The Phenomenal Basis of Intentionality

New York, USA: Oxford University Press (2018)
  Copy   BIBTEX

Abstract

Some mental states seem to be "of" or "about" things, or to "say" something. For example, a thought might represent that grass is green, and a visual experience might represent a blue cup. This is intentionality. The aim of this book is to explain this phenomenon. Once we understand intentionality as a phenomenon to be explained, rather than a posit in a theory explaining something else, we can see that there are glaring empirical and in principle difficulties with currently popular tracking and functional role theories of intentionality, which aim to account for intentionality in terms of tracking relations and functional roles. This book develops an alternative theory, the phenomenal intentionality theory (PIT), on which the source of intentionality is none other than phenomenal consciousness, the subjective, felt, or qualitative aspect of mental life. While PIT avoids the problems that plague tracking and functional role theories, it faces its own challenges in accounting for the rich and complex contents of thoughts and the contents of nonconscious states. In responding to these challenges, this book proposes a novel version of PIT, on which all intentionality is phenomenal intentionality, though we in some sense represent many non-phenomenal contents by ascribing them to ourselves. This book further argues that phenomenal consciousness is an intrinsic feature of mental life, resulting in a view that is radically internalistic in spirit: Our phenomenally represented contents are literally in our heads, and any non-phenomenal contents we in some sense represent are expressly targeted by us.

Links

PhilArchive



    Upload a copy of this work     Papers currently archived: 90,593

External links

Setup an account with your affiliations in order to access resources via your University's proxy server

Through your library

Similar books and articles

Phenomenal Intentionality.David Bourget & Angela Mendelovici - 2016 - The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
Consciousness and Intentionality.Angela Mendelovici & David Bourget - 2020 - In Uriah Kriegel (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of the Philosophy of Consciousness. New York, USA: Oxford University Press. pp. 560-585.
The Role of Valence in Intentionality.David Leech Anderson - 2017 - Mind and Matter 15 (1):71-90.
The fiction of phenomenal intentionality.Nicholas Georgalis - 2003 - Consciousness and Emotion 4 (2):243-256.
Why phenomenal content is not intentional.Howard Robinson - 2009 - European Journal of Analytic Philosophy 5 (2):79-93.
Phenomenal Intentionality.Uriah Kriegel (ed.) - 2013 - , US: Oxford University Press.
Intentionality and Normativity.Uriah Kriegel - 2010 - Philosophical Issues 20 (1):185-208.
Motivation and Horizon: Phenomenal Intentionality in Husserl.Philip J. Walsh - 2017 - Grazer Philosophische Studien 94 (3):410-435.
Phenomenal Intentionality and the Problem of Representation.Walter Ott - 2016 - Journal of the American Philosophical Association 2 (1):131--145.
Phenomenal intentionality past and present: introductory.Uriah Kriegel - 2013 - Phenomenology and the Cognitive Sciences 12 (3):437-444.

Analytics

Added to PP
2018-01-13

Downloads
335 (#54,962)

6 months
28 (#94,377)

Historical graph of downloads
How can I increase my downloads?

Author's Profile

Angela Mendelovici
University of Western Ontario

Citations of this work

Inferentialism, Australian style.David J. Chalmers - 2021 - Proceedings and Addresses of the American Philosophical Association 92.
Why Mary Left Her Room.Michaela M. McSweeney - forthcoming - Philosophy and Phenomenological Research.
Mental Representation.David Pitt - 2020 - Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
Consciousness and Intentionality.Angela Mendelovici & David Bourget - 2020 - In Uriah Kriegel (ed.), The Oxford Handbook of the Philosophy of Consciousness. New York, USA: Oxford University Press. pp. 560-585.

View all 72 citations / Add more citations

References found in this work

Introspecting phenomenal states.Brie Gertler - 2001 - Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 63 (2):305-28.

Add more references