At least since Locke, philosophers and psychologists have usually held that concepts arise out of sensory perceptions, thoughts are built from concepts, and language enables speakers to convey their thoughts to hearers. Christopher Gauker holds that this tradition is mistaken about both concepts and language. The mind cannot abstract the building blocks of thoughts from perceptual representations. More generally, we have no account of the origin of concepts that grants them the requisite independence from language. Gauker's alternative is to show (...) that much of cognition consists in thinking by means of mental imagery, without the help of concepts, and that language is a tool by which interlocutors coordinate their actions in pursuit of shared goals. Imagistic cognition supports the acquisition and use of this tool, and when the use of this tool is internalized, it becomes the very medium of conceptual thought. (shrink)

The goal of perceptual systems is to allow organisms to adaptively respond to ecologically relevant stimuli. Because all perceptual inputs are ambiguous, perception needs to rely on prior knowledge accumulated over evolutionary and developmental time to turn sensory energy into information useful for guiding behavior. It remains controversial whether the guidance of perception extends to cognitive states or is locked up in a “cognitively impenetrable” part of perception. I argue that expectations, knowledge, and task demands can shape perception at multiple (...) levels, leaving no part untouched. The position advocated here is broadly consistent with the notion that perceptual systems strive to minimize prediction error en route to globally optimal solutions :181–204, 2013). On this view, penetrability should be expected whenever constraining lower-level processes by higher level knowledge is minimizes global prediction error. Just as Fodor feared cognitive penetration of perception threatens theory-neutral observation and the distinction between observation and inference. However, because theories themselves are constrained by the task of minimizing prediction error, theory-laden observation turns out to be superior to theory-free observation in turning sensory energy into useful information. (shrink)

Reliable misrepresentation is getting things wrong in the same way all the time. In Mendelovici 2013, I argue that tracking theories of mental representation cannot allow for certain kinds of reliable misrepresentation, and that this is a problem for those views. Artiga 2013 defends teleosemantics from this argument. He agrees with Mendelovici 2013 that teleosemantics cannot account for clean cases of reliable misrepresentation, but argues that this is not a problem for the views. This paper clarifies and improves the argument (...) in Mendelovici 2013 and response to Artiga's arguments. Tracking theories, teleosemantics included, really do need to allow for clean cases of reliable misrepresentation. (shrink)

It is a live possibility that certain of our experiences reliably misrepresent the world around us. I argue that tracking theories of mental representation have difficulty allowing for this possibility, and that this is a major consideration against them.

Perceptions "present" objects as red, as round, etc.-- in general as possessing some property. This is the "perceptual content" of the title, And the article attempts to answer the following question: what is a materialistically adequate basis for assigning content to what are, after all, neurophysiological states of biological organisms? The thesis is that a state is a perception that presents its object as "F" if the "biological function" of the state is to detect the presence of objects that are (...) "F". The theory contrasts with causal/informational theories, and with internalist theories, for example those which assign content on the basis of introspected feel. Its advantages are that it permits perceptual error while at the same time allowing content to be expressed in terms of external properties. The argument of the paper is illustrated throughout by examples from biology and computational psychology. (shrink)

This paper examines the relationship between a family of concepts involving reliable correlation, and a family of concepts involving adaptation and biological function, as these concepts are used in the naturalistic semantic theory of Dretske's "Explaining Behavior." I argue that Dretske's attempt to marry correlation and function to produce representation fails, though aspects of his failure point the way forward to a better theory.

In the opening section of this paper we spell out an account of our na ve view of bodily sensations that is of historical and philosophical significance. This account of our shared view of bodily sensations captures common ground between Descartes, who endorses an error theory regarding our everyday thinking about bodily sensations, and Berkeley, who is more sympathetic with common sense. In the second part of the paper we develop an alternative to this account and discuss what is at (...) stake in deciding between these two ways of understanding our everyday view. In the third and final part of the paper we offer an argument in favour of our alternative. (shrink)

The dominant view among philosophers of perception is that color experiences, like color judgments, are essentially representational: as part of their very nature color experiences possess representational contents which are either accurate or inaccurate. My starting point in assessing this view is Sydney Shoemaker’s familiar account of color perception. After providing a sympathetic reconstruction of his account, I show how plausible assumptions at the heart of Shoemaker’s theory make trouble for his claim that color experiences represent the colors of things. (...) I consider various ways of trying to avoid the objection, and find all of the responses wanting. My conclusion is that we have reason to be skeptical of the orthodox view that color experiences are constitutively representational. (shrink)

In this lucid portrayal of human behavior, Fred Dretske provides an original account of the way reasons function in the causal explanation of behavior.

Mendelovici (forthcoming) has recently argued that (1) tracking theories of mental representation (including teleosemantics) are incompatible with the possibility of reliable misrepresentation and that (2) this is an important difficulty for them. Furthermore, she argues that this problem commits teleosemantics to an unjustified a priori rejection of color eliminativism. In this paper I argue that (1) teleosemantics can accommodate most cases of reliable misrepresentation, (2) those cases the theory fails to account for are not objectionable and (3) teleosemantics is not (...) committed to any problematic view on the color realism-antirealism debate. (shrink)

What colour does a white wall look in the pinkish light of the late afternoon? Philosophers disagree: they hold variously that it looks pink, white, both, and no colour at all. A new approach is offered. After reviewing the dispute, a reinterpretation of perceptual constancy is offered. In accordance with this reinterpretation, it is argued that perceptual features such as color must always be predicated of perceptual objects. Thus, it might be that in pinkish light, the wall looks white and (...) the light looks pink. The paper concludes by discussing some criteria for object identification in perceptual states. (shrink)

The objective of this dissertation is to examine Millikan's teleosemantics as an attempt to explain intentionality in a naturalistically way. Naturalistic semantics in general tries to explicate intentionality as a physical or 'natural' relation between mental representations, understood as physical structures, to things in the world. The essence of the problem, from a naturalistic perspective, is to explain how meaning arises out of purely physical structures. The main difficulties for naturalists are grouped into two problems, which I will label the (...) 'normative problem' and the 'descriptive problem' respectively. The normative problem is to explain what constitutes semantic normativity. The descriptive problem is to explain how mental representation acquire their particular semantic contents. ;Millikan answers the normative problem by reducing semantic norms to biological norms. In order to exhibit some strengths of Millikan's approach, I contrast two main competing theories about the notion of function , the etiological theory of function vs. Cumminsian functional analysis. I argue that the etiological theory of function gives us a more promising perspective for answering the normative problem. ;The etiological approach to functions leads us to a counter-intuitive conclusion that a 'swampman' that suddenly arises in a swamp by improbable coincidence but otherwise a perfect physical duplicate of a normal person, doesn't have any intentional states. I argue that, if we assume that 'intentional states' are normative, the teleosemantic conclusion about the swampman can be defended as an inference to the best explanation of this normative character. ;For the descriptive problem, Millikan suggests a consumer-based teleosemantics. According to Millikan, the content of a representation is identified with the Normal condition which should be presupposed for the consumer device of that representation to perform its proper function in accordance with the most proximate Normal explanation. In a nutshell, fixation of content is reduced to the matter of giving a univocal Normal explanation of the consumer's proper function. I consider two main criticisms against this approach. The first problem raises questions about the privileged status of consumer-level explanations in fixing representational content over other levels of Normal explanation all of which are evolutionarily and causally adequate. I will argue that teleosemanticists can live with this criticism. The second problem concerns the role of counterfactuals in teleosemantics for answering Fodor's disjunction problem. To answer some disjunction cases that critics have come up with, Millikan should invoke some sort of counterfactual analysis of causal relevance. But, it is very doubtful that such a counterfactual analysis is readily available to Millikan, given her resolute commitment to historical approach to functions. This is where I think that Millikan's theory encounters its most serious problems. ;My tentative conclusion is that, whereas Millikan's theory provides a very fruitful perspective for understanding the normative character of intentional content, it fails to give a satisfactory answer to the descriptive problem. (shrink)