The examination will have two parts.  The first part will ask you to explain, carefully but briefly, a number of basic ideas covered in the readings. (Probably 6-8 questions.)  The second part will ask you to write two more extended essays.

1. qualia vs. Qualia (Tye)
2. intentionalism
3. intension vs. extension
4. Twin Earth
5. linguistic division of labor
6. externalism vs. internalism about content
7. narrow content
8. cyborg
9. opaque vs. transparent technology [Clark 37ff, 103, etc.]
10. neural opportunism [Clark 62ff]
11. "Good at Frisbee, Bad at Logic" [Clark 75]
12. neural constructivism [Clark 83ff]
13. telepresence [e.g. Clark 103ff; see index for other references]
14. Democritean universe
15. difference between deterministic and indeterministic Democritean universes
16. evitability
17. Austin's putt
18. explain how Dennett thinks there can be events without causes in a deterministic universe
19. hard determinism
20. libertarianism
21. horizontal vs. vertical transmission of design (Dennett 145ff)
22. Prisoner's Dilemma (Dennett 147ff)
23. physical stance, intentional stance, design stance (Dennett 151)
24. memes (Dennett 175ff)
25. being good to seem good (Dennett chapter 7)
26. Libet experiment and Dennett's response (chapter 8)
27. Cartesian Theater (Dennett 233)
28. Turing Test
29. idealism
30. recurrent network

The general idea for the essays is to take a position on one of the views we have discussed so far, and defend your position in relation to the issues and arguments discussed in the readings for the class. Essays will be graded on the accuracy, thoroughness, and clarity with which you discuss the relevant readings, as well as the cogency and clarity of your arguments. I will probably give you three questions and ask you to write on two of them.

1. Explain what intentionalism about qualia is. Notice that if intentionalism is true, then there cannot be two experiences which have the same phenomenal content, but different qualia. Explain at least two examples that might appear to be examples of experiences that have the same phenomenal content but different qualia, and explain why Tye thinks that these examples are not actually counterexamples to intentionalism. Conclude with your own evaluation of how successful his response to these examples is.

2. Explain Putnam's Twin Earth argument that at least some of our ordinary mental contents are wide rather than narrow. (Of course, you'll also have to explain what "wide" and "narrow" mean in this context!) Evaluate his argument. Then explain and evaluate one argument for the existence of narrow content.

3. Andy Clark writes: "[E]ither the basic feeling of presence is always some kind of illusion, even in the normal everyday case, or if you don't want to count that feeling as illusory, the case of feeling the cup with my hand and feeling it with the telemanipulator are really, in the deepest sense, potentially on a par" (Clark, p. 105). This quotation is a sort of miniature version of one of the main arguments of the entire book. Discuss the overall argument of the book in light of the quotation. Give your own evaluation of the main argument of the book (and your reasons for this evaluation).

4. Daniel Dennett writes: "If you make yourself really small, you can externalize virtually everything" (Dennett, p. 122 and several times thereafter). What does Dennett mean by this? Why does he think "making yourself really small" is a bad idea? How is his thesis here related to the theme of Clark's book?

5. Andy Clark writes: "What we really need to reject, I suggest, is the seductive idea that all these various neural and nonneural tools need a kind of privileged user. Instead, it is just tools all the way down" (Clark, p. 136). In a somewhat similar vein, Dennett writes of "the brain's user-illusion of itself, which I call the self as a center of narrative gravity" (253). Discuss the similarities (and differences, if any) between Dennett's conception of the self (in Chapter 8, especially toward the end) and Clark's (especially in his chapter 5). Give your own evaluation of their views, with your reasons for it.

6. Is free will incompatible with determinism? Discuss some of Dennett's reasons for answering "no," and give your own evaluation of those reasons.

7. Can indeterminism help explain the possibility of free will? Explain and evaluate Dennett's reasons for answering "no."