Mental Functioning and the Ontology of Language Barry Smith Graz, July 21, 2012 .
Mental Functioning and the Ontology of Language Barry Smith Buffalo, September 24, 2012.
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Transcript of Mental Functioning and the Ontology of Language Barry Smith Buffalo, September 24, 2012.
2
Shimon Edelman’s Riddle of Representation
two humans, a monkey, and a robotare looking at a piece of cheese
what is common to the representational processes in their visual systems?
http://ontology.buffalo.edu/smith/book/austrian_philosophy/
Investigations in Ontology and
Psychology
with support from the Imperial-Royal Minister of Culture and Education in
Vienna, 1904
Bertrand Russell
It is argued, e.g., by Meinong, that we can speak about "the golden mountain," "the round square," and so on .... In such theories, it seems to me, there is a failure of that feeling for reality which ought to be preserved even in the most abstract studies. Logic, I should maintain, must no more admit a unicorn than zoology can”
from 1874 to 1914 Brentano controls Austrian philosophy
BrentanoVienna
MeinongGraz
EhrenfelsPrague
TwardowskiLemberg
Husserl Proßnitz
from 1874 to 1914 Brentano controls Austrian philosophy
BrentanoVienna
MeinongGraz
EhrenfelsPrague
TwardowskiLemberg
Franz Kafka
Husserl Proßnitz
Brentano revolutionizes psychology
Brentanopublished Psychology
from an Empirical Standpoint, 1874
Meinong Ehrenfelsfounder of Gestalt psychology, 1890
Husserl Twardowski
Wundt first laboratory of
experimental psychology, 1879
Brentanists revolutionize ontology
Brentano
MeinongOn the Theory
of Objects, 1904
EhrenfelsHusserl
first formal mereology, 1902
______
first use of ‘formal ontology’
~1905;
Twardowski
Leśniewskilogical
formalization of mereology,
1916
Brentanists revolutionize our understanding of the relations between psychology and
ontology
Brentano introduces in 1874 the idea of intentional directedness
(aboutness)
Meinong Ehrenfels Husserl Twardowski
how can we think about what does not exist?
Brentanists revolutionize our understanding of the relations between psychology and
ontology
Brentano introduces in 1874 the idea of intentional directedness
(aboutness)
Meinong Ehrenfels Husserl Twardowski
Stefan Schulz famous contributor to
zoology of unicorns
Brentanists introduce the problem of understanding the relation between intentionality and language
Brentano
Meinong Ehrenfels Husserlcategorial
grammar, 1901
Twardowski
Leśniewskifounder of
formal mereology
Tarski invents formal
semantics
“From Intentionality to Formal Semantics”Brentano
Husserl Twardowski
Leśniewskiformal
mereology
Tarski formal
semantics
Joseph Woodger Axiomatic Method in
BiologyPatrick Hayes
“Ontology of Liquids”…
Description Logics, OWL …
Brentanists revolutionize our understanding of the relations between psychology and language
Brentano
Meinong EhrenfelsHusserl
two kinds of aboutness: relational
Twardowski
3 Levels of Reality
Level L1: the level of reality e.g. in wounds, bacteria, on the side of the patientLevel L2: the level of cognitive representations of this reality, e.g. in beliefs, desires and other mental acts and statesLevel L3: the level of publicly accessible concretizations of L2 cognitive representations in information artifacts of various sorts, e.g. texts, databases, ontologies
Relations that a good theory of mind and language needs to deal with
• between uses of language and external objects
• among uses of language themselves• among mental phenomena• between uses of language and mental
phenomena
Relations that a good theory of mind and language needs to deal with
• between uses of language and external objects(a) between a referring use of an expression and its object (assuming that it has an object),(b) between the use of a (true) sentence and that in the world which makes it true,(c) between a used predicate and the object or objects of which it is predicated, and also, at least in certain cases, between this object and those of its parts and aspects in virtue of which the predicate holds,• among uses of language themselves, for example:(a) anaphoric relations, (b) relations between those acts (act parts) which are referring and those
which are predicating uses of expressions, (c) relations between successive uses of sentences in higher-order structures
such as narratives, arguments, conversations, and so on.
Relations that a good theory of mind and language needs to deal with
• among mental phenomena(a) between mental acts and underlying mental states (attitudes, beliefs)(b) between one mental act and another, e.g. an act of thought is fulfilled by an act of perception• between uses of language and mental phenomena(a) between my acts and states and those associated uses of language which are overt actions on my part, for example actions of promising or commanding,(b) between my mental acts and states and the overt actions (including utterances) of other subjects with whom I come into contact (relations of understanding, of communication)