Status Updates From Intuition Pumps and Other T...

Intentionality is what philosophers call the meaning, the translation, the bottom line.

What does Dennett mean by "higher" animals? Like not protozoa? Like likable animals like rabbits and owls, if not bears? Do animals not have minds? Jane Goodall taught an ape to communicate, hadn't she? Dolphins and bats communicate via echolocation, which I've used in lieu of eyesight before.

Why do words have meaning? I suggest for communication and delight.

Are rhetorical questions that heinous a device? I think they endender conversation nicely by encouraging thought.

Because we certainly all read/skim argumentative essays regularly. Actually, it's more true than false.

Jootsing? Hofstadter sounds familiar, searching the Internet.

I'm embarrassed to admit that I use Occam's broom often. It ties to inherent laziness. :[

This is the first book I've attempted by this author. His name has been referenced, sometimes reverently and sometimes not, in other material I've read over the years. Definitely worth the wait. Lots of eye-opening perspectives on ways to think.

I read the four steps in a critical commentary to Mom. I think it's far kinder than I am, by instructing readers not to criticise others unless you've re-expressed the idea, told the Victim what you liked about it; what you've learned from it. Most people don't do that, in my experience, but I am not very experienced - I speak mostly from the Internet forum.
1. Re-express
2. List agreements
3. Learn?
4. KILLIT

That first chapter was fun! It made me think of the driver of the Magic School Bus, Ms Frizzle: "Get messy with it!"

The fear of becoming a dupe and publishing only good results must both be anathema according to Dennett. He claims there's no such thing as philosophy-free science, but then again, newsflash: he is a Tufts philosophy professor. Was Copernicus a philosopher? Was Newton a philosopher? Well, the latter wrote "Philosophiæ Naturalis Principia Mathematica" so I suppose. How about Kepler? Oh, he studied philosophy.

I finished the introduction and I am still puzzled. Haha, I didn't need to be told making mistakes is the best way to learn anything! But let's continue, after a pause to sleep or read something else or whatever else I'm doing with this weekend.

What exactly is an intuition pump again? Something so obvious it hurts? I don't follow. *index* It says 1-15. I guess I'll figure it out as I go along. Like Aesop's Fables? A carefully-designed persuasion tool, he suggests. I've heard of Doug Hofstadter! Let's "turn all the knobs" to discover what he's talking about, then. I don't think I get it yet! This is hard. But let's get through the 15-page intro...

I am excited to see what friends have been reading! I've heard of Dennett before, in the atheism circles. What will he present in this book? It should be worth more than some of the theories of thinking I've seen before. I personally enjoy considering Philosophy, so things will most likely go well. "Thinking is hard." Yes? Many people make their livings through it.