The nature of Intentional states

Artificial Identity

10.1093/oso/9780190652951.003.0020 ◽

2017 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

James DiGiovanna

Keyword(s):

Personal Identity ◽

Moral Dilemmas ◽

Self Awareness ◽

Ethical Theories ◽

Intentional States ◽

Fine Grained ◽

Persistence Conditions ◽

Moral Problems ◽

Extreme Change ◽

At Will

Enhancement and AI create moral dilemmas not envisaged in standard ethical theories. Some of this stems from the increased malleability of personal identity that this technology affords: an artificial being can instantly alter its memory, preferences, and moral character. If a self can, at will, jettison essential identity-giving characteristics, how are we to rely upon, befriend, or judge it? Moral problems will stem from the fact that such beings are para-persons: they meet all the standard requirements of personhood (self-awareness, agency, intentional states, second-order desires, etc.) but have an additional ability—the capacity for instant change—that disqualifies them from ordinary personal identity. In order to rescue some responsibility assignments for para-persons, a fine-grained analysis of responsibility-bearing parts of selves and the persistence conditions of these parts is proposed and recommended also for standard persons who undergo extreme change.

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Are there Non-Propositional Intentional States?

10.1093/oso/9780198732570.003.0011 ◽

2018 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

John R. Searle

Keyword(s):

Intentional State ◽

States Of Affairs ◽

Intentional States ◽

The World ◽

Essential Idea ◽

Limited Class ◽

The Mind

Intentionality is that feature of the mind by which it is directed at or about objects and states of affairs in the world. Intentionality is simply aboutness or directedness. “Proposition” is more difficult, but the essential idea is this: every intentional state has a content. Sometimes it seems that the content just enables a state to refer to an object. So if John loves Sally, then it appears that the content of his love is simply “Sally”. But if John believes that it is raining, then the specification of the content requires an entire “that” clause. “Are there non-propositional intentional states?” amounts to the question, “Are there intentional states whose content does not require specification with a ‘that’ clause?” This chapter explores whether there are any non-propositional states, and suggest that a very limited class, such as boredom, is in fact non-propositional.

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A Display Theory of Attitude Attribution

10.1093/oso/9780198803348.003.0004 ◽

2018 ◽

Author(s):

Mark Sainsbury

Keyword(s):

Intentional States ◽

Real Entity ◽

The Subject

This is the central chapter in the book. It describes and defends display theory, a theory of attitude attribution according to which the words in the complement put concepts on display rather than using them in the normal attributive way. Attributions are true if the displayed concepts match the concepts subjects exercise in their intentional states. Display theory explains various features of intensionality. For example, there is no reason why a displayed concept in a true attribution need be true of some real entity: all that matters is whether the subject exercised it, not what, if anything, it refers to. A use of superscripts is developed which enables us to state with precision different ways in which attitude attributions can be true. The theory is extended to apply to non-conceptual intentional states.

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Representation, Consciousness, and Time

Metaphysica ◽

10.1515/mp-2018-0007 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 19 (1) ◽

pp. 137-155

Author(s):

Sean Allen-Hermanson

Keyword(s):

Thought Experiment ◽

Conscious Experience ◽

Unity Of Consciousness ◽

Intentional States ◽

Empirical Argument

Abstract I criticize Bourget’s intuitive and empirical arguments for thinking that all possible conscious states are underived if intentional. An underived state is one of which it is not the case that it must be realized, at least in part, by intentional states distinct from itself. The intuitive argument depends upon a thought experiment about a subject who exists for only a split second while undergoing a single conscious experience. This, however, trades on an ambiguity in “split second.” Meanwhile, Bourget’s empirical argument is question-begging. My critique also has implications for debates about the essential temporality and unity of consciousness experience, and, phenomenal atomism.

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Intentional States and Natural Representation

Renewing Meaning ◽

10.1093/0199263663.003.0008 ◽

2004 ◽

pp. 187-205

Author(s):

Stephen J Barker

Keyword(s):

Natural Representation ◽

Intentional States

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Redundant Group Agency

Philosophy of the Social Sciences ◽

10.1177/0048393119847273 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 49 (5) ◽

pp. 364-384

Author(s):

Lars J. K. Moen

Keyword(s):

False Beliefs ◽

Group Agency ◽

Intentional States ◽

Group Agent ◽

Group Members

According to group-agent realism, treating groups as agents with their own intentional states, irreducible to those of the group members, helps us explain and predict the groups’ behavior. This paper challenges this view. When groups judge logically interconnected propositions, group members often have incentives to misrepresent their beliefs concerning propositions they care less about in order to increase the probability of their groups adopting their view of propositions they consider more important. Aggregating such untruthful judgments may lead to the group forming false beliefs. Treating groups as agents will then not help us explain or predict their behavior.

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Fragmentation and Singular Propositions

10.1093/oso/9780198850670.003.0008 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 183-198

Author(s):

Robert Stalnaker

Keyword(s):

Possible Worlds ◽

Propositional Attitudes ◽

Phenomenal Experience ◽

A Posteriori ◽

Possible World ◽

Intentional States ◽

Singular Propositions ◽

Necessary A Posteriori

Two puzzles are described: a problem about necessary a posteriori truths and a problem about propositional attitudes with singular propositions as their contents. Two strategies for solving them are compared. The first is the diagonalization strategy, which distinguishes possible worlds that are compatible with what is actually expressed by a given sentential clause from possible worlds that are compatible with what would be expressed by the clause if that possible world were actual. The second strategy is the fragmentation strategy, which represents the intentional states described by sentential clauses as separate nonintegrated representational states. It is argued that these are complementary, not competing, strategies. Both play a role in the solutions to the problems. In conclusion, it is suggested that these strategies can also help to clarify a number of further problems—about self-locating attitudes, about the nature of computation, and about knowledge of phenomenal experience.

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