In this paper, I present a version of a sense-data approach to perception, which differs to a certain extent from well-known versions like the one put forward by Jackson. I compare the sense-data view to the currently most popular alternative theories of perception, the so-called Theory of Appearing (a very specific form of disjunctivist approaches) on the one hand and reductive representationalist approaches on the other. I defend the sense-data approach on the basis that it improves substantially on those alternative (...) theories. (shrink)

Intention is one of the masterworks of twentieth-century philosophy in English. First published in 1957, it has acquired the status of a modern philosophical classic. The book attempts to show in detail that the natural and widely accepted picture of what we mean by an intention gives rise to insoluble problems and must be abandoned. This is a welcome reprint of a book that continues to grow in importance.

In Mind and World, John McDowell argues against the view that perceptual representation is non-conceptual. The central worry is that this view cannot offer any reasonable account of how perception bears rationally upon belief. I argue that this worry, though sensible, can be met, if we are clear that perceptual representation is, though non-conceptual, still in some sense 'assertoric': Perception, like belief, represents things as being thus and so.

Consider the skeptic about the external world. Let’s straightaway concede to such a skeptic that perception gives us no conclusive or certain knowledge about our surroundings. Our perceptual justification for beliefs about our surroundings is always defeasible—there are always possible improvements in our epistemic state which would no longer support those beliefs. Let’s also concede to the skeptic that it’s metaphysically possible for us to have all the experiences we’re now having while all those experiences are false. Some philosophers dispute (...) this, but I do not. The skeptic I want to consider goes beyond these familiar points to the much more radical conclusion that our perceptual experiences can’t give us any knowledge or even justification for believing that our surroundings are one way rather than another. (shrink)

This article surveys work in epistemology since the mid-1980s. It focuses on contextualism about knowledge attributions, modest forms of foundationalism, and the internalism/externalism debate and its connections to the ethics of belief.

The Realm of Reason develops a new, general theory of what it is for a thinker to be entitled to form a given belief. The theory locates entitlement in the nexus of relations between truth, content, and understanding. Peacocke formulates three principles of rationalism that articulate this conception. The principles imply that all entitlement has a component that is justificationally independent of experience. The resulting position is thus a form of rationalism, generalized to all kinds of content. To show how (...) these principles are realized in specific domains, Peacocke applies the theory in detail to several classical problems of philosophy, including the nature of perceptual entitlement, induction, and the status of moral thought. These discussions involve an elaboration of the structure of entitlement in ways that have applications in many other areas of philosophy. He also relates the theory to classical and recent rationalist thought, and to current issues in the theory of meaning, reference and explanation. In the course of these discussions, he proposes a general theory of the a priori. The focus of the work lies in the intersection of epistemology, metaphysics, and the theory of meaning, and will be of interest both to students and researchers in these areas, and to anyone concerned with the idea of rationality. (shrink)

This is a review of Christopher Peacocke's book The Realm of Reason (Oxford University Press, 2004).

This paper has five theses, which are intended to address the claims in Jerry Fodor's paper. (1) The question arises of the relation between the philosophical theory of concepts and epistemology. Neither is explanatorily prior to the other. Rather, each relies implicitly on distinctions drawn from the other. To explain what makes something knowledge, we need distinctions drawn from the theory of concepts. To explain the attitudes mentioned in a theory of concepts, we need to use the notion of knowledge. (...) (2) Concepts can have a normative dimension without their nature being interpretation‐dependent, and without their nature being mind‐dependent. The normative dimension traces back instead to the role of truth as a constitutive aim of judgement. (3) Conceptual combination is to be explained at the level of reference and semantic value. When we respect this fact, there is no difficulty in explaining compositionality for epistemically‐constrained concepts. (4) Epistemically‐constrained theories of concepts are committed to the applicability of the notion of the a priori. They are not committed to the applicability of the notion of analyticity, where this is construed as truth purely in virtue of meaning or the identity of concepts. (5) Possession of a concept has causal‐explanatory powers, whether given by a possession condition in the form presented in A Study of Concepts, or by possession of an implicit conception. A possession‐condition theory of concepts need not be a form of dispositionalism. (shrink)

: I present an argument for the existence of nonconceptual representational content. The argument is compatible with McDowell's defence of conceptualism against those arguments for nonconceptual content that draw upon claims about the fine‐grainedness of experience. I present a case for nonconceptual content that concentrates on the idea that experience can possess representational content that cannot perform the function of conceptual content, namely figure in the subject's reasons for belief and action. This sort of argument for nonconceptual content is best (...) achieved with examples from auditory perception, especially our perception of music. (shrink)

I present an argument for the existence of nonconceptual representational content. The argument is compatible with McDowell's defence of conceptualism against those arguments for nonconceptual content that draw upon claims about the fine‐grainedness of experience. I present a case for nonconceptual content that concentrates on the idea that experience can possess representational content that cannot perform the function of conceptual content, namely figure in the subject's reasons for belief and action. This sort of argument for nonconceptual content is best achieved (...) with examples from auditory perception, especially our perception of music. (shrink)

Reichenbachian approaches to indexicality contend that indexicals are "token-reflexives": semantic rules associated with any given indexical-type determine the truth-conditional import of properly produced tokens of that type relative to certain relational properties of those tokens. Such a view may be understood as sharing the main tenets of Kaplan's well-known theory regarding content, or truth-conditions, but differs from it regarding the nature of the linguistic meaning of indexicals and also regarding the bearers of truth-conditional import and truth-conditions. Kaplan has criticized these (...) approaches on different counts, the most damaging of which is that they make impossible a "logic of demonstratives". The reason for this is that the token-reflexive approach entails that not two tokens of the same sentential type including indexicals are guaranteed to have the same truth-conditions. In this paper I rebut this and other criticisms of the Reichenbachian approach. Additionally, I point out that Kaplan's original theory of "true demonstratives" is empirically inadequate, and claim that any modification capable of accurately handling the linguistic data would have similar problems to those attributed to the Reichenbachian approach. This is intended to show that the difficulties, no matter how real, are not caused by idiosincracies of the "token-reflexive" view, but by deep facts about indexicality. (shrink)

This highly acclaimed book is a major contribution to the philosophy of language as well as a systematic interpretation of Frege, indisputably the father of ...

In the course of his discussion of perception, Searle criticizes representative theories in general. In this paper I will argue that, even though his criticisms may be adequate regarding a certain form of these theories, perhaps the most frequently defended by philosophers of perception, a version I will outline here scapes to them. A second issue I raise concerns Searle’s claim that his theory of perception is a form of direct realism. I will raise difficulties for Searle’s attempt to maintain (...) at the same time a “token-reflexive” theory of perception and the thesis of direct realism. (shrink)