Dissertation, University of New South Wales (
2007)
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Abstract
Abstract
A fundamental error has dominated philosophy and science since ancient times, the
assumption of the existence of the "unicom-world"—that is, the existence of one unique
world. It is one of the oldest and most dominant paradigms in human thinking that has
generated many pseudo-problems in philosophy and science. We can identify this
thinking paradigm, the unicom-world, in the majority of myths, theological doctrines,
philosophical approaches and scientific theories.
In order to avoid this error, in Part I of this thesis, I show that it is necessary to
replace the unicom-world (in which all entities, such as Gods, minds, bodies, planets,
tables and micro-particles have been placed all together) with "epistemologically
different worlds" (which presuppose that each class of entities forms an epistemological
different world). More than three centuries ago, Descartes was aware of the impossibility
of solving an "anomaly" (the mind-body problem) but did not realize that the cause of
this "mystery" is the unicom-world. The role of Kantian a priori constitutive elements
(categories and pure intuitions) is extended to the epistemologically constitutive
interactions among classes of epistemologically different entities that belong to
epistemologically different worlds. The consequence of the existence of
epistemologically different worlds is that the famous mind-body problem is a false
problem or a pseudo-problem.
In Part II, from the "epistemologically different worlds" perspective, I analyze
notions from:
(1) The philosophy of mind and cognitive science (the mind-body problem, emergence
and reduction, mental causation and supervenience, levels, etc.)
(2) The philosophy of science (Camap's linguistic frameworks, Quine's and Goodman's
relativity, Friedman's relative constitutive a priori principles) and the science of the
twentieth century (the relationship between Einstein's theory of relativity and quantum
mechanics, complementarity and superposition, entanglement, nonlocality and
nonseparability from quantum mechanics).