We argue that relating to myself as me provides, as such, a reason to care about myself: grasping... more We argue that relating to myself as me provides, as such, a reason to care about myself: grasping that an event involves me, instead of another, makes it matter in a special way. Further, this self-concern is not simply a matter of seeing in myself some instrumental value for other ends. We use as our foil a recent skeptical challenge to this view offered in Setiya (2015). We think the case against self-concern is powered by unwarrantedly narrow construals of three key notions. One is the notion of a first-personal way of relating to oneself. A narrow account of the first person in terms of special epistemic relations to oneself makes it easy to overlook a source of non-instrumental reasons of self-concern, located in the special relation a subject has to herself as agent. Two is the notion of what it is to be a reason. And three is the notion of self-concern itself. We show that the skeptical case rests in part on a slide towards neighbouring but distinct notions of egoism and self...
This chapter explores the significance of Lady Gaga's meat dress and asks, how much of her wo... more This chapter explores the significance of Lady Gaga's meat dress and asks, how much of her work is a commodification of feminism and how much of its radical message survives the journey? With reference to artists like Carolee Schneemann, Jana Sterbak and Linder Sterling, it looks at how meat has been used in feminist art to reflect on issues of the body, sexuality and consumption. Drawing parallels with transgressive stars like Gaga and Madonna it examines whether their images are just commercial signifiers, or an expression of women's alienation within postmodern pop.
In this paper I am going to argue that we should take actions to be prime. This will involve clar... more In this paper I am going to argue that we should take actions to be prime. This will involve clarifying what it means to claim that actions are prime. I will consider Williamson's construal of actions as prime in a way that parallels his treatment of knowledge. I will argue that we need to be careful about treating our actions in the way suggested because of an internal relation between the success condition of an action and the action itself; a parallel relation does not hold for most cases of knowledge.
11 Mental Actions and the No-Content Problem Lucy O'Brien 1. INTRODUCTION In this chapter I ... more 11 Mental Actions and the No-Content Problem Lucy O'Brien 1. INTRODUCTION In this chapter I want to suggest that a consideration of mental action reveals a certain kind of externalism about mental content to be more problematic than we have come to think. The externalism I ...
It is an extraordinary thing that Descartes' famousCogitoargument is still being puzzled over... more It is an extraordinary thing that Descartes' famousCogitoargument is still being puzzled over; this paper is another fragment in an untiring tradition of puzzlement. The paper will argue that, if I were to ask the question ‘do I have a grounds for thinking that I exist?’ theCogito could provide for a positive answer. In particular, my aim in this is to argue, in opposition to recent discussion by John Campbell, that there is a way of construing conscious thinking on which theCogitocan be seen to provide a non-question begging argument for one's own existence.
This paper is focused on the question of the extent to which an appeal to trying is helpful in ou... more This paper is focused on the question of the extent to which an appeal to trying is helpful in our attempts to explain our knowledge of our actions. To this end I will consider two models for knowing our actions that centre on tryings. I will argue that if we allow that there are mental actions there are problems with both models. If we think there are mental actions, we are, I argue, going to have to give an account of our knowledge of them that does not appeal to trying. So, if we hope to give an account of our knowledge of our actions which is uniform across mental and physical cases, we have reason to avoid appealing to tryings in our attempt to do so.
CONTENTS Acknowledgments x Introduction 1 1 A BRIEF HISTORY OF HYPNOSIS 8 1.1 Introduction 8 1.2 ... more CONTENTS Acknowledgments x Introduction 1 1 A BRIEF HISTORY OF HYPNOSIS 8 1.1 Introduction 8 1.2 Animal magnetism 9 1.3 The Nancy School 15 1.4 Charcot and the Salpetriere School 18 7.5 Hypnotic anesthesia 19 1.6 Hypnosis and secondary consciousness 24 7.7 ...
Page 1. NOUS 29:2 (1995) 232-247 Evans on Self-Identification' LUCY F. O'BRIEN Universi... more Page 1. NOUS 29:2 (1995) 232-247 Evans on Self-Identification' LUCY F. O'BRIEN University College London I. Self-Identification and Information The sense of a singular term, for a Fregean, is a mode of presentation of the referent. ...
Page 1. r Anscombe and the Self-Reference Rule LUCY F. O'BRIE N It is commonly noted that th... more Page 1. r Anscombe and the Self-Reference Rule LUCY F. O'BRIE N It is commonly noted that the first person pronoun, T, is governed by a fairly simple rule: the rule that T refers to the person who uses it. It is prima facie plausible ...
We argue that relating to myself as me provides, as such, a reason to care about myself: grasping... more We argue that relating to myself as me provides, as such, a reason to care about myself: grasping that an event involves me, instead of another, makes it matter in a special way. Further, this self-concern is not simply a matter of seeing in myself some instrumental value for other ends. We use as our foil a recent skeptical challenge to this view offered in Setiya (2015). We think the case against self-concern is powered by unwarrantedly narrow construals of three key notions. One is the notion of a first-personal way of relating to oneself. A narrow account of the first person in terms of special epistemic relations to oneself makes it easy to overlook a source of non-instrumental reasons of self-concern, located in the special relation a subject has to herself as agent. Two is the notion of what it is to be a reason. And three is the notion of self-concern itself. We show that the skeptical case rests in part on a slide towards neighbouring but distinct notions of egoism and self...
This chapter explores the significance of Lady Gaga's meat dress and asks, how much of her wo... more This chapter explores the significance of Lady Gaga's meat dress and asks, how much of her work is a commodification of feminism and how much of its radical message survives the journey? With reference to artists like Carolee Schneemann, Jana Sterbak and Linder Sterling, it looks at how meat has been used in feminist art to reflect on issues of the body, sexuality and consumption. Drawing parallels with transgressive stars like Gaga and Madonna it examines whether their images are just commercial signifiers, or an expression of women's alienation within postmodern pop.
In this paper I am going to argue that we should take actions to be prime. This will involve clar... more In this paper I am going to argue that we should take actions to be prime. This will involve clarifying what it means to claim that actions are prime. I will consider Williamson's construal of actions as prime in a way that parallels his treatment of knowledge. I will argue that we need to be careful about treating our actions in the way suggested because of an internal relation between the success condition of an action and the action itself; a parallel relation does not hold for most cases of knowledge.
11 Mental Actions and the No-Content Problem Lucy O'Brien 1. INTRODUCTION In this chapter I ... more 11 Mental Actions and the No-Content Problem Lucy O'Brien 1. INTRODUCTION In this chapter I want to suggest that a consideration of mental action reveals a certain kind of externalism about mental content to be more problematic than we have come to think. The externalism I ...
It is an extraordinary thing that Descartes' famousCogitoargument is still being puzzled over... more It is an extraordinary thing that Descartes' famousCogitoargument is still being puzzled over; this paper is another fragment in an untiring tradition of puzzlement. The paper will argue that, if I were to ask the question ‘do I have a grounds for thinking that I exist?’ theCogito could provide for a positive answer. In particular, my aim in this is to argue, in opposition to recent discussion by John Campbell, that there is a way of construing conscious thinking on which theCogitocan be seen to provide a non-question begging argument for one's own existence.
This paper is focused on the question of the extent to which an appeal to trying is helpful in ou... more This paper is focused on the question of the extent to which an appeal to trying is helpful in our attempts to explain our knowledge of our actions. To this end I will consider two models for knowing our actions that centre on tryings. I will argue that if we allow that there are mental actions there are problems with both models. If we think there are mental actions, we are, I argue, going to have to give an account of our knowledge of them that does not appeal to trying. So, if we hope to give an account of our knowledge of our actions which is uniform across mental and physical cases, we have reason to avoid appealing to tryings in our attempt to do so.
CONTENTS Acknowledgments x Introduction 1 1 A BRIEF HISTORY OF HYPNOSIS 8 1.1 Introduction 8 1.2 ... more CONTENTS Acknowledgments x Introduction 1 1 A BRIEF HISTORY OF HYPNOSIS 8 1.1 Introduction 8 1.2 Animal magnetism 9 1.3 The Nancy School 15 1.4 Charcot and the Salpetriere School 18 7.5 Hypnotic anesthesia 19 1.6 Hypnosis and secondary consciousness 24 7.7 ...
Page 1. NOUS 29:2 (1995) 232-247 Evans on Self-Identification' LUCY F. O'BRIEN Universi... more Page 1. NOUS 29:2 (1995) 232-247 Evans on Self-Identification' LUCY F. O'BRIEN University College London I. Self-Identification and Information The sense of a singular term, for a Fregean, is a mode of presentation of the referent. ...
Page 1. r Anscombe and the Self-Reference Rule LUCY F. O'BRIE N It is commonly noted that th... more Page 1. r Anscombe and the Self-Reference Rule LUCY F. O'BRIE N It is commonly noted that the first person pronoun, T, is governed by a fairly simple rule: the rule that T refers to the person who uses it. It is prima facie plausible ...
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