Scientific Realism
Philosopher Hilary Putnam calls himself a scientific realist for a number of reasons, including his contention that there's no serious difference in the reality status of scientific objects and common sense objects. Even with respect to observabilit...
Is Mind Distinct from Body?: Distinctions Between Computers and the Human Mind
In his 1972 book What Computers Still Can't Do Hubert Dreyfus points out capacities of the mind computers fail to match such as a sense of relevance and common sense. What computers can do is spread the computational load over time and operate with ...
Is the Real World Independent of Our Minds? (Part 3)
Philosopher Hilary Putnam continues his discussion of whether or not the external world is independent of our minds. At one time he made the statement that there is no real world independent of our conceptual system--a statement which he now regrets...
Artificial Intelligence: The Common Sense Problem
Professor of Philosophy Hubert Dreyfus talks about recognizing early on that computers using only symbols and rules can't match what a human brain can do, because the machines lack what we call common sense.
Percent in Word Problems: Applying Common Sense
This clip stresses the importance of using common sense to determine if an answer is correct. "Usually, when you set up the proportion wrong," the clip explains, "the answer comes out really impossibleÂ…you know right away you've made a mistake."