Chapter 3 Study Questions

1. What does O’Shaughnessy mean by “spiritualizing” bodily action? How, initially (i.e. section 1), does this present a problem?

When we spiritualize bodily action, we understand "willing" to be an entirely mental act that causes whatever physical action we do. In this way, we keep bodily action in the inner realm and completely split it off from the outward active phenomena. In this case one does not open a door, but instead internally wills their wrist to twist while grasping the knob in hopes that the knob will turn and the door open. When one tries to do x (turn) to y (knob), it is understood as "the performing of an act of will directed at y (knob) in the hope of producing x (turn). In this case all tryings consist of the "same kind of phenomena", the direct and internal act of the will.

This presents a problem in that there are multiple ways of defining "I can...". It is important to distinguish which form should be used when considering the willing of extra-bodily things. Furthermore, once the model is found, there is a problem in discovering how it is to be known whether or not one has the power to move extra-bodily objects (i.e. the sun). How does one go about trying and failing at doing this? When we spiritualize bodily action, actions are manifested in internal willings. However, we cannot even begin to internally attempt to will the movement of extra-bodily objects, and thus cannot conceive of whether or not this is possible.

2. Describe three distinct uses of “I cannot move my so-and-so” (where “so-and-so” is some bodily part) — along with paradigm occasions for the use of that expression in that way.

a) The first case is one in which there is an external force other than the given limb that is preventing movement of the limb. In this case the subject would be able to move his or her limb if it were not for the external barrier preventing the movement. For example, a man with a normally working leg has his leg trapped under a tree and is unable to move it. It is under the circumstances of his leg being trapped under a tree alone that causes his inability to move his leg.
b) The second case involves a subject that is recovering from a previously paralyzed limb. In this case it is not an external object but rather the internal motor mechanism of the limb that is preventing motion. Furthermore, in the first case the subject could push and pull at his leg in order to "try" to move his limb. However, in this case the subject can only simply say that he is trying without actually showing any outward signs of trying.
c) The third case is considered the instrumentalist case. Here when the subject is asked to raise his right arm, he uses his left arm to instrumentally lift his right arm. These acts are acts that are willed by instrumentally moving one's arm.

3. O’Shaughnessy claims: (IF θ1, THEN θ2) and NOT(IF θ2, THEN θ1).But he also accepts (IF(θ2 + ?), THEN θ1). What goes in the place of “?” to make a principle that O’Shaughnessy accepts?

θ1 claims that if liberty prevails then liberty does prevail and trying suffices, while θ2 claims just that if libery prevails then trying suffices. In other words θ1 states that given the circumstances that one is able to move his arm without external barriers and that there are no external barriers then one can move his arm. θ2 states the first half of θ1 by stating that if there are no external barriers one can move his arm. In this sense if θ1 is true, θ2 must be true as it is a necessary condition of θ1 being true. However, θ2 is only half the story of what it takes for θ1 to be true. If θ2 is true and it is also known that there is no current external barrier, then we can state θ1 is also true. Stated another way "IF (θ2 + ?), THEN θ1". Here the ? is that in the given situation there is no external barrier preventing θ2 from being acted out.

4. By your lights, what would be involved in trying to move the sun—just by willing it?

I don't understand here if the question is jokingly asking us what we would do in trying to will the sun to move or just seeking the answer that it is inconceivable what one would do in order to try and fail at willing the sun move. Thus, I must say that I am unsure what it would mean to try to will the sun to move. Mystics may concentrate very hard on the sun and mentally request of the sun movement. However, is that what it is to try to move the sun? This trying is unlike the trying of moving one's limb in the case of a tree trapping a leg. Trying in this case consists of pushing and pulling. Furthermore, in the case of a paralyzed limb it is even conceivable that one attempts to move the limb in the way they move other limbs. It is harder to conceive of, but it is understood in this case that one simply tries to move the limb. However, to say the same about the sun seems entirely different. We know nothing of what it means to will the sun to move and thus to try to seems inconceivable as well.

5. What’s the difference between instrumental trying and trying according to the “model use,” which makes the latter problematic?

Instrumental trying consists of performing an action instrumentally. For example, lifting one's arm by using the opposite arm to raise it. The model use involves directly willing the arm to raise. This becomes problematic when one is asked to wiggle their earlobe and after supposedly trying cannot do so. When we ask him how he went about trying he cannot really answer the question. However, when we ask someone to open a door through instrumental trying, he will simply turn the doorknob and open the door. When asked how he went about trying he can simply state what it took for him to complete the task. When one considers the willing of movements outside of the body one is considering the direct internal willing described in the model use of trying. However, it is inconceivable what one would do in order to try to perform movements of extra-bodily objects in this noninstrumental way.

6. (Section 2.) O’Shaughnessy is relying on a distinction between intensions and extensions. What is the difference? What is the intension of a word? What is the extension of a word? What would it be to hold the view that intensions determine extensions?

The intension of a word is a definition or description of the given term. The extension of a word is the set of all things that are included by the term. The difference here is that the intension is just a description that helps people to identify something that is in the set of all things that are within the given term. The intension may be found to be inadequate with time and research and may have to be updated from time to time. The extension however is the actual set of all things that are designated within the term, whether we realize it at the time or not. If we do not include something within a term but years later find out that it does happen to fall under the term it does not mean that only now it is in the extension. Rather it was in the extension the entire time, we just did not realize it based on the intension of the term at the time. If one holds the view that intensions determine extensions, the previous example would be different. In this case the thing that was found and not known to be in the set of the term would not be part of the extension because the intension at the time does not support it. In this case, an object is only in the extension if it can be identified by the intension that is used at a given time. For example, if a new species of cat is found that does not fall under the current intension of the term cat, then it will not be seen as part of the extension even if it actually should be.

7. Reconstruct and display perspicuously, premise by premise, the argument that is behind the volitionist linguistic reform (p. 75).

a)Actions are psychological phenomena
b)An essential mark of the mental (psychological phenomena) is that it is directed beyond itself
c)Thus, since action is entirely psychological/mental, it cannot have an object that is not given to the subject
d)Therefore if moving a limb causes another event which causes another event we cannot say that moving the limb was co-present in the external events since these external events were not of objects given to the subject
e)Consequently, the psychological event of limb moving cannot also include the external events caused by the limb moving
f)In this sense, moving the knob is not an act description as one did not move the knob since that was not a psychological event, but rather the act description lies in the psychological event of finger movement
g)Moving the knob can however be an act description if the will can reach beyond the body and directly activate the movement of the knob

8. What is nominalism (p. 82)?

Nominalism states that there is no one heading "action" that can include all the different types of action considered across the mental and physical. Arm-movings and trying-to-remembers differ greatly, and to classify them both as acts is to place two very different phenomena under the same category. Nothing about these phenomena forces us to lump them together as we do, but in the end it is just our decision to do so. Nominalism, however, realizes that there is a number of senses of action and that there is no one heading in which they all can fall under.

9. Explain and argue for the claim that “killings are necessarily instrumental, while only a few arm raisings are instrumental” (p 85).

No act-type is necessarily non-instrumental because anything we do can do non-instrumentally we can do instrumentally. For example, one can non-instrumentally raise one's arm by simply raising it. However, the act can also be carried out instrumentally by lifting it up using the other arm. Some act types, however, are necessarily instrumental because they cannot be carried out non-instrumentally. Any event that occurs through a non-instrumental limb movement exerting onto another object in order to carry out that event is instrumental. If one cannot carry out the event directly, then it is necessarily an instrumental act. For example, killing is necessarily instrumental because one cannot directly will a killing.

10. (A crucial discussion.) What does O’Shaughnessy say that your “just knowing” that Φ will occur is “opaque” but “explicable”?

A "just knowing" is opaque and explicable in cases such as just knowing that your arm will rise when you intend it to rise and you know that your arm is in full working order. What was just stated is essentially the explanation of the just knowing; however, it is opaque in that one intuitively knows that it will happen. One does not know it is going to happen from seeing it happen, such as knowing that the limb exists, but rather, just knows intuitively that it will happen when one intends it to and when the limb is in working order.

11. What does O’Shaughnessy mean by “aesthetic” in referring on page 102 to “the ordinary aesthetic situation”?

One definition of the word aesthetic refers to the pertaining to the senses. In this passage O'Shaughnessy is discussing what it would be like for someone to have absolutely no sensation in his arm and to still be able write a letter. Would this person know the posture of his limb or if it was flexed? Could the limb be amputated without him noticing? If the person truly had know sensation whatsoever in his limb, this should be the case. He then states that there is the possibility of the person just knowing, but this is far remove from the "ordinary aesthetic situation" which is to say the ordinary situation of pertaining to sensations as we understand them.

12. After all those other cases, where does O’Shaughnessy get off saying of his last case (the rubber hand) that it “suffers from the defect of being altogether too fantastic”? What’s the special problem with that case?

The major problem with this case is not that the rubber hand could not have the same look and feel of a normal hand, in fact the rubber hand can work well in this endeavor. The problem is that we have accumulated so much knowledge as to the true structure and function of the hand that we see this example of a rubber hand to be highly fantastical. Since the rubber hand can look and feel like a hand, we originally concede to the example, but as O'Shaughnessy states, this is misleading as he may have made it a hand of diamond or of water. The bottom line is that the example is miraculous especially as the hand is made of something other than flesh and blood since the explanation for movement is the muscles and nerves lacking in the rubber hand since the explanation for movement is the muscles and nerves lacking in the rubber hand.