Is self-knowledge compatible with
externalism?
Pierre
Jacob
Institut
Jean Nicod, CNRS,
1
bis avenue de Lowendal,
75007
Paris, France.
Email:
jacob@ehess.fr
Externalism is
the view that the contents of many of a person's propositional attitudes and
perhaps sensory experiences are extrinsic properties of the person's brain:
they involve relations between the person's brain and properties instantiated
in his or her present or past environment. Privileged self-knowledge is the
view that every human being is able to know directly or non-inferentially, in a
way unavailable to anybody else, what he or she thinks or experiences. Now, if
what I think (or experience) is not in my brain, then it seems indeed as if I
cannot have any privileged authoritative first-personal access to the content
of what I think. Hence, externalism seems inconsistent with privileged
self-knowledge. The purpose of this paper is to provide a road towards a
conciliation between self-knowledge and externalism.
Keywords externalism, informationally
based teleosemantics, self-knowledge, introspection, compatibilism.
For quite obvious
reasons, externalist theories of mental content are widely thought to be
incompatible with privileged self-knowledge. Broadly speaking, externalism is
the view that what a person thinks is not entirely determined by his or her
inner cognitive resources but depends on items and properties present in his or
her environment. Privileged self-knowledge is the view that each person has a
direct privileged access to the contents of his or her own thoughts. This
tension is the topic of the present paper.
1. The Problem
Externalism is the
view that the contents of many of an individual's propositional attitudes and
perhaps also - although this is more controversial - the contents of an
individual's sensory experiences are not intrinsic properties of an
individual's brain: they supervene on relations between an individual's brain
and properties instantiated in his or her environment. In other words, content
is an extrinsic property of the individual's brain: it may involve relations
between the person's brain and properties instantiated in his or her present or
past environment. Just as the meaning of a token of a word of a natural
language is not an intrinsic property of the token, the content of a mental
representation is not an intrinsic property of the mental symbol (if any)
tokened in the individual's brain. As Putnam (1975) famously put it, “meanings
ain't in the head”.
1.1. Varieties of Externalism
I think it is useful
to distinguish a social and a non-social version of externalism. According to
the non-social version of externalism, content may supervene on relations
between an individual's brain and physical, chemical, biological properties
instantiated in the individual's environment. According to the social version
of externalism, what an individual thinks may even supervene on what other
members of the individual's community think. Social externalism may be
illustrated by thoughts involving so-called “deferential” concepts. A
deferential concept is a concept expressed by a word whose meaning (e.g., “elm”
or “arthritis”) an individual layperson does not quite master or masters
incompletely. He or she will therefore not unreasonably be inclined to defer to
experts from his or her community to sharpen his or her understanding of the
concept. At the root of social externalism is the view that incomplete or
partial mastery of a concept does not prevent a person from having genuine
thoughts involving that concept.[1]
Notice that although
the content of an individual's thought involving a deferential concept may
depend upon what other members of his or her community happen to think,
presumably the non-conceptual content of an individual's sensory experience does
not so depend either upon what other members of his or her community think or
upon what they experience. The non-conceptual content of a sensory
representation does not involve concepts - let alone deferential ones[2].
I take it that the contents of my visual experiences do not depend upon what
other members of my community experience. This, however, is perhaps not
so clear for the non-conceptual contents of an individual's emotions: the
non-conceptual content of an individual's emotion may perhaps depend upon the
non-conceptual contents of the emotions of members of his or her community.
Depending on one's view of the relation between concepts and percepts (or
thoughts and sensory experiences), the content of an individual's sensory
experience may perhaps depend upon what other members of his or her community
think if it depends upon one of his or her thoughts involving a
deferential concept and if the latter in turn supervenes upon what
members of his or her community think. Assuming that there is a level of visual
perception which is modular by Fodor's (1983) criteria, i.e., informationally
encapsulated or non-epistemic in Dretske's (1969, 1990) sense, then the content
of an individual's non-epistemic visual experience will not depend upon what
other members of his or her community happen to think. Unlike non-social
externalism then, social externalism clearly applies to the contents of
conceptual thought, not so clearly to the non-conceptual contents of an
individual's sensory representations. In the sequel, only externalism of the
non-social variety will be relevant.
1.2. Self-Knowledge
Privileged
self-knowledge is the view that each of us is able to know directly or
non-inferentially, in a way unavailable to anybody else, what he or she thinks
or experiences.[3] If what I
think (or experience) is not in my brain - if what I think is metaphysically
constituted by relations between my brain and properties instantiated in my
brain's environment -, then it may seem as if I cannot have any privileged
authoritative first-personal access to the content of what I think. To put my
cards on the table, I think there are two separable pieces of knowledge
involved in full self-knowledge: one is the knowledge of what one thinks (or
the knowledge of the content of one's thought); the other is the knowledge of
the fact that one thinks (the knowledge that one experiences so-and-so or the
knowledge that one believes such-and-such). Full self-knowledge involves both
kinds of knowledge: knowledge of what one thinks and knowledge that one thinks
it.[4] My view is not that in introspection, one
may as a matter of fact come to know the content of one’s own thought without
knowing that one thinks it. My view is that, for the analytic purpose of
understanding how introspective self-knowledge arises, full self-knowledge can
be usefully decomposed into two components.[5]
Although I argue in
favor of a conciliation between externalism and self-knowledge, I am thus less
of a compatibilist than Burge (1988) is. On his view, having privileged self-knowledge
about a thought consists merely in having the ability to think that thought -
whether or not having this ability requires the thinker to stand in some
appropriate relation to items in his or her social and non-social environment.
To know that I am thinking that water is wet, it is enough that I be able to
think that water is wet - whatever is required for me to think that water is
wet allows me to know that I think that water is wet. Unlike Burge (1988), I
claim that my grounds for knowing what I think are not ipso facto
grounds for knowing that I think it: in order to know that I believe that water
is wet, it is not enough that I be able to think that water is wet, I must also
appropriately form a higher-order belief about my belief that water is wet and
hence apply my concept of belief to myself.[6]
In order to know that I know that water is wet, I must possess the concept of
knowledge (which itself involves the concept of belief). I may be able to think
that water is wet and be devoid of the concepts of belief and knowledge.
1.3. Informationally based teleosemantics
In this paper, I want
to argue that a particular kind of externalism is compatible with partial
privileged self-knowledge - privileged self-knowledge of the first sort, i.e.,
knowledge of what one thinks. The kind of externalism I have in mind is a
particular brand of a teleosemantic approach to mental content which combines
teleological ideas with informational semantics. According to this approach,
which I will call the indicator-functional version of teleosemantics and which
is roughly Dretske's (1988, 1995), to have content is to have an indicator (or
information-carrying) function: to mean that x is F is to have
the function to indicate F. The relevant notion of function is the teleological
notion: a device's teleofunction (or proper function) is what the device is
supposed to do.[7] Hence, it
can capture the normativity of content. Like most teleosemanticists, I think
that the best account of a device's teleofunction is Wright's (1973)
etiological account, according to which Z is the proper function of
trait X in system S iff Xs were selected for doing Z
because X's doing Z contributed to the proliferation of S's
ancestors. In other words, a device's function is what it has been designed to
do. Device S (or some state of S) will carry information about
property F if it covaries (or is correlated) with instantiations of F.
S will have the teleological function to carry information about F
if it has been designed by some selection process or other to carry information
about F.[8]
Clearly, such a
teleosemantic theory is externalist since, on this view, what I think is a
matter of two broad extrinsic factors: first, states of my brain will not carry
information about some property instantiated in my environment unless they are
nomically correlated with instantiations of the property in question. Secondly,
they will not have indicator functions unless my brain has been suitably shaped
by some phylogenetic and/or ontogenetic historical processes. Prima facie, the
claim that an informationally based teleosemantic theory of mental content is
compatible with some amount of privileged self-knowledge should seem
surprising. It should seem surprising precisely because on this approach, the
content of what I think and experience depends (or supervenes) on nomic
correlations between properties of states of my brain and properties
instantiated in my environment; and it depends (or supervenes) on both the
phylogenetic and the ontogenetic history of my brain. And I certainly do not
have authoritative first-personal privileged access to nomic correlations
between properties of my brain and properties instantiated in my environment.
Nor do I have authoritative first-personal privileged access to the ontogenetic
history of my brain, let alone to its phylogenetic history. So if correct, the
claim that the indicator functional theory of mental content can
accommodate some aspect of partial privileged self-knowledge is interesting.
2. The Scope of the Principle of the Reflexivity of Content
2.1. Introspection as Displaced Perception
Now, Dretske (1995)
has an intriguing account of introspection, i.e., the process whereby a person
comes to know about his or her own mind. Dretske calls his account “displaced
perception”. Displaced perception, which applies first and foremost to
knowledge of the external world, is a process whereby a person comes to know
through perception facts involving things which he or she does not perceive.
Dretske gives a number of telling examples of this process: one comes to know
how much one weighs by looking at the hand of a bathroom scale. What is
perceived is the scale. What is learned is a physical fact about oneself. One
may come to know that someone else is at the door by hearing the bell ring.
What one perceives is a sound. What one learns is the presence of a human being
at the entrance of one's home. One may come to learn about distant events in
the world by reading a newspaper or by listening to the radio, and so on. What
goes on in all these cases is that one derives a conceptual representation of
some fact from the perceptual representation of a distinct fact. So the idea is
that one derives a conceptual representation of the fact that e.g., k is
F from perceiving the G-ness of h. According to Dretske,
this is typically what happens in the case of introspective knowledge of one's
perceptual experiences.
In this paper, I will
not say much about displaced perception. However, the difference between
perceptual knowledge of the external world and implications of perceptual
knowledge of the external world will be relevant later. My present goal is to
argue for the (partial) compatibility between externalism and first-personal
authoritative access to the contents of one's own mind. First, I want to spell
out a principle which I will call the principle of the Reflexivity of Content,
and which, I claim, falls out of the indicator-functional version of
teleosemantics. Furthermore, I will argue that, if correct, this principle
entails a limited amount of privileged self-knowledge or first-personal
authoritative access to the contents of an individual's thoughts and
experiences. Thirdly, I will examine the scope and limits of the kind of
privileged self-knowledge which follows from the Reflexivity of teleosemantic
content. Finally, I will briefly examine three objections to the limited kind
of self-knowledge which falls out of the indicator-functional view of mental
content.
2.2. Stating the Principle of the Reflexivity of Content
Suppose system S
- a thermometer (or a watch) - has the function to carry information about the
temperature (or to keep track of time). Call F the indicated property. S
- the thermometer (or the watch) - has the function to indicate the
determinable property F. When S represents the temperature as
being 20°C (or the time as being 5:15 PM) - a determinate property -, S
is ipso facto in a state which carries information about its being 20°C
that S is representing the temperature to be (or about its being 5:15 PM
that S is representing the time to be). Whether the temperature is
actually 20°C or not, if S represents it to be 20°C, then S must
be in a state which carries information about the way it represents the
temperature. If broken (or malfunctioning), S might represent the
temperature inaccurately: it might misrepresent the temperature. If it does,
then it does not carry information about temperature: it does not
indicate the temperature. But even if S does not carry information about
the temperature - even if it misrepresents it - still S must occupy a
state carrying information about how it is representing or
misrepresenting the temperature.
This principle, which
I call the principle of the Reflexivity of Content, can be stated thus:
Reflexivity of Content:
A system cannot
represent (whether correctly or incorrectly) things to be F unless the
system is in a state carrying information about F-ness, i.e., about how
it represents things to be. In other words, in the process whereby system S
represents something to be F, S has automatically available
information about the content of its own representation.
Note that the
principle holds of representational systems with indicator functions. I am not
assuming that such systems are ipso facto minds. A representational system
derives its indicator functions either from an intentional or from a
non-intentional process of selection. If the latter, then it is a mental
representational system: it can be a mind. If the former (i.e., if it is an
artefact), then it is a non-mental representational system. Although a
non-mental representational system S may occupy states with
representational content, it cannot, I assume, have experiences, beliefs and
desires. Only systems whose indicator functions derive from a non-intentional
selection process may have experiences, beliefs and desires. If S
derives its informational functions from an intentional process, it can
nonetheless carry information. In other words, information may be available to
it. From the fact that the information that p is available to S,
it does not follow that S threreby knows that p. S will
not know that p unless it can form the belief that p. If S
is a non-mental representational system, it will not be able to form such a
belief and hence will not be able to know that p. Thus, the principle of
the Reflexivity of Content merely says that by virtue of representing the
instantiation of a property, a representational system - be it mental or
non-mental - has available information about the property being represented. It
does not say that the device knows which property is being represented.[9]
Now let us assume that
beliefs are representations. On the indicator-functional teleosemantic theory
of belief contents, when I form the belief that p, I have privileged
information about the fact that what I believe is that p or that p
is the content of my belief. Whether I believe correctly or incorrectly that p,
my believing that p provides me with information about the way I
represent the world - about the fact that I represent the world in such a way
that ‘p’ is true. Let us assume that perceptual experiences are
representations. Then on the indicator-functional teleosemantic theory of the
non-conceptual content of perceptual experience, when I have a visual
experience as of a yellow lemon, my visual experience carries information about
how I represent the world too. Whether my visual experience is veridical or
hallucinatory, it provides me with privileged information about how I am
representing the world, namely as containing a yellow lemon in front of me.
2.3. A Teleosemantic Argument for the Principle of the
Reflexivity of Content
Now, I will briefly
sketch the teleosemantic argument in favor of the principle of the Reflexivity
of Content. According to the theory I accept, S will not represent
things to be F unless S has the function to indicate (or carry
information about) F. If S works according to its design - if it
performs its indicator function -, then S represents F correctly
and it does carry information about F. So if S correctly
represents something as F, then it does carry information about its
being F that it is representing. In virtue of correctly representing
something as F, S is in a state carrying the information that F
is being instantiated. This information is thus available to S. So we
get the principle of the Reflexivity of Content for veridical representations.
What about non-veridical representations? If S misfunctions, then it
will misrepresent F when F is not being instantiated. Suppose
that S does not perform its indicator function according to design:
suppose that S incorrectly represents or misrepresents F as being
instantiated when F is not instantiated. If S represents x
to be F when x is in fact G, not F, then S
does not carry information about the property instantiated by x, namely,
G. However, in misrepresenting x as being F, S
turns out to be correlated with what would be the case if,
contrary to fact, S were performing its function. Even if S
misrepresents the fact that F is being instantiated when it is not,
still S carries information about the property which would be
instantiated if it were doing its job according to design. If F
is the property which, by design, S has the function to indicate, then F
is the property which would be instantiated if S were
representing the fact that F is being instantiated and S were
performing its function according to its design. Hence, if S has the
function to indicate F, when S represents something as being F,
then S carries information about the fact that it is representing F,
whether it is representing F correctly or incorrectly. This is the
principle of the Reflexivity of Content.
3. The Limits of the Principle of the Reflexivity of Content
Now I want to examine
the scope and limits of the teleosemantic principle of the Reflexivity of
Content and the kind of self-knowledge it secures. According to this principle,
a device cannot represent something as F without having available and
reliable information about the content of its representation. Does it
follow that it also has information about the fact that what it is doing is
representing? If a device has information about how it is representing
what it represents, does it ipso facto have the information that
it is representing? A device cannot represent x as F without
occupying a state carrying the information that the way it represents x
is as being F, not G. If I have a visual chromatic experience
representing a lemon in front of me as being yellow, then I occupy a state
carrying the information that yellow is how I represent the lemon to be. The
question which the principle of the Reflexivity of Content raises is the
following: Does it not entail that any device with representational powers must
have the information that it is a representational device? From the fact
that one cannot represent x as F unless one is in a state
carrying information about how one is representing x, it seems to
follow that one must ipso facto have the information that what one is
doing is representing - that one is engaged in representation. If a creature
has a visual experience of x as F, it would seem to follow from
the principle of the Reflexivity of Content that the creature has the
information that it has experiences. If a creature believes that x is F,
it would seem to follow from the principle of the Reflexivity of Content that
it automatically has information about the fact that it has beliefs. I want to
argue that such consequences do not follow. In effect, I want to argue that
information is not closed under known logical implication.
3.1. Perceptual knowledge is not deductively closed
Let us turn our
attention temporarily from self-knowledge to knowledge of the external world. I
want to reflect on a similar failure of closure: perceptual knowledge is not
closed under known logical implication in at least two respects.
Consider a typical
case of perceptual knowledge. Suppose I see a yellow lemon in front of me. From
an informational point of view, if my visual system is in good working
condition, if the yellow lemon is in good viewing conditions and if the
illumination is appropriate, when I see a yellow lemon in front of me, my
visual chromatic experience provides me with the information that there is a
yellow lemon in front of me. If my visual system is reliable, then the information
which it provides is reliable. If so, then the visual information that the
lemon in front of me is yellow is reliable. I am thereby in a position to know
that there is a yellow lemon in front of me or that the lemon in front of me is
yellow. And this is a piece of knowledge I gained via visual perception.
Arguably though,
having the visual experience of a yellow lemon will not suffice for me to know
that there is a yellow lemon in front of me. Having the visual experience is
one way to know. Another way to know would be to be told by someone trustworthy
that there is a yellow lemon in front of me. But having the visual experience
is not enough in and of itself to provide knowledge. Presumably, a creature may
have a visual experience of a yellow lemon without believing that there is a
yellow lemon in front of her. Roughly, the visual experience is what Dretske
(1969) has called non-epistemic vision. However, in order to know that
there is a yellow lemon in front of one, one must believe that there is.
And arguably one cannot believe that there is a yellow lemon in front of one
unless one has the concept of a lemon. So, provided that I have the
required conceptual apparatus and provided that my visual system is reliable,
then having the visual information that there is a yellow lemon in front of me
can provide me with the knowledge that there is.
Now, I am tempted to
suppose that the proposition that the lemon in front of me is yellow (or the
proposition that there is a yellow lemon in front of me) could not be true
unless there were physical objects or unless there were an external world. In
other words, the truth of the proposition that there is a yellow lemon in front
of me presupposes the existence of lemons, the existence of physical objects
and the existence of an external world. However, as argued by Dretske (1969,
1981), I want to claim that from the fact that I see that there is a
yellow lemon in front of me and from the fact that nothing can be a yellow
lemon unless it is a physical object, it does not follow that I see
(or can see) that there are physical objects (let alone that there is an
external world).
I can see the yellow
lemon in front of me. I can also see that there is a yellow lemon in front of
me. If my visual experience is reliable and provided that I have the concept of
a lemon, I thereby come to know that there is a yellow lemon in front of me. It
can be true that there would not be a yellow lemon in front of me for me to see
unless it were a physical object and therefore unless there were physical
objects. Nonetheless, the fact that I see the yellow lemon in front of
me does not entail that I see that there is a physical object, let alone
that there is an external world. Seeing a yellow lemon in front of one has a
sensory phenomenology. Seeing that there is a yellow lemon in front of one too
has a sensory phenomenology. There is something it is like for one to see a
yellow lemon. However, it is by no means obvious that there is a phenomenology
- a sensory phnomenology - to seeing (or thinking) that there are physical
objects. Or rather, if there is a phenomenology, it is not obvious that this
phenomenology is sensory. If a lemon is yellow, then it is colored. Although
there is a sensory phenomenology to seeing a yellow lemon, it is by no means
obvious that there is a sensory phenomenology to seeing (or thinking) of a
lemon that it is colored.
The view I want to
hold then is that I learn that there is a yellow lemon in front of me by visual
perception. There are true propositions which are implied by what I learn by
visual perception. But these true propositions are not such that I can learn
about them by visual perception. Thus, perceptual (or visual) knowledge of the
external world is not closed under known logical implication. Let us say that
there is a broad and a narrow sense of “perceptual (e.g., visual) knowledge”.
In the broad sense perhaps, anything which I come to know by exploiting visual
perception counts as perceptual knowledge. But in the narrow sense, not every
consequence of what I am perceptually aware of counts as a piece of perceptual
knowledge.
In fact, within an
informational framework, there is a distinction to be made between the source
of information and the information channel.[10]
The former is what the information transmitted is about. The latter is
the means by which the information is communicated to a receiver. From
an informational point of view, I can thus get knowledge by perception if the
perceptual channel which delivers the information is reliable - if, in other
words, the information delivered is reliable. However, a signal cannot provide
a reliable information about a source and at the same time supply the
information that the information provided is reliable. It cannot, while
delivering a reliable piece of information about a source, provide the
additional information that it is reliable or that the channel through which
the piece of information has been delivered is a reliable channel. A watch
cannot simultaneously tell you what time it is if you did not know it in
advance and tell you that it is reliable. You can tell whether a watch
is reliable by looking at the position of its hands if you antecedently
know what time it is. If you do not know antecedently the time, you will
learn what time it is by looking at the watch's hands if the watch is reliable.
But you will not jointly learn what time it is and whether the watch is
reliable just from looking at its hands.
I learn that the phone is
ringing by hearing the phone ring. I learn that my wife is wearing perfume by
smelling her perfume. I learn that lemons are acid by tasting lemons. All these
things I learn by perception (be it visual, auditory, olfactory or gustatory).
And, if my perceptual systems are reliable, all these things are things I come
to know by perception. All these facts are facts of which I have perceptual
knowledge in the narrow sense. But I do not thereby come to know by perception
that my visual system, my auditory system, my olfactory system and my gustatory
system are reliable. I do not have perceptual knowledge in the narrow sense of
the fact that my perceptual systems are reliable.
Thus, the situation
with respect to knowledge of the external world is the following. I come to
know in the narrow sense various things by perception. What I come to know by
perception in the narrow sense implies a number of propositions such as that
there is an external world. Although such propositions are logically implied by
what I have learned by perception, I do not come to know by perception all the
consequences of what I know perceptually in the narrow sense. I do not know by
perception - if I know it - that there is an external world. If the information
which is provided by my perceptual system is reliable, then what I learn by
perception is perceptual knowledge in the narrow sense. From the fact that my
perceptual system is reliable and from the fact that what I learn by perception
is knowledge, it does not follow that I can know by perception that my
perceptual system is reliable. In other words, from the fact that my perceptual
system is reliable and from the fact that what I learn by perception is
knowledge, it does not follow that I can know by perception that I am not
hallucinating a yellow lemon when I perceive one or that my senses do not deceive
me.
3.2. Self-knowledge is not deductively closed
I now want to argue
that the situation with respect to self-knowledge is parallel to the situation
with respect to knowledge of the external world. If the principle of the
Reflexivity of Content is correct, then a representing creature has information
about how it is representing whatever it represents in one of the senses
of “how it is representing what it represents”. A creature has privileged
first-personal authoritative access to the contents of his or her thoughts and
experiences. But it does not follow that she thereby has privileged
first-personal authoritative access to the fact that she is thinking, believing
or experiencing. A creature can have beliefs and experiences without having
either the concept of belief or the concept of experience. According to
the indicator-functional theory of mental content, a representational system
has the function to provide information about properties instantiated in its
environment. It does not thereby have the function to provide information about
properties instantiated by itself. In virtue of exercising its
representational capacities, a creature gets information about how it
represents things in its environment. It does not thereby learn that it is
a representational system. In order to learn that it is a representational
system, it must have the concept of representation. In order to entertain the
thought that it is thinking, a creature must have the concept of thought. In
order to entertain the thought that it has beliefs or experiences, a creature
must employ either the concept of belief or the concept of experience.
Let me sum up what I
have argued. According to the principle of the Reflexivity of Content, in
representing x as F, a system has available information about the
fact that it represents x as F and not otherwise. Does it not
follow then that such a system is ipso facto able to know that it is
representing something as F? No, it does not. In order to know the
latter, it must represent the fact that it is representing. And unless it
possesses the concept of representation, it will not be able to do so.
Externalism of a certain sort is therefore compatible with partial
self-knowledge to the following extent: a representational system has direct authoritative
access to how it is representing what it is representing. It does not
have direct authoritative access to the fact that what it is doing is
representing. Another way to put the point would be to say that I have
first-personal authoritative access to what I think, believe or experience (to
the content of my thoughts, beliefs and experiences), not to the fact
that I am thinking, believing or experiencing. I have first-personal
authoritative access to the contents of my thoughts, not to the attitudes under
which I entertain these thoughts.
4. Three Objections
4.1. First Objection
At this point, I can
well imagine the following objection. When I introspect and come to know that I
believe such-and-such, it certainly does not seem to me as if I first become
immediately aware of the content of what I think, and then only through a
second stage do I learn that my belief is a belief and not a desire, a hope or
a fear. It rather seems as if it all comes as a package: introspection makes me
aware of my beliefs qua beliefs, of my desires qua desires, just as it makes me
aware of their contents and attitudes. Awareness of the difference between
belief and desire seems as immediate as the difference between any two
propositional contents.
I agree that introspection
cannot disentangle awareness of content from awareness of the attitude under
which the content is being entertained. The reason is, I think, that we do have
higher-order concepts such as the concepts of representation, thought, belief
or desire. And we cannot refrain from making use of these concepts when we
reflect on our own minds. Consider the distinction between what Dretske calls
epistemic vision and simple or non-epistemic vision (or visual representation)
of things in the external world - a distinction often made in terms of the
distinction between the conceptual and the non-conceptual content of a
representation. As I said above, unlike the exercise of epistemic vision, the
exercise of simple or non-epistemic vision can proceed, it is claimed,
independently from any conceptual resources and/or belief-forming mechanism. A
philosopher who argues for this distinction is not claiming that unless a
person can refrain from exercising his or her conceptual abilities and/or from
forming beliefs, he or she will not be able to achieve simple or non-epistemic
vision. Rather, what is being claimed is that simple or non-epistemic vision of
an object does not require the formation of a belief - non-epistemic
vision is compatible with the fact that the person fails to exploit his or her
conceptual resources and to form any belief about the object. It is, therefore,
consistent with the distinction between epistemic and non-epistemic vision that
we normally form beliefs and exercise our conceptual abilities upon seeing
things.
Similarly, I want to
say, we have available information about the content of what we think. But
arguably, in making introspective use of this information, we exploit our
conceptual resources about our own minds, i.e., we exploit our concepts of
belief, desire and experience. Indeed, we can hardly resist exploiting these
concepts. And this is why introspectively it does not seem as if we are aware
of what we think independently of our awareness of the way we entertain the
content of our thought - independently of our awareness of the fact that our
thought is e.g., a belief or a desire. Importantly, I claim that we directly
have available information about the content of our thoughts (and experiences),
not about the attitude under which the content is being entertained, hence, not
about the fact that we think or experience. However, I do not claim that
we know the content of our thought without knowing that we are thinking.
Full introspective knowledge is knowledge both of what we think and that we
think it. And furthermore, in turning available information about the content
of what we think into knowledge of what we think, we must apply some
attitude concept or other. A creature cannot come to know the content of its
representation without deploying the concept of representation. We cannot come
to know the content of our thought without applying the concept of thought.
Application of such concepts is the price to pay for transforming available
information about the content of what we think into knowledge of our mind.
So, although full
introspective knowledge is knowledge of what one thinks and knowledge that one
thinks it, I think that the distinction is justified. Its justification, it
seems to me, stands or falls with the distinction between propositional content
and propositional attitudes which in turn holds for unreflective thoughts. On
my view,[11] although
non-mental representational devices (artefacts such as gauges, thermometers and
the like) do not have attitudes such as beliefs and desires, still their states
may have contents, i.e., they may represent the instantiation of such and such
a property in the environment. Such a device may even represent the content of
another device. So, for example, the state of an alarm system may represent the
state of a thermometer which in turn represents the temperature.[12]
The reason I stress the fact
that the distinction between content and attitude holds for unreflective
thoughts is that, in the case of reflective thoughts, the distinction does not
always hold. Suppose, for example, that (in Cogito-like thoughts) what I think
is that I am presently thinking or that what I presently believe is that I have
beliefs. In such cases, the distinction between content and attitude may
collapse. And so does the distinction between knowledge of what one thinks and
knowledge that one thinks it. The latter collapses in so far as (or because)
the former collapses. But in so far as one and the same content can be
entertained under different attitudes, the distinction between knowing what one
thinks and knowing that one thinks it does, I think, obtain. Notice, however,
that such reflective thoughts are different from introspective self-knowledge.
Although they are higher-order thoughts, such reflective thoughts do not in and
of themselves amount to knowledge about the content of one’s own mind. My
thought that I am presently thinking and my belief that I have beliefs are
typical reflective thoughts. But they differ from my introspective claim to
know what I believe when e.g., I am aware that I believe that water is wet.
Unlike Burge (1988), I do not think it is sufficient to be able to believe that
water is wet in order to know that one believes that water is wet, since one
may have this belief and lack the concept of belief. In order to know that one
believes that water is wet, one must hold the belief that water is wet and form
the higher-order belief that one believes it. The reflective thought that one
is thinking is just that: a reflective thought. It is not a claim about
self-knowledge. Nor is the belief that one has beliefs. Both are reflective
thoughts that may arise as logical consequences of any thought or any belief.
4.2. Second Objection
A second and powerful
objection is the following. Consider Putnam's (1975) celebrated
thought-experiment. Oscar on Earth and Twoscar on Twin-Earth express different
natural kind concepts when each of them utters a token of the word 'water': the
former refers to water, the latter to twater. Any externalist account of the
contents of concepts - and, as I pointed out, the informationally based
teleosemantic account clearly is an externalist account - is bound to claim
that, before the discovery of the molecular structure of water, Oscar on Earth
and Twoscar on Twin Earth must have had introspective access to different
concepts with different contents. But how could they? Prior to the discovery of
the molecular structure of water, water on Earth and twater on Twin Earth could
not be distinguished by any method and by anyone. Only after the
discovery of the molecular structure of water on Earth could chemists
distinguish the molecular structure of water from that of twater. So how could
Oscar's introspectively formed belief about his water concept differ from
Twoscar's introspectively formed belief about his twater concept? This
challenge raises a problem for any externalist account of natural kind concepts
- not just an informationally based teleosemantic account.
As I see it, the best
response available to an externalist - any externalist - is to bite the bullet
and accept the view that Oscar and Twoscar do have introspective access to two
different concepts and that they did so even before the discovery of the
molecular structure of water. They do so even if, were Oscar to move from Earth
to Twin-Earth or were Twoscar to move from Twin-Earth to Earth, neither could
recognize any difference. The introspective situation of Oscar and Twoscar with
respect to their distinct concepts (of water and twater) is rather like the
situation I might be in were I acquainted with two identical twins: Sara and
Mara. My seeing Sara differs from my seeing Mara in virtue of the fact that
Sara is not Mara. My belief that Sara has blond hair differs from my belief
that Mara has blond hair for the same reason. For all that, I might be
completely unable to distinguish my beliefs and my visual experiences just
because I might be unable to distinguish Sara from Mara.[13]
Does not the strategy I am
recommending here amount to a recognition that externalism is not after all
compatible with priviledged self-knowledge of the content of one’s own
concepts? I think that the strategy I am recommending is consistent with
self-knowledge properly construed. What, I think, it is inconsistent with is
not self-knowledge but the view that self-knowledge is in effect
self-ominiscience.
Suppose I cannot tell the
difference between my seeing Sara and my seeing Mara. Does it follow that I am
not really having two genuine and genuinely distinct visual experiences? As an
externalist, I do not think so. My belief about my visual experience of Sara
might be indistinguishable from my belief about my visual experience of Mara.
Similarly, my belief about my visual hallucinatory experience might be
indistinguishable from my belief about my visual experience caused by a real
object. Still, the two experiences will differ in that only one of them is an
experience of an object. When I compare my belief that Sara has blond
hair with my belief that Mara has blond hair, I form a higher-order belief about
my two distinct first-order beliefs. My higher-order belief forming mechanism
might fail to identify any recognizable difference between my two first-order
beliefs. On the view I argue for here, I have special access to the content of
my own thoughts (beliefs and experiences) in the sense that my access to my own
thoughts differs from either your access to my thoughts or my access to your
thoughts. But this special first-personal introspective access is not
omniscience: it does not guarantee that for any difference between any
two of my thoughts (sensory experiences, concepts and/or beliefs), I can find
out about it. I am authoritative about the contents of my own thoughts in the
sense that I do not need to observe my own behavior to determine what I think
(the way I need to observe your behavior to determine what you think). But
differences between two of my thoughts may escape the notice of my
introspective resources. To use a term of Boghossian (1989: 481),
self-knowledge might not “exhaust” the content of one’s mind. It might not
exhaust the contents of sub-personal states. It might not exhaustively
recognize each and every difference between the contents of personal states
either.
4.3. Third Objection
A third objection is
the following. On the present account of introspective self-knowledge based on
the Principle of the Reflexivity of Content, a person's knowledge of her own
mind is two-tiered. On the one hand, from the very fact that she entertains a
thought, a person has direct privileged access to the contents of her thoughts.
But she does not have the same access to the fact that e.g., she thinks or
believes whatever it is she thinks or believes. She does not have access to the
fact that what she is doing is thinking or believing in the same direct way she
has access to the content of what she is thinking. In order to know the fact
that what she is doing is thinking or believing, she must form a higher-order
belief about this fact. And this she cannot do unless she uses her higher-order
concepts of thought and/or belief. A person can have experiences, entertain
thoughts and form beliefs without possessing the concepts of experience,
thought and belief. If so, then she will not be able to form the higher-order
thought that she is having experiences, entertaining thoughts and forming
beliefs.
Now, I want to claim,
a person cannot represent the fact that she is representing the world as being
thus-and-so unless she can misrepresent what she is representing. An internal
state cannot be a representation unless it may be a misrepresentation. The same
is true for believing (and/or knowing) that one believes that p. In
other words, a person cannot know that she believes that p unless she
believes that she does. And she cannot believe that she believes that p unless
her higher-order belief could be a false belief. It follows that on the present
account, a person's full self-knowledge of her own mind - contrary to the
Cartesian tradition - turns out not to be infallible; it is fallible.
Now the question
arises: How could a person be mistaken about the fact that she believes
what she does? A person, I claim, has direct privileged access to the fact that
what she believes is that p (or about the content of her experiences).
How then could she be wrong about the fact that she entertains this content as
a belief? Of course, a creature could not think that she is thinking that p
unless she had the concept of thought. But assuming that she does and assuming
that she has several distinct concepts for distinct propositional attitudes,
how could she misapply them? To see how she could, consider the difference
between knowing and believing that p. I assume that knowing that p
involves believing that p, but it involves more. Believing that p
is necessary though not sufficient for knowing that p. Now a person may
well think that she knows that p where in effect she merely
believes that p. She might erroneously take herself to know that p
because she wrongly takes her belief that p to be reliable when in fact
it is not. In this case, she would misjudge the reliability of her belief that p
and therefore be wrong in taking herself to know that p. If so, then
although perhaps a person might not be mistaken in thinking that what she is
thinking is that p, still she might be mistaken in thinking that she
knows it. Perhaps another case of erroneous self-ascription of an attitude
might be the kind of self-deception involved in wishful thinking for example.
Suppose I come to believe that a certain proposition q is true under the
influence of wishful thinking. Do I really believe that proposition q is
true? Am I right in self-ascribing to myself a belief in the truth of q?
Suppose someone (e.g., my psychoanalyst) points out that the evidence in favor
of the truth of q is very thin indeed and she convinces me that I very
much want q to be the case. I might then revise my higher-order belief
that I believe that q is true and come instead to the view that I wish
that q were true: I so much wished q to be true that I managed to
convince myself that I believed q to be true whereas the evidence
overwhelmingly suggests otherwise.
In examining the
previous second objection, I argued that self-knowledge should not be confused
with omniscience about the contents of one’s own thoughts. I now want to point
out that, on the view I am recommending, there is room for error in the
self-ascription of concepts of propositional attitudes. This follows from the
assumption that in order to know how one entertains a thought e.g., as a
belief, one must form a higher-order belief which involves the concept of
belief. There is no guarantee that the application of the concept of belief
will be correct. Nor can it be ruled out that the higher-order belief is false.
As Boghossian (1989: 481-2) puts it, it is one thing to recognize “a profound
asymmetry between the way in which I know my own thoughts and the way in which
I may know the thoughts of others”. It is quite another to claim that
“self-knowledge is both infallible and exhaustive”. In response to the previous
objection, I argued that it is not exhaustive. In response to the present
objection, I claim that it is not infallible.
5. Conclusion
In this paper, I have
assumed an externalist view of the contents of propositional thoughts, i.e., an
informationally based teleosemantic account. First, I have argued that this
account entails a principle which I have dubbed the principle of the
Reflexivity of Content which in turn entails that a person has direct
privileged access to the content of her thoughts: by virtue of entertaining a
thought, a person has available information about what she thinks. Secondly, I
have argued that from the fact that a person has first-personal direct
authoritative access to the content of her thoughts it does not follow that she
is thereby similarly authoritative about the fact that she thinks or has
thoughts. So on the picture of self-knowledge which I have sketched, full
self-knowledge turns out to have two components: knowledge of what one thinks
and knowledge that one thinks it. Finally, I have examined three objections to
my two-tiered account of self-knowledge and I have tried to dispel them.
References
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An initial version of
this paper was presented at the International Colloquium entitled “Categories
and Beliefs”, organized by the Rosselli Foundation in Torino, from 13 to 14
November 1999. I am grateful to participants at this Colloquium, to
participants at a Workshop on “Self-Consciousness”, organized by Albert Newen
at the University of Bonn (Germany) from
8 to 9 July 1999, and to three referees for Mind and Society for helpful criticisms.
[1] See Burge (1979). Some philosophers - e.g., Donnellan (1993) - have offered a metalinguistic account of the phenomenon of incomplete or partial conceptual mastery on which Burge (1979) bases his argument for social externalism. I think, however, that the metalinguistic account faces a decisive objection. On the metalinguistic account, Mara's full belief (involving her partial mastery of the concept expressed by the word 'arthritis') that she has arthritis in her thigh is really the belief that she has in her thigh what experts in her community call 'arthritis'. If so, then two persons speaking different languages may not share the same belief involving concepts of which they have partial mastery. But I think this consequence is undesirable.
[2]
Although it has been questioned by McDowell (1994), I assume here the
distinction between conceptual and non-conceptual content.
[3] See Boghossian (1989).
[4]
The two-tiered view I am arguing for here is quite similar to the view
defended by Bernecker (1996).
[5]
Much of the justification for the decomposition between the two kinds of
knowledge derives from the claim (encapsulated in the Principle of Reflexivity)
that by virtue of representing the instantiation of a property, a device has
available information about the property being represented. Much of my defense
of the two-tiered view relies on the differences between having available information and knowing.
[6]
See Bernecker (1996) for a discussion of Burge’s compatibilism.
[7] As Millikan (1984, 1993) and Neander (1995) have emphasized, unlike the non-teleological notion analyzed e.g., by Cummins (1975), the teleological notion of function has normative implications.
[8]
See Jacob (1997, ch. 4).
[9]
This point will be relevant again when I argue that perceptual knowledge
and self-knowledge are not closed under logical implication.
[10] See Dretske (1981).
[11]
As on the views of Dretske (1995) and Bernecker (1996).
[12]
See Bernecker (1996, p. 504).
[13] Thanks to Diego Marconi, Mike Martin and Alberto Voltolini for discussing this very point at the Conference.