scholarly journals The extended mind argument against phenomenal intentionality

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Cody Turner
Keyword(s):  
Functional Role ◽  
Role Theory ◽  
Extended Mind ◽  
Phenomenal Consciousness ◽  
Phenomenal Intentionality ◽  
Intentional States ◽  
Mind Argument

AbstractThis paper offers a novel argument against the phenomenal intentionality thesis (or PIT for short). The argument, which I'll call the extended mind argument against phenomenal intentionality, is centered around two claims: the first asserts that some source intentional states extend into the environment, while the second maintains that no conscious states extend into the environment. If these two claims are correct, then PIT is false, for PIT implies that the extension of source intentionality is predicated upon the extension of phenomenal consciousness. The argument is important because it undermines an increasingly prominent account of the nature of intentionality. PIT has entered the philosophical mainstream and is now a serious contender to naturalistic views of intentionality like the tracking theory and the functional role theory (Loar 1987, 2003; Searle 1990; Strawson 1994; Horgan and Tienson 2002; Pitt 2004; Farkas 2008; Kriegel 2013; Montague 2016; Bordini 2017; Forrest 2017; Mendelovici 2018). The extended mind argument against PIT challenges the popular sentiment that consciousness grounds intentionality.

The Phenomenal Intentionality Theory

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Angela Mendelovici
Keyword(s):  
Functional Role ◽  
Phenomenal Consciousness ◽  
Intentional State ◽  
Phenomenal Intentionality ◽  
Intentional States ◽  
Phenomenal State ◽  
Recommended Treatment ◽  
Original Intentionality ◽  
Phenomenal States

This chapter introduces the phenomenal intentionality theory (PIT), on which all original intentionality arises from phenomenal consciousness. It argues that PIT succeeds precisely where its main competitors, the tracking and functional role theories discussed in previous chapters, fail. The version of PIT that this chapter and the remainder of the book defends is strong identity PIT, on which all intentionality arises from phenomenal consciousness (strong PIT), and (roughly) phenomenal states give rise to intentional states simply by being identical to them (identity PIT). In short, according to strong identity PIT, every intentional state is identical to a phenomenal state. This chapter closes by previewing how later chapters handle certain challenging cases for PIT, including those of thoughts, states with broad or object-involving contents, standing states, and nonconscious occurrent states. The recommended treatment rejects derived intentionality and so qualifies as a version of strong PIT.

The Phenomenal Basis of Intentionality

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Angela Mendelovici
Keyword(s):  
Functional Role ◽  
Phenomenal Consciousness ◽  
Mental States ◽  
Alternative Theory ◽  
Mental Life ◽  
Qualitative Aspect ◽  
Phenomenal Intentionality ◽  
Functional Roles ◽  
The Rich ◽  
Intrinsic Feature

Some mental states seem to be "of" or "about" things or to "say" something. For example, a thought might represent that grass is green, and a visual experience might represent a blue cup. This is intentionality. The aim of this book is to explain this phenomenon. Once we understand intentionality as a phenomenon to be explained, rather than a posit in a theory explaining something else, we can see that there are glaring empirical and in-principle difficulties with currently popular tracking and functional role theories of intentionality, which aim to account for intentionality in terms of tracking relations and functional roles. This book develops an alternative theory, the phenomenal intentionality theory (PIT), on which the source of intentionality is none other than phenomenal consciousness, the subjective, felt, or qualitative aspect of mental life. While PIT avoids the problems that plague tracking and functional role theories, it faces its own challenges in accounting for the rich and complex contents of thoughts and the contents of nonconscious states. In responding to these challenges, this book proposes a novel version of PIT, one on which all intentionality is phenomenal intentionality, though we in some sense represent many non-phenomenal contents by ascribing them to ourselves. This book further argues that phenomenal consciousness is an intrinsic feature of mental life, resulting in a view that is radically internalistic in spirit: Our phenomenally represented contents are literally in our heads, and any non-phenomenal contents we in some sense represent are expressly targeted by us.

scholarly journals The Universality of Experiential Consciousness

Information ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 31
Author(s):  
Robert Logan
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Extended Mind ◽  
Phenomenal Consciousness ◽  
Human Mind ◽  
Human Consciousness ◽  
Rational Decision ◽  
Verbal Language ◽  
Rational Decision Making ◽  
Living Things ◽  
Philosophical Debates

It is argued that of Block’s (On a confusion about a function of consciousness, 1995; The Nature of Consciousness: Philosophical Debates, 1997) two types of consciousness, namely phenomenal consciousness (p-consciousness) and access consciousness (a-consciousness), that p-consciousness applies to all living things but that a-consciousness is uniquely human. This differs from Block’s assertion that a-consciousness also applies to some non-human organisms. It is suggested that p-consciousness, awareness, experience and perception are basically equivalent and that human consciousness has in addition to percept-based p-consciousness, concept-based a-consciousness, a verbal and conceptual form of consciousness that can be utilized to coordinate, organize and plan activities for rational decision-making. This argument is based on Logan’s (The Extended Mind: The Emergence of Language, The Human Mind and Culture, 1997) assertion that humans are uniquely capable of reasoning and rationality because they are uniquely capable of verbal language and hence the ability to conceptualize.

scholarly journals Consciousness and Intentionality

2020 ◽  
pp. 559-585
Author(s):  
Angela Mendelovici ◽  
David Bourget
Keyword(s):  
Phenomenal Consciousness ◽  
Mental States ◽  
Phenomenal Intentionality ◽  
The Past ◽  
First Approximation ◽  
Key Features ◽  
The Relationship

Philosophers traditionally recognize two key features of mental states: intentionality and phenomenal consciousness. To a first approximation, intentionality is the ‘aboutness’ of mental states, and phenomenal consciousness is the felt, experiential, qualitative, or ‘what it’s like’ aspect of mental states. In the past few decades, these features have been widely assumed to be distinct and independent. But several philosophers have recently challenged this assumption, arguing that intentionality and consciousness are importantly related. This chapter overviews the key views on the relationship between consciousness and intentionality and describes our favored view, which is a version of the phenomenal intentionality theory, the view that the most fundamental kind of intentionality arises from phenomenal consciousness.

The fiction of phenomenal intentionality

2003 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 243-256 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nicholas Georgalis
Keyword(s):  
Philosophy Of Mind ◽  
Intentional State ◽  
Phenomenal Intentionality ◽  
Intentional States ◽  
Recent Philosophy ◽  
The Asymmetry

This paper argues that there is no such thing as “phenomenal intentionality”. The arguments used by its advocates rely upon an appeal to “what it is like” (WIL) to attend on some occasion to one’s intentional state. I argue that there is an important asymmetry in the application of the WIL phenomenon to sensory and intentional states. Advocates of “phenomenal intentionality” fail to recognize this, but this asymmetry undermines their arguments for phenomenal intentionality. The broader issue driving the advocacy of phenomenal intentionality is the belief that consciousness must somehow be implicated in intentionality. With this I agree. But because of the asymmetry of application of WIL, the path chosen by advocates of phenomenal intentionality to secure this conclusion cannot succeed. A brief overview of recent philosophy of mind explains the temptation to take this wrong path. Fortunately, there are other routes that implicate consciousness in intentionality. In consequence, though there is no phenomenal intentionality, there is a phenomenology of intentionality.

Phenomenal Intentionality Meets the Extended Mind

The Monist ◽  
2008 ◽  
Vol 91 (2) ◽  
pp. 347-373 ◽  
Author(s):  
Terry Horgan ◽  
Uriah Kriegel ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Extended Mind ◽  
Phenomenal Intentionality

Fit and Congruency

2019 ◽  
Vol 18 (3) ◽  
pp. 148-156
Author(s):  
Mary Hogue ◽  
Lee Fox-Cardamone ◽  
Deborah Erdos Knapp
Keyword(s):  
Role Theory ◽  
Social Role ◽  
Gender Diversity ◽  
Job Fit ◽  
Cross Sectional Survey ◽  
Cross Sectional ◽  
Working Adults ◽  
Role Congruity ◽  
Self Selection ◽  
Selection Of

Abstract. Applicant job pursuit intentions impact the composition of an organization’s applicant pool, thereby influencing selection outcomes. An example is the self-selection of women and men into gender-congruent jobs. Such self-selection contributes to a lack of gender diversity across a variety of occupations. We use person-job fit and the role congruity perspective of social role theory to explore job pursuit intentions. We present research from two cross-sectional survey studies (520 students, 174 working adults) indicating that at different points in their careers women and men choose to pursue gender-congruent jobs. For students, the choice was mediated by value placed on the job’s associated gender-congruent outcomes, but for working adults it was not. We offer suggestions for practitioners and researchers.

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