Online research in philosophy

1. In the course of his philosophical development, Jerry Fodor has indicated two sorts of non-broad (i.e., non-truthconditional) content of mental representations, namely content of mental state types opaquely taxonomized (de dicto content: DDC) and narrow content (NC) qua mapping function from contexts (of thought) to broad contents. According to the former conceptualization, mental state tokens which are truth-conditionally identical may be such that they cannot both truthfully ascribed to one and the same subject at the same time, for they differ in their respective DDC. In Fodor's own example, Oedipus' thoughts that he will marry Jocasta and that he will marry Mum are truth-conditionally identical, but different as far their DDC is concerned; one cannot indeed truthfully ascribe both thoughts to him simultaneously1. According to the latter conceptualization instead, mental state tokens of molecularly identical twins placed in different environments (such as Earth and Twin-Earth) are such that, although they differ in their truth-conditions, they share the same NC2. For instance, these twins respectively think that water quenches thirst and that twater (a liquid similar to water but its chemical composition) quenches thirst. Although these thoughts thus differ in broad content, they have the same NC: had the Twin-Earthling twin been brought up on Earth rather than on Twin-Earth where he actually lives, he would have thought that water quenches thirst rather than that twater quenches thirst3. According to Fodor's picture, both concepts are invoked for the purpose of psychology in order to account for one and the same thing, namely subjects' behavior. On the one hand, difference in behavior of a subject whose thought-tokens have the same truth-conditions may be ascribed to difference in the DDC of these tokens4. On the other hand, identity in behavior between two molecularly identical subjects whose thought-tokens have different truth-conditions is explained in terms of the NC- identity of these tokens5..

In his latest book, The Elm and the Expert (1994), Fodor notoriously rejects the notion of narrow content as superfluous. He envisions a scientific intentional psychology that adverts only to broad content properties in its explanations. I argue that Fodor's change in view is only apparent and that his previous position (1985-1991) is extensionally equivalent to his "new" position (1994). I show that, despite what he says narrow content is for in his (1994), Fodor himself has previously never appealed to the notion of narrow content in explaining Frege cases and cases involving the so-called deferential concepts. And for good reason: his notion of narrow content (1985-91) couldn't explain them. The only apparent change concerns his treatment of Twin Earth cases. However, I argue that the notion of broad content that his purely informational semantics delivers is, in some interesting sense, equivalent to the mapping notion of narrow content he officially gave up. For his pure informational semantics fails to avoid assigning disjunctive content to twins, since nomic covariations take care not only actual but also counterfactual contexts into account. I show that none of the attempts made by Fodor to block this consequence of his theory works. The present notion of broad content he now operates with is therefore in a position to take over all the important jobs that his previous notion of narrow content could do.

A major obstacle to formulating a broad-content intentional psychology is the occurrence of ''Frege cases'' - cases in which a person apparently believes or desires Fa but not Fb and acts accordingly, even though "a" and "b" have the same broad content. Frege cases seem to demand narrow-content distinctions to explain actions by the contents of beliefs and desires. Jerry Fodor ( The elm and the expert: Mentalese and its semantics , Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1994) argues that an explanatorily adequate broad-content psychology is nonetheless possible because Frege cases rarely occur in intentional-explanatory contexts, and they are not systematically linked to intentional laws in a way that demands intentional explanation. Thus, he claims, behaviors associated with Frege cases can be considered ceteris-paribus exceptions to broad-content intentional laws without significantly decreasing the explanatory power of intentional psychology. I argue that Frege cases are plentiful and systematically linked to intentional laws in a way that requires intentional explanation, specifically in the explanation of why certain actions are not performed. Consequently, Frege-case behaviors cannot be construed as ceteris-paribus exceptions to intentional laws without significantly eroding the explanatory power of intentional psychology and reducing the rationality of the agent. Fodor thus fails to save broad-content psychology from the prima facie objections against it based on Frege cases.

Jerry Fodor now holds (1990) that the content of mental state types opaquely taxonomized (de dicto content: DDC) is determined by the 'orthographical' syntax + the computational/functional role of such states. Mental states whose tokens are both orthographically and truth-conditionally identical may be different with regard to the computational/functional role played by their respective representational cores. This make them tantamount to different contentful states, i.e. states with different DDCs, insofar as they are opaquely taxonomized. Indeed they cannot both be truthfully ascribed to a single subject at the same time. Some years ago (1987), Fodor postulated a notion of mental content which also went beyond that of a mental state's truth-conditions. States whose tokens differ in their truth-conditions, or broad content, might, he claimed, still share a narrow content (NC), which was causally responsible for the shared behavior of the subjects of these states. For instance, two molecularly identical individuals, living in environments in all respects the same, except for the chemical substance of the phenomenically indistinguishable liquids filling their respective lakes and rivers, would behave similarly when having truth-conditionally different thoughts regarding those liquids. According to Fodor, this sameness of behavior was causally dependent on the sameness of the NC of the two individuals' truth-conditionally different thoughts. Now, this way of individuating mental states is still of interest for semantics. Indeed, NC allows one contextually to fix the broad content of a mental state token. Echoing Kaplan's notion of character,1 Fodor explained NC as a function that mapped contexts (of thought) onto broad contents. NC was thus invoked by Fodor mainly in order to account for sameness of intentional behavior. But DDC also plays a role in explaining intentional behavior, precisely by explaining why a subject whose thought-tokens have identical truthconditions may behave differently..

Jerry Fodor argues for individualism and for narrow content by way of rejecting an argument based on the conceptual connections between reason-properties and action-properties. In this paper I show that Fodor’s argument fails. He is right that there is a New Logical Connections Argument to be made, and that it does show that water thoughts and XYZ thoughts are not different causal powers with respect to intentional properties of behaviors. However, the New Logical Connections Argument also shows that they are not causal powers at all with respect to intentional properties ofbehaviors, and so Fodor’s argument to individualism and narrow content is unsound. Along the way I show that Fodor’s version of the New Logical Connections argument has serious problems of overkill.

If psychology requires a taxonomy that categorizes mental states according to their causal powers, the common sense method of individuating mental states (a taxonomy by intentional content) is unacceptable because mental states can have different intentional content, but identical causal powers. This difference threatens both the vindication of belief/desire psychology and the viability of scientific theories whose posits include intentional states. To resolve this conflict, Fodor has proposed that for scientific purposes mental states should be classified by their narrow content. Such a classification is supposed to correspond to a classification by causal powers. Yet a state's narrow content is also supposed to determine its (broad) intentional content whenever that state is 'anchored' to a context. I examine the two most plausible accounts of narrow content implicit in Fodor's work, arguing that neither account can accomplish both goals.

In 'Fodor's Modal Argument' I claim that Fodor's latest defence of narrow content does not work. I claim that Fodor's modal argument is an unsuccessful resurrection of the Logical Connection Argument. Russow claims that my arguments fail because I confuse cause properties with causal powers, focus on events rather than properties, and overlook the fact that Fodor is trying only to explain narrow behavior. In this paper, I plead 'not guilty' to all of Fodor's charges. Narrow content still does not exist.