1. Original/Derived Intentionality. All will agree that there is some sort of distinction to be made here. A map is not about a chunk of terrain just in virtue of the map's physical and geometrical properties. Consider the contour lines on a topographical map. The closer together, the steeper the terrain. But that closer together should mean steeper is a meaning assigned by the community of map-makers and map-users. This meaning is not intrinsic to the map qua physical object. Closer together might have meant anything, e.g., that the likelihood of falling into an abandoned mine shaft is greater.
So some things derive their referential and semantic properties from other things. What about these other things? I draw you a map so that you can find my camp. I use the Greek phi to mark my camp and the Greek psi to mark the camp of a heavily-armed crazy man that you are well advised to avoid. I intend that phi designate my camp. That intending (narrow sense) is a case of intentionality (broad sense). This is not in dispute. What is in dispute is whether my intending is a case of original or of derived intentionality.
If the latter, then a regress ensues which appears to be both infinite and vicious. But before discussing this further, I need to bring in another point.
2. Ascriptivism Versus Realism. Dennett appears to hold an ascriptivist or projectivist or imputationalist or instrumentalist theory of intentionality: nothing is an intentional system intrinsically or an sich; a system is intentional in virtue of someone's assigning intentional states to it. Thus there is no fact of the matter as to whether or not my computer (when it is running a chess program) has beliefs and desires (e.g., the desire to inflict mate.) But it may be useful to take up the "intentional stance" vis-a-vis the computer in order to explain its behavior. Given the computer's complexity, the physical and design stances are unavailing.
A realist about intentionality, on the other hand, is someone who holds that some systems really are intrinsically intentional: their having beliefs and desires is not a matter of anyone's viewing them as having such states. One way to be a realist is by being a reductive realist. Such a person admits the reality of intentional states but identifies them with something believed to be more fundamental such as brain states. If you believe, with Dretske, that intentionality does not need naturalizing, but already is a natural phenomenon in the natural world below the level of conscious mind, then you are presumably a reductive realist about intentionality. You are saying this: there is intrinsic intentionality, but it is physical in nature.
I'm a realist too, but I hold that intentionality is irreducibly real: it cannot be reduced to, or identified with, anything else. It is what it is and not some other thing. Part of the reason I believe this is because the alternatives are quite hopeless.
3. The Ascriptivist Regress. Suppose one takes the ascriptivist line. Then an infinite regress appears unavoidable. Suppose I ascribe intentionality to my chess playing computer. Quite obviously, my ascribing, projecting, imputing, is itself an intentional state or a series of such states. So if ascriptivism is true, then my acts of ascribing must themselves be ascribed -- otherwise they are intrinsic and the game is over. This launches us on a regress that is obviously infinite since at each level, one can "kick it up a notch." It is also clear that the regress (unlike the truth regress say) is vicious since at no level is the explanation of intentionality complete.
One might think to avoid the regress by embracing a circle: I ascribe intentional states to the computer and it ascribes intentional states to me. But surely this is even more of an absurdity for reasons that needn't be belabored.
The upshot is that pure ascriptivism is incoherent.
4. Adulterated Ascriptivism. Perhaps the solution is to mix some realism in with the ascriptivism. Maybe it goes like this. I have a head full of homunculi. These little men and women, working together, ascribe intentionality to me. But each homunculus has its intentionality ascribed to it by other, stupider, homunculi which are constituents of it. The stupider homunculi, in turn, are composed of even stupider ones, and so on until we get to the level of individual neurons which, as Pollack says, "aren't 'about' anything." The base level homuncuili are so stupid that one could say that they don't even rise to the level of being either stupid or intelligent.
Does this avoid the dilemma of having to choose between a vicious infinite regress and a vicious circle? What Dennett is proposing is a finite regress that terminates with something naturalistically acceptable, namely entities that lack intrinsic or original intentionality.
Admittedly, this proposal gets rid of the infinity of the regress, but not its viciousness: we still have no explanation of intentionality. Consider the base-level homunculi. They are so primitive as to lack all intentionality. How then can they ascribe intentionality to their colleagues one level up? Surely it is obvious that the ascribing of intentionality is itself an intentional act or series thereof.
The point is quite simple. If the regress terminates with base entities utterly devoid of intentonality, then no higher level entities will be intentional. For the higher-ups get their intentionality only from the ones lower down in the hierarchy. If the ones at the very bottom have no intentionality, then they can't transmit it up. But if, on the other hand, the ones at the very bottom possess intentionality, then it is false that all intentionality is derived.
In the final analysis, Dennett is an eliminativist about intentionality. His position amounts in the end to the denial of intentionality. To see this, you just have to think clearly. Dennett is saying that all intentionality is derivative, none is intrinsic or original. But that makes sense only if one embraces an infinite regress. But in this case an infinite regress must be vicious. On the other hand, a regress that terminates either terminates with entities that are intrinsically intentional or entities that are not. If the former, the game is over. If the latter, no intentionality gets transmitted up and Dennett is an eliminativist.
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