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The Natural Origins of Convention

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Abstract

Neo-pragmatists propose that content is determined by social convention (Haugeland in Philosophical Perspectives, 4: 383-427, 1990). A convention is a coordination problem in which each agent prefers any solution to none, yet has no preference amongst the alternative solutions. This paper argues that the best known theory of convention, David Lewis’ (1969), cannot yield a theory of content because it appeals to beliefs and other states that themselves have content. The question then arises whether a theory of convention that does not appeal to states with content can be developed. The idea that a radical enactivist approach to convention based on basic emotions is then tentatively proposed.

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Notes

  1. “Usually” because radical enactivist approaches to convention deny that decisions, understood to be the outcome of processes involving content, have a role in conventions. See below.

  2. Note that Dennett would strongly object to applying the “as-if” label to the states attributed from what he calls the “intentional stance”. See his Dennett 1991.

  3. Again Dennett (1991) would object: he doubts the value of the instrumentalist/realist distinction.

  4. For a critique of experiments linking disgust to negative moral evaluations see Case et al. 2012.

  5. There is some controversy about exactly which emotions are basic, and how many basic emotions there are. The list I have given is that originally proposed by Paul Ekman. See his (1999) for discussion.

  6. The phrase “set up to be set off” is Prinz’s. See his 2004, p.54.

  7. I am indebted to Lina Eriksson and Dan Hutto for very helpful discussion.

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Correspondence to Ian Ravenscroft.

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Ravenscroft, I. The Natural Origins of Convention. Philosophia 43, 731–739 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11406-015-9617-3

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