I am an anti-naturalist: I don’t believe that all phenomena can be explained naturalistically or physicalistically. This is not because I am a theist. It is rather the other way around: one of the reasons I am a theist is because I cannot accept naturalism. (Of course, one can reject naturalism without adopting theism.) I would prefer naturalism to theism on the ground of theoretical economy if it could be made to work.
Unfortunately, there is just too much that naturalism cannot explain. For one thing, it cannot explain why anything contingent exists in the first place. I would argue further that it cannot explain what existence is, or truth, or causation. It also cannot explain the phenomena of consciousness, self-consciousness, conscience. Among the latter we find the phenomenon of intentionality. What follows is an unpublished draft which examines and rejects one attempt to argue that intentionality is unproblematically viewable as a natural phenomenon.
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IS THERE INTENTIONALITY IN THE PHYSICAL WORLD?
CRITICAL REMARKS ON DRETSKE
‘Intentionality’ is the philosophical term of art for that property of (some) mental states whereby they are (non-derivatively) of, or about, or directed to, an object. The state of perceiving, for example is necessarily object-directed. One cannot just perceive; if one perceives, then one perceives something. The same goes for intending (in the narrow sense), believing, imagining, recollecting, wishing, willing, desiring, loving, hating, judging, knowing, etc. Such mental states refer beyond themselves to objects that may or may not exist, or, in the case of propositional accusatives, may or may not be true. Thus Bush’s belief that Saddam possessed WMDs is the belief it is, and has the aboutness it has, whether or not the proposition the belief is about is true or false.
Franz Brentano took intentionality to be the criterion whereby physical and mental phenomena are distinguished. For Brentano, (i) all mental phenomena are intentional, (ii) all intentional phenomena are mental, and (iii) no mental phenomenon is physical. (Franz Brentano, Psychologie vom empirischen Standpunkt (1874), Bk. II, Ch. 1.) But we are now living in naturalistic times. The widespread conviction that physicalism or materialism or naturalism in some version or other just must be true has made it seem important to 'naturalize' intentionality, to show how intentional phenomena such as beliefs and desires can be explained physicalistically. For if they cannot be so explained, if they cannot be identified with physical phenomena, how can they be real? As Jerry Fodor puts it, "If aboutness is real, it must be really something else." (Jerry A. Fodor, Psychosemantics: The Problem of Meaning in the Philosophy of Mind (Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press, 1987), p. 97) This is Fodor’s paradoxical way of saying that there is a problem about explaining how intentionality — the ‘unnatural’ property of reference to what need not exist or be true — can be real given that only natural items are real.
This concern gives rise to what may be called the 'naturalization project,' the attempt to show that intentional phenomena are either identical to or supervenient upon physical phenomena. Others do not see much of a problem here. Fred Dretske, for example, holds that "there is no need to naturalize intentionality" since "It is already a familiar part of our physical world." (Fred Dretske, "If You Can't Make One, You Don't Know How It Works," Midwest Studies in Philosophy XIX, eds. French, et al. (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 1994), p. 471.) He means original, not derived or borrowed intentionality of the kind found in words and maps. A map, for example, is about a portion of terrain. But the map’s aboutness is not intrinsic to it, but borrowed from us, who interpret the map as about the terrain. Our interpreting, however, and our comparing of map and terrain, are presumably instances of original intentionality. Dretske's view, then, is that there is original or intrinsic intentionality in natural systems below the level of mind. Not only are mental intentional phenomena really physical, but there are nonmental intentional phenomena. If Dretske is right, we should not be puzzled by mental intentional phenomena, nor should we take them as posing any threat to a thoroughgoing naturalism.
Dretske invites us to consider a compass the needle of which normally (i.e., when it is functioning properly and is used correctly) points to magnetic (as opposed to geographic) North. Dretske holds that this pointing or indicating is a case of original intentionality: the compass’ “being a reliable indicator does not itself depend on us." (Ibid., p. 471.) It is unlike a map which gets its intentionality from us. So far, so good.
But what makes the needle's pointing to magnetic North an intentional phenomenon? Note that Dretske's claim is not that the needle's behavior is in some metaphorical or 'as-if' sense intentional, but that it is genuinely intentional. Now one mark of intentionality is aspectuality. "Anything exhibiting this mark is about something else under an aspect." (Ibid.) The idea is a familiar one. To be aware (whether in perception, imagination, memory...) of something x is to be aware of it as something F. Necessarily, awareness is always awareness of something as something. Furthermore, even if every F is a G, I can be aware of x as F without being aware of x as G. Indeed, this is so even if necessarily (whether metaphysically or nomologically) every F is a G. Thus I can be aware of a moving object as a cat, without being aware of it as spatially extended, as an animal, as a mammal, as an animal that cools itself by panting as opposed to sweating, as my cat, as the same cat I saw an hour ago, etc. Dretske sees the same structure in compass needles:
Compass needles are about geographical regions or directions under one aspect (as, say, the direction of the pole) and not others (as the habitat of polar bears). This is the same way our thoughts are about a place under one aspect (as where I was born) but not another (as where you were born). (Ibid.)
Dretske's argument seems to be this:
a. Anything that is about objects under some aspects but not others in the way our thoughts are is an intentional state.
b. Compass states are about objects under some aspects but not others in the way our thoughts are.
Therefore
c. Compass states are intentional states.
This strikes me as a breathtakingly bad argument the badness of which should be evident from my (deductively valid) reconstruction. First of all, to say that the needle is 'about' the polar region as magnetic North is just to say that its pointing in that direction is caused by the magnetic properties of the polar region. What else could 'about' mean here? It is obvious that the needle is not conscious of magnetic North, or of anything else. A compass needle cannot intend or mean anything, any more than a pile of bear scat can intend or mean anything. Of course, one can say such things as, 'This fresh bear scat means that a bear was in the vicinity recently,' but this use of 'means' expresses derivative intentionality, intentionality of the kind which presupposes the original intentionality of minds. And to say that the compass needle's pointing is not 'about' the polar region as bear-inhabited is just to say that its pointing in that direction is not caused by the 'ursine' properties of the polar region, even though the 'ursine' and magnetic properties are coexemplified. Premise (b), then, is simply and strikingly false.
It is widely accepted that causation is always causation in respect of specific properties. Thus a knife cuts through tendons in virtue of its sharpness and not in virtue of its being two feet long, but fits into the drawer in virtue of its being two feet long but not in virtue of its sharpness. The properties may even be necessarily coextensive. Triangularity and trilaterality are necessarily coextensive properties: there is no possible world in which one but not the other is exemplified. Nevertheless, it is in virtue of the triangularity, but not the trilaterality, of a piece of metal that I have three bloody points on the palm of my hand.
What Dretske is doing in the quoted passage, then, is assimilating the aspectuality of intentionality to the 'aspectuality' of causation:
INTENTIONALITY: if x is about y, then x is about y under some aspect F, and x can be about y under F without being about y under G even if necessarily every F is a G.
CAUSATION: if x is caused by y, then x is caused by y in virtue of some property F of y, and x can be caused by y in virtue of F without being caused by y in virtue of G of y even if necessarily every F is a G.
No doubt there is an interesting structural analogy between the aspectuality of intentionality and the 'aspectuality' of causation. But does this analogy warrant saying that the compass needle is about a place in the same way (Dretske's words) that our thoughts are about a place? I would think not. First of all, to use ‘about’ and ‘of’ in connection with the pointing of compass needles is a misuse of terms, or at best a misleading idiosyncrasy. There may be as-ness in the compass example, but there is no of-ness. Genuine intentionality involves both as-ness and of-ness. Second, even if we acquiesce in Dretske's terminological mischief, a compass needle is not 'about' or 'of' a place the way consciousness is — on pain of an egregious equivocation. Consciousness presents its object, makes or lets it appear, which is something it could not do apart from consciousness; the needle does not present its 'object,' nor does it make or let it appear. Strictly speaking, the needle's pointing does not have an object; it has a cause. Nor does the needle present its 'object' under an 'aspect.' One cannot speak literally of aspects here, because nothing is appearing to the needle or to the compass. ‘Aspect’ by its very etymology (ad-spectare) is a mind-involving term. What we have here again is terminological inflation. Furthermore, the needle's pointing to magnetic North is a purely physical, publicly observable, pointing. In this sense, consciousness does not 'point' to its object; it is rather the presentation of its object. I cannot examine your states of consciousness to see what they are about the way I can examine compass needles, weather vanes, etc. to see what they are pointing at. And I do not examine my own states of consciousness to see what they are about. I may examine a state of my body such as a skin rash to inquire about its underlying cause, but I never examine my conscious experiences to see what they are of or about. Experiences are not signs of their objects. Husserl refuted this 'sign-theory' of consciousness long ago. (Cf. Edmund Husserl, Logical Investigations vol. II, trans. J. N. Findlay (New York: The Humanities Press, 1970), pp. 593-596.)
Thus it is only by equivocating on such key words as 'about' and 'aspect' that Dretske can come to ascribe original intentionality to compass needles, clouds, smoke, tree rings, and the like. But he may be committing another mistake, namely, that of inferring that if something is not a case of derived intentionality, then it must be a case of original intentionality. For there is the possibility that it is a case of what Searle calls ‘as-if’ intentionality, which of course is not intentionality at all. A good example is a thermostat which, as we say, ‘senses’ a change in room temperature. Such talk is harmless in everyday life but misleading to some philosophers. Clearly, the thermostat does not literally sense anything; it is not conscious of a change in temperature. ‘Sensors’ in general, whether electrical, mechanical, electromagnetic, photoelectric, etc., do not literally sense anything. Sentience is a mode of consciousness, and no such contraption as a thermostat is conscious. Or do you want to say that a chocolate bar melting in a hot car literally feels the heat? Yet thermostats behave as if they sense a change in temperature; it is as if they possess intentional states. The same holds for the pointing of the compass needle. From the fact that this is not a case of derived intentionality, it does not follow that it is a case of original intentionality. What follows is that it is not a case of intentionality at all, but merely behaves as if it were a case of intentionality. As Colin McGinn puts it, "When we think we are conceiving of content in the absence of consciousness we are really treating a system as if it were conscious, while simultaneously denying that this is what we are up to."(Colin McGinn, The Problem of Consciousness (Oxford: Blackwell Publishers, 1991), p. 33. McGinn does not endorse this view.)
To deny the distinction between intrinsic and 'as-if' intentionality would be to embrace the view that all natural phenomena are intentional. For all natural phenomena have causes, and causation, as noted, is always in respect of properties. But it is surely obvious that not all natural phenomena are intentional in the very same way conscious phenomena are intentional. If they were, absolutely everything would be conscious, which is absurd.
What one could say, perhaps, is that that there are two kinds of intentionality, or two kinds of content. There is unconscious intentionality and there is conscious intentionality. In this way one might hope to avoid the absurd conclusion that every natural phenomenon exhibits conscious intentionality. McGinn speaks in this connection of "two species of content, personal and subpersonal..." He continues:
I doubt that the self-same kind of content possessed by a conscious perceptual experience, say, could be possessed independently of consciousness; such content seems essentially conscious, shot through with subjectivity. This is because of the Janus-faced character of conscious content: it involves presence to the subject, and hence a subjective point of view. Remove the inward-looking face and you remove something integral — what the world seems like to the subject. (Ibid. p. 34)
This is right, and spells the doom of the naturalization project, the attempt to account for such intentional phenomena as beliefs and desires in wholly physicalistic terms. For what it implies is that there can be no third-person, wholly objective, understanding of conscious intentionality. But without an understanding of conscious intentionality, there is no understanding of mind.
But even more fundamentally, could there be two kinds of original intentionality? Is this a coherent proposal? If there are two kinds or species of original intentionality, conscious and unconscious, then there must be a genus of which they are the species. But what could this genus be? We saw, pace Dretske, that the pointing of the compass needle is not about magnetic North in the same sense that a thought is about magnetic North. It is only by equivocating on 'of' and 'about' that one could think otherwise. Thus there is no generic aboutness. If there is no generic aboutness, there can be no kinds or species of aboutness. Clearly, what we must say is that unconscious intentionality is no more a kind of intentionality than artificial leather is a kind of leather. In 'artificial leather,' 'artificial' does not specify, but shifts, the sense of 'leather.' Similarly, 'unconscious' does not specify, but shifts, the sense of 'intentionality.' Unconscious intentionality, then, is as-if intentionality. And McGinn's subpersonal contents are as-if contents.
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Are the only two choices Naturalism or Theism? Or is this a false dichotomy? Some religions such as Buddhism posit a spiritual existence without a deity.
Posted by: John Gallagher | Thursday, 19 May 2005 at 01:23
Read my fifth sentence.
Posted by: Bill Vallicella | Thursday, 19 May 2005 at 10:41
I think one can make a more serious effort to expand naturalism to include the fact that systems throughout nature have a true intrinsic first-person intentional aspect. A successful effort would not say other parts of nature have anything approaching full-bore human consciousness, which is the panpsychist idea that nearly everyone else views as absurd. It would instead show that what we know as human first person experience is built up from a fundamental aspect of the world (which may also be an ingredient necessary for real causation). This isn't easy to work out, of course, but IMO holds more promise than tradtional materialism and dualism.
Posted by: Steve Esser | Thursday, 19 May 2005 at 12:53
Steve, The devil is in the details, and I have yet to see how one builds a gradualist bridge from natural processes to mind.
Posted by: Bill Vallicella | Saturday, 21 May 2005 at 14:01
"Unfortunately, there is just too much that naturalism cannot explain. For one thing, it cannot explain why anything contingent exists in the first place." In other words: "Why is there something rather than nothing?" Even if I leave aside the popular view among physicists that Nothing might simply be unstable, I must ask how theism can explain why anything contingent exists in the first place, without merely declaring that the Deity is, well, just not contingent. One intellectually and theologically consistent response to the question, of course, is to say "Quite right! God is not contingent. Haven't you been listening?" But if one doubts the existence of God, then such an answer is obviously not very satisfying, and even believers get no answer as to why God is not contingent. And if theists are allowed such latitude, why can't we naturalist-leaning types follow suit and just announce that Nature is not contingent? Einstein, who seemed to want it both ways, suspected that as far as God's design for the Universe was concerned, He simply had no choice in the matter. Mightn't it be premature to sign off on what naturalism can and cannot explain? I certainly agree that there is much that naturalism has not explained. Although the "gradualist bridge from natural processes to mind" is still incomplete, I think it is also fair to say that "I have yet to see" it proven that it will always be. At the very least we need be in no rush to make up Gods of the Gaps to fill the void. We can take our time, as Wittgenstein suggested. Regards, Malcolm Pollack
Posted by: Malcolm Pollack | Wednesday, 08 June 2005 at 20:37
By the way, I cheerfully defer to the work you have done on the detailed philosophical problem of existence. I am only pointing out that if we are looking for origin-of-everything explanations, I have yet to see how the theistic "God did it" isn't mere question-begging. And most of what naturalism addresses is far removed from the question of the origin and contingency of the world itself (although I would not agree that such questions have in any way been demonstrated to be beyond naturalism's potential grasp); more to the point, given that the world does indeed seem to exist, I think naturalism is in a position to take a pretty good whack at the problems of the emergence from simple initial conditions, and mechanics of, consciousness, self-consciousness, conscience, and so forth. Certainly I'd say that Dennett, Pinker, Dawkins, et al. are pursuing promising lines of inquiry as far as the "gradualist bridge" is concerned -- promising enough, at least, that there is no reason to give up on them just yet. Regards, Malcolm Pollack
Posted by: Malcolm Pollack | Thursday, 09 June 2005 at 15:33
Nothing is unstable? What are the good physicists doing, reifying Nothing, making of it a something? Yes, I had a feeling that you would not let that one go by. I was talking about what to a physicist amounts to "nothing": namely the vacuum, or "empty" spacetime, which is as close to genuine nothingness as we appear to be able to get in the actualized world. I'm a bit queasy about the very idea of some sort of idealized Nothingness (in the sense of your "who did you see? Nobody" example) preceding the World, not only because I have difficulty with imagining how Nothing can somehow change its state to become Something (how can Nothing have a state, or the potential to change, in the first place?), but also because in the prevailing cosmological view it is spacetime, not just extended space, that wraps in on itself at the Big Bang - so there is not a meaningful sense in which anything could have temporally preceded the World, any more than there is any place that is north of the North Pole. Why is God necessary rather than contingent? That's easy. The very concept of God is the concept of a being than which no greater can be conceived, which entails in short steps that God is a necessary being. This is not to say that God exists. It is to say that if God exists, then God necessarily exists, and if God does not exist, then God is impossible. That was Anselm's insight. I have indeed heard Anselm's argument, which as I recall was picked up by Descartes as well. But as you point out there are two choices - God either exists, and necessarily so, or he does not, and is impossible. Is that selection itself contingent? It seems to me, also, that the idea of God being necessary in order to enable the creation of contingent "child" objects get a good deal of unnecessary intuitional window dressing from the use of the term "being", which is freighted with all sorts of anthropomorphic connotations: life, intelligence, consciousness, etc. It has always struck me that this argument of necessity implies that there is necessarily some BE-ing, some existing Non-Nothingness, that is required for contingent items to become possible, but what that might look like is anybody's guess - what is "God" to one person is a set of laws and initial conditions to another. Similarly, with all the time in the world one cannot build a gradualist bridge from the physical to the mental. Well, at one point the composition of stars was thought to be something that would be forever unknown - quite obviously so, because we wouldn't be able to build a bridge to them, either. ...mental states have a "first person ontology" (in Searle's phrase) which makes it impossible to understand them in natural-scientific terms. Impossible? Granted, mental states differ from everything else in that the very thing that is most interesting about them is the part that is subjective. But let's not toss in the towel just yet! If we assume as a working hypothesis that the subjective experience of consciousness is entirely a result of the activity of the physical brain, and we reach the point of being able to watch the brain and say "now she is thinking this, and feeling that, and if we suppress the action of this glial bundle she will lose consciousness, but if we link these neurons over here she will see her present situation in a wistful but amusingly ironic light, and will first laugh, then sigh", etc., then in what meaningful sense is there anything left to account for? In other words, if it became possible to map subjective experience reliably onto third-person phenomenology, then what is really left over? Not that we are close to this, of course, but nobody has shown that it is impossible in principle. On a personal note I do hope you don't mind me occupying so much of your bandwidth these past few days, by the way. As an amateur and layman I very much appreciate the opportunity to have such an interesting discussion of these persistent questions.
Posted by: Malcolm Pollack | Thursday, 09 June 2005 at 23:32