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Who is Daniel Dennett?
Daniel Dennett is a philosopher who contributed to the science of philosophy and the science of mind. He was born on March 28, 1942 in Boston, Massachusetts. He currently teaches at the University of Tufts. -
Consciousness
In the year 1969 Daniel Dennett published the book "Content and Consciousness." He was known for having an out of the box view of consciousness. He believed consciousness was not real and argued that we only think of ourselves as conscious because we communicate through language. Our way of communication requires us to keep track of what we are thinking, knowing what thoughts to say and which thoughts to keep to ourselves.
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Intentional Stance
Daniel Dennett introduced intentional stance, which is the level of abstraction and mental properties we see while examining the behavior of our objects of observation. He theorized there were three different levels of abstraction: the physical stance, the design stance and the intentional stance. The physical stance is used commonly in physics and engineering because it deals with properties of physical laws. The design stance is used everyday by you and me,
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Natural Selection
In 1995 Daniel Dennett published his book "Darwins Dangerous Idea." He believed natural selection was all biological. He thought the idea of natural selection was the greatest idea ever suggested, but that it was dangerous. Darwin ultimately says purpose can emerge without any sort of direction, which can be a very unsettling thought. We, as people are creators made from God the almighty creator, that is what tradition tells us.
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Free Will
In 2003 Daniel Dennett published his book titled "Freedom Evolves." In this book Dennett explains that even though our actions may be pre-determined, our abilities have evolved so we can still be free. He uses the term "evitability" meaning the ability of someone to anticipate a likely consequence and avoid undesirable ones though action. He also argues that altruism, instead of helping others with no gain on your part, should be looked at as helping yourself by helping others.
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