Switch to: References

Add citations

You must login to add citations.
  1. Mental Files.Rachel Goodman - 2024 - Philosophy Compass 19 (3).
    The so-called ‘mental files theory’ in the philosophy of mind stems from an analogy comparing object-concepts to ‘files’, and the mind to a ‘filing system’. Though this analogy appears in philosophy of mind and language from the 1970s onward, it remains unclear to many how it should be interpreted. The central commitments of the mental files theory therefore also remain unclear. Based on influential uses of the file analogy within philosophy, I elaborate three central explanatory roles for mental files. Next, (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   1 citation  
  • A plea for epistemic ontologies.Gilles Kassel - 2023 - Applied ontology 18 (4):367-397.
    In this article, we advocate the use of “epistemic” ontologies, i.e., systems of categories representing our knowledge of the world, rather than the world directly. We first expose a metaphysical framework based on a dual mental and physical realism, which underpins the development of these epistemic ontologies. To this end, we refer to the theories of intentionality and representation established within the school of Franz Brentano at the turn of the 20th century and choose to rehabilitate the notion of a (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  • Defending Moderate De Se Skepticism.Henry Clarke - 2023 - Philosophical Studies 180 (2):661-677.
    Moderate skepticism about de se thought accepts that there is a kind of mental state which is about the thinker and is psychologically indispensable for intentional action, but rejects the claim that this kind employs an indexical way of referring. Morgan (2021) has proposed an explanatory argument meant to show that the psychological kind does employ an indexical way of referring to the thinker, on the basis of the special connection between these thoughts and the use of the first-person pronoun (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  • Files are mental particulars: a rejoinder to the relationist challenge.Mieszko Tałasiewicz - 2022 - Synthese 200 (6).
    The paper is a rejoinder to a challenge against the particularist version of the mental files framework posed by the relationist approach based on the notion of content coordination [such as recent attempt by Rachel Goodman and Aidan Gray in ]. Relationists argue that important explanatory goals of MFF: could be achieved without positing files as mental particulars, as there is a relationist notion of content coordination at hand that can be aptly used for “filing without files”; and should be (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   1 citation  
  • Perceptual Modes of Presentation as Object Files.Gabriel Siegel - 2024 - Erkenntnis 89 (6):2377 - 2395.
    Some have defended a Fregean view of perceptual content. On this view, the constituents of perceptual contents are Fregean modes of presentation (MOPs). In this paper, I propose that perceptual MOPs are best understood in terms of object files. Object files are episodic representations that store perceptual information about objects. This information is updated when sensory conditions change. On the proposed view, when a subject perceptually represents some object a under two distinct MOPs, then the subject initiates two object files (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   2 citations  
  • A Review of Recanati’s Mental Files. [REVIEW]Hsiang-Yun Chen - 2020 - NCCU Philosophical Journal 44:177-204.
    In Mental Files, Recanati proposes a non-descriptivist approach to reference in terms of mental files, mental representations that play the role of Fregean mode of presentation. Recanati argues that we refer via mental files and that the reference of a file is determined relationally, rather than satisficationally; files are not to be equated to the information they contain, but typed by their function—to store information gained through certain epistemically rewarding relation to objects in the environment. I offer a critical overview (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  • Mental Filing Systems: A User's Guide.Henry Clarke - 2021 - Ergo: An Open Access Journal of Philosophy 8.
    How seriously should we take the idea that the mind employs mental files? Goodman and Gray (2022) argue that mental filing – a thinker rationally treating her cognitive states as being about the same thing – can be explained without files. Instead, they argue that the standard commitments of mental file theory, as represented by Recanati’s indexical model, are better seen in terms of a relational representational feature of object representations, which in turn is based on the epistemic links a (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   3 citations  
  • Predelli on Fictional Discourse.Manuel García-Carpintero - 2022 - Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism 80 (1):83-94.
    John Searle argues that fictions are constituted by mere pretense—by the simulation of representational activities like assertions, without any further representational aim. They are not the result of sui generis, dedicated speech acts of a specific kind, on a par with assertion. The view had earlier many defenders, and still has some. Stefano Predelli enlists considerations derived from Searle in support of his radical fictionalism. This is the view that a sentence of fictional discourse including a prima facie empty fictional (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   3 citations  
  • A Puzzle about Communication.Matheus Valente & Andrea Onofri - 2023 - Review of Philosophy and Psychology 14 (3):1035-1054.
    It seems plausible that successfully communicating with our peers requires entertaining the same thoughts as they do. We argue that this view is incompatible with other, independently plausible principles of thought individuation. Our argument is based on a puzzle inspired by the Kripkean story of Peter and Paderewski: having developed several variations of the original story, we conclude that understanding and communication cannot be modeled as a process of thought transfer between speaker and hearer. While we are not the first (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   1 citation  
  • Anaphoric Dependence and Logical Form.Manuel García-Carpintero - 2020 - Disputatio 12 (58):265-276.
    In the core chapters 4–6, Iacona (2018) argues against the “Uniqueness Thesis” (UT), stating that “there is a unique notion of logical form that fulfils both the logical role and the semantic role” (39), where the former “concerns the formal explanation of logical properties and logical relations, such as validity or contradiction” (37), and the latter “concerns the formulation of a compositional theory of meaning” (ibid.). He argues for this on the basis of relations of coreference among referential expressions, names (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  • Frege’s Puzzle and Cognitive Relationism: An Essay on Mental Files and Coordination.Paolo Bonardi - 2020 - Disputatio 12 (56):1-40.
    This paper will critically examine two solutions to Frege’s puzzle: the Millian-Russellian solution proposed by Salmon and Braun, which invokes non-semantic modes of presentation (guises, ways of believing or the like); and Fine’s relationalist solution, which appeals to semantic coordination. Special attention will be devoted to discussing the conception of modes of presentation as mental files and to elucidating the nature of coordination. A third solution to Frege’s puzzle will be explored which, like Salmon’s and Braun’s, adopts the Millian-Russellian semantics (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  • Intentional Identity and Coordination.Hsiang-Yun Chen - 2017 - Studia Semiotyczne 31 (2):35-51.
    The concept of intentional identity has aroused considerable interests since Geach. I argue, however, that the real import of intentional identity is still not duly appreciated. Drawing on three sets of close-knit data – intersubjective and intrasubjective intentional identity, along with cross-speaker anaphora, I submit coordination as the key to its proper understanding and propose a set of success conditions thereof.
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  • The Metaphysics of Mental Files.Simon Prosser - 2020 - Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 100 (3):657-676.
    There is much to be said for a diachronic or interpersonal individuation of singular modes of presentation (MOPs) in terms of a criterion of epistemic transparency between thought tokens. This way of individuating MOPs has been discussed recently within the mental files framework, though the issues discussed here arise for all theories that individuate MOPs in terms of relations among tokens. All such theories face objections concerning apparent failures of the transitivity of the ‘same MOP’ relation. For mental files, these (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   7 citations  
  • (1 other version)Towards a theory of singular thought about abstract mathematical objects.James E. Davies - 2019 - Synthese 196 (10):4113-4136.
    This essay uses a mental files theory of singular thought—a theory saying that singular thought about and reference to a particular object requires possession of a mental store of information taken to be about that object—to explain how we could have such thoughts about abstract mathematical objects. After showing why we should want an explanation of this I argue that none of three main contemporary mental files theories of singular thought—acquaintance theory, semantic instrumentalism, and semantic cognitivism—can give it. I argue (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  • Fictional, Metafictional, Parafictional.François Recanati - 2018 - Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society 118 (1):25-54.
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   25 citations  
  • What Do Object Files Pick Out?Edwin Green - 2018 - Philosophy of Science 85 (2):177-200.
    Many authors have posited an “object file” system, which underlies perceptual selection and tracking of objects. Several have proposed that this system internalizes principles specifying what counts as an object and relies on them during tracking. Here I consider a popular view on which the object file system is tuned to entities that satisfy principles of three-dimensionality, cohesion, and boundedness. I argue that the evidence gathered in support of this view is consistent with a more permissive view on which object (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   11 citations  
  • What Is an Object File?E. J. Green & Jake Quilty-Dunn - 2021 - British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 72 (3):665-699.
    The notion of an object file figures prominently in recent work in philosophy and cognitive science. Object files play a role in theories of singular reference, object individuation, perceptual memory, and the development of cognitive capacities. However, the philosophical literature lacks a detailed, empirically informed theory of object files. In this paper, we articulate and defend the multiple-slots view, which specifies both the format and architecture of object files. We argue that object files represent in a non-iconic, propositional format that (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   60 citations  
  • Names of Truth Bearers, and “That”‐Clauses: A Dilemma for Millians.Paolo Bonardi - 2017 - Theoria 83 (3):175-184.
    Millianism is the doctrine according to which the semantic content of a proper name is exhausted by its referent. This article raises and attempts to solve a dilemma for Millians: either a proper name of a truth bearer is in turn a truth bearer ; or having a truth bearer as semantic content is not sufficient for a linguistic expression to be a truth bearer. As it will be shown in the manuscript, the dilemma does not arise with “that”-clauses in (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   1 citation  
  • Frege Puzzles and Mental Files.Henry Clarke - 2018 - Australasian Journal of Philosophy 96 (2):351-366.
    This paper proposes a novel conception of mental files, aimed at addressing Frege puzzles. Classical Frege puzzles involve ignorance and discovery of identity. These may be addressed by accounting for a more basic way for identity to figure in thought—the treatment of beliefs by the believer as being about the same thing. This manifests itself in rational inferences that presuppose the identity of what the beliefs are about. Mental files help to provide a functional characterization of a mind capable of (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   6 citations  
  • Indexing the World? Visual Tracking, Modularity, and the Perception–Cognition Interface.Santiago Echeverri - 2016 - British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 67 (1):215-245.
    Research in vision science, developmental psychology, and the foundations of cognitive science has led some theorists to posit referential mechanisms similar to indices. This hypothesis has been framed within a Fodorian conception of the early vision module. The article shows that this conception is mistaken, for it cannot handle the ‘interface problem’—roughly, how indexing mechanisms relate to higher cognition and conceptual thought. As a result, I reject the inaccessibility of early vision to higher cognition and make some constructive remarks on (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   2 citations  
  • Breaking the language barrier: conceptual representation without a language-like format.Iwan Williams - forthcoming - British Journal for the Philosophy of Science.
    An important part of the explanatory role of concepts is that they enable us to combine a wide variety of objects, properties and relations in thought, with contents spanning diverse domains. I discuss an argument that appears to show that paradigmatic non-linguistic representational formats are unsuited to play this role, and thus conceptual representation could not occur in these formats. I show that this argument fails, because it overlooks the possibility of individual concepts being shared between a number of special (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  • The Meanings of Fictional Names.Fiora Salis - 2021 - Organon 28 (1):9-43.
    According to Millianism, the meaning of a name is exhausted by its referent. According to anti-realism about fictional entities, there are no such entities. If there are no fictional entities, how can we explain the apparent meaningfulness of fictional names? Our best theory of fiction, Walton’s theory of make-believe, makes the same assumptions but lacks the theoretical resources to answer the question. In this paper, I propose a pragmatic solution in terms of two main dimensions of meaning, a subjective, psychological (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   1 citation  
  • Keeping track of what’s right.Laura Schroeter & François Schroeter - 2018 - Canadian Journal of Philosophy 48 (3-4):489-509.
    In this paper, we argue that ordinary judgments about core normative topics purport to attribute stable, objective properties and relations. Our strategy is first to analyze the structures and practices characteristic of paradigmatically representational concepts such as concepts of objects and natural kinds. We identify three broad features that ground the representational purport of these concepts. We then argue that core normative concepts exhibit these same features.
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  • Co-filing and De Jure Co-referential Thought in the Mental Files Framework.Poong Shil Lee - 2019 - Erkenntnis 87 (1):309-345.
    In the mental files framework, mental files contain pieces of information. Then, how can we explain the fact that multiple pieces of information are stored in a single mental file? This fact can be called ‘co-filing’. Recanati recommends an account of co-filing as a way to avoid the circularity that can occur when one attempts to explain co-filing in terms of the fact that pieces of information are taken to be about the same object. I argue that his account is (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   1 citation  
  • Rip Van Winkle and the Retention of 'Today'-Belief: A Puzzle.Victor M. Verdejo - 2020 - Res Philosophica 97 (3):459-469.
    Can a subject who expresses a belief with ‘today’ on a given day, and subsequently loses track of time, retain and re-express that belief on a future, potentially distant day? Since Kaplan’s tentative remarks on Rip Van Winkle, it has become popular to answer this question in the positive. However, a remarkably simple variation of the Rip Van Winkle story can show that this kind of view leads to a puzzling dilemma: either subjects cannot re-express a belief with utterances of (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   1 citation  
  • The Real Guarantee in De Se thought: How to characterize it?Manuel García-Carpintero - forthcoming - Philosophical Quarterly.
    Castañeda, Perry and Lewis argued that, among singular thoughts in general, thoughts about oneself ‘as oneself’—first-personal thoughts, which Lewis aptly called de se—have a distinctive character that traditional views of contents cannot characterize. Drawing on Anscombe, Annalisa Coliva has argued that a feature she calls Real Guarantee marks apart de se thoughts—as opposed to others including Immunity to Error through Misidentification that have been proposed for that role. I'll argue that, while her work points to a truly distinguishing feature of (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark  
  • Mental Files. Triggering Mechanisms, Metadata and ‘Discernibility of Identicals’.Mieszko Tałasiewicz - 2017 - Studia Semiotyczne 31 (2):13-34.
    This paper initially follows the final part of the debate between singularism and descriptivism to the point of convergence, and discusses the notion of acquaintanceless singular thought. Then a sketch of a mental files model is presented. Firstly, the triggering mechanisms for opening files are discussed. Two kinds of discourse situations, acquaintance-situations and decoding-situations, are identified and different triggering mechanisms are postulated for each. Secondly, a bipartite structure of a file is introduced, combining an objectual part, encompassing what traditionally has (...)
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   1 citation  
  • Anchoring Utterances.Herbert H. Clark - 2021 - Topics in Cognitive Science 13 (2):329-350.
    Clark highlights a neglected issue in research on language use: the process by which speakers and addressees anchor utterances with respect to individual entities in their common ground. In his review, he identifies the challenges linked to investigations of anchoring, but also displays the pitfalls of evading it.
    Download  
     
    Export citation  
     
    Bookmark   4 citations