Category: Metaphysics

Philosophers have long speculated about autonomy and agency, but the development of autonomous systems has made such speculation even more important.  Keeping things simple, an autonomous system is capable of operating independent of direct human control. Autonomy comes in degrees of independence and complexity. It is the capacity for independent operation that distinguishes autonomous systems from those controlled externally.

Toys provide useful examples of this distinction. A wind-up mouse toy has some autonomy: once wound up and released, it can operate on its own until it runs down. A puppet, in contrast, has no autonomy as a puppeteer must control it.

Robots provide examples of more complex autonomous systems. Google’s driverless car is an example of an advanced autonomous machine. Once programmed and deployed, it might be able to drive itself to its destination. A normal car isa non-autonomous system as the driver controls it directly. Some machines allow both autonomous and non-autonomous operation. For example, there are drones that follow a program guiding them to a target and then an operator can take direct control.

Autonomy, at least in this context, is distinct from agency. Autonomy is the capacity to operate (in some degree) independently of direct control. Agency, at least in this context, is the capacity to be morally responsible for one’s actions. There is a connection between autonomy and moral agency as moral agency requires autonomy. After all, an entity whose actions are completely controlled externally would not be responsible for what it was made to do. For example, a puppet is not accountable for what the puppeteer makes it do. Likewise for remote controlled drones used to assassinate people.

While autonomy is necessary for agency, it is not sufficient. While all agents have some autonomy, not all autonomous entities are moral agents. A wind-up toy has a degree of autonomy but has no agency. A modern robot drone following a pre-programed flight-plan has a degree of autonomy but lacks agency. If it collided with a plane, it would not be morally responsible. The usual reason why such a machine would not be an agent is that it lacks the capacity to decide. Or put another way, it lacks freedom.  Since it cannot do otherwise, it is no more morally accountable than an earthquake or a super nova.

One obvious problem with basing agency on freedom (especially metaphysical free will) is that there is endless debate over this subject. There is also the epistemic problem of how one would know if an entity had such freedom and free will seems epistemically indistinguishable from a lack of free will.

As a practical matter, it is often just assumed people have the freedom needed to be agents. Kant famously took this approach. What he saw as the best science of his day indicated a deterministic universe devoid of metaphysical freedom. However, he contended that such freedom was needed for morality, so it should be accepted for this reason.

While humans are willing (generally) to attribute freedom and agency to other humans, there are good reasons to not attribute freedom and agency to autonomous machines even those that might be as complex as (or even more complex than) a human. The usual line of reasoning is that since such machines would be built and programmed by humans, they would do what they do because they are what they were made to be. This is in contrast to the agency of humans: humans, it is alleged, do what they do because they choose to do what they do.

This distinction between humans and suitably complex machines seems a mere prejudice favoring organic machines over mechanical machines. If a human was in a convincing robot costume and credibly presented as a robot while acting like a normal human, people would be inclined to deny that “it” had freedom and agency. If a robot was made to look and act just like a human, people would be inclined to grant it agency, at least until they learned it was “just” a machine. Then there would probably be an inclination to regard it as a very clever but unfree machine. An excellent fictional example of this is Harlan Ellison’s Demon With a Glass Hand.

 But it would not be known whether the human or the machine had the freedom alleged needed for agency. Fortunately, it is possible to have agency even without free will (but with a form of freedom).  The German philosopher Leibniz held the view that what each person will do is pre-established by their inner nature. On the face of it, this seems to entail there is no freedom: each person does what they do because of what they are—and they cannot do otherwise. Interestingly, Leibniz takes the view that people are free. However, he does not accept  a commonly held view that freedom requires actions that are unpredictable and spontaneous. Leibniz rejects this view in favor of the position that freedom is unimpeded self-development.

For Leibniz, being metaphysically without freedom would involve being controlled from the outside, like a puppet controlled by a puppeteer or a vehicle operated by remote control.  In contrast, freedom is acting from one’s values and character. This is what Leibniz and Taoists call “inner nature.” If a person is acting from this inner nature and not external coercion so that the action is the result of character, then that is all that can be meant by freedom. This view, which attempts to blend determinism and freedom, is known as compatibilism. On this view, humans have agency because they have the required degree of freedom and autonomy.

If this model works for humans, it could apply to autonomous machines. To the degree that a machine is operating in accord to its “inner nature” and is not operating under the control of outside factors, it would have agency.

An obvious objection is that an autonomous machine, however complex, would have been built and programmed (in the broad sense of the term) by humans. As such, it would be controlled and not free. The easy and obvious reply is that humans are “built” by other humans (by mating) and are “programmed” by humans via education and socialization. As such, if humans can be moral agents, then a machine could also be a moral agent.

From a moral standpoint, I would suggest a Moral Descartes’ Test (or a Moral Turing Test). Descartes argued that the sure proof of having a mind is a capacity to use true language. Turing later proposed a similar test involving the ability of a computer to pass as human via text communication. In the moral test, the test would be a judgment of moral agency: can the machine be as convincing as a human in its possession of agency? Naturally, a suitable means of concealing the fact that the being is a machine would be needed to prevent prejudice from affecting the judgment. The movie Blade Runner featured something similar, the Voight-Kampff test aimed at determining if the subject was a replicant or human. This test was based on the differences between humans and replicants in regard to emotions. In the case of moral agency, the test would have to be crafted to determine agency rather than to distinguish a human from machine, since the issue is not whether a machine is human but whether it has agency. A non-human moral agent might differ greatly from a human, and it should not be assumed that an agent must be human, and non-humans cannot be moral agents. The challenge is developing a test for moral agency. It would be interesting if humans could not pass it.

 

Back when ISIS was a major threat, President Obama refused to label its members as “Islamic extremists” and stressed that the United States was not at war with Islam. Not surprisingly, some of his critics and political opponents took issue with this and often insisted on labeling the members of ISIS as Islamic extremists or Islamic terrorists.  Graeme Wood rather famously, argued that ISIS is an Islamic group and was adhering very closely to its interpretations of the sacred text.

Laying aside the political machinations, there is an interesting philosophical and theological question here: who decides who is a Muslim? Since I am not a Muslim or a scholar of Islam, I will not be examining this question from a theological or religious perspective. I will certainly not be making any assertions about which specific religious authorities have the right to say who is and who is not a true Muslim. Rather, I am looking at the philosophical matter of the foundation of legitimate group identity. This is, of course, a variation on one aspect of the classic problem of universals: in virtue of what (if anything) is a particular (such as a person) of a type (such as being a Muslim)?

Since I am a metaphysician, I will begin with the rather obvious metaphysical starting point. As Pascal noted in his famous wager, God exists, or God does not.

If God does not exist, then Islam (like all religions that are based on a belief in this God) would have an incorrect metaphysics. In this case, being or not being a Muslim would be a matter of social identity. It would be comparable to being or not being a member of Rotary, being a Republican, a member of Gulf Winds Track Club or a citizen of Canada. That is, it would be a matter of the conventions, traditions, rules and such that are made up by people. People do, of course, often take this made-up stuff very seriously and sometimes are willing to kill over these social fictions.

If God does exist, then there is yet another dilemma: God is either the God claimed (in general) in Islamic metaphysics or God is not. One interesting problem with sorting out this dilemma is that to know if God is as Islam claims, one would need to know the true definition of Islam and thus what it would be to be a true Muslim. Fortunately, the challenge here is metaphysical rather than epistemic. If God does exist and is not the God of Islam (whatever it is), then there would be no “true” Muslims, since Islam would have things wrong. In this case, being a Muslim would also be a matter of social convention in that one would belong to a religion that was right about God existing, but wrong about all the rest. There is, obviously, the epistemic challenge of knowing this and everyone thinks they are right about their religion (or lack of religion).

Now, if God exists and is the God of Islam (whatever it is), then being a “true” member of a faith that accepts God, but has God wrong (that is, all the non-Islam monotheistic faiths), would be a matter of social convention. For example, being a Christian would thus be a matter of the social traditions, rules and such. There would, of course, be the consolation prize of getting one thing right (that God exists).

In this scenario, Islam (whatever it is) would be the true religion (that is, the one that got it right). From this it would follow that the Muslim who has it right (believes in the true Islam) is a true Muslim. There is, however, the obvious epistemic challenge: which version and interpretation of Islam is the right one? After all, there are many versions and even more interpretations. And even assuming that Islam is the one true religion, only the one true version of Islam can be right. Unless, of course, God is very flexible about this sort of thing. In this case, there could be many varieties of true Muslims, much like there can be many versions of “true” gamers.

 If God is not flexible, then most Muslims would be wrong: they are not true Muslims. This leads to the obvious epistemic problem: even if it is assumed that Islam is the true religion, then how does one know which version has it right? Naturally, each person thinks they have it right. Obviously enough, intensity of belief and sincerity will not do. After all, the ancients had intense belief in and sincerity about what are now believed to be made up gods (like Thor and Athena). Going through books and writings will also not help. After all, the ancients had plenty of books and writings about what we regard as their make-believe deities.

What is needed, then, is a sure sign, clear and indisputable proof of the one true view. Naturally, each person thinks they have that and everyone cannot be right. God, sadly, has not provided any means of sorting this out. There are no glowing divine auras around those who have it right. Because of this, it seems best to leave this to God.

A Philosopher’s Blog 2025 brings together a year of sharp, accessible, and often provocative reflections on the moral, political, cultural, and technological challenges of contemporary life. Written by philosopher Michael LaBossiere, these essays move fluidly from the ethics of AI to the culture wars, from conspiracy theories to Dungeons & Dragons, from public policy to personal agency — always with clarity, humor, and a commitment to critical thinking.

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The bookshelves of the world abound with self-help tomes. Many profess to help with emotional woes, such as sadness, and make vague promises about happiness.  Philosophers have long been in the business of offering advice on how to be happy. Or at least how not  to be too sad.

Each spring semester I teach Modern Philosophy and cover our good dead friend Spinoza. In addition to an exciting career as a lens grinder, he also managed to avoid being killed by an assassin. However, breathing in all that glass dust contributed to his untimely death. But enough about his life and death, it is time to get to the point of this essay.

As Spinoza saw it, people are slaves to their emotions and chained to what they love, such as fame, fortune and other people. This inevitably leads to sadness: the people we love betray us or die. That fancy Tesla that once brought joy might become associated with a fascist. That million-dollar beach house can be swept away by the rising tide. A great job can be lost as a company seeks to boost its stock prices by downsizing the job fillers. And so on, through all the ways things can go badly.

While Spinoza was a pantheist and believed that everything is God and God is everything, his view of human beings is like that of the philosophical mechanist: humans are not magically exempt from the laws of nature. He was also a strict determinist: each event occurs from necessity and cannot be otherwise. There is no chance or choice. So, for example, Trump could not have lost the 2024 election As another example, I could not have written this essay in any other manner, so I had to make that remark about Trump winning in 2024 rather than mentioning his 2020 defeat.   

Buying into determinism, Spinoza took the view that human behavior and motivations can be examined as one might examine “lines, planes or bodies.” More precisely, he took the view that emotions follow the same necessity as all other things, thus making the effects of the emotions predictable provided one has enough knowledge.  Spinoza then used this idea as the basis for his “self-help” advice.

According to Spinoza all emotions are responses to the past, present or future. For example, a person might feel regret because she believes she could have made her last relationship work if she had only put more effort into it. As another example, a person might worry because he thinks that he might lose his job in the next round of downsizing at his company. These negative feelings rest, as Spinoza sees it, on the false belief that the past could have been otherwise and that the future is undetermined. Once a person realizes nothing could have been any different and the future cannot be anything other than what it will be, then that person will suffer less from emotions. Thus, for Spinoza, freedom from the enslaving chains is the recognition and acceptance that what was could not have been otherwise and what will be cannot be otherwise.

This view does have a certain appeal, and it does make sense that it can have some value. In regard to the past, people do often beat themselves up emotionally over past mistakes and wonder about how things might have been different.  These regrets can bind a person and thus trap them in the past as they spend hours wondering “what if?” This is not to say that feeling regret or guilt is wrong. Far from it. But lamenting about the past to the detriment of the now is a problem.  It is also a problem to believe that things could have been different when they, in fact, could not have been different.

This is also not to say that a person should not reflect on the past. After all, a person who does not learn from her mistakes is doomed to repeat them. People can, of course, also be trapped by the past because of what they see as good things. They are chained to what they (think) they once had or once were (such as being the big woman on campus back in college).

In regard to the future, it is easy to be trapped by anxiety, fear and even hope. It can be reassuring to embrace the view that what will be will be and to not worry and be happy. This is not to say that one should be foolish about the future, of course.

There is, unfortunately, one fatal and obvious problem with Spinoza’s advice. If everything is necessary and determined, his advice makes no sense: what is, must be and cannot be otherwise. To use an analogy, it would be like shouting advice at someone watching a cut scene in a video game. This is pointless, since the person cannot do anything to change what is occurring. What occurs must occur and cannot be otherwise. For Spinoza, while we might think life is like a game, it is like a cut scene: we are spectators and not players controlling the game.

The obvious counter is to say “but I feel free! I feel like I am making choices!” Spinoza was aware of this objection. In response, he claims that if a stone were conscious and hurled through the air, it would think it was free to choose to move and land where it does. People think they are free because they are “conscious of their own actions, and ignorant of the causes by which those actions are determined.” In other words, we think we are free because we do not know better. Going back to the video game analogy, we think we are in control as we push the buttons, but this is because we do not know how the game works. We are just along for the ride and not in control.

Since everything is determined, whether a person heeds Spinoza’s advice is also determined. If you do, then you do and you could not do otherwise. If you do not, you could not do otherwise. As such, his advice seems beyond useless. This is a stock paradox faced by determinists who give advice: their theory says that people cannot choose to follow their advice as they will just do what they are determined to do. That said, it is possible to salvage some useful advice from Spinoza.

The first step is to reject his view that I lack free will.  I have a stock argument for this that goes as follows. Obviously, I have free will or I do not. It is equally obvious that there is no way to tell whether I do or not. From an empirical standpoint, a universe with free will looks and feels just like a universe without free will: you just observe people doing stuff and apparently making decisions while thinking and feeling that you are doing the same.  Suppose someone rejects free will and they are wrong. In this case they are not only mistaken but also consciously rejecting real freedom. 

Suppose someone rejects free will and they are correct. In that case, they are right. But not in the sense that they made the correct choice. They are determined to have that view and it would just so happen that it matches reality.

If I can choose, then I should obviously choose free will. If I cannot choose, then I will think I chose whatever it is I am determined to believe. If I can choose and choose to think I cannot, I am in error. Since I cannot know which option is correct, it seems best to accept free will. If I am free, I am right. If I am not free, then I am mistaken but have no choice.

Given the above argument, I accept that I have agency. This makes it possible for me to meaningfully give and accept (or reject) advice. Turning back to Spinoza, I obviously cannot accept his advice that I am enslaved by determinism. However, I can accept some of his claims, namely that I am acted upon by my attachments and emotions. As he sees it, the emotions are things that act upon us. On my view, they would  be things that impinge upon our agency. As I love to do, I will use an analogy to running.

I thought about this  essay on a run and also focused on the fact that feelings of pain and tiredness were impacting me like the way cold or rain might. In the case of pain and tiredness, the attack is from inside. In the case of the cold or rain, the attack is from the outside. Whether the attack is from inside or out, the attack is trying to make the choice for me, to rob me of my agency as a runner and make me give up. If the pain, cold or rain makes me stop, then I am not acting. I am being acted upon. If I choose to stop, then I am acting. If I choose to go on, I am also acting. And acting rightly.  As a runner I know the difference between choosing to stop and being forced to stop.

Being aware of this is useful for running. Thanks to decades of experience I understand, in a way Spinoza might approve, the workings of pain, fatigue and so on. To use a specific example, I know that I am acted upon by pain and I understand how it works. As such, the pain is not in control, I am. If I wish, I can run myself to ruin (and I have done just this). Or I can be wiser and avoid damaging myself.

Turning back to emotions, feelings impinge upon me in ways analogous to pain and fatigue. I do not have full control over how I feel as the emotions simply occur, perhaps in response to events or perhaps simply as the result of an electrochemical imbalance. To use a specific example, like most people I will sometimes feel depressed and know I have no reason to feel this. It is like the cold or fatigue in that it is just impinging on me. As Spinoza argued, my knowledge of how this works is critical to dealing with it. While I cannot fully control the feeling, I understand why I feel that way. It is like the cold I felt running in the Maine winters. It is a natural phenomenon that is, from my perspective, trying to destroy me. In the case of the cold, I can wear warmer clothing and stay moving. Knowing how it works enables me to choose how to combat it. Likewise, knowing how negative feelings work enables me to choose how to combat them. If I am depressed for no reason, I know it is just my brain trying to kill me. It is not pleasant, but it does not get to make the decisions for me. Fortunately, our good dead friend Aristotle has some excellent advice for training oneself to handle emotions.

That said, the analogy to cold is particularly apt. The ice of the winter can kill even those who understand it and know how to resist it. Sometimes the cold is just too much. Likewise, the emotions can be like the howling icy wind and be too much for the mind. We are, after all, only human and have our limits. Knowing this is a part of wisdom. Sometimes you just need to come in from the cold or it will kill you. Have some hot chocolate. With marshmallows.

It is July 16, 2214. I am at Popham Beach in what I still think of as Maine. I am standing in the sand, watching the waves strike the shore. Sand pipers run in the surf, looking for lunch. I have a two-hundred-year-old memory of another visit to this beach. In that memory, the water is cold on the skin and there is a mild ache in the left knee, a relic of a quadriceps tendon repair. Today there is no ache. What serves as my knee is a biomechanical system free of all aches and pains. I can, if I wish, feel the cold by adjusting my sensors. I do so, and what was once data about temperature becomes a feeling in what I still call my mind. I downgrade my vision to that of a human, then tweak it so it perfectly matches the imperfect eyesight of the memory. I do the same for my hearing and turn off my other sensors until I am, as far as I can tell, merely human. I walk into the water, enjoying the feeling of the cold. My companion asks me if I have ever been here before. I pause and consider this question. I have a memory from a man who was here in 2014. But I do not know if I am him or if I am but a child of his memories. But it is a lovely day…too lovely for metaphysics. I say “yes, long ago”, and wait patiently for the setting of the sun.

 

In science fiction one form of immortality is downloading memories from an old body to a new one. This, of course, rests on the assumption that a person is their memories. Philosophers have long considered whether a person is her memories. John Locke claimed a person is their consciousness and, in a science fiction move, considered the possibility that memories could be transferred from one soul to another. While Locke’s view can be a bit confusing (he distinguishes between person, body, soul and consciousness while not being entirely clear about how memory relates to consciousness), he seems to think a person is their memory. As far back as a person’s memory goes, they go and this brings along moral accountability. Being a Christian, Locke was concerned about judgment day and needed a mechanism of personal identity that did not depend on the sameness of body. Being an empiricist, he also needed an empirical basis. Memory contained within a soul seemed to take care of both concerns.

As noted earlier, Locke anticipates the science fiction idea of memory transfer and considers the problem that arises if memory makes personal identity and if memory could be transferred or copied. His solution can be seen as a divine cheat: he claims God, in His goodness, would not allow this to happen. However, he does discuss cases in which one (specifically Nestor) loses all memory and thus ceases to be the same person, though the same soul might be present.

So, if Locke is right about memory being the basis of personal identity and wrong about God not allowing the copying of memory, then if my memories were transferred to another consciousness, then it would be me. So, in my opening story, if the being standing on the beach in 2214 had my memory from 2014, then we would be the same person, and I would be 248 years old.

David Hume, another dead British empiricist, presented a problem for Locke’s account: intuitively, people believe they can extend their identity beyond their memory. That is, I do not suppose that it was not me just because I forgot something. Rather, I suppose it was me and that I merely forgot. Hume took the view that memory is used to discover personal identity and then he went off the rails and declared it was all about grammar rather than philosophy.

Another stock problem with the memory account is that if memory can be copied, it can be copied many times. The problem is that what serves as the basis of personal identity is supposed to be what makes me who I am and distinct from everyone else. If what is supposed to provide my distinct identity can be duplicated, then it cannot be the basis of my distinct identity. Locke, as noted above, “solves” this problem by divine intervention. However, without this intervention there seems to be no reason why my memory of Popham Beach from 2014 could not be copied many times if it could be copied once. As such, the entity on the beach in 2214 might just have a copy of my memory, just as it might have a copy of the files stored on the phone I was carrying then. The companion mentioned in the short tale might also have those same memories, but they both cannot be me.

The entity on the beach might even have an actual memory from me, a literal piece of my brain. However, this might not make it the same person as me. To use an analogy, it might also have my watch or my finger bone from 2014, but this would not make it me.

Interestingly (or boringly) enough, the science fiction scenario really does not change the basic problems of identity over time. We must determine what makes me the person I am and what makes me distinct from all other things, be that a scenario involving the Mike from 2014 or the entity on the beach in 2214. For that entity on the beach to be me, it would need to possess whatever it is that made me the person I was in 2014 (and, hopefully, am now) and what distinguished that Mike from all other things, that is, my personness and my distinctness.

Since we do not know what these things are (or if they even are at all), there is no way to say whether that entity in 2214 could be me. It is safe, I think, to claim that if it is just a copy of something from my memories, then it is not me. At best, it would be a child of my memory. It would, as philosophers have long argued, have the same sort of connection to Mike 2014 that Mike 2014 had to Mike 2013. It is also worth considering that as Hume and Buddha have claimed, that there really is no self, so that entity on the beach in 2214 is not me, but neither am I.

When I was young, I had my first out of body experience (OBE for short). While I did not know about them at the time, I later learned that my experience matched the usual description: I felt as if the center of my awareness and perception had left my body. It seemed as if I could perceive from this out-of-body location, albeit with greater vividness (retrospectively, it seemed like high definition). After that, I had OBEs from time to time, especially when I was under great stress, such as in graduate school.

When I was a kid, I only had two explanations for the experiences. One was supernatural: my soul was leaving my body. The other was paranormal: somehow, I had some special sensory ability. As I learned philosophy and science, I came up with other explanations. As a bit of fun philosophy, I’ll go through some.

When I learned about metaphysical dualism and Descartes, I had a theory that would explain my experience. For dualists, there are two types of stuff: the mental and the physical. The mind is made of mental stuff which thinks but is not extended in space. The body is made of physical stuff that does not think but is extended in space. On the dualist view, a person is their mind, and this mind somehow interacts (or syncs) with the body. Since the mind is distinct from the body, it could presumably leave and still interact (or sync) with the physical world. Roughly put, an OBE would be having the ghost leaving the shell but then returning to the l living body.

This account of the OBE does face all the challenges of metaphysical dualism and some of its own. In terms of the usual problems, there is the difficulty in proving the existence of such a mind and the classic mind-body problem of accounting for how the mind and body interact. In terms of a specific problem with dualist OBE, there is the obvious problem of how a disembodied mind would perceive the physical world without its body. If it could do this, then there would be no need for sense organs and people would not lose their senses due to damage or disease.

Another approach to the OBE experience is to make use of Occam’s Razor, which can be taken as the metaphysical principle that entities should not be multiplied beyond necessity. That is, if there are competing explanations for a phenomenon, then the one with the fewest posited metaphysical entities has an advantage. The principle is also applied to the number of assumptions required by explanations, and it is sometimes crudely put as the notion that the simplest explanation is best.

In the case of my OBE experiences, an application of Occam’s Razor would cut away the metaphysical account in favor of one with fewer entities or assumptions. In this case, the more economical explanation would be that my experiences were the result of unusual activity in my nervous system that created the impression that my awareness was outside my body. Since such “malfunctions” do occur without the need to postulate a wandering soul, this explanation has the most scientific appeal. It is also disappointing; like learning a magic trick is not magic, but misdirection and deceit. Fortunately, it can be fun to briefly pretend to ignore the most plausible explanation and consider some other philosophical options. After the fun is over, the most plausible explanation should, of course, be reseated on its throne.

One interesting possibility is that the mind has the capacity to receive sensory data in non-standard ways. That is, our epistemic capabilities extend beyond our sense organs, or we are someone able to acquire sensory data from an unusual perspective. OBE experiences involve, at least in my case, only sight and hearing and these involve energy. It could be imagined that the nervous system is able to shift its perception point by manipulating this energy. The easy and obvious counter to this is that studies of the nervous system would have presumably found evidence of such a strange system. Since there seems to be no biological mechanism for this, this explanation is defective.

It also fun to consider the philosophical view known as phenomenology or idealism. This view was most famously held by Berkeley.  His view made it into the popular consciousness with the question: “if a tree falls in the forest and there is no one to hear it, does it make a sound?” The answer, for Berkeley, was that there is always someone there to hear it. This someone is, of course, God and He perceives everything all the time. This might explain why when you shower, you might feel like someone is watching. 

Getting back on track, Berkeley’s philosophical view is a rejection of dualism. Unlike the metaphysical materialist who rejects the mind and accepts matter, Berkeley accepted the mind and rejected matter. For him, what we regard as physical objects are collections of ideas in minds. For example, the device that you are using to read this is not a physical machine and it is “made” of ideas. On this view, all experiences are OBE as there are no bodies in which to have experiences. However, one could have experiences as if one was outside one’s body.

Another way to look at phenomenology is to think of virtual reality. On this view reality is all virtual with no physical entities. This provides a way to explain OBEs, they could be glitches in perception. To use a video game first person shooter analogy, the game is supposed to set the camera so that it is as if you are seeing the world from the eyes of your character. This camera can glitch due to a software error, causing you to see the game world from a point “outside” your character’s head. This would be a game OBE. If phenomenology is correct, then perhaps OBEs are these sorts of glitches as the point of perception is briefly in the wrong place. Since the world is clearly imperfect, such glitches are not inconceivable. Alternatively, it need not be glitch, perhaps this sort of perceptual capability is a feature and not a bug.

While I would like to regard my OBEs as supporting metaphysical dualism (and thus the possibility of existence after death), the best explanation is the least fun, that it is a malfunction of the brain and a strange hallucination.

The classic problem of the external world presents an epistemic challenge forged by the skeptics: how do I know that what I seem to be experiencing as the external world is really real for real? Early skeptics claimed that what seems real might be a dream. Descartes upgraded the problem through his evil demon which used its powers to befuddle its victim. As technology progressed, philosophers presented the brain-in-a-vat scenarios and then moved on to more impressive virtual reality scenarios. One recent variation on this problem was made famous by Elon Musk: we are characters in a video game. This is a variation of the idea that this apparent reality is just a simulation. There is a strong inductive argument for the claim that this is a virtual world.

One stock argument for the simulation world  uses the form of statistical syllogism. It is statistical because it deals with statistics. It is a syllogism by definition: it has two premises and one conclusion. Generically, a statistical syllogism looks like this:

 

Premise 1: X% of As are Bs.

Premise 2: This is an A.

Conclusion: This is a B.

 

The strength of this argument depends on the percentage of As that are B. The higher the percentage, the stronger the argument. This makes sense: the more As that are Bs, the more reasonable it is that a specific A is a B.  Now, to the simulation argument.

 

Premise 1: Most worlds are simulated worlds.

Premise 2: This is a world.

Conclusion: This is a simulated world.

 

While “most” is vague, the argument is such that if its premises are true, then the conclusion is more likely to be true than not. Before embracing your virtuality, it is worth considering a similar argument:

 

Premise 1: Most organisms are bacteria.

Premise 2: You are an organism.

Conclusion: You are a bacterium.

 

Like the previous argument, the truth of the premises makes the conclusion more likely to be true than false. However, you are not a bacterium. This does not show that the argument itself is flawed. The reasoning is good, and any randomly selected  organism would most likely be a bacterium. Rather, it indicates that when considering the truth of a conclusion, one must consider the total evidence. That is, information about the specific A must be considered when deciding whether it is a B. In the bacteria example, there are facts about you that would count against the claim that you are a bacterium, such as the fact that you are a multicellular organism.

Turning back to the simulation argument, the same consideration applies. If it is true that most worlds are simulations, then any random world is more likely to be a simulation than not. However, the claim that this specific world is a simulation would require consideration of the total evidence: what evidence is there that this world is a simulation? This reverses the usual challenge of proving that the world is real by requiring evidence it is not real. At this point, there is little evidence that this is a simulation. Using the usual fiction examples, we do not seem to find glitches that would be best explained as programming bugs, we do not seem to encounter outsiders from reality, and we do not run into some sort of exit system (like the Star Trek holodeck). That said, all this is still consistent with the world being a simulation: it might be well programmed, the outsider might never be spotted (or never go into the system) and there might be no way out. At this point, the most reasonable position is that the simulation claim is at best on par with the claim that the world is real since all evidence is consistent with both views. There is, however, still the matter of the truth of the premises in the simulation argument.

The second premise seems true, whatever this is, it seems to be a world. As such, the first premise is the key. While the logic of the argument is good, if the premise is not plausible then it is not a good argument overall.

The first premise is usually supported by a now standard argument. The reasoning includes the claims that the real universe contains large numbers of civilizations, that many of these civilizations are advanced and that enough of these advanced civilizations create incredibly complex simulations of worlds. Alternatively, it could be claimed that there are only a few (or just one) advanced civilizations but that they create vast numbers of complex simulated worlds.

The easy and obvious problem with this sort of reasoning is that it involves making claims about an external real world to try to prove that this world is not real. If this world is claimed to not be real, there is no reason to think that what seems true of this world (that we are developing simulations) would be true of the real world (that they developed super simulations, one of which is our world).  Drawing inferences from what we think is a simulation to a greater reality would be like the intelligent inhabitants of a Pac Man world trying to draw inferences from their game to our world.

There is also the fact that it is simpler to accept that this world is real rather than making claims about a real world beyond this one. After all, the simulation hypothesis requires accepting a real world on top of our simulated world. Why not just have this be the real world?

While the classic werewolf is a human with the ability to shift into the shape of a wolf, movies usually show a transformation into a wolf-human hybrid. The standard werewolf has a taste for human flesh, a vulnerability to silver and a serious shedding problem. Some werewolves have impressive basketball skills, but that is not a standard werewolf ability.

There have been various efforts to explain werewolf myths and legends. Some of the scientific (or at least pseudo-scientific) theories include mental illness or disease. On these accounts, the werewolf does not transform into a wolf-like creature; they are afflicted people. These non-magical werewolves are possible but are more tragic than horrific.

There are also supernatural accounts of werewolves, many involving vague references to curses. In many tales, the condition can be transmitted, perhaps by a bite or even by texting. These magical beasts are not possible unless, of course, this is a magical world.

There has even been some speculation about technology-based shifters, perhaps nanotechnology that can rapidly re-structure a living creature without killing it. But these would be werewolves of science fiction.

Interestingly enough, there could also be philosophical werewolves (which, to steal from Adventure Time, could be called “whywolves”) that have a solid metaphysical foundation. Well, as solid as metaphysics gets.

Our good dead friend Plato (who was probably not a werewolf) laid out a theory of Forms. According to Plato, the Forms are supposed to be eternal, perfect entities that exist outside of space and time. As such, they are even weirder than werewolves. However, they neither shed nor consume human flesh, so they have some positive qualities relative to werewolves.

For Plato, all the particular entities in this imperfect realm are what they are in virtue of their instantiation of Forms. This is sometimes called “participation”, perhaps to make the particulars sound like they have civic virtue. To illustrate this with an example, my husky Isis was a husky because she participated in the form of Husky. This is, no doubt, among the noblest and best of dog forms. Likewise, Isis was furry because she instantiated the form of Fur (and shared this instantiation with all things she contacted, such was the depth of her generosity).

While there is some nice stuff here in the world, it is evident that all the particulars lack perfection. For example, while Donald Trump’s buildings are clearly quality structures, they are not perfect buildings. Likewise, while he does have a somewhat orange color, he does not possess perfect Orange (John Boehner is closer to the Form of Orange yet still lacks perfection).

Plato’s account of the imperfection of particulars, like Donald Trump, involves the claim that particulars instantiate or participate in the Forms in varying degrees. When explaining this to my students, I usually use the example of photocopies of various quality. The original is analogous to the Form while the copies of varying quality are analogous to the particulars.  Another example could be selfies taken of a person using cameras of various qualities. I find that the youth relate more to selfies than to photocopies.

Plato also asserts that particulars can instantiate or participate in “contrasting” Forms. He uses the example of how things here in the earthly realm have both Beauty and Ugliness, thus they lack perfect Beauty. For example, even the most attractive supermodel still has flaws. As such, a person’s beauty (or ugliness) is a blend of Beauty and Ugliness. Since people can look more or less beautiful over time (time and gravity are both very mean), this mix can shift and the degree of participation or instantiation can change. This mixing and shifting of instantiation can be used to provide a Platonic account of werewolves (which is not the same as having a Platonic relation with a werewolf).

If the huge assumptions are made that a particular is what it is because it instantiates various Forms and that the instantiations of Forms can be mixed or blended in a particular, then werewolves can easily be given a metaphysical explanation in the context of Forms.

For Plato, a werewolf would be a particular that instantiated the Form of Man but also the Form of Wolf. As such, the being would be part man and part wolf. When the person is participating most in the Form of Man, then he would appear (and act) human. However, when the Form of Wolf became dominant, her form and behavior would shift towards that of the wolf.

Plato mentions the Sun in the Allegory of the Cave as well as the light of the moon. So, it seems appropriate that the moon (which reflects the light of the sun) is credited in many tales with triggering the transformation from human to wolf. Perhaps since, as Aristotle claimed, humans are rational animals, the direct light of the sun means that the human Form is dominant. The reflected light of the full moon would, at least in accord with something I just made up, result in a distortion of reason and thus allow the animal Form of Wolf to dominate. There can also be a nice connection here to Plato’s account of the three-part soul: when the Wolf is in charge, reason is mostly asleep.

While it is the wolf that usually takes the blame for the evil of the werewolf, it seems more plausible that this comes from the form of Man. After all, research on wolves shows that they have been given a bad rap. So, whatever evil is in the werewolf comes from the human part. The howling, though, is all wolf.

On an episode of the Late Show, host Stephen Colbert and Jane Lynch had an interesting discussion of guardian angels. Lynch, who starred as a guardian angel in “Angel from Hell”, related a story of how her guardian angel held her in a protective embrace during a low point of her life. Colbert, ever the rational Catholic, noted that he believed in guardian angels despite knowing they do not exist. The question of the existence of guardian angels is yet another way to consider the classic problem of evil.

In general terms, a guardian angel is a supernatural, benevolent being who serves as a personal protector. The nature of  this guarding varies. For some, the guardian angel is supposed to serve in the classic “angel on the shoulder” role and provide good advice. For others, the angel provides a comforting presence. Some even claim that guardian angels take a very active role, such as reducing a potentially fatal fall to one that merely inflicts massive injury. My interest is, however, not with the specific functions of guardian angels, but with the question of their existence.

In the context of monotheism, a guardian angel is an agent of God. As such, this ties them into the problem of evil. The general problem of evil is the challenge of reconciling the alleged existence of God with the existence of evil. Some take this problem to decisively show that God does not exist. Others contend that it shows that God is not how philosophers envision Him in the problem, so that He is not omniscient, omnibenevolent or omnipotent. In the case of guardian angels, the challenge is to reconcile their alleged existence with evil.

There are presumably thousands or millions of cases each day in which a guardian angel could have saved the day with little effort. For example, a guardian angel could tell the police the location of a kidnapped or missing child. As another example, a guardian angel could keep a ladder from slipping. They could also do more difficult things, like preventing cancer from killing children or deflecting bullets away from school children. Since none of this ever happens, the obvious conclusion is that there are no guardian angels of this type.

However, as with the main problem of evil, there are ways to address this problem. One option, which is not available in the case of God, is to argue that guardian angels have very limited capabilities and are weak supernatural beings. Alternatively, they might operate under very restrictive rules. One problem with this reply is that weak angels are indistinguishable in their effects from non-existent angels. Another problem ties this into the broader problem of evil: why wouldn’t God deploy a better sort of guardian or give them broader rules? This, of course, just brings up the usual problem of evil.

Another option is that not everyone gets an angel. Jane Lynch, for example, might get an angel that hugged her. Alan Kurdi, the young boy who drowned trying to flee Syria, did not get a guardian angel. While this would be an explanation of sorts, it still just pushes the problem back: why would God not provide everyone in need with a guardian? We humans are, of course, limited in our resources and abilities, so everyone cannot be protected all the time. However, an omnipotent God does not face this challenge.

It is also possible to make use of a stock reply to the problem of evil and bring in the Devil. Perhaps Lucifer deploys his demonic agents to counter the guardian angels. So, when something bad happens to a good person, it is because her guardian angel was defeated by a demon. While this has a certain appeal, it would require a world in which God and the Devil are closely matched, thus allowing the Devil to defy God and defeat His other angels. This, of course, just brings in the general problem of evil: unless one postulates two roughly equal deities, God is on the hook for the Devil and his demons. Or rather, God’s demons since He created them.

Guardian angels fare no better than God in regards to the problem of evil. That said, the notion of benevolent, supernatural personal guardians predates monotheism. Socrates, for example, claimed to have a guardian who would warn him of bad choices (which Stephen Colbert also claims to have).

These sorts of guardians were not claimed to be agents of a perfect being, and so avoid the problem of evil. Supernatural beings that are freelancers or who serve a limited deity can reasonably be expected to be limited in their abilities and it would make sense that not everyone would have a guardian. Conflict between opposing supernatural agencies also makes sense, since there is no postulation of a single supreme being.

While these supernatural guardians do avoid the problem of evil, they run up against the problem of evidence: there does not appear to be adequate evidence for the existence of such supernatural beings. In fact, the alleged evidence for them is better explained by alternatives. For example, a little voice in one’s head is better explained in terms of the psychological rather than the supernatural (a benign mental condition rather than a supernatural guardian). As another example, a fall that badly injures a person rather than killing them is better explained in terms of the vagaries of chance than in terms of supernatural intervention.

Given the above discussion, there seems to be little reason to believe in the existence of guardian angels. The world would be radically different if they did exist, so they do not. Or they do so little as to make no meaningful difference, which is hard to distinguish from them not existing at all.  

I certainly do not begrudge the belief in guardian angels. If that belief leads them to make better choices and feel safer in a dangerous world, then it is a benign belief. I certainly have comforting beliefs as well, such as the belief that most people are basically good. Perhaps these beliefs are our guardian angels.

In my previous essay I introduced the notion of using the notion of essential properties to address the question of whether James Bond must be a white man. I ran through this rather quickly and want to expand on it here.

As noted, an essential property (to steal from Aristotle) is a property that an entity must have. In contrast an accidental property is one that it does have but could lack. As I tell my students, accidental properties are not just properties from accidents, like the dent in a fender.

One way to look at essential properties is that if a being loses an essential property, it ceases to be. In effect, the change of property destroys it, although a new entity can arise. To use a simple example, it is essential to a triangle that it be three-sided. If another side is added, the triangle is no more. But the new entity could be a square. Of course, one could deny that the triangle is destroyed and instead take it as changing into a square. It all depends on how the identity of a being is determined.

Continuing the triangle example, the size and color of a triangle are accidental properties.  A red triangle that is painted blue remains a triangle, although it is now blue. But one could look at the object in terms of being a red object. In that case, changing the color would mean that it was no longer a red object, but a blue object. Turning back to James Bond and his color, he has always been a white man.

Making Bond a black man would change many of his established properties and one can obviously say that he would no longer be white Bond. But this could be seen as analogous to changing the color of a triangle: just as a red triangle painted blue is still a triangle, changing Bond from a white to a black man by a change of actors does not entail that is no longer Bond. Likewise, one might claim, for changing Bond to a woman via a change of actor.

As noted in the previous essay, the actors who have played Bond have been different in many ways, yet they are all accepted as Bond. As such, there are clearly many properties that Bond has accidentally. They can change with the actors while the character is still Bond. One advantage of a fictional character is, of course, that the author can simply decide on the essential properties when they create the metaphysics for their fictional world. For example, in fantasy settings an author might decide that a being is its soul and thus can undergo any number of bodily alterations (such as through being reincarnated or polymorphed) and still be the same being. If Bond was in such a world, all a being would need to be Bond would be to be the Bond soul. This soul could inhabit a black male body or even a dragon and still be Bond. Dragon Bond could make a great anime.

But, of course, the creator of Bond did not specify the metaphysics of his world, so we would need to speculate using various metaphysical theories about our world.  The question is: would a person changing their race or gender result in the person ceasing to be that person, just as changing the sides of a triangle would make it cease to be a triangle? Since Bond is a fictional character, there is the option to abandon metaphysics and make use of other domains to settle the matter of Bond identity. One easy solution is to go with the legal option.

Bond is an intellectual property, and this means that you and I cannot create and sell Bond books or films. As such, there is a legal definition of what counts as James Bond, and this can be tested by trying to see what will get you sued by the owner of James Bond. Closely related to this the Bond brand; this can change considerably and still be the Bond brand. Of course, these legal and branding matters are not very interesting from a philosophical perspective, and they are best suited for the courts and marketing departments. So I will now turn to aesthetics.

One easy solution is that Bond is whoever the creator says Bond is; but since the creator is dead, we cannot determine what he would think about re-writing Bond as someone other than a white man. One could, of course, go back to the legal argument and assert that whoever owns Bond has the right to decide who Bond is.

Another approach is to use the social conception: a character’s identity is based on the acceptance of the fans. As such, if the fans accept Bond as being someone other than a white man, then that is Bond. After all, Bond is a fictional character who exists in the minds of his creator and his audience. Since his creator is dead, Bond now exists in the minds of the audience; so perhaps it is a case of majority acceptance, a sort of aesthetic democracy. Bond is whom most fans say is Bond. Or one could take the approach that Bond is whoever the individual audience member accepts as Bond; a case of Bond subjectivity. Since Bond is fictional, this is appealing. As such, it would be up to you whether your Bond can be anyone other than a white man. A person’s decision would say quite a bit about them. While some might be tempted to assume that anyone who believes that Bond must be a white man is thus a racist or sexist, that would be a mistake. There can be non-sexist and non-racist reasons to believe this. There are, of course, also sexist and racist reasons to believe this.  As a metaphysician and a gamer, I am onboard with Bond variants that are still Bond. But I can understand why those who have different metaphysics (or none at all) would have differing views.