Psychology Dictionary of Arguments

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Colours: in philosophy, the problem of coulour is, among other things, the question of how individual sensory impressions can be generalized or objectified. See also qualities, qualia, perception, inverted spectra, private language.
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Annotation: The above characterizations of concepts are neither definitions nor exhausting presentations of problems related to them. Instead, they are intended to give a short introduction to the contributions below. – Lexicon of Arguments.

 
Author Concept Summary/Quotes Sources

Ruth Millikan on Colour - Dictionary of Arguments

I 270
Standard Conditions/Contents/Millikan: 1. To give them a content, "standard observers" must mean more than "observers for whom red things look red, under standard conditions."
And according to "standard conditions".
Cf. >Ideal observer
, >Idealization, >Observation.
Solution: Standard conditions for red must be spelled out.
Problem: no human being has any idea how this should work.
Problem: if you had every reason to believe that you are a standard observer, there are circumstances where an object appears to have a different color than it has. But then you would not conclude that the thing was not red.
Problem: if a thing is defined by its opposite properties, an observer must also be able to identify these opposing properties. And it can be the case that these never come to light!
Problem: how can my experience testify the opposite of red and green?
Many authors: think that you can never assert at all that red and green could be in the same place at the same time.
I 271
MillikanVsTradition: this is not true, in reality, there are many possibilities, e.g. squinting.
Complementary colors/perception/seeing/certainty/Millikan: our confidence in the fact that red and green are opposites, (perhaps built into nature) is an empirical certainty. And this is certainty for the objective validity of these concepts, for the fact that red and green are properties - and not just hallucinations.

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Explanation of symbols: Roman numerals indicate the source, arabic numerals indicate the page number. The corresponding books are indicated on the right hand side. ((s)…): Comment by the sender of the contribution. Translations: Dictionary of Arguments
The note [Concept/Author], [Author1]Vs[Author2] or [Author]Vs[term] resp. "problem:"/"solution:", "old:"/"new:" and "thesis:" is an addition from the Dictionary of Arguments. If a German edition is specified, the page numbers refer to this edition.

Millikan I
R. G. Millikan
Language, Thought, and Other Biological Categories: New Foundations for Realism Cambridge 1987

Millikan II
Ruth Millikan
"Varieties of Purposive Behavior", in: Anthropomorphism, Anecdotes, and Animals, R. W. Mitchell, N. S. Thomspon and H. L. Miles (Eds.) Albany 1997, pp. 189-1967
In
Der Geist der Tiere, D Perler/M. Wild, Frankfurt/M. 2005


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