Content is pragmatic: Comments on Nicholas Shea's Representation in cognitive science

Mind and Language 35 (3):368-376 (2020)
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Abstract

Nicholas Shea offers Varitel Semantics as a naturalistic account of mental content. I argue that the account secures determinate content only by appeal to pragmatic considerations, and so it fails to respect naturalism. But that is fine, because representational content is not, strictly speaking, necessary for explanation in cognitive science. Even in Shea’s own account, content serves only a variety of heuristic functions.

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