Introduction to Philosophy Coursera week 4 Quiz

In this blog you will find the correct answer of the Coursera quiz Introduction to Philosophy Coursera week 4 Quiz mixsaver always try to brings best blogs and best coupon codes

Suilin has a human mind, but a tennis ball does not. This is a fact. What things can Suilin do that a tennis ball can’t that might make this fact true? (Tick all options that apply)

Think thoughts about thoughts.
Be in states (such as thinking, believing, desiring) that are about things.
Be in states such that there’s ‘something it’s like’ to be in them.
Bounce up and down.

2. Substance dualism (or Cartesian dualism) is the view that:

Mind and matter are very different kinds of things.
We can never know anything for certain.
We can never know whether our minds and our bodies are different kinds of things.
Minds and bodies are made of the same type of substance, but have different properties.

3. Princess Elisabeth of Bohemia objected to Descartes dualism because:

It is unclear how a non-physical thing can cause changes in a physical thing.
Everything is only made out of one kind of substance.
We can never know for certain whether a theory is true.
A malevolent demon could be deceiving us into thinking substance dualism was true.

4. From what Suilin has said so far, which of the following is the best definition of the identity theory of mental states?

Brain states are identical to mental states.
Substance dualism is false.
We cannot tell the difference between mental states and brain states.
Mental states correspond to brain states.

5. Which of the following claims would a type-type identity theorist reject?

There could be two creatures in the same type of mental state, but different types of brain state.
Every mental state is identical with some physical state.
Substance dualism is false.
For every type of mental state, there is a type of physical state which is identical to it.

6. Which of the following would be the best way of objecting to the identity theory on the basis of the ‘multiple realizability’ of mental states?

An octopus might be in the same type of mental state as me, but in a very different type of brain state.
There might be other species that have very different kinds of mental states to ours.
Brain states and mental states seem like very different kinds of things.
Science has shown that feeling pain is not the same as ‘having C-fibres firing’

7. Hilary Putnam thought that we should understand mental states in terms of their…

Function.
Subjective feeling.
Interaction with the brain.
Intrinsic properties.

8. In virtue of what, according to the functionalist, would it be possible for both an alien and a human—who have very different physical makeups—to be in a state of pain?

They both can be in mental states that have the functional role associated with pain.
Their physical bodies are both associated with the same kind of immaterial mind.
They both ultimately evolved from the same evolutionary ancestors.
They both are ultimately constituted from the same fundamental particles described by physics.

9. What, according to the functionalist, is the difference between things which merely have

functional roles (such as carburetors) and things whose functional roles amount to their having a mind?

The functional roles must have evolved to avoid predators.
The functional roles must be possessed by material substances.
The functional roles must be sufficiently complex.
The functional roles must be possessed by immaterial substances.

10. What must a computer do to pass the Turing test?

Respond to questions in such a way that one cannot distinguish between it and a human being.
Make as many errors performing calculations as a human being.
Experience the world in the same way as a human being.
Be subject to the same human rights as a human being.

11. What is the difference between the syntactic properties of a symbol and the semantic properties of a symbol?

The syntactic properties of a symbol pertain to its form whereas the semantic properties of a symbol pertain to its meaning or content.
Symbols have syntactic properties, but sentences only have semantic properties
Chinese languages such as Mandarin have syntactic properties, whereas European languages, such as English, only have semantic properties.
Understanding logic and mathematics only involves recognising syntactic properties whereas understanding poetry only involves recognising semantic properties.

12. What is the bearing of the hard problem of consciousness on functionalism?

Providing a functional analysis of something doesn’t explain why it has conscious experience.
It is hard to produce functional analyses of things.
It is hard to produce a computer that can pass the Turing test.
Producing a functional analysis of something doesn’t explain why that functional role has evolved.

Practice: Are Scientific Theories True?

1. What is meant by “saving the phenomena”?

Providing a good analysis of available scientific data and observations.
Providing a good story about the phenomenology of science: what it is like to do science.
Providing a true story about what causes scientific data and observations.

2. According to Duhem, how did ancient Greek astronomers view the status of their scientific claims?

Sophisticated hypotheses that can explain the apparent celestial motion of the planets, but that do not necessarily provide a true description of their motion.
Mathematical contrivances that fail to provide a good formula for predicting the celestial motion of the planets.
Sophisticated hypotheses that can explain the apparent celestial motion of the planets, and that probably also provide a true description of their motion.
Sophisticated hypothesis that provide an entertaining account of the phenomena, but do not aim to be true.

3. Scientific Realism has a semantic aspect and an epistemic aspect. What is the semantic aspect about?

The semantic aspect is about our attitude towards scientific theories – what we believe about a theory when we accept it.
The semantic aspect is about scientific theories – why we should believe they are important.
The semantic aspect is about the language of scientific theories – the terms of a theory and how they should be understood.
The semantic aspect is about the language of scientific theories – the terms of a theory, how they should be spelled in English, how many syllables they contain, and so on.

4. Scientific Realism has a semantic aspect and an epistemic aspect. What is the epistemic aspect about?

The epistemic aspect is about realism – about what is real and what is not.
The epistemic aspect is about our attitude towards scientific theories – how we learn the terms that a scientific theory uses.
The epistemic aspect is about the language of scientific theories – the terms of a theory and how they should be understood.
The epistemic aspect is about our attitude towards scientific theories – what we believe about a theory when we accept it.

5. What does the No-Miracles Argument for scientific realism say?

Miracles are exceptions to previously exceptionless regularities. Such exceptions are highly unlikely.
Given the success and progress of science, it is more likely than not that scientific realism is true.
The success and progress of science is a miracle, so scientific realism must say that miracles are possible.
Given its success and progress, we should think of science as the pinnacle of human endeavour.

6. True or false: For constructive empiricism, the aim of science is truth.

True
False

7. The constructive empiricist claims an advantage for her view over scientific realism in terms of metaphysical commitment. What is this claimed advantage?

Constructive empiricism and scientific realism are equally metaphysically committed. Both are committed to the existence of unobserved entities figuring in today’s successful scientific theories.
Constructive empiricism can explain metaphysical truths, but scientific realism cannot.
Scientific realism is more metaphysically committed than constructive empiricism. For scientific realism to be true, unobserved entities figuring in today’s successful scientific theories must exist.
Constructive empiricism is more metaphysically committed than scientific realism. For constructive empiricism to be true, unobserved entities figuring in today’s successful scientific theories must exist.

8. The Inference to the Best Explanation argument puts pressure on constructive empiricism. This argument claims that there is one inferential path that justifies us in believing in the existence of unobservable entities and of…

Unobserved unobservables.
Observed observables.
Observed unobservables.
Unobserved observables.

Minds, Brains and Computers

1. Which of these are *not* a mental states?

The experience of having built a house
Imagining building a house
Remembering building a house
The pain of building a house
The act of building a house
The process of building a house
Thinking of building a house

2. Which of the following is the best statement of Substance, or Cartesian, dualism?

Material substances cause things to happen whereas immaterial substances do not.
Only creatures with a body can have a mind.
The mind is made from a different substance than the body.
It is hard to understand how a mind could be the same sort of thing as a body.
Material substances are natural whereas immaterial substances are supernatural.
We can never know anything for certain.

3. On what grounds did Princess Elizabeth of Bohemia object to substance dualism?

There is no evidence that immaterial minds exist.
Physical things can be changed only by interaction with other physical things.
Material substances probably do not exist whereas immaterial substances do exist.
Identity theory provides a better account of the nature of experience.
We do not have material bodies because we are being deceived by a malevolent demon.
An immaterial mind would cause impossible bodily actions.

4. Which of these claims would an Identity Theorist accept? (Tick as many boxes as is appropriate.)

Pain is reducible to the firing of C-fibres.
Pain is caused by C-fibres firing.
Pain is C-fibres firing.
Pain is the result of C-fibres firing.

5. Consider this statement: “a dog is a dog is a dog”. How many word tokens are in it?

6. How many word types are in the statement “a dog is a dog is a dog”?

Enter answer here : 3
7. Imagine for the sake of argument that an alien species with a completely different chemical makeup to humans was capable of experiencing the same taste of strawberries that humans do. What would this immediately show us?

That neither humans nor aliens have brain states that are related to the experience of taste
That identity theory is false for humans but true for aliens.
That the experience of taste is immaterial.
That both humans and aliens have immaterial souls
That the experience of the taste of strawberries cannot be identical to a brain state.
That standards of taste are universal.

8. Functionalists hold that the content of a belief is determined by the practical usefulness of that belief. True or false?

True
False

9. Consider the following sentence: “Moses supposes that roses have noses”. Which of the following is a syntactic property of the sentence? (Tick as many boxes as is appropriate.)

That it says something that might be true
That it is composed of 6 word tokens
That English speakers can understand it
That it says something strange
That it is true of Moses
That it is composed of 31 letters
That it begins with the letter ‘M’
That it pertains to Moses

10. If we accept the conclusion of Searle’s ‘Chinese Room’ argument, which of these things can a human mind do that a computer cannot do?

Give correct answers to mathematical problems
Stop working properly because of a virus
Understand what the word ‘philosophy’ means
Find the winning move in a game of chess
Translate sentences from one language into another

Are Scientific Theories True?

1. Which of these is an accurate characterisation of the semantic aspect of scientific realism?

That only the language of science really describes reality.
The terms of a scientific theory should be understood as relative to the culture of a some particular society.
The terms of a scientific theory should be understood as referring to the relevant objects in the external world.
The terms of a scientific theory should be understood as referring to immaterial ideas.
The terms of a scientific theory should be understood as referring to certain symbols in the external world.
The terms of a scientific theory should be understood as expressing the scientist’s attitudes towards certain objects in the world.

2. Which of these is an accurate characterisation of the epistemic aspect of scientific realism?

We believe that only our best scientific theories are logically coherent.
We believe that our best scientific theories at least approximate the truth.
We believe that our best scientific theories can do no more than coherently explain our observations about natural phenomena.
We believe that our best scientific theories are at least useful for creating technology that works.

3. Which of the following are claims made by constructive empiricists? (Select as many boxes as is appropriate.)

Scientific theories do not need to be true in order to be good.
We should only believe those parts of our scientific theories that pertain to \textit{observable}observable things: i.e. the empirically accessible parts of our theories.
Science is the only practice that allows us to accurately describe entities that we cannot observe.
The phenomena we observe are mind-dependent, so we should suspend our belief in the truth of our experiences.

4. Constructive empiricists claim that empirical adequacy is the aim of science. When is a scientific theory empirically adequate?

When its claims about unobservable phenomena are false.
When its claims about observable phenomena are true.
When its claims about unobservable phenomena are true.
When its claims about both observable and unobservable phenomena are true.

5. How do constructive empiricists explain the success of scientific theories in predicting observable phenomena?

They provide a ‘Darwinian’ explanation: the reason scientific theories are successful in predicting the observable phenomena is because producing theories that are successful at predicting the observed phenomena has adaptive value. If we could not, then our evolutionary ancestors would not have survived.
They provide a ‘Darwinian’ explanation: the reason our current scientific theories are successful in predicting the observable phenomena is because only theories that are successful at predicting the observable phenomena survive.
They claim that we can explain the success of scientific theories in terms of their truth.
They point out that if a theory is empirically adequate then it follows from the definition of ’empirical adequacy’ that the theory will predict the observable phenomena.

6. Which of the following is an example of scientific realists’ criticisms of constructive empiricism?

Constructive empiricism lacks an explanation of why our scientific theories are successful at predicting \textit{novel}novel phenomena.
Constructive empiricism lacks an explanation of why scientists construct the theories they do.

7. Constructive empiricists are committed to the claim that there is a distinction between observable and unobservable phenomena. What is this distinction?

Something is observable if it is postulated by science, which is an \textit{empirical}empirical discipline. Something is unobservable if it is believed to be known by unscientific, and hence \textit{non-empirical}non-empirical, means.
All \textit{natural}natural phenomena, even things such as atoms and electrons, are observable, whereas \textit{mental}mental phenomena are unobservable.
Something is observable if it can be directly perceived by the senses. Something is unobservable if it cannot be directly perceived by the senses.
Something is observable if it can be assigned a value such as mass, acceleration or force. Something is unobservable if it cannot be assigned a value such as mass, acceleration or force.

8. Which of the following is an instance of Inference to the Best Explanation?

The existence of the Higgs boson provides the best explanation for a certain set of observational data provided by the Large Hadron Collider at Cern. Therefore, the Higgs boson exists.
Although we cannot perfectly explain certain things, such as the birth of the universe, even those things must be potentially perfectly explainable because they are observable.
The observational data provided by the Large Hadron Collider at Cern could exist even if the Higgs boson does not. Therefore the Higgs boson does not exist.

9. Why do scientific realists appeal to the distinction between \textit{unobservables}unobservables and unobserved \textit{observables}observables in arguing against constructive empiricism?

Realists hold that we use the same inferential practices to infer the existence of unobserved but observable things (such as dinosaurs) as we use to infer the existence of unobserv\textit{able}able things (such as electrons). As such, if we are warranted in believing in the former then we are warranted in believing in the latter.
Realists hold that since there is no conceptual distinction between “unobserved observables” and “unobservables”, if you believe in the former you should also believe in the latter.
Realists hold that there are no such things as unobservables, since we \textit{can}can observe entities such as the Higgs Boson using equipment like the Large Hadron Collider. Hence, there are only unobserved observables, contrary to constructive empiricism.
Realists hold that the aim of science is to provide true descriptions of unobservables, but not of unobserved observables, contrary to constructive empiricism.

10. What is meant by “idealization” in science?

“Idealization”, in this context, refers to the progression towards a final, ideal science.
“Idealization”, in this context, refers to when scientific models distort or simplify the physical systems they represent in some way.
“Idealization”, in this context, refers to the philosophical view that reality is a construction of the mind.
“Idealization”, in this context, refers the the tendency of scientific realists to have an idealized view of the nature of science.

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