Mental causality cannot be reduced to physical causality - Location 2217ish !!!!!

“As the perspectives of psychology and natural science were radically

different and not translatable into one another, psychology could not

allow for the possibility that a physical cause could bring about a

mental effect, or that a mental cause could bring about a physical effect.

This stricture was Wundt’s principle of ‘psychophysical parallelism’,

which held that, although physical and psychological causal chains ran

parallel to one another, they were neither identical, nor even comparable

(Wundt 1894:36; Mischel 1970:10).”

he conditions of mental reciprocity produce new and specific

expressions of general mental forces, expressions which cannot be

predicted on the basis of knowledge of the properties of the

individual consciousness… And thus it takes both individual

psychology and Völkerpsychologie to constitute psychology as a

whole.

(Wundt 1908b:227)

Moreover, Wundt

adopted a view of philosophy according to which it was neither the

foundation of, nor the ultimate arbiter between, the sciences. Instead,

philosophy was to be ‘inductive’, i.e. tied to the scientific knowledge of

its time, and the role of the arbiter was reserved for the new science, psychology.

Brentano – observation of inner mental phenomena impossible, but inner perception is possible 2320

Avenarius and Mach rejected the metaphysical dualism

between the mental and the physical, claiming that ‘experience’

(Erfahrung) showed no such division….

. They demanded that psychological explanations

be based on physiological principles, and that mentalistic concepts—that

is, concepts presupposing the notion of an acting ego-subject—be

excluded from psychology.

Wundt accused Husserl not only of psychologism but also of

‘logicism’ (Logizismus), that is of an attempt to turn psychology into a

subdomain of logic.

CLASS begins

What is the strong program?

Get away from the sociology that explains deviations

Latour presents strong program as being totally socially constructivist.

He makes them appear as if the only reason they believe x is the case is, b/c of that and that social causes.

Latour’s approach is not neutral towards the results, for him what matters is who succeeds. He doesn’t observe controversies objectively.

Kusch draws from Latour, but in a very selective way.

He takes from latour that it’s about enrolling other actors to your cause (baska birsey de dedi)

He says it’s ultimately about rhetorics.

When talking about frege- Husserl, he doesn’t mention numbers when explaining why Husserl won and not Frege.

-most neurophilosophers do not run their own labs

Not true for Dennett, Searle, Metzinger etc.

They’re coming out of analytic philosophy, of Fregean heritage.

Part of their epistemic culture cannot be explained by the tools we developed in the laboratory s tudies.

We haven’t fleshed out why we think….

Kusch wrote Fuko’s Strata and Fields

Kusch’s approach is basically a critical approach.

That’s why latour keeps arguing that critic has run out of steam.

It’s more of a constructive than a critical approach, doesn’t aim to destabilize sth in a big way.

If u wanna make a strong case u don’t wanna have human agents involved….

…anyway latour vs the strong program debate is in the background

The relationship btw analytic philosophy, and it’s relationship to the history of philosophy, and Kusch’s take on this.

Analytic philosophy, basically philosophy and the history of philosophy are different things.

Hubert Dreyfus – student of Husserl-Heidegger rejection of psychologism, external phd thesis member

When u read latour- why critic is running out of steam piece, the moment critical sociology comes in, it’s about showin g how irrational you are etc.

Bert dreyfus responds to this, bourdieu – political onthology of Heidegger.

Dreyfus says whether he’s nazi or not doesn’t have to do w/ whether he’s got the hammering right.

You’re a universalist, you go and say natives that they’re wrong.

Gadamer – hermeneutic process , no foundation other than the dialogue. Common horizon is being established.

Habermas: hermeneutics works as long as there is no interference, like either a neurosis or as

Which has to do w/ the fact that objectivity is about intersubjectivity when push comes to show.

Latour has this idea of anthropology as some form of diplomacy enterprise.

That’s where he diverges from good naturalists who hold that truth is settled by the facts.

The symmetricality thing

Strong program in the ssk cannot be objective

To what extent are their books self-refuting?

Both end their books by (kusch and …) acknowledging their partiality.

Objectivity is more like a regulative ideal. It’s not like anyone has ever been objective.

Interesting thing happening towards the end of the books, in the 1920s, phenomenology wins the struggle, and oalso in the larger context of Lebensphilosophie

That goes along w/ the anti-intellectual atmosphere of Weimar Republic.

Lebensphilosophie is all about experience but not about experiment. (or vice versa?check)

Fieldwork as paradigmatic method of anthropology … w/ Lebensphilosophie.

Kultur vs civilization, and the emphasis on life. There is some alienating moment, where u think, in a way that sets the ground.

Is anthropology today an anti-intellectual sphere, in USA ?

What is at stake here is time and again logics and mathematics.

What about psychology of mind?

Maybe psychologism is not as much a sin in that domain as it is somewhere else.

One of the def.s that come up when you look at rebineu’s work on fieldwork in philosophy?

If you don’t wanna dictate that model where philosophy dictates the question and the fieldworker goes and does the dirty job, then who comes up w/ philosophical questions?

In neurophilosophy, some ppl perceive themselves as analytic philosophers but analytic philosophers don’t wanna include them.

They say things like, the problem w/ analytical philosophy is, they prematurely try to define concepts while they’re lacking empirical data.

It’s a virtue to be imprecise as long as there is a lack of precision in the data.

Wundt- volkpsychology thing

A figure who is at the origins of anthropology and there is experimental psychology which turns into neurophilosophy and cognitive neuroscience.

There are certain psychological phenomena that cannot be studied well in experimental setting and that require social”? setting.

And then from there on it breaks apart.

In the next session the challenge is to weave them back together.