose of this paper is to argue that Aristotle’s account of thought admits of two kinds of singular thought: thought about an individual as an instance of a kind (‘This F is G’) and thought simply about an individual ‘a’, without the sortal concept F (‘a is G’). The difference between the two is that whereas the former requires knowledge of the kind (i.e. F) into which the singular item falls, or at least some sortal grasp of the individual in question such as through experience or the testimony of a knowledgeable person, the latter is simply based on, but cannot be identified with, sense perception, memory, phantasy or some other way of gaining non-sortal information about the individual. The view opposed is the Thomistic line of interpretation that, in Aristotle’s view, singular thought is to be understood as some sort of general thought, indirect or reflexive: general thought applied to a singular item given by a phantasm. The Thomistic view makes singular thought merely accidental and fails to give an adequate account of singular truth-claims.

Louise Fiona Richardson gives a talk on philosophy and perception It is beyond dispute that the senses interact. In this paper I will consider the way in which such interaction constrains thought about the senses, and in particular, thought about how they are distinguished from one another. I will consider two views of what it is to have a sense. On the first view, senses are systems. On the second, they are capacities. I will argue that on each view, the occurrence of different forms of multimodal perception rules out some views of how the senses are distinguished. The occurrence of perception not restricted to one sense does not, however, make it impossible to distinguish between the senses, either as systems or capacities. Neither does it make that distinction otiose. And whilst there is an explanatory penalty to be paid if one seeks to explain perception only one sense at a time, I will argue that given a plausible, defensible view of how to count perceptual experiences at a time, interaction between the senses does not show that it is illegitimate to talk of perceptual experiences belonging to one modality, at least whilst thinking of senses as capacities.

Jerome Dokic gives a talk on common sense and philosophy One of the functions of the common sense in Aristotle’s theory of perception is apparently to monitor the activity of our sensory modalities, and to make us aware that we see, hear, touch, taste, etc. However, the status of the common sense as a “second-order” perception, and its relationship to “first-order” perception (seeing, hearing, touching, tasting, etc.) remains to be clarified. On the one hand, numerous examples (involving perceptual certainty and uncertainty, perception of silence, darkness, and more generally absences) show that second order perception cannot be reduced to first-order perception. On the other hand, second-order perception can hardly be conceived as a form of meta-representational awareness, whether perceptual or theory-based. In this presentation, I shall suggest that the monitoring function of the common sense is best understood in relation with contemporary cognitive science research on meta-cognition. Common sense is a meta-perceptual ability which is distinct from both object level sensory perception and meta-representational knowledge about our senses.