Crash Course Philosopy

Lecture Notes

Abstract

This is a collection of my notes on the Crash Course - Philosophy on Youtube. A series of 47 lectures each covering a dedicated topic. It provides a contemporary overview of major topics in Philosophy and introduces fundamental questions with arguments.

What is Philosophy?

Crash Course - Philosophy ¹ — Art of philosophy…

• What? …think about questions
• Why? …deep wisdom, love of truth, virtuous living
• Kind of questions… (aspects not explained by science)
  • How, why do we think, learn, make decisions?
  • What is the nature of reality?
  • Is there a god? Do we have a soul?

Philosophy traditions in the east…

• Arabic/Persian …relation between reason and revelation
• Indian …enlightenment & nature of reality
• China …practical: social conduct, government, self-cultivation

Major fields of western philosophy…

• Metaphysics …nature of reality
• Epistemology …nature & scope of knowledge
• Value theory
  • Ethics …human condition — How to live?
  • Aesthetics …concept of beauty

How to Argue

Interlocutors = participants in dialog, debate, conversation

Aristotle …humans have a capacity to be rational

• Tripartite soul
  • …rational/logic — truth, facts, arguments
  • …spirited/emotional — feelings
  • …appetitive/desires — eat, sex, power
• Sound argument: premise + premise = conclusion
  • Deductive reasoning …based on true premisses
  • Inductive reasoning …based on past experiences to predict future
  • Abductive reasoning …conclusion based on explanation
• Reason should overcome emotions and desires
  • Logic …correct reasoning
  • Fallacy = Flaw in reasoning

Socrates …goal is to find truth …counter arguments …critical questioning

Nature of Reality

All we have to believe with is our senses: the tools we use to perceive the world, our sight, our touch, our memory. If they lie to us, then nothing can be trusted. And even if we do believe, then still we cannot travel in any other way then the road our senses show us; and we must walk that road to the end.

— American Gods, Niel Gaiman

Plato …question: really real vs think is real

• Mistake to believe: Material objects are the most real things
• Ordinary world shadow of a higher truth

Cartesian Skepticism

Rene Descartes = Skeptic …can anything be known with certainty

“I think, therefore, I am”

I am doubting! ⇒ I exist! — Thought requires a thinker

• Rotten ideas infect everything!
  • …disbelieve everything (temporarily) …examine possible believes
  • …accept those where there could be no doubt = only believe true things
• Empirical believes based on sense…
  • Local doubts based on sense experiences — What if everything is deception?
  • Global doubt = Radical skepticism — Idea of evil genius

Empiricism

Empiricism …response to skepticism — Nature of reality = Truth

• Empiricism …sense-experience most reliable source or knowledge
• Rationalism …reason (ideas) most reliable source of knowledge

Locke …“tabular rasa” = blank slate

• Knowledge obtained by experiences …we are born knowing nothing
• Tries to explain disagreement about our perception of the outside world …introduces distinction between:
  • Primary qualities: Qualities of physical objects (size, weight…)
  • Secondary qualities: Non-objective, just in our mind (color, taste…)

Berkley …primary & secondary qualities do not exist!

• Primary qualities not real …there is only perception
• Without perception nothing is existing …God is the ultimate perceiver
• Practically nobody gives up believe in reality

Meaning of Knowledge

Knowledge = justified true believe

• “believe” …propositional attitude of truth
• Justification based on evidence to support the believe
• Evidence based on …testimony …observation
• Differentiate…
  • Assertion = Linguistic act …declarative sentence …has truth value
  • Proposition = content of assertion (underlying meaning)
• True believe != Knowledge
  • We can have false believes, we can not have false knowledge
  • Cf. Gettier cases (1960s)

Science & Pseudoscience

Karl Popper …two types of sciences (probability vs contingency)

• Pseudoscience = Method to confirm believe
  • Locks backward to assert (think Sigmund Freud)
  • Irrefutable theories != science
• Science = Method to disconfirm believe
  • Uses past evidence to predict (think Albert Einstein)
  • Disproved by falls predictions — Genuine science tries to falsify
  • Modern science: testable, refutable, falsifiable

Argument for God

Theology ⇒ Assumes God exits — Faith ⇒ By definition unprovable

Philosophy of religion ≠ Belief

• …not the study of religions scriptures (for example the Bible)
• …not psychology or religious sociology

Ontological Argument

Ontology = Study of being

Anselm of Canterbury — Ontological argument for the exists of God…

• God ⇒ Best possible thing we can imagine …nothing greater can be conceived
• …thing can only exist in our imagination
• …things in reality always better than things in out imagination
• …imagined God less greater then real God
• ⇒ God must exists! …since God is the greatest conceivable thing

Predicate = Something that is said of another object

Objection: Immanuel Kant — Existence ≠ Predicate

John Wisdom — “The parable of the invisible gardener” (1944)

Cosmological Argument

Infinite regress = Chain of reason based on existence of something before it (no starting point)

Thomas Aquinas — 4x Cosmological argument

1. Argument from “motion”
   • Motion exits ⇒ First mover (God)
2. Argument from “causation”
   • Things are caused ⇒ First causer (God …itself uncaused)
3. Argument from “contingency”
   • Contingent being = Could have not existed
   • Necessary being = Can not not exist
   • ⇒ At least one necessary thing God
4. Argument from “degrees”
   • Need of a measuring stick …degrees of perfection
   • Something perfect must exist to measure against
   • ⇒ God is pinnacle of perfection

Counter arguments & fallacies…

• Does not establish existence of a particular God
• Does not rule out polytheism
• Does not prove sentient God
• Pre-assumption: No infinite regress exits
• Self-defeating: God exempt from the rules

Teleological Argument

Teleological = Explain something as a function of is purpose (goal oriented)

• Argument by analogy (inductive argument)
• For example: Clock requires clock maker …world requires world make (God)
• Hume argues: Flawed world ⇒ Flawed creator (can not be God)

Probability argument by Richard Swinburne — Intelligent Desgin

• Even if other possible explanations for the universe exist…
• …got with the most likely ⇒ More probable that God designed the world
• Chance & evolution unlikely to reach observable level of complexity

Fine-tuning argument ⇒ God setup the right conditions (for evolution)

Objection: Sample set one ⇒ No probability claim possible

What is God Like?

Omni-god (tradition of the old testament) has divine attributes:

• Omniscient …all-knowing
• Omnipotent …all-powerful
• Omnibenevolent …perfect goodness
• Omnitemporal …exists at all places
• Omnipresent …exists at all times

Not specifically described in the old scriptures bu implied

Objection: Internally inconsistent ⇒ Can not all be true at the same times

Example: Divine impeccability

Why is there evil?

Logic problem of evil (biggest problem of theism)

• Theists believe in omni-God
• Contradiction argument (by atheism)…
• …God should stop evil or God is not omni-God.

Theodicy = Existence of evil does not rule out God

• “The free will defense” …addresses moral evil …does not address natural evil
• Fiction: “The Brother Karamazov”, Dostoyevsky
• Soul-making theodicy — John Hick
  • Deliberate imperfect world (created by God)
  • …to test/develop human being
  • …evil required to understand good

Epistemic Responsibility

Responsibility regarding our beliefs, things you do…

W. K. Clifford — Do not believe anything upon insufficient evidence…

• …otherwise you act epistmemically and morally wrong
• Argument: Beliefs always spread ⇒ private beliefs do not exist
  • Our beliefs spread by interaction …talk, action and non-action
  • Unavoidable that beliefs influence others…
  • ⇒ We have a responsibility in what we belief and propagate
• Belief in God ⇒ blind faith…
  • …believer ignores facts and reasonable arguments
  • Faith ⇒ Unexamined & unthoughtful life

William James — Moral believes without evidence…

• Proposes to differentiate believes in following categories:
  • Live or dead, forced or unforced, and momentous or trivial
  • Momentous = Believes that change your life for the better
  • Argument: Believe with insufficient evidence permissible when…
  • …believe is life, forced and momentous

Objection: Basically allows any believe depending on the perspective

Philosophy of Religion

Question: Does God exist?

Pragmatism (Blais Pascal) = Finding true beliefs is less important then …finding beliefs that work practically

Pascal Wagner = Believe whatever has the greatest benefit

	God Exists	God Doesn’t
Belief	Heaven	Nothing
Disbelief	Hell	Nothing

• Objection: Implicates that…
  • …belief has an inherent benefit
  • …God does not care why we belief — “Fake it till you make it!”
• Response: Wagner sees belief as inherently beneficial, for example:
  • Death is not the end
  • Security of feelings
  • Ordered & meaningful world

Fideism (Sören Kierkegard) = Belief has to come from faith alone

• Belief entirely irrational (not done with brain)
• “Leap to faith” is mandatory

Teapot analogy (Bertrand Russell)

• Assertion can not be disproved ⇒ Intolerable assumption
• Philosophical burden of proof upon the person making the claim…
• …disprove does not need to be provided by others

Human Existence

Existentialism (Jean Paul Satre) = Humans exist to add existential properties

• Implies …no predetermined purpose ≠ Atheism
• Opposite ⇒ Essentialist (Aristotle & Plato) …believe that humans are born with purpose

Nihilism (Friedrich Nietzsche) = Believes in ultimate meaninglessness of life

Absurdity (Kierkegard & Nietzsche) = Search for answer in an answerless world

• Why? Humans need meaning
• Implies: No teleology, no absolute, no cosmic justice, no fairness, nor order, no rules

Freedom = No guidelines

• We need to design our own code …need to invent morality
• Live authentically = Meaning defined by yourself …authentic = valuer you choose to accept
• Bad faith = Refusal to accept absurd
• (Albert Camus) Literal meaning of live = Whatever prevents you from killing yourself

Perspective on Death

Death dreamless sleep or passage to afterlife (Socrates)…

• …either way, death is nothing to fear
• Implies ⇒ Cultivate mind, since it transfers to afterlife

No afterlife …just body & now (Epicurus)

• Death = Cessation of sensation
• Good & Evil …sensed in terms of sensation
• Implies ⇒ Death neither good nor evil

Materialist — You = Your body …death just non-existence

• Thomas Nagel: Death problem = FOMO (Fear of missing out)
  • Depends on your value of life
  • Sanctity of life vs quality of life
• Afraid of dying ≠ Afraid of death

Daoism (China) …death of others:

• Fear to be left behind/alone
• Why would you fear the inevitable?
  • Death just one more change
  • Death end of a great journey

Identity

Relation a thing bears only to itself — Whatever makes a thing uniquely what it is

Indiscernibility of identicals (Leibniz)

• Two things with exactly the same properties identical
  • Accidental properties = Traits that can be taken away
  • Essential properties = Core properties that define a thing
• Conflicts with existentialists believe that no essential properties exist
  • Heraclitus: Nothing is identical to itself = Everything changes all the time

Persistent identity — Fungibility …objects interchangeable with other object of the same kind

Personal Identity

Essential properties of a person …preserve identity over time

Body theory …same body from birth to death …not the case from biology point of view

Memory theory (John Lock) = “You” are not physical stuff, but consciousness…

• Retain memories of yourself …memories connected over time
• Basically a person is its unique chain of memories
• Implies that after we losing memory we have a different identity
  • Questions about first memory (not from birth) …faulty memory

Does this matter? Live base on relations to personal identity…

• Arguments against a personal identity… (David Hume)
• …self does not persist over time …concept of self is an illusion
• …no single constant “me”
• …certain identity = same set of properties — How to maintain properties over time
• “Self” is a bundle of ever-changing impressions …mind fooled to think of a constant

Argument for psychological connectedness (Derek Parfin) …every experience changes “you” adding connections …connections lost over time

Personhood

What constitutes a person? — Person ≠ Human

• Humans defined by biological attributes
• Person is a being part of a moral community
• Example: Superman not human but a person

Possibility to be a human but not a person?

• Premiss: Person deserves moral consideration
• Genetic criterion base on biology does not work (animals, aliens, etc)
• Artificial Intelligence (AI) = Can a non-living being be a person?
  • Where is the threshold of personhood …strong AI supposed to think like humans
  • Turing-test …technology that is convincing …behaviour based test
• “The chines room” analogy (William Lycan)…
  • …truing-test not enough to argument for a strong AI
  • Strong AI requires actual understating (not only a statistical process)

Cognitive criteria

1. Consciousness
2. Reasoning
3. Self-motivated activity
4. Capacity to communicate
5. Self-awareness

Social criterion = Whenever someone recognizes personhood

Peter Singer: Personhood = Sentience, ability to feel pleasure & pain (capacity to suffer)

Gradient theory states that personhood comes in degrees …important in ethics

Where is your mind?

Aka mind-body problem…

• Fact: Brain damage changes person = Non-physical personality affected physically
• Reductive physicalism = World only made of physical stuff
• Substance dualism = World physical & mental stuff effecting each other
• Mysterianism = Question of consciousness unsolvable by human mind

Determinism vs Free-Will

Are we free? — Libertarian free will …some human actions freely chosen

• Hard determinism = Events caused by past events …cause & effect
  • Event causation …no physical event can occur without previous causing physical event
  • …in opposition to…
  • Agent causation …human mind can cause a chain of causality that was not caused by anything else
  • …note that free action requires options …implies that agents can effect causal chain of the universe
• Reductionism (Baron D’Holbach)
  • Everything inevitable …result of unbroken chain of events
  • Everything reduced down to a singular thing…
  • …mental state = brain state = biological state = physical state = deterministic
  • Implies that the brain is deterministic …mind can not reconstruct causality
  • Decisions = deterministic process …felt by the mind as free will
  • Uncomfortable implication …hard determinism difficult to refute

Compatibilism

Belief in determinism, but some human actions are free will…

• Soft determinism = Determination comes from within ourselfs
  • Implies moral responsibility
  • Question: Mental illness …still responsible?
• Franfurt Cases (Harry Frankfurt)
  • Manipulating brain device analogy …still responsible
  • Separation of internal & external causes not possible …action more or less free
• Am I free? …wrong question …better to ask…
  • How much control do I have?
  • Patricia Churchman — Feeling free = having control

Language & Meaning

Language is the structure of the mind, and the reality we experience is shaped by the language we speak. Language is a power that can change our perception of the universe, history and the development of human civilisation.

What are “words”?

• Word = Collection of sounds or symbols
• Philosophy of language…
  • …thinks about how words are perceived by others
  • …reasoned arguments to understand & explain language

Sense & reference (Gottlob Frege) …used to communicate mental concepts:

• Single words (reference) can have multiple senses (meanings)
• Sense = Way words tie us to objects or concepts
• Reference = Designated object or concept

Learned by example and context (Ludwig Wittgenstein) …word not defined:

• Words are a cluster of concepts with familiar resemblance
• Meaning is use …impossible to communicate subjective meaning …examples: pain, love
• Speaker meaning …intended meaning, audience meaning …understood meaning ⇒ Should match

Conversational Implicature

Language has no intrinsic meaning (Ludwig Wittgenstein)

• Literal meaning = Specific, commonly accepted meaning …intended thing a word stands for
• Opposite ⇒ Figures of speech = non literal meaning …speaking in idioms, slang, metaphors, fragments

Meaning implied by speaker (H. P. Grice) = Conversational Implicature

• Understanding = Perceived meaning
• …facial expression, tone of voice, gesture, conventional behaviour
• Difference between…
  • …what is said = Actual linguistic content
  • …and what is implied = More then words …combines words with context

Cooperative principle = Audience uses context to understand

• Ambiguity …literal words need interpretation
• …understand most likely intended meaning

Grices’s maxims for communication:

1. Quantity …adequately informative
2. Quality …not false …not based on insufficient evidence
3. Relation …relevant things to the subject
4. Manner …no obscure phrases …avoid ambiguity …brief & orderly

Good conversation = Successful communication of meaning (by following the rules above)

• Floating a maxim = Deliberate change of a maxim …sarcasm, intention to confuse or embarrass

How Words Can Harm

Language understood by context …distinction between speaker intend and listener understanding

• Ambiguity… more then on plausible interpretation
• Context based on shared knowledge & beliefs
• Words can be deliberately chosen to cause harm…
  • Hate speech specifically target with harmful intend
  • …difference between use and mention of hateful words

Thick concepts …words with pre-loaded descriptive meaning and evaluative context

Fighting words …meant to incite violence …do not deserve freedom for speech

Metaphorical identification …words signal attitude and meaning to listener

• …listener wants to act according to expectations
• …not conscious …speaker changes self-perception of listener
• …humans shaped by others believes about them

Imaginary Objects

…non-existent objects enabled by language:

• …talk & think about pictures in our imagination
• …words allow to track concepts in our heads even if they do not correspond to anything real

Alexis Meinong — Meaningful thoughts about non-existent objects requires…

• …the object to have being
• Meinongs ontology:
  • …absistence …every possible thinkable object
  • …subsistence …numbers, theorems, possible objects without physical existence
  • …existence …objects in the physical world

Aestheticians about fictional objects:

• …reference universe of discourse …fictional universe
• …not necessarily shared with real universe …may have overlap
• …helps to think about hypothetical universes …aka the future
• …skill to create & conceptualize believable fictional universes

Aesthetic Appreciation

Aesthetic enjoyment…

• …examples …listen to music …flavorful food
• …emotional investment into books

What actually is art?

• …object that prompts valuable aesthetic emotions
• …human-made art objects …natural beauty
• …art = aesthetic emotions

Leo Tolstoy — Artists create to communicate feelings which can not be expressed by word)

Ludwig Wittgenstein — You know it when you see it!

Arthur Danto — Antology of art…

• …beauty in the eye of the beholder
• …subjective to the perceiver

David Hume — Do I like it? (subjective) vs Is it good? (objective)

• …sense of aesthetic taste (in an abstract way)
• …detect & evaluate aesthetic properties
• Taste developed over time…
  • …depends on past experiences
  • …knowledge about the subject

Aesthetics

Art and morality …standards for evaluation of beauty

What purpose servers art in your lives?

Plato — Art play to emotions not our reason…

• …problematic …spiritual thinking
• …opposite of truth ⇒ depicts imaginary

R. G. Collingwood — Art used as escape from live…

• …simple amusements …distraction
• …magic of art …changes our perception of the world
• …may communicate how to better interact with reality

Aristotle — Pro art…

• …body needs to experience full range of emotions
• Catharsis …problem of tragedy

Why emotional investment in art? → “The paradox of fiction”

• Kendal Walton — Quasi-emotions …emotional-like response
• …vs…
• Noel Carrol — Real emotions without external reality

Art inspires positive change in the world…

Metaethics

What is morality? …objective …preference …conventions

Metaethics divided into two general perspectives…

• Moral anti-realism
  • …no moral facts …moral propositions have no objective features
  • Moral subjectivism …right or wrong relative to peoples attitudes
• Moral realism
  • …seek to discover moral truth
  • …belief that there are moral facts
  • …moral propositions ⇒ true or false
  • Moral absolutism …there are absolute moral standards
  • Moral relativism …more then one position
  • Cultural relativism …morals differ between cultures

Can a culture be wrong?

• …normative cultural relativism
• …never a reason to change anything
• …no moral facts …only moral attitudes

Ethical theories:

• …moral foundations …consistent answers
• …starting assumptions …assumed beliefs
• Grounding problem …search for foundation of moral beliefs

Divine Command Theory

Moral propositions come from the bible!

• …solves the grounding problem
• …ethical foundation is God

Objections… Plato — Euthyphro dialog

• …right actions right because God commands them?
• or… are right actions commands by good because they are right?
• ⇒ true dilemma …forced to choose between two options …both with unpleasant results
  • …morality depends on interpretation of Gods commanding
  • ⇒ concept of goodness vacuous
• Either…
  • …God bound by standards outside himself
  • or… God’s goodness doesn’t mean anything

How to follow divine commands without knowing God?

• …preloaded knowing whats good
• …called natural law theory …predictable goal driven system

Thomas Aquinas — The basic goods according to scriptures:

1. Life
2. Reproduction
3. Education
4. Seek Good
5. Society
6. Avoid offense
7. Shun ignorance

Natural laws not necessarily associated to religion…

• …my life is valuable
• ⇒ your life is like my life
• ⇒ your life is valuable
• ⇒ I shouldn’t kill you
• ⇒ killing violation of natural law

Why people violate natural law?

• …if God made us to seek good
• …reason ⇒ ignorance, emotions …emotions overpower reason

Categorical Imperative

Moral code does not come from a supernatural force (God)…

Kant — Morality is a constant …almost mathematical sense …distinction between:

• …things we aught to do morally
• …things to do for non-moral reasons
• -> most things not moral choices

Hypothetical imperative …reasonable actions to reach goal

Categorical imperatives …moral obligations …derived from pure reason …must be followed

Right & wrong knowable by intellect. The universalizability principle:

“Act only according to that maxime which you can at the same time will that it should become a universal law without contradiction”

• What is the maxime of my action?
  • → consider if this action should be universalized
  • …without any contradiction …example: stealing
• What is a contradiction? …exception for yourself or others

The formula of humanity:

“Act so that you treat humanity, weather in your own person or in that of another, always as an end, and never as a mere means.”

• What are means?
  • …only for your own benefit
  • → treat humans as ends-in-themselves
• Self-governed, autonomous beings should not be used as mere means

Utilitarianism

…some lines that good people never cross …example: killing

Moral obligation to kill a killer?

• …do not focus on the intent if human behaviour
• → pay attention to the consequences of behaviour

Jeremy Bentham & John Stuart Mill

• …good consequences = good actions
• Actions measured in terms of happiness, pleasure produced…
• …happiness final end
• …applied equally to everyone
• → hedonistic theory …good = pleasure
• ≠ egoism theory …everyone ought, morally, to pursue their own good

“We should act always so as to produce the greatest good for the greatest number…”

• ⇒ principle of utility
• …moral decision from the position of a benevolent, disinterested spectator
• …disposition of good will & not emotionally invested

Contractarianism

Thomas Hobbs — Rational people do not want “State of nature”:

• …no rules …solitary, poor, nasty, short live
• freedom ≠ Security
• …domination by force …anti-system …no order

Benefits found in cooperation…

• Free → self-interested → rational → moral humans
• Contract = shared agreement …can not be violated by right acts
• Implicit contracts everywhere
  • …never actually agreed to
  • …imposed by civil environment
  • …for example citizenship, laws
  • …rights imply obligations

Contracts make society possible…

• …defection …breaking the contract …instead of cooperation
• …civilisation build on people keeping contracts
  • → not given by nature
  • …created by binding rules
  • …morality determined by contractors

Virtue Theory

Aristotle — “Virtuous” ⇒ ethical theory that emphasizes individuals character

• …focus on being good → right actions follow
• Proper function of a human is…
  • …use reason …be social
  • …right behaviour develops naturally

“Golden mean” …midpoint between extremes

• …courage is between cowardice & recklessness
• …honesty is between fail to say anything & brutal honesty
  • …deliver hard news gracefully
  • …offer criticism constructively
• …generosity is between stinginess & prodigality

Virtue ⇒ skill …way of living

• …learned through experience
• …practical wisdom …through habituation
• …follow “moral examples”
• Motivation ⇒ Eudamonia …live well lived
  • …human flourishing …striving for:
  • …pushing yourself
  • …finding success
  • …full of happiness
  • …achieve something difficult
  • …never stop improving
  • …overcome failure
  • …being best person you can be

Moral Luck

Bernard Williams & Thomas Nagel — Moral responsibility…

• …acts you can be praised or blamed for
• “Ought implies can principle”…
  • …being able to do something moral
  • …possibility required for moral act
  • …no moral blame for out of control situation

Casual vs moral responsibility…

• …moral agent ⇒ can think about right & wrong
• …makes decision accordingly
• …harm ≠ wrong doing
• …external factors effect moral quality of our actions

Different kinds of luck…

• …constitutive …depends on human characters …preposition to overcome moral flaws
• …circumstantial …character shaped by environment …indoctrination

Praise & blame difficult to assign …not about morality

⇒ function of society to encourage & discourage behaviour

Justice

What is justice about? …equality …fairness …needs …what someone deserves…

• Justice is harmony …understanding of justice defines how society works…
• Distributive justice…
  • …concerned about distribution of resources
  • …“justice as equality” vs “need based justice” vs “merit based justice”

Johan Rawls — “justice is fairness”…

• …favor the least well-off
• …levels playing field of society
• …from of need based justice
• …overcome natural inequality
• Human rights ⇒ fulfill basic needs…
  • …welfare maximisation
  • …rehabilitation …help wrongdoers to follow rules
  • …restorative justice ⇒ focus on making amends
  • …help to right the wrongs
  • …example: community services

Robert Nozick — Do not try to even out inequality…

• …help is not an obligation
• …retributive justice …wrongdoer suffers in proportion he made others suffer
• …eye for an eye justice …capital punishment
• …deterrence …punishment as message to others

Footnotes

1. Crash Course - Philosophy, YouTube
   https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLUHoo4L8qXthO958RfdrAL8XAHvk5xuu9