A proper understanding of Millikan

Ruth Millikan’s teleological theory of mental content is complex and often misunderstood. This paper motivates and clarifies some of the complexities of the theory, and shows that paying careful attention to its details yields answers to a number of common objections to teleological theories, in particular, the problem of novel mental states, the problem of functionally false beliefs, and problems about indeterminacy or multiplicity of function

The series spectra of the stripped boron atom (BIII)

In a preceding article [1], we have brought forward evidence that in "hot spark" spectra the strongest lines generally correspond to atoms from which the valence electrons have all been stripped off, so that the resulting spectrum is hydrogen-like, i.e., is due to one single electron moving between the series of levels characteristic of a simple nucleus-electron system. For such a nucleus-electron system the Bohr theory in its elementary form [2] which dealt only with circular orbits, i.e., with variations in azimuthal quantum numbers, the radial being always zero, yielded at once the result that the energies corresponding to a given quantum state, e.g., quantum number 1, increased in the ratio 1, 4, 9, 16, etc., as the nuclear charged increased in the ratio 1, 2, 3, 4, etc. This meant physically that the frequencies corresponding to jumps from infinity to an orbit of given quantum number, technically called term-values, when divided by the square of the nuclear charge should come out a constant; otherwise stated that the constant term in the Rydberg formula should become N, 4N, 9N, 16N

Experimental evidence for the essential identity of the selective and normal photo-electric effects

In the fall of 1913, while studying the photo-electric properties of freshly cut surfaces of the alkali metals in extreme vacua, we observed that immediately after first cutting, the fresh surface of sodium showed very large photo-sensitiveness when tested with monochromatic light of wave length 5461 A., even when the vacuum was of the order 10(-6) mm. as measured by a McLeod gauge. But after several weeks of experimenting and many cuttings a condition was reached in which a freshly cut surface was completely insensitive when illuminated with this wave length. The lost sensitiveness reappeared, however, in the course of not more than two minutes after cutting, and grew rapidly to a very large value in fifteen or twenty minutes. When the gas pressure was of the order of 0.01 mm. the same phenomenon occurred but the rise to a maximum value was less rapid. From these results we began to surmise that photo-electric currents must be due to the influence of some active gas, which diffused from the walls to the metal and whose action upon the surface was retarded by the presence of an inert gas

chapter 13

The Jean-Nicod Lectures 2002 (expanded version

Chapter 16

The Jean-Nicod Lectures 2002 (expanded version