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Hilary Putnam: 3 ideas worth knowing

3 ideas from Hilary Putnam, each explained in a minute and credited to the original work. Free on Savvy.

• Two identical twins call different liquids 'water' — and neither one can tell

  Hilary Putnam imagined a planet identical to Earth in every way, except its lakes are filled with a liquid, XYZ, that looks, tastes and behaves exactly like water but has a differe…

  — Hilary Putnam, The Meaning of 'Meaning'

• How do you know you're not just a brain in a jar being fed a fake world?

  Imagine your brain removed from your body, suspended in nutrient fluid, and wired to a supercomputer feeding it perfectly convincing fake sensations — you'd have no way to tell fro…

  — Hilary Putnam, Reason, Truth and History

• What makes something a mind might have nothing to do with what it's made of

  Functionalism argues that a mental state like pain isn't defined by any particular stuff, neurons or silicon, but by what it does: what causes it and what it causes in turn. Hilary…

  — Hilary Putnam, The Nature of Mental States

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