Externalism before language: The real reason why “thoughts ain't in the head”

Abstract

It is argued that standard arguments for the Externalism of mental states do not succeed in the case of pre-linguistic mental states. Further, it is noted that standard arguments for Internalism appeal to the principle that our individuation of mental states should be driven by what states are explanatory in our best cognitive science. This principle is used against the Internalist to reject the necessity of narrow individuation of mental states, even in the prelinguistic case. This is done by showing how the explanation of some phenomena requires quantification over broadly-individuated, world-involving states; sometimes externalism is required. Although these illustrative phenomena are not mental, they are enough to show the general argumentative strategy to be incorrect: scientific explanation does not require narrowly-individuated states.

Links

PhilArchive



    Upload a copy of this work     Papers currently archived: 90,221

External links

  • This entry has no external links. Add one.
Setup an account with your affiliations in order to access resources via your University's proxy server

Through your library

  • Only published works are available at libraries.

Similar books and articles

Davidson on first‐person authority and externalism.Sven Bernecker - 1996 - Inquiry: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Philosophy 39 (1):121-139.
Externalism and Authoritative Self-Knowledge.Cynthia Macdonald - 1998 - In Crispin Wright, Barry C. Smith & Cynthia Macdonald (eds.), Knowing Our Own Minds. Oxford University Press. pp. 123-155.
Externalism and Token‐Identity.A. C. Genova - 2010 - Southern Journal of Philosophy 45 (2):223-249.
Externalism, internalism, and knowledge of content.Keith Butler - 1997 - Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 57 (4):773-800.
Externalism about mental content.Joe Lau - 2008 - Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
Problemas del empirismo en la filosofía de la mente.Jose S. Pescador Hierro - 1997 - Teorema: International Journal of Philosophy 16 (2):35-49.

Analytics

Added to PP
2010-12-22

Downloads
19 (#679,913)

6 months
1 (#1,028,709)

Historical graph of downloads
How can I increase my downloads?

Author's Profile

Ron Chrisley
University of Sussex

Citations of this work

No citations found.

Add more citations

References found in this work

No references found.

Add more references