- Oct 2024
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Once this is realized, we begin to appreciate that reasons similar to those which ledPereboom to consider moral responsibility incompatible with determinism also provide us with reasons to considermeaningfulness incompatible with determinism
This isn't true- we can still find objective meaning in good deeds. In fact, many believe good deeds must have objective meaning, they must have intrinsic value. Good deeds done through manipulation still count as good deeds.
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for an agent to be morally responsible for an action is just for the action to really belong to the agent.
In the case of Tom, someone fulfills this requirement that isn't Tom.
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The reason for this is that meaningfulness requires deep attributability in a way that is inconsistentwith the relevant features of the agent’s life being determined entirely by factors beyond his control.
This may very well be true, but his example does not fully exhibit this since there will always be an agent responsibly for actions, just may be the actions of others.
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Importantly, wecannot construct an analogous case in which an agent’s life is rendered meaningful purely by factors beyond thatagent’s control.
what about committing good deeds by accident? What about cases of a martyr- someone (uncontrollably dies due to intervention by another, and this wrongful death caused a huge civil rights movement- example George Floyd. Despite what anyones political values may be, it's undeniable the the death of George Floyd sparked the reimergence and growth of the BLM movement. Floyd had no control over the factors surrounding his death, yet I think anyone would consider this life meaningful in a sense.
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Due to the covertmanipulation of Tom’s life, the features in virtue of which we were inclined to judge Tom’s life meaningful do notappear to be deeply attributable to Tom in the appropriate way. And absent such deep attributability, Tom’s life is nolonger correctly seen as meaningful.
However, they are attributable to a third party. So Tom's life wouldn't be meaningful for Tom, but it would be meaningful to the team making Tom's decisions. So for an objection to determinism, this example is invalid because determinism doesn't claim that our life choices are determined by virtue of another (who would be able to take responsibility), but by virtue of circumstance, which is void of responisbility.
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if Tom’s life lacks meaningfulness in [this case], then all lives will lack meaningfulness in adeterministic world
If this is true, then technically we would all be controlled by scientists given the comparison. But if that were true that we were all controlled by scientists, it wouldn't really be us who considered the meaningfulness of life- it would be the scientists. I don't think the scientists would have us believe in the meaninglessness of their project as it would go against their best interest.
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Tom’s viewing of his own life as meaningful mightbe a necessary condition for it being meaningful, but it is not sufficient.
but, as suggested by Pisciotta, Tom's life isn't really HIS own, therefore the stipulation that his own view of HIS life is not sufficient is irrelevant because there's no life of his own to feel satisfied with.
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Tom would cease to see his life as meaningful.Crucially, I think Tom would cease to see the life he has lived as his in any important sense; and seeing the life ashis would appear to be a prerequisite for viewing it as meaningful
VERY IMPORTANT PASSAGE
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What was once for Tom a source of pride and satisfaction would cease to be so.
not because pride and satisfaction would be invalid due to determinism, but because these senses should be alotted elsewhere- the scientists.
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Instead, you acknowledge that you were the agent ofwrongdoing, you feel genuine sorrow for what you have done, and you deeply regret havingacted as you did. Moreover, because you are committed to doing what is right and to your ownmoral improvement, you resolve not to act in this way in the future. None of these measureswould be threatened
they would be if determinist Tom was true since one could blame the third party
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Suppose a friend repeatedly mistreats you, and in consequence you decide to endyour relationship with him. But he then apologizes to you, indicating his recognition that hisactions were wrong, a wish that he had not mistreated you, and a commitment to refrain from theimmoral behavior. Because of this you decide retain the friendship. In this case, the aspect offorgiveness that is consistent with hard incompatibilism is a willingness to cease to regard pastimmoral behavior as a reason to weaken or end a relationship
In the case of Determinist Tom, this would be invalid because since Tom's actions are being controlled by others, he has no real control over mending his past mistakes.
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- Sep 2024
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Her response is imagined, though the felicitousness of thatimagination is often called into question
the novel leaves all female perspectives to the imagination, it allows it to not a voice of its own- a passive role.
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Storiesand assertions circulate and are exchanged – most dramatically between thecreature and his creator – but none have the impact of those accompanied by afemale corpse
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hat we witness instead is the apparently seamlesstransmission of narrative from one speaker to another.
noting that theyre all male narratives. Never gives voice to the female perspective.
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What is it that is said through thedismemberment of the female body?
Victor reacts to losing control over the male creature by seizing it in one of the only ways he can over the woman. By destroying her he is controlling her.
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both as womenand defective subjects in terms of the experiment, they are discarded and thrown intothe river.
i think his also embodies how women are tossed aside if they are not seen as "useful" to their male counterpart's ideal vision. (exemplified in the Catholic church, a valid reason for divorce is if a women cannot produce children, reducing her to her reproductive ability).
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and therefore monstrous
women seen as monsterous when they stopped conforming to the view of the ,ale gaze/ when the cease doing what is expected of them (i.e. childbirth)
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- Apr 2024
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Muslims should be treated as free men, not as slaves
I believe this to be an inherent property of Islamic society, but not the overarching goal of it. As we've discussed a good portion of Arabic philosophy stems from translation of Aristotle. While he values political science as the highest good and notes the importance of political freedom, I believe it is his concept of philia that is the center of the Islamic political world. I think achieving political freedom is ensured in the cultivation of philia in a society. Philia holds the notion that we should all treat another as if we are a friend. Rather than just random faces on the street, applying philia makes society more interpersonal. In order to treat someone like a friend, a true friend, equality of persons is required. One could not apply philia to someone they treat like a slave. Political freedom is not necessarily the goal, but an ensured outcome in reaching for the goal of cultivation of philia. Ultimately, I think the goal of Islamic society is to be a virtuous one, under aristotle's definition and conditions. Respecting other's political freedom is simply one aspect of that.
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motivated
motivation counts as a felt emotion
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A being is a welfare subject only if it hasintrinsic desires.
i reject this on the grounds that a being doesn't need consciousnessness in order to have an emotional response to its environment.
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On his view, which he calls motivationalsentientism, a being has welfare and moral status only if it has the right kind of consciousness torationally motivate action.
I disagree with this. A being doesn't have to be rationally motivated necessarily in order for it to be happy as a reaction to life and sad as a reaction to death.
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I value for their own sake,including the pleasures of eating steak or thinking about philosophy
might not have to be conscious to show this pleasure or displeasure. If one ate rotten food they could be displeased by it and spit it out instinctively without being conscious of it directly.
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Indeed, we may even suppose that they feel indifferent to their own continued existence
It is under these grounds that a creature is not a wellfare subject with no moral status.(For a conscious being)
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Crucially, however, they areincapable of affective experience of any kind
If blobs are incapable of emotional feeling then they are not wellfare subjects.
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Ihave no dispute with the claim that consciousness has intrinsic value in something like the way thatunconscious life does.
i agree with this
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If so, then we are in fullagreement. In a world without consciousness, nothing has value in this restricted sense: nothing isgood or bad for anyone, so nothing is morally good or bad
no
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is it true that all value is grounded inconsciousness
no
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o unconscious beings are welfare subjects.Zombies may have value for conscious beings like us, but their lives have no value for them
I disagree with this on some occasions. As long as a being has ability to feel emotions it, their lives have value. they just might not be aware of this value.
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consciousness
emotion
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If a creature has no capacity forconsciousness, nothing can be good or bad for it from its own perspective
however, i hold that a creature doesn't need a consciousness in order to have something go good or bad for it. There are also things that are good or bad for something from an objective point of view. Starvation would be objectively bad for any living creature, while as living is universally good for one.
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Indeed, I’ll argue that Vulcans have no moral status at all
i disagree as they have the capacity to feel emotion. This moral status , however, is lesser than a human's.
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The plausible suggestion here isthat being a welfare subject is what gives you moral status in the first place. Following Chalmers, then,let’s assume that all and only welfare subjects have moral status
i agree. i also hold that each of these can be held in certain degrees. One welfare subject can have more or less moral staus than another, this is in relation to having greater degrees of wellbeings.
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f you switch tracks, it will kill five nonconscious zombies
if these zombies exhibit signs of being scared in this situation, perhaps shaking or moving erratically, then i hold it would be wrong to kill them. However, their capacity for emotion is lesser than the human's because they can experience and be self-aware of this capacity. Because they can feel their emotions on a deeper level, they have greater moral status than the zombies.
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Vulcans have moral status
vulcans, on my view, have wellbeing, however this wellbeing is in proportionate to their capacity for emotion. Humans have more wellbeing, or more complex wellbeing, than vulcans because they have greater capacity for emotion and can also experience this.
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Feelings of desire and emotion represent their objectspositively or negatively just like feelings of pleasure and displeasure
I'd like to hold that emotions need not be positively or negatively valanced, there can be neutral emotions. Emotions are often responses to stimuli, and if one is responding to a neutral stimuli, then i believe the emotion caused can be neutral as well. For example, curiosity doesn't always need to be positively or negatively valanced. If it is curiosity of the unknown, not enough information may be available to the subject to form a positive or negative valance.
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Fred Feldman (1988) gives theexample of an injured motorcyclist who feels pleased that he survived his accident, although he hastaken a powerful anesthetic that prevents him from feeling any sensations at all. When we imagineVulcans, it is not enough to imagine creatures who are incapable of sensory
lets take feldman's example and modify it. suppose this is an unconscious zombie similar to a human in every other way physically. It can do any physical action a human can do. The zombie has the same accident as the motorcyclist in the example. Before the accident, the zombie went through life exhibiting behavior that was neutral in every way, showing no sign of pleasure of displeasure in any sense or at any period of time. After the accident, even if the zombie has no physical sensation, it exhibits behavior that shows it is pleased with life. Even if this behavior is as simple as walking around with a smile on the zombies face, or senselessly humming a joyful tune, it shows taking pleasure in life.
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it is vulnerable to the sameobjection that Chalmers raises against Singer’s view: namely, that it wrongly excludes conscious beingswho are incapable of affectively valenced consciousness of any kind
wrongly excludes other beings who are not conscious but still have complex lives and felt emotions
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Meanwhile, no unconscious being has any degree of moral status no matter how complexits life might be in other ways.
disagree
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Inclusive Sentientism: A being has moral status if and only if it has the capacity forconsciousness
reject this too
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Without conscious perceptionand conscious thought, these things would be impossible. Speaking for myself, however, I can see nowelfare value in conscious thought or perception per se
consciousness + autonomy, consciousness without autonomy or bodily control we would not value conscious experience as much.
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Blobs can be damaged or destroyed, but they cannot be harmed or wronged.
do blobs have any moral significance then? would it be better to kill 1 blob for 5 zombies? standards for moral significance.
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docdrop.org docdrop.orgUntitled10
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The questionisnot,Canthey reason?,norCantheytalk? but,Canthey suffer?”
i agree with this
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(DoestheVulcanhaveadesiretokeepon living?
if something can have desires, want or not want to do something, if it has autonomy, it has moral status.
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They mightevenwanttobuildafamilyormakemoney.They experiencenopleasurewhenanticipatingorachiev-ingthesegoals,butthey valueandpursuethegoalsallthesame,
might not have positive or negative affective states, (which to me are kinds of emotion), but does still have capacity to feel emotion, as descibed. The fact that they want to do something shows they feel desire for one thing over the other. Desiring, or wanting something, counts as a instinctive feelings, therefore it counts as an emotion. (therefore vulcans are wellfare subjects) I also think this description of wants and desires is contradictory to the above premises set. if they experience desire i think that entails an experience of a positive affective state. desire has been described, given by a seperate philosopher, as having a 'pro attitude' towards somthing.
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Notjustanysortofconsciousness bestows moralsta-tus;theconscious experienceofpositiveornegativeaffectivestatesisrequired.
these "affective states" are emotions, singer values conscious experience of them however I value them intrinsically for the sake of wellbeing. Doesn't matter if one can experience an affective state, of any kind, as long as it has the capacity for different affective states.
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fabeingisnotcapableofsuffering,orofexperiencingenjoy-mentorhappiness,thereisnothingtobetakenintoaccount.Thisiswhythelimitofsentience(usingthetermasaconvenient,ifnot strictlyaccurate,shorthandforthecapacitytosufferorexperienceenjoymentorhappiness)istheonlydefensiblebound-aryofconcernfortheinterestsofothers.
I largely agree with this, however the only difference is I don't believe these emotions have to be experienced in order to matter to contribute to wellbeing/moral status.
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Ifacreaturehasnocapacityforconsciousness, nothingcanbegoodorbadforitfromitsownperspective.Andit’snaturaltoconcludethatifnothingisgoodorbadforacreature, thenthecreaturehasnomoralstatus.
this is a specific kind of consciousness though, valence consciousness. this kind of consciousness differs because of its pro or con attitudes. A pro or con attitude is an emotion by my definiton.
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Wheneveranythingisgoodorbadforsomeone,it’sbecauseoftheirconsciousness.
emotions*
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Others switch to killing the chicken,presumably because they think the zombies have some degree of moralstatus, perhaps deriving from their intelligent behavior.
unconscious emotional creatures may not experience emotion but still demonstrate emotional behavior.
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magine something as close to us as possible without thecapacity for consciousness.
(maybe quote this)- as long as zombies can feel emotions, they can have wellbeing. If, for the sake of the though experiment, these zombies are the closest thing to us without consciousness, then it's reasonable to think they can still have emotions. They lose the ability to experience these emotions like we do, but they can still feel certain things emotionally, like how we can experience emotions unconsciously.
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If it can experience something,that should be taken into account in our moral calculations.
my own view- if it can emotionally feel somethings it has wellbeing (therefore moral status)
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donot capture the huge number of criminal laws that do not involve anyindividual victim at all.
curriculum teaches a polarized view of an 'evil' crime, teaches how to prosecute and deal with the most extreme cases. This leads to overcriminalization. Less sever cases and proceedings are dealt with as if it's sever as homocide.
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Criminal lawforces us to wrestle with how we define and differentiate between differentdegrees of evil.”
inferring that all acts of crime are some kind of "evil"
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the conduct targetedby criminal law is exceptionally harmful or injurious;
villainization of criminals (Lefkowitz quote).
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According to this now-canonical model, the purposeof the field is to identify conduct sufficiently injurious to individuals or tosociety generally to warrant distinctive penalties, and to impose saidpenalties on those who engaged in such conduc
never prompted to question why distinctive penalties are the only option of punishment. Why punishment (not rehabilitation) is the assumed deserved response to crime.
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A system that is permeated with,and perhaps exists to perpetuate, racism. 144 A system that regularly
who's to say the enitre legal and prison system isn't the same in nature? what are some fundamental differences in principle or execution of this systems that would make one believe these injustices are not congruent.
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Even if Answer #2 is ninety-eight percent"right," the stubborn persistence of just a few of "the dangerous few"would still present the same dilemma for the abolitionist to confront.
rather than prisons, a form a rehabilitation could be the answer. Many drug addicts, addicts in general, are sent to rehab for rehabilitation. Regardless of how violent or severe the addiction is, Rehab is mean to rehabilitate and help these people rather than punish them for their choices and mistakes.
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- Mar 2024
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What does Descartes claim about this certainty of his whole system of physics at the endof the Principles?
laims that the certainty of his entire system of physics is grounded in the certainty of his metaphysical principles. Descartes believed that by establishing a firm foundation in metaphysics, he could build a system of physics that was equally certain and reliable.
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?
no.
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What sort of view does Elizabeth suggest would be preferable to Descartes’s?
a holistic monistic view approach rather than dualistic.
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Why does he bring up the quality of heaviness? (Consider also what Descartes says aboutheaviness in the Objections and Replies.)
Descartes brings up the example of heaviness to illustrate the difference between primary and secondary qualities. He argues that heaviness, as a primary quality, is an inherent property of objects that can be objectively measured and understood through mathematical analysis. However, the sensation of heaviness, as a secondary quality, is subjective and varies depending on the observer's perception and physiological state.(distiguishing between objective reality and sensory perceptions)
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What does he tell us about how these three primitive notions are best known?
introspection and a clear + distinct understanding. extension-sensory experiences + introspection. Thought- introspection and reflective counsciousness. union- inference + rational reflection. (introspection, sensory experience, and rational reflection.)
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Explain Descartes’s responses to Elizabeth’s worry:How are the three primitive notions part of his response?
mind and body interact through the union of their primitive notions (thought and extension). Although extension and thought are fundamentally distinct, their union allows for causal interaction. Descartes suggests that the pineal gland, located in the brain, serves as the point of interaction between mind and body. Through this union, mental states can influence bodily states and vice versa, without violating the laws of nature. 3 primitive notions: essense of body- extension, essense of mind- thoug, essence of mind+body- union (know these through intelelct, intellect + imagination, + sensation)
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Explain the problem about mind-body interaction which Elizabeth posed to Descartes.What problem does she see?
If the mind is distinct from the body and the two are seperate, how sre they connected and how could they interact? Says in order for mind to move the body there needs to be contact or extension present, which isn't possible since the mind is not extented and immaterial
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What does the following sentence mean: "The cause of an idea must have at least as muchformal reality as the idea has objective reality." How does Descartes use this principle toprove the existence of God in the third meditation?
Descartes then argues that, since he himself is a finite and imperfect being, he cannot be the cause of the idea of God. Therefore, the idea of God must have originated from a cause that possesses infinite formal reality—i.e., a perfect being that is God. Descartes concludes that the existence of God is necessary to explain the presence of the idea of God within human minds.
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What does the following sentence mean: "The cause of an idea must have at least as muchformal reality as the idea has objective reality." How does Descartes use this principle toprove the existence of God in the third meditation?
This is the third causal principle: the cause of the idea must be at least as perfect as what the idea represents. He uses this to prove God's existence by saying he has a clear and distinct idea of God as an infinitely perfect being. Therefore the cause of this idea must be infititely perfect, entailing Go'd existence.
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Why does Descartes bring up the wax in the second Meditation-- what is that argumentmeant to achieve?
The wax example shows how we do not come to know something through our senses. We see and percieve the wqx change form yet we know it's still wax- how? Through our intellect. Establishing we come to know things through intellect not perception.
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The cogito: "this pronouncement “I am, I exist” is necessarily true every time I utter it orconceive it in my mind"--what is D. trying to establish here, and how exactly does he do so?How does he carve out a new notion of mind in the process? Is sensation included in theCartesian mind? If so, how so?
descartes is establishing the I that we cannot doubt. By questioning the minds existence we are proving that it exists as a thinking thing. the mind is a thinking thing while the body is a sensing thing; soul is NOT made of something physical
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Ascending order of doubt in the first meditations (three main reasons for doubt given, eachof which throws more of our ordinary beliefs into doubt)-- what are the reasons and whatare their scope?
sensory doubt- our senses sometimes decieve us (optical illusion, wax ex) dreaming doubt- cant be certain that we arent in a dream rather than reality imperfect creator- cant be certain there isn't a deciever fabricating what we know through senses and even memories/ conceptual truths
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critical criminology is viewed asunable to explain the existence of those laws which provide equal protectionto all members of society, those laws seen to be irrelevant to the interests ofthe capitalist elite, and those laws inimical to the interests of the capitalistelite.
agree- but its a difference that doesn't make a difference. A majority of the laws privilege the privlieged so even with the few in place that value equality or equity, the end result of society remains the same.
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Critical criminology
marxist (or at least marxist adjacent)theory of law
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