File spoon-archives/bhaskar.archive/bhaskar_2001/bhaskar.0111, message 26


Date: Wed, 28 Nov 2001 10:05:52 -0800
From: Ruth Groff <rgroff-AT-yorku.ca>
Subject: BHA: PON ch. 3 question


Hi all,

I actually have two basic questions about a section in chapter 3 of PON.  I want to make sure that I've understood it before I go on to write about it.  

Chapter 3 is the chapter on the philosophy of psychology.  Near the end of  the section called "Agents, Reasons and Causes II: Naturalism Vindicated" (pps. 95-7 in the 3rd edition copy), Bhaskar says two things.  I want to make sure that I haven't misread him.  

The first point that I'm interested in is stated explicitly, on p. 96 in my copy.  It goes as follows: "And a person's essence consists just in what she is most fundamentally disposed to do (or become): that set of effective beliefs that determines her psychic (and behavioural) identity, and fixes her in her particularity as a kind."

The second point is less explicitly articulated.  It is spread out over the last three pages of the section.  On p. 95, Bhaskar sets out a typology of beliefs, wants/desires and action:  "belief corresponds to a tendency possessed, a want corresponds to a tendency exercised and an action to its manifestation in some or other physical state of the world, whether or not the want is realized."   On p. 97, he doles out credit to various major thinkers for showing, one a-piece, how you get from one or the other of these items to the next.

With respect to the first point, I want to check that I've got the various claims straight: (1) people have essences  (2) essence is cognitive - i.e., one's essence is defined by a set of beliefs that one holds, viz. the "effective ones" (3) people fall into natural, or natural-esque, kinds, in virtue of their essences, and (4) every individual has a unique essence and constitutes a unique kind.  

With respect to the second point, I want to make sure that I am correct in my understanding of the implicit directional ordering.  It seems to me to be beliefs - wants - action.

As I said, these are basic exegetical matters.  But I want to make sure that I haven't misread anything.
Thanks,
Ruth 



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