Abstract

This dissertation is concerned with theories of mental content, and in particular with the relationships between a theory of content and truth and rationality. My strategy is to examine the metaphysics of various approaches to content and ask certain questions. What is it for a belief to be true on a particular theory? What is it for a thought process to be rational? Are truth and rationality useful explanatory properties on each theory? Are they useful normative or action-guiding properties? Does a theory allow truth and rationality to be valuable? ;I argue that there is a useful categorization of theories of mental content in terms of the kinds of connection they make between content and truth and rationality. Some theories, most notably Donald Davidson's and other theories inspired by his work, make it a constitutive truth, and thus necessary, that any entity that has intentional states must believe mostly truths and be largely rational. This holistic theories can be contrasted with other atomistic approaches, including those championed by Jerry Fodor and others, that deny such necessary connections, and leave the question of just how much truth and falsehood can be believed, and how rational or irrational a believer can be, to be settled by empirical investigation. ;The various chapters of this dissertation examine these different types of theories, and also the teleological theory of Ruth Millikan. I argue that atomistic theories of content have certain undesirable consequences: truth and rationality will no longer be explanatorily or normatively useful properties. On the other hand, holistic theories of content that make truth and rationality necessary features of systems with intentional states face different problems, because the norms they claim are constitutive of content are unlikely to be true of evolved creatures. Teleological theories, which presume a weak, historical connection between content and truth and rationality, fare best against these tests--they make truth and rationality important parts of explanations, and provide some motivation for pursuing them