1. Constructing the World
David Chalmers

2. Admin Website/syllabus: http://consc.net/class/ctw/
Office hours: Tuesdays 3-5
Assessment: Paper, drafts encouraged.
Incompletes: Draft required by end of term, paper by beginning of spring.
Discussion list: constructing-the-

3. Laplace’s Demon
An intellect which at a certain moment would know all forces that set nature in motion, and all positions of all items of which nature is composed, if this intellect were also vast enough to submit these data to analysis, it would embrace in a single formula the movements of the greatest bodies of the universe and those of the tiniest atom; for such an intellect nothing would be uncertain and the future just like the past would be present before its eyes
Pierre-Simon Laplace, 1814

4. Laplace’s Scrutability Thesis
If a Laplacenean intellect knew all the Laplacean truths, then for any hypothesis p it could entertain, it could know whether p.
Laplacean truths = current positions of all fundamental (physical?) entities
Laplacean intellect = vast enough to submit these data to (ideally rational?) analysis

5. Problems for Laplace’s Demon I
Indeterminism: physical truths at a time not enough
Mental truths: physical truths across time not enough?
Self-locating truths: objective truths not enough?
Negative truths: positive truths not enough?
Moral truths, mathematical truths, metaphysical truths?

6. Revising the Thesis I
Still: one can handle these problems by expanding the basic class of truths.
The following Empirical Scrutability thesis remains on the table:

7. Empirical Scrutability
There is some limited class of Laplacean truths such that if a Laplacean intellect knew the Laplacean truths, then for any hypothesis p it could entertain, it would be in a position to know whether p.

8. Problems for Laplace’s Demon II
Fitch’s paradox: An unknown truth q yields an unknowable truth q and no- one knows q.
A problem for: for all truths p, the demon could know p
Laplace finesses this: “knows whether p”
Also: Can Laplace’s demon know all about its own brain/mind processes?
Demon complexity = world complexity?

9. Revising the Thesis II
These problems arise from the demon inhabiting the same world that it is to know
One can overcome these problems by stating the thesis in terms of conditional knowledge.

10. Conditional Scrutability
There is a limited class of Laplacean truths such that for any true proposition p, a Laplacean intellect would be in a position to know that if the Laplacean truths obtain, then p.
Extending the idea: the Laplacean truths are all the empirical information that is needed, so the conditional itself is a priori?

11. A Priori Scrutability
There is a limited class of Laplacean truths such that for any truth p, it is knowable a priori (by a Laplacean intellect) that if the Laplacean truths obtain, then p.

12. Primitive Concepts
“For all our complex ideas are ultimately resolvable into simple ideas, of which they are compounded and originally made up, though perhaps their immediate ingredients, as I may so say, are also complex ideas.”
John Locke, 1690

13. Wierzbicka’s Primitives
substantives: I, you, someone, people, something, body
determiners: this, the same
quantifiers: one, two, some, all, many/much
evaluators: good, bad
descriptors: big, small
intensifiers: very
mental predicates: think, know, want, feel, see, hear
speech: say, words, true
action and events: do, happen, move, touch
existence and possession: there is/exist, have
life and death: live, die
time: when/time, now, before, after, a long time, a short time, for some time, moment
space: where/place, here, above, below, far, near, side, touching
logic: not, maybe, can, because, if
augmentors: very, more

14. A Sample Analysis X lied to Y = X said something to person Y;
X knew it was not true;
X said it because X wanted Y to think it was true;
people think it is bad if someone does this.

15. The Aufbau
In Der Logische Aufbau der Welt (1928), Carnap proposes a single nonlogical primitive: recollected phenomenal similarity
And ultimately proposes that we can dispense with this primitive, yielding only logical primitives
All other expressions can be defined in terms of these primitives.

16. Definability Thesis
There is a compact class of primitive expressions such that all expressions are definable in terms of that class.

17. Definitional Scrutability
There is a compact class C of truths such that for any truth S, S is logically entailed by C-truths along with definitions.
Definitions must have an appropriate logical form, and meet conditions of adequacy: truth, analyticity, apriority, necessity, ...?
E.g. ‘For all x, x is a bachelor iff X is an unmarried man’.

18. A Priori Scrutability
If definitions are required to be a priori, then Definitional Scrutability entails a version of A Priori Scrutability
There is a compact class C of truths such that all truths are logically entailed by C-truths along with a priori truths.
Likewise for Analytic Scrutability, Necessary Scrutability, etc.

19. Carnap’s Construction of the World
Carnap defines qualia in terms of phenomenal similarity
He defines spacetime in terms of qualia
He defines behavior in terms of spacetime
He defines other minds in terms of behavior
He defines culture in terms of behavior and other minds.

20. Carnap’s Scrutability Thesis
All truths are definitionally entailed by a very limited class of truths
There is a world-sentence that entails everything: e.g.
x y z Rxy & Rxz & ~Ryz ...

21. Problems for the Aufbau
Goodman: definition of qualia fails
Quine: definition of spacetime fails
Newman: logical construction is vacuous
Quine: no analytic/synthetic distinction
Kripke: names inequivalent to descriptions
Many: most expressions are undefinable

22. Responding to the Problems
The first three problems are problems only for Carnap’s very limited bases
Expand the base!
The last two (or three?) problems are problems only for Carnap’s definitional entailment relation
Weaken the relation!

23. A revised Aufbau thesis
Where Carnap said:
All truths are definitionally entailed by logical/phenomenal truths
It’s still viable to say
All truths are a priori entailed by a compact class of truths

24. Problems for Definitions
The counterexample problem: For many terms in natural language, all purported definitions appear to have (actual, conceivable, possible) counterexamples
So those definitions aren’t true, a priori, necessary.

25. The Case of Knowledge Knowledge = justified true belief
Counterexample: Gettier
Knowledge = JTB not inferred from falsehood
Counterexample: fake barns
Knowledge = 12-clause Chisholm definition
Counterexamples: still coming...

26. Definitions and A Priori Entailment
So: ‘know’ may not be definable in more primitive vocabulary
But this is compatible with the claim that ‘know’-truths are a priori entailed by truths in a more primitive vocabulary

27. Gettier Case
G = 'S believes with justification that p. S has no evidence concerning q. S forms a belief that p or q, based solely on a valid inference from p. p is false but q is true.’
K = ‘S does not know that ‘p or q’
Then: ‘If G, then K’ is arguably a priori

28. Analysis without Definitions
So: a priori scrutability doesn’t require definitions.
It requires only casewise analysis: a priori conditionals regarding specific scenarios
Modeled by an intension (mapping from scenarios to truth-values), not a definition
Counterexample arguments threaten definitions but not intensions/scrutability.

29. Kripke’s Antidescriptive Arguments
Modal argument: ‘N = the D’ isn’t necessary
Concerns necessity, not apriority
No objection to a priori scrutability
Epistemic argument: ‘N =the D’ isn’t apriori
An argument from counterexample
No objection to a priori scrutability.

30. Scrutability of Reference
Once we know enough about the world, we’re in a position to know what our terms refer to (without further empirical information).
E.g. ‘Hesperus’, ‘Godel’, etc.
Problems:
(i) unclarity of ‘know what terms refer to’
(ii) Quinean inscrutabiity (permutation)

31. Scrutability of Truth
Once we know enough about the world, we’re in a position to know whether our utterances (and beliefs) are true (without further empirical information).
Better: there’s a compact class of truths such that for any true sentence S, one can know (a priori) that if the C-truths obtain, S is true.

32. Scrutability Base
Scrutability base = Class of truths from which all truths are scrutable
Scrutability thesis: There’s a compact scrutability base

33. Compactness What is it for a class of truths to be compact?
(i) Involve a small finite class of expressions, or of families of expressions
(ii) No trivializing mechanisms
Better definitions welcome -- but it won’t matter much in practice.

34. Potential Scrutability Bases
Carnap: logic, or logic plus phenomenal similarity
Chalmers & Jackson: physical, phenomenal, indexical, that’s-all
CTW: phenomenal, nomic, indexical, that’s-all
Others: spatiotemporal, quiddistic, mathematical, normative, ontological?

35. Multiple Bases
There will be many scrutability bases, and even many minimal scrutability bases.
Is there a privileged scrutability base?
Maybe: invoke a conceptual grounding relation more fine-grained than a priori entailment
Require/hope that there will be a scrutability base involving primitive concepts

36. Fundamental Scrutability
Fundamental scrutability: All truths are (a priori) scrutable from metaphysically fundamental truths
Where: metaphysically fundamental truths are the metaphysical grounds for all truths (and will necessitate all truths).

37. Roles of Scrutability Why is the scrutability thesis interesting?
It has many applications.

38. Epistemology
The scrutability thesis is a watered- down version of the knowability thesis -- its plausible core?
Some scrutability theses have anti- skeptical applications

39. Modality
One can use a generalized scrutability thesis to construct the space of epistemically possible worlds, or scenarios
E.g. maximal consistent sets of sentences in a generalized scrutability base.
Useful for many epistemological purposes
Closely related to metaphysically possible worlds?

40. Meaning
One can use a generalized scrutability thesis to define intensions (cf. 2D):
functions from scenarios to truth-values
functions from scenarios to extensions
Nice epistemic properties (cf. Fregean sense)
A is true at all scenarios iff A is a priori
‘a’, ‘b’ have same intension iff ‘a=b’ is a priori

41. Other Applications Content: Define narrow contents?
Metaphysics: Adjudicate realism/anti- realism, and/or what’s fundamental?
Unity of Science: A chain of reductive explanation?
Metaphilosophy: Philosophical optimism?

42. Plan The Aufbau [1 week] Formulate scrutability theses [1]
Argue for scrutability theses [2]
Address hard cases, minimize the base [2]
Foundations (apriori, concepts, reference) [3]
Applications (modality, meaning, content) [4]

43. Next Week
Next week: The Logical Construction of the World, parts I-IV.
Especially sections 1-16*, 38-44*, , *, , *.