Reference no: EM13899224 , Length:

INSTRUCTIONS:

Answer all three questions below. Your answers should consist mostly of your own words. References

You may use direct quotes from the primary texts, but if you do so:

1) you must place these in double quotes (" ") and provide a parenthetical reference following the quote showing the page of the primary text it was taken from, e.g., (31), except where more information is needed-see below, and

2) you must fully explain the quote itself.

You do not need to provide bibliographical information for the primary source when you use a direct quote, as long as it is taken from one of our actual readings as posted on Blackboard or from the book by Oreskes and Conway. Only when it is not clear from the context which reading you are quoting from should you provide more information. In such cases, provide the author along with the page number, and even the title if necessary, e.g., (Oreskes and Conway, 31) or (Rousseau, First Discourse, 27).

The only title, at the top of the first page, before your answers should be: "PHI 2394 Final Exam, Date, First name, Last name, Student number."

*Please name your document as follows: Lastname,firstname.doc e.g., DeSouza,Nigel.doc Submit your document to [email protected] by 5 pm on December 18th.

Questions 500-1000 words each (1000 words is the strict maximum), 25 marks each

1. Naomi Oreskes and Eric M. Conway discuss "reductionism" on p. 14 of The Collapse of Western Civilization. Here is a fuller explanation of the term that includes aspects we highlighted in the lecture, taken from the Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy:

Reductionists are those who take one theory or phenomenon to be reducible to some other theory or phenomenon. For example, a reductionist regarding mathematics might take any given mathematical theory to be reducible to logic or set theory. Or, a reductionist about biological entities like cells might take such entities to be reducible to collections of physico-chemical entities like atoms and molecules. The type of reductionism that is currently of most interest in metaphysics and philosophy of mind involves the claim that all sciences are reducible to physics. This is usually taken to entail that all phenomena (including mental phenomena like consciousness) are identical to physical phenomena. (https://www.iep.utm.edu/red-ism/)

I have italicized the parts relevant to this question, which takes you back to the first part of our course, "Science and human nature", in which we talked about the attempt in philosophy to provide a full explanation of human beings, in particular, of human consciousness. Our discussion constantly highlighted several dichotomies: objective/subjective, body/mind or body/soul, material/immaterial, among others.

Question: Choose any two of the following thinkers we read and explain how their theories are reductionist: Descartes, J. J. Smart, Paul Churchland, David Braddon-Mitchell and Frank Jackson. Now explain why you agree or disagree with a reductionist approach to explaining human consciousness. You are welcome to draw on other authors we read in formulating this part of your answer, e.g., Jerome Shaffer, John Searle, Evan Thompson.

In The Collapse of Western Civilization, there are two central factors that Oreskes and Conway, via their "future historian, living in the Second People's Republic of China" (p. x), hypothesize caused the climate change crisis that eventually led to this collapse: one has to do with science, the other with economics. The next question is about science, the following question is about economics.

2. Question: Provide a reconstruction of our two authors' arguments for how science is in part to blame for the climate change crisis that addresses the following points:
(i) the problem of specialization in science vs. the complex nature of climate change;
(ii) the excessively stringent standards for accepting scientific claims as true;
(iii) the separation between knowledge and power that the authors associate with the failure of "positivism"-on this point, explain the parallel with Rousseau in his Discourse on the Arts and Sciences, p. 27. The authors discuss these points in all three chapters of the book.
Explain whether you agree or disagree with their arguments.

3. In Chapter Three, Oreskes and Conway discuss how free-market capitalism, as it has evolved in the West, has played a role in preventing timely action on climate change. They discuss two historical periods in capitalism: in the first, regulative action was taken when it was seen that issues needed to be addressed; in the second, the one we are currently in, such regulative action has been stymied by what they call "market fundamentalism". Question: Provide a reconstruction of the argument Oreskes and Conway make for why market fundamentalism has prevented timely action on climate change that addresses the following:

(i) how the underlying problem is one of the "tragedy of the commons"-see the yellow highlighted sections of the article of this name, that we discussed in class, on Blackboard.

(ii) what they mean by the term "market fundamentalism"

(iii) the two historical periods in capitalism that they identify and their relevance

(iv) how they hold out hope for preventing the climate change-induced collapse of Western civilization that they prognosticate is our future otherwise.

Explain whether you agree or disagree with their arguments.