[b]John Searle
One of the many marks of a philosophical sensibility is an obsession with problems which most sane people regard as not worth bothering about.[/b]
My wife used to say that.
A lot.
But could something think, understand, and so on solely in virtue of being a computer with the right sort of program? Could instantiating a program, the right program of course, by itself be a sufficient condition of understanding? This I think is the right question to ask, though it is usually confused with one or more of the earlier questions, and the answer to it is no.
And that’s before we get to the part about determinism.
The best objects to think with are words, because that is part of what words are for. Indeed, it is a condition for something to be a word that it be thinkable.
Let’s think of one that isn’t, Mr. Objectivist.
I have thus defined the concept of the “Background” as the set of nonintentional or preintentional capacities that enable intentional states of function.
Not unlike the background here, he thought.
The problem posed by indirect speech acts is the problem of how it is possible for the speaker to say one thing and mean that but also to mean something else.
Or the solution posed of course.
Whatever is referred to must exist. Let us call this the axiom of existence.
And not just unicorns.