Lingnan University Digital Commons @ Lingnan University Theses & Dissertations Department of Philosophy 8-13-2014 The nature of intuition : what theories of intuition ought to be Hung Nin LAM Follow this and additional works at: https://commons.ln.edu.hk/philo_etd Part of the Philosophy Commons Recommended Citation Lam, H. N. (2014). The nature of intuition: What theories of intuition ought to be (Master's thesis, Lingnan University, Hong Kong). Retrieved from http://commons.ln.edu.hk/philo_etd/12 This Thesis is brought to you for free and open access by the Department of Philosophy at Digital Commons @ Lingnan University. It has been accepted for inclusion in Theses & Dissertations by an authorized administrator of Digital Commons @ Lingnan University. Terms of Use The copyright of this thesis is owned by its author. Any reproduction, adaptation, distribution or dissemination of this thesis without express authorization is strictly prohibited. All rights reserved. THE NATURE OF INTUITION: WHAT THEORIES OF INTUITION OUGHT TO BE LAM HUNG NIN MPHIL LINGNAN UNIVERSITY 2014 THE NATURE OF INTUITION: WHAT THEORIES OF INTUITION OUGHT TO BE by LAM Hung Nin A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the Degree of Master of Philosophy in Philosophy Lingnan University 2014 ABSTRACT The Nature of Intuition: What Theories of Intuition Ought to Be by LAM Hung Nin Master of Philosophy Immediate striking feelings without any conscious inference are viewed as one of the sources of truth by many philosophers. It is often claimed that there is a long tradition in philosophy of viewing intuitive propositions as true without need for further justification, since the intuitiveness, for traditional philosophy, suggests that the proposition is self-evident. In philosophical discussions, it was extremely common for philosophers to argue for the intuitiveness of their theories. Contemporary philosophers have put increasing attention and effort into the study of this methodology in philosophy. They explicitly use the term ‘intuition’ and ‘appealing to intuition’ to refer to such common practice in philosophy. Recently there are numerous papers discussing the topic of intuition, its reliability, evidential status, and what philosophy ought to be. These disputes have lasted for several decades and it seems the disputes may even continue for several more decades. Despite the excessive usage of the term ‘intuition’, there are still polarized attitudes towards intuition: not only on the question of whether we should appeal to intuition in doing philosophy, but also on what ‘intuition’ means. The latter problem, the divergence of understanding on ‘intuition’, seems to be the main factor causing endless disputes of this topic and it should be the problem primarily solved. There are philosophers who notice the problem that there is no general agreement on the accounts of intuition. However, surprisingly, most of them have not attempted to solve the problem, but just simply give their own accounts of intuition, or claim that it is improbable to have general agreement on the definition of ‘intuition’ instead. In fact, it is possible to have a general acceptable theory of intuition. The main aims of the thesis are to provide the method of seeking the good candidates for a general acceptable theory of intuition and to use the method in seeking one of the good theories. In order to achieve the goals, the thesis will (1) provide the ground for the discussion, by specifying several features of intuition as the desiderata of a good theory; and (2) examine several theories of intuition that have been offered in recent literature as example. We will find that, unfortunately, among the theories selected in philosophy, there still seems to be no satisfactory account of intuition. Nevertheless, there seems a promising account of intuition offered in psychology. The thesis will argue the psychological account is one of the good candidates of general acceptable theory of intuition. If not, we at least have a method of seeking the good theories of intuition. DECLARATION I declare that this is an original work based primarily on my own research, and I warrant that all citations of previous research, published or unpublished, have been duly acknowledged. (LAM Hung Nin) Date: Contents Part I Chapter 1: Introduction 1.1 The Plan of the Thesis ..................................................................... 1 1.2 Background Questions .................................................................... 5 Chapter 2: The Features of Intuition 2.1 Fallibility ........................................................................................ 37 2.2 Novelty .......................................................................................... 49 2.3 Particularity ................................................................................... 54 2.4 Plasticity ........................................................................................ 68 2.5 Variability ...................................................................................... 78 2.6 Heterogeneity ............................................................................... 91 Part II Chapter 3: Theories of Intuition 3.1 George Bealer ............................................................................. 104 3.2 Ernest Sosa .................................................................................. 122 3.3 David Lewis ................................................................................. 139 3.4 Hilary Kornblith ........................................................................... 144 3.5 Timothy Williamson .................................................................... 157 Chapter 4: Psychological Theory of Intuition 4.1 Dual Processes of Reasoning ...................................................... 165 4.2 Explanation for the Features ...................................................... 172 4.3 Conclusion .................................................................................. 180 Bibliography....................................................................................................... 185 i Acknowledgements I would like to express my sincere gratitude to my supervisor, Prof. Jennifer Nado, for her patient guidance and valuable advice of this research work. She shares literature and her experience in doing research, generously gives constructive suggestions and her time in helping the planning and development of the project. Without the helps from Prof. Nado, I could not imagine what difficulties I will face in completing this thesis. My grateful thanks are also extended to my examiners, Prof. Max Deutsch, Prof. Darrell Rowbottom and Prof. Derek Baker, for their useful critiques in helping the development of the thesis. Finally, I wish to acknowledge the understandings and supports from my family and friends throughout the preparation of the project. ii Part I Chapter 1: Introduction 1.1 The Plan of the Thesis Immediate striking feelings without any conscious inference are viewed as one of the sources of truth by many philosophers. It is often claimed that there is a long tradition in philosophy of viewing intuitive propositions as true without need for further justification, since the intuitiveness, for traditional philosophy, suggests that the proposition is self-evident. In philosophical discussions, it has been extremely common for philosophers to argue for the intuitiveness of their theories. Contemporary philosophers have put increasing attention and effort into the study of this methodology in philosophy. They explicitly use the term ‘intuition’ and ‘appealing to intuition’ to refer to such common practice in philosophy. Recently there are numerous papers discussing the topic of intuition, its reliability, evidential status, and what philosophy ought to be. These disputes have lasted for several decades and it seems the disputes may even continue for several more decades. The excessive usage of the term ‘intuition’, which has occurred in the papers of both advocates and opponents of this methodology for a long time, does not mean there are many agreements reached in the discussion. There are polarized attitudes towards intuition: not only on the question of whether we should appeal to 1 intuition or not in doing philosophy, but also on what ‘intuition’ means. The latter problem, the divergence of understanding of ‘intuition’, I believe, is the main factor causing endless disputes on this topic and it should be the problem primarily solved. Some philosophers (Weinberg, 2007, p. 318; Williamson, 2004, p. 109; 2007, p. 215) notice the problem that there is no general agreement on the accounts of intuition. However, surprisingly, most of them1 have not attempted to solve the problem, but just simply give their own accounts of intuition2, or claim that it is improbable to have general agreement on the definition of ‘intuition’ instead. Philosophers seem to ignore the fact that, even if they can successfully build up a positive account of intuition, their theories are merely one of the competing accounts of intuition. They still have the responsibility to show that their account of intuition has advantages over other theories, before they can comfortably use their account of intuition in the arguments. The indifference towards the divergence of understanding on ‘intuition’ allows philosophers to build up their own accounts for intuition. Different philosophers have different understanding of the term