Philosophy of Mind: Take Home Exam
Wylie Breckenridge
Question 1
We might say that a statue of Napoleon is about Napoleon because it
resembles him. Could we explain the intentionality of our thoughts in a
similar way?
We often talk about one thing, X, being a 'representation of' or 'about' another thing, Y.
X might be a physical object - a statue of Napoleon is about Napoleon. Or X might be
linguistic - the word 'Napoleon' is about Napoleon. Or X might be a mental state - a
thought of Napoleon is about Napoleon. What is it that makes these things
representations of Napoleon? Can we come up with a condition for when X represents
Y?
Consideration of the statue example prompts the so-called resemblance theory of
representation:
X represents Y if and only if X resembles Y
Note, first of all, that this theory has restricted application. Some types of representation
do not rely on resemblance - the word 'Napoleon' does not resemble Napoleon.
Furthermore, some things cannot be represented at all by resemblance - try drawing a
picture of the idea 'if it is not raining this afternoon, then I will go for a walk' 1. Given
these restrictions, how well does the theory work?
In cases where X is a physical object, the theory has problems. I'll mention three.
Firstly, resemblance is not sufficient for representation. There are identical twins called
Bill and Ben. Bill resembles Ben, but we would not want to be forced into saying that
Bill is about Ben. Secondly, resemblance is symmetric but representation is not.
Napoleon resembles the statue just as much as the statue resembles Napoleon, but we do
not want to say that Napoleon is about the statue. Thirdly, the idea of resemblance is
vague. How close does the resemblance have to be? Simply saying that X has to
resemble Y in some way is too liberal - every physical object resembles Napoleon in at
least being extended.
The first two problems could be overcome by requiring that there is some kind of
purpose to X resembling Y. That would rule out accidental resemblance, as in the case
of Bill and Ben, and it would remove the problem of symmetry - the statue was made to
resemble Napoleon, but Napoleon was not made to resemble the statue. We could
modify the theory to this:
X represents Y if and only if X purposely resembles Y
The problems remain, however, of making 'purpose' and 'resemble' more precise.
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Only resemblance can be used in the drawing. Symbols, such as a cross through a cloud, are not allowed
- they do not resemble the idea that they represent.
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So when X is a physical object, the resemblance theory needs modification in the ways
suggested. What about when X is a mental state? The theory would say:
Mental state X represents Y if and only if X resembles Y
At first sight this is absurd. It claims that if you were to look inside my head when I'm
thinking about Napoleon, you would see something that resembles Napoleon. But this is
not logically impossible. If a collection of clay particles can resemble Napoleon, then
why can't a collection of neurons resemble him? We shouldn't rule it out immediately
because it seems implausible. We can actually test this claim (at least in principle) by
opening up my head and having a look. If we find something that resembles Napoleon,
then the claim becomes plausible. If we don't, then we still cannot rule it out. We may
have been looking in the wrong place or at the wrong scale. It is, however, a hard claim
to swallow.
It becomes more appealing if we change the point of view. In the above discussion, we
took 'my thought X resembles Y' to mean 'my thought X looks like Y from the point of
view of someone else'. What if we take it from my point of view? The theory would
then say:
My mental state X represents Y if and only if, to me, X resembles Y
What does it mean for my mental state to resemble Y? I propose the following
definition:
My mental state X resembles Y if and only if it produces in me a similar qualitative
experience as does Y
When I think about Napoleon, I have a similar visual experience to the one I would
have if I looked at him directly. It may be less vivid, but having this thought will be
more like looking at Napoleon than looking at a bad drawing of Napoleon might be. I
don't mean for this definition to be restricted to visual experience. It includes all of the
qualitative experiences that may accompany a thought. For example, my thought 'it is
cold outside' produces various images and also feelings within me - that of being cold,
of wanting a thicker jumper etc. The theory then says:
My mental state X represents Y if and only if it produces in me a similar qualitative
experience as does Y
Does this theory suffer the same three problems as above? Firstly, is similarity of
qualitative experience sufficient for representation? At first sight, no. When I think
about Bill I have a similar visual experience to that of looking at Ben, but my thought is
not about Ben, it's about Bill. But we need to be careful here. When I think about Bill,
his image is accompanied by the thought 'this is what Bill looks like'. When I look at
Ben, I get the same image, but it is accompanied by the thought 'this is what Ben looks
like'. So taken in its entirety the qualitative experience is different. Secondly, do we
have the problem of symmetry? The theory is only being applied to representations in
which X is a mental state. So if Y is not a mental state, then we don't have the unwanted
symmetry. What if Y is a mental state? I don't think there is a problem here either.
There is a qualitative difference between thinking the thought Y, and thinking about
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thinking the thought Y. This difference ensures an asymmetry between X and Y.
Thirdly, the problem of vagueness in the definition. This is still here. What exactly is
meant by 'similar'?
Although it needs fleshing out, I think that this extended resemblance theory of mental
representation has promise. It is not just limited to thoughts that involve images. It says
that my thought of 'thunder' is a representation of thunder because when I think of
thunder I have a similar (acoustic) experience to the one I have when I listen to thunder.
It says that my thought 'if it is not raining this afternoon, then I will go for a walk' is a
representation of that state of affairs, because it is accompanied by a similar set of
experiences - in this case a whole range of images, beliefs, desires, feelings etc. The
question of how an external observer would apply the theory needs to be addressed can we do any better than relying on the introspection of the person having the thought?
Can we record and compare the subjective experience of the thinker? Would it be a
problem if the only person who could know what a thought is about is the person having
the thought? These questions need to be addressed.
Question 5
Why is misrepresentation a problem for causal theories of mental content?
Causal theories of mental content, put simply, say that a representational mental state is
about whatever caused it. Fleshing out exactly what this means is tricky. I will restrict
my attention to very specific mental states - those of the form 'I believe that so-and-so is
the case', where so-and-so is some state of affairs in the world. For example, 'I believe
that a woman is sitting opposite me' is a mental state of this form. I will say that the
state of affairs 'a woman is sitting opposite me', is (i) what the state represents, or (ii)
what it is about, or (iii) its content. I will use the terms 'thought' and 'mental state'
interchangeably.
The causal theory says that the thought 'I believe that a woman is sitting opposite me'
represents the state of affairs 'a woman is sitting opposite me' because it is caused by
that state of affairs. This is a bit too crude, because there will be other causes as well physiological and psychological factors, other beliefs, etc. What the causal theory wants
to do is pick out just that state of affairs in the world that was a part of this cause, and
label that as the content of the belief. In general it says:
What the thought 'I believe that Y' represents is the state of affairs that is a necessary
and sufficient state of affairs for the thought to come about
The theory says that the thought 'I believe that a woman is sitting opposite me' is about
the state of affairs 'a woman is sitting opposite me' because 'a woman sitting opposite
me' is a necessary and sufficient state of affairs for the thought to come about. The
'sufficient' part is intended to capture the idea that the state of affairs is needed to cause
my belief. The 'necessary' part is needed to ensure that we only get the state of affairs
that the belief is about. For example, the state of affairs 'a woman is sitting opposite me,
and a man is sitting next to her' may be sufficient for the belief to come about, but it is
not necessary. The state of affairs 'someone is sitting opposite me' may be necessary for
the belief to come about, but it is not sufficient. The state of affairs 'a woman is sitting
opposite me' may be both necessary and sufficient.
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A problem comes to mind. The theory says that if I believe that Y is the case, then Y is
a necessary condition for that belief to arise, so Y must be the case. If I believe that a
woman is sitting opposite me, then a woman is sitting opposite me. If she wasn't, then
the belief could not have come about. I cannot be mistaken in this belief. But this is
contrary to experience. It might be a man dressed as a woman, in which case my belief
is mistaken. This is the problem of error: the causal theory says that error is not
possible, experience says that it is.
Proponents of the theory are forced to respond in one of two ways, each of which
creates its own problem. They must say either that this mistaken belief cannot arise, or
that I don't believe what I think I do. The first creates the so-called Misrepresentation
Problem, and the second the so-called Disjunction Problem.
The Misrepresentation Problem arises by claiming that I will only believe things that are
the case. If there is not a woman sitting opposite me, then I will not believe that there is.
Experience suggests that this is not so.
To see how the Disjunction Problem arises, consider my belief 'there is a woman sitting
opposite me'. Suppose this belief will come about only in either of these two
circumstances: (i) there is a woman sitting opposite me, or (ii) there is a man dressed as
a woman sitting opposite me. Neither circumstance, taken by itself, is necessary for the
belief to come about. But the disjunction 'either a woman is sitting opposite me or a man
dressed as a woman is sitting opposite me' is necessary - it must be the case that one of
these two circumstances obtains. The causal theory is thus forced to say that what I
believe is this disjunction, not just that a woman is sitting opposite me. Realistically it
will be even worse - what I will have to believe is the disjunction of every possible
circumstance that would make me think a woman is sitting there, and there could be a
lot of them. In fact, there may be circumstances that I could never think of, let alone
believe. That's the Disjunction Problem.
It seems to me that these problems are not as great as they first appear. They arise from
a misapplication of the causal theory. The theory claims that what a belief is about is
that of state of affairs, and only that state of affairs, that contributed to causing the
belief. We must be careful not to forget that our other beliefs play a role here too. To see
what I mean, let's apply the theory more carefully in a couple of cases.
Suppose that I have no idea who, if anyone, is sitting opposite me. Suppose that I close
my eyes and ears and, by thinking alone, come to decide that a woman is sitting there.
What state of affairs in the world contributed to this belief? None. It arose purely from
my other beliefs. What, according to the causal theory, is this belief about? Nothing.
What state of affairs, then, does the causal theory say must be the case? None. So the
theory does not require that a woman be sitting there, even though I believe it. The
theory does allow for error.
Now consider the situation in which I decide, by looking, that a woman is sitting there.
What state of affairs in the world contributed to the belief this time? It is not the state of
affairs 'a woman is sitting there', or 'a man dressed as a woman is sitting there' or their
disjunction. It is the state of affairs 'something that looks like a woman doing what
looks like sitting in a place that seems to be opposite me'. What, according to the theory,
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is the content of my belief? Just that. The theory is not forced to say that the content is a
disjunction of any number of circumstances. It says that the content of my belief is just
what I can see, not what I then go on to deduce. My belief that it is a woman sitting
there is due, in part, to what I can see. That is the content of the belief. And it is due, in
part, to my other beliefs - that it is unlikely that a man would be dressed as a woman,
that no one would have put a cardboard dummy there, etc. When combined, I come to
believe that a woman is there.
I think this clarification removes the problem of error, but only by shifting it elsewhere.
At first sight, the theory rules out the possibility of mistaken beliefs because believing
that Y implies that Y must be the case. This is the Misrepresentation Problem. I have
just shown (in the first scenario above) that the theory does allow for a belief that Y,
even though Y might not be the case. In such a case, however, it says that the belief has
no content. Clearly, we don't want to be forced into this position either.
We may be able to overcome this new problem by defining the content of a belief to be
not just the state of affairs in the world that leads to it, but the complete state of affairs in the world and in my head - that leads to it. This would be to say that a belief is about
so-and-so not only because of what is happening in the world, but also because of what
is happening in the mind. This seems, to me, a more promising approach.
In summary, misrepresentation is not so great a problem for the causal theory as it first
appears. When the theory is carefully applied, it fully allows for errors in belief. Its
troubles lie elsewhere - in having too narrow a definition of what the content of a belief
is. Broadening this definition is the next step.
Bibliography
Tim Crane, The Mechanical Mind, Penguin, 1995.
Luke Russell, Lecture notes, 1998.
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