本课程将为你介绍现代哲学中的一些研究领域。在每个模块中，将由不同的哲学家为你讲述其专业领域内最重要的疑问和问题。 首先，我们来了解什么是哲学，哲学有哪些独特的目标与方法以及哲学与其他学科有何不同？之后，我们会在课程剩余的时间内向你简要介绍各种哲学领域的总体情况。你要学习的主题包括：知识论，其中将讨论囊括我们对世界和我们自身的了解以及如何获取这些知识；科学哲学，我们将在此模块中调查科学研究和实践中的基础概念问题；心灵哲学，我们将在此模块中询问物质拥有心灵的意义以及应如何理解和诠释心灵；道德哲学，我们将在此模块中探究道德判断和反应的本质，看它们是旨在得出客观的道德真相，还是仅作为个人或文化偏好，以及，形而上学，我们将在此模块中思考有关事实本质的一些基础概念问题。 本慕课 (MOOC) 课程由爱丁堡大学 Eidyn 研究中心领导设计。为配合“哲学导论”的授课，我们为大家倾力推荐一本由 Routledge 出版社出版的名为 "Philosophy for Everyone" 的配套书籍。这本“哲学导论”的课程配套书籍是由爱丁堡大学哲学小组为满足慕课 (MOOC) 学生要求而编写的。"Philosophy for Everyone"一书中包含清晰易懂的章节、章节摘要、词汇表、探究问题、补充阅读推荐以及在线资源指南。 This is a translated version. To join the original English version, Please visit this page https://www.coursera.org/learn/philosophy
关于改变的两种观念
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En provenance du cours de The University of Edinburgh
哲学导论（中文版）
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À partir de la leçon
时间旅行与哲学 - Alasdair Richmond
在最后一个模块中，我们将思考形而上学中的某些问题，该哲学分支研究的是现实有哪些超感因素。 我们的学习示例是时间旅行的可能性（或不可能性）。 有人认为，动动脑子就可以知道我们显然不可能制造出一种机器，用于将人送到过去的时间。 但从逻辑上讲，时间旅行真的不可能吗？ 如果要这一点成为可能，宇宙需要满足什么条件？ 我们能知道宇宙是否满足这种条件吗？
Rencontrer les enseignants
Dr. Dave WardLecturer in Philosophy
University of Edinburgh
Professor Duncan PritchardProfessor of Philosophy
University of Edinburgh
Professor Michela MassimiFull Professor
Philosophy
Dr. Suilin LavelleLecturer in Philosophy
University of Edinburgh
Dr. Matthew ChrismanReader in Philosophy
Philosophy
Dr. Allan Hazlett
Dr. Alasdair RichmondDr.
Philosophy
Okay, so so
far we've covered Lewis' account of what time travel actually involves.
And we've covered Lewis' attempt at trying to diffuse the appeal of
grandfather paradoxes.
So so far the account is this.
Traveling to the past is logically possible provided that what the traveler
does in the past is consistent with the history whence the traveler comes.
Now at this point, you might be thinking, well hang on.
If the travelers actions already exist in the past, and
some say before the traveler sets out.
Or at least if travelers actions exist at external times,
early in the travelers departure,
how can the traveler possibly have any impact on the past?
People sometimes hear Lewis' analysis and
think well surely the traveler is just a sort of pre-preprogrammed robot,
completely predetermined to go through a completely rigid set of actions.
Well, still people might think that a traveler in the past is doomed to be
a sort of ghost, forced to witness events the powerless to intervene.
But Lewis thinks that it’s possible for
a traveler to be really concretely present in the past.
A properly functioning human agent with intentions and wishes and choices and
to make a difference to the past.
You have to be careful how we imagine the impact of a traveler in the past.
Lewis distinguishes between two senses in which it could be said a traveler
could change the past.
What I'm going to call replacement change and counterfactual change.
In a nutshell, Lewis says that a traveler in the past cannot effect
replacement changes but can effect counterfactual changes.
What's a replacement change?
Consider a perfectly ordinary object, like a glass.
If I were to drop a glass from waist height onto a concrete floor,
and the glass shatters,
I would have replaced an intact glass with a set of glass fragments.
I would have effected a replacement change in events.
There was an intact glass, the intact glass is shattered.
The intact glass has gone away, and
in its stead it's being replaced by a set of glass fragments.
Now Lewis thinks that replacement changes can happen to concrete objects, but
not to times.
You can't replacement change any time, past, present or future.
Suppose you make a plan to meet a friend for
lunch at twelve o'clock at a certain restaurant.
And then you get a text from your friend to say I'm sorry,
I can't make lunch today, can we meet tomorrow?
Well that hasn't replacement changed the future.
It's not that you did in the future meet at a certain restaurant and
then that future somehow went away.
So Lewis says yes you can't affect replacement changes in the past but
you can't affect replacement changes in the future either.
Replacement changes can only happen to complete objects.
You can replace a concrete object,
like an intact glass with a set of glass fragments.
But complete objects are not the same as times.
So that's replacement change.
Counterfactual change may be a little bit harder to get a handle on.
But counterfactual change is the impact that you have assessed in terms of what
would have happened, counterfactually, if you hadn't been present.
One of the things that enabled me to be on time for
this session this morning was that my alarm clock went off on time.
But if the alarm clock hadn't gone off, I would've been late.
So I can assert the counterfactual if my alarm clock had broken
I wouldn't have been on time.
So when my alarm went off clearly had an impact on
my ability to attend this session on time.
If my alarm clock had broken I would have been late.
So, in a sense, the alarm has changed the course of my day.
But that change is not to be assessed in replacement terms.
It's not that there was an original version of events where
my alarm clock didn't go off and I was late.
And then somehow my alarm clock did go off and history was replacement changed,
and I was on time.
Rather the impact the alarm clock had can be assessed counterfactually.
This morning really happened.
What we see happened is my alarm clock going off on time.
But if it had happened differently, history would have unfolded differently.
Another example.
Historians who treated the period,
not least Arthur Wellesley, the Duke of Wellington.
Maintain that a crucial fact in determining the outcome
of the Battle of Waterloo was the arrival in the late afternoon at the Battle
of Prussian forces under the command of Field Marshal Blucher.
Wellington himself frequently said that if Blucher had been late,
Napoleon would have won.
So that's clearly a counterfactual conditional.
If Blucher had been late, Napoleon would have won.
Again, it's not that Blucher made a replacement change
to the Battle of Waterloo.
It's not that Waterloo originally issued in a French victory and
then Blue Coats forces arrived and the French victory somehow was made such that
it never was and an allied victory took it's place.
Waterloo happened only once, with a victory for the allies.
But an important factor in that victory was the arrival of Marshal Blucher.
So we can see that Blucher's arrival changed the course of history.
But it changed it in the counterfactual sense, not in the replacement sense.
Okay, we've got two senses of change, replacement change, counterfactual change.
Lewis maintains that time travelers can have an impact on the past
in the counterfactual sense.
The presence of a traveler might make history different
from what it would have been if the traveler hadn't been there.
Going back to my attempt at assassinating Hitler.
Suppose my time machine deposits me in Vienna at 1908 with
a great flash of light.
And I've arrived so close to Hitler that Hitler sees a flash of light and recoils.
He steps back in shock out of the path of a tram that
would otherwise have cut him down.
In this case, I can assert the counterfactual
if I hadn't traveled back in time, Hitler would've died.
So in this case, I clearly had a counterfactual impact on history.
I have, albeit unwittingly, been partly responsible for Hitler's survival.
So it could well be that the course of history could
consistently contain the counterfactual impact of the presence of time travelers.
Another example, suppose that I travel back to 1864 and I bump into Lincoln.
Lincoln's about to give the mutuled famous words at the Gettysburg address, but
he's unsure of which version to give.
He has a choice between the famous version that history recalls and another version.
And I say to him,
go with the version that's starts these great resident sentences about
how this nation was conceived in liberty that will go down very well.
Lincoln takes my advice, and the other version of the speech is big.
But suppose if I hadn't intervened,
Lincoln would have recited a different version of the Gettysburg address.
Well I have clearly had an impact on history.
History is different as a result of my effort.
But I've not replaced anything.
I've not made one version of the Gettysburg Address disappear and
another version take its place.
The Gettysburg Address happens once and once only.
But I've still changed the course of history.
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