Power Structuralism in Ancient Ontologies

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.

Howard Robinson gives a talk on philosophy and the role of the intellect Abstract: First, I will consider Jaworski’s interesting recent attempt to defend hylomorphism, understood as the irreducible and the causal efficacy of structure. I shall reject this as unsuccessful, then try to see where this leaves us. I shall develop what I’ll dub the ‘radically dualist’ option, according to which the fundamental physical level and the mind are the only fundamental levels. This will involve looking at different interpretations of the question ‘are there any Fs?’ – roughly, the realist and conceptualist interpretations. I shall then look at how this relates to the Aristotelian/Wigginsian treatment of our common-sense ontology, especially the reality of biological entities

Anna Marmodoro gives a talk on Aristotle and his philosophy Aristotle draws a distinction between qualities that are perceptible via a single sense only, the special sensibles, and qualities that are perceptible by more than one sense at once, the common sensibles. What are the ontology and the epistemology of the common sensibles, in light of Aristotle’s assumption that each sense organ is sensitive to only its own special sensibles? Does the problem of common sensibles give us reasons for giving up a ‘separatist’ view of sense experiences? Or rather can it be solved by postulating extra perceptual powers for the senses? Are more ‘parsimonious’ options viable? In this paper I engage with these and related questions, which have attracted the interest of Aristotelian scholars (Gregoric 2007, Johansen 2012) and philosophers of the mind (Tye 2007) alike. I offer my own reading of Aristotle’s account and examine its philosophical viability.

Rory Madden, Lecturer in Philosophy at University College London, gives a talk about animate organisms for the Power Structuralism in Ancient Ontologies Project. Rory argues - against prevailing opinion in the contemporary personal identity debate - that intuitive verdicts about cerebrum-transplant and brain-in-a-vat cases are consistent with the thesis that we are fundamentally biological organisms of a certain kind.

Professor Richard Sorabji, Wolfson College Oxford, gives a talk on freedom and responsibility as part of the series 'Talks on Powers, Structures and Relations in Ancient Philosophy'.

Peter Simons, Professor of Philosophy, Trinity College, Dublin, gives a talk as part of the series 'Metaphysics of Powers, Causation and Persons'. A process ontology (Heraclitus, Whitehead, Rescher) takes spatiotemporally extended events and processes as primary entities, enduring things as secondary. A factored ontology (Empedocles, Aristotle, Ingarden) investigates the non-entities in virtue of which there is categorial diversity in the world. Their combination purports to be a grounded universal ontological framework. As such it has not only to account for appearances but also to offer satisfactory solutions to known metaphysical difficulties such as the nature of causation, the status of spacetime, the regularity of the universe, the role of structure, and the emergence of mind. This talk will outline such an ontology and consider how far it does and can meet such desiderata.

Mechanisms are at centre-stage right now in philosophy of science, especially in discussions of causal explanation and causal inference. For instance Jon Williamson and Frederica Russo argue that experimental and correlational evidence is not enough, evidence for the generating mechanism is required as well for solid causal inference. Nancy Cartwright endorses their view in this talk.

John Heil, Professor of Philosophy, Washington University in St Louis, gives a talk on Cartesian Transubstantiation. According to the received view of the metaphysics of the Eucharist endorsed by the Catholic Church after the thirteenth century, sacramental bread and wine are 'converted' into Christ's body and blood (this is transubstantiation), but the accidents of the bread and wine remain on the altar inhering in no substance. Such a view is difficult to square with Aristotelian physics, but much more difficult to reconcile with the physics of Descartes. Two ill-fated attempts by Descartes to provide an account of transubstantiation consistent with his conception of the material universe are discussed in the context of a broader discussion of related metaphysical issues.

Professor Jim Hankinson, University of Texas at Austin, gives a talk for the Power Structuralism in Ancient Ontologies project.

Jeff Brower, Associate Professor of Philosophy, Purdue University, gives a talk explaining the key differences between Aristotelian and more contemporary theories of relations.