| Thought |
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| Crane (Tim) |
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| Source: Crane - Elements of Mind - An Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind, 2001, Chapter 4 |
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| Paper - Abstract |
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Sections
- Thoughts And Beliefs – 102
- Consciousness And Belief – 105
- Propositional Attitudes – 108
- The Propositional Attitude Thesis – 112
- De Re And De Dicto Attitudes – 114
- Internalism And Externalism – 117
- The Argument For Externalism – 121
- Demonstrative Thought – 126
- The Prospects For Explaining Thought – 128
Section Summaries
- Note1 – Thoughts and beliefs: The term 'thought' will be used for a kind of mental state or act, not for the content of such states or acts.
- Note2 – Consciousness and belief: Belief, properly so-called, is never conscious; belief is a mental state, not a mental act; what philosophers call 'conscious belief is really the event of becoming conscious of what one believes.
- Note3 – Propositional attitudes: Russell's term 'propositional attitude' picks out those intentional states whose intentional content is evaluable as true or false; the nature of propositional content discussed; Fregean and neo-Russellian accounts compared.
- Note4 – The propositional attitude thesis: The thesis that all intentional states are propositional attitudes introduced and rejected; the thesis is unmotivated and it has obvious counter-examples.
- Note5 – De re and de dicto attitudes: Thoughts and attitudes can be described in a 'de re' or relational style as well as in the more usual 'de dicto' style; the fact that there are such de re ascriptions does not imply that there is a category of de re thoughts or attitudes; the nature of intentional states can be separated from the conditions for their ascription.
- Note6 – Internalism and externalism: Externalists about intentionality believe that some intentional states or acts constitutively depend on the existence of their objects, while the strongest form of internalism denies this; it is argued that internalist intentionality is coherent, and that there is no prima facie intuitive case in favour of externalism.
- Note7 – The argument for externalism: Externalists employ the influential 'Twin Earth' argument in favour of their position; internalists may challenge this argument in two ways; the most plausible way is to deny the externalist's claim that content determines reference; no positive argument for internalism is provided, though.
- Note8 – Demonstrative thought: Demonstrative thoughts ('that F is G') have been claimed to be another source of externalist arguments; much of what externalists claim about demonstrative thought can be accepted by internalists.
- Note9 – The prospects for explaining thought: The prospects for a reductive account of thought or intentionality briefly considered.
Comment:
For a précis and analysis of the whole Book, see this Note10.
Write-up11 (as at 12/02/2015 16:48:00): Crane - Thoughts and Beliefs
This is a review of Section 31 of "Crane (Tim) - Thought", from "Crane (Tim) - Elements of Mind - An Introduction to the Philosophy of Mind". For the previous Section, (the last Section of Chapter 3 – "Crane (Tim) - Consciousness") see this Note12.
Crane’s Abstract The term 'thought' will be used for a kind of mental state or act, not for the content of such states or acts.
My Notes
- Crane firstly introduces some terminology by distinguishing between thoughts as acts (that is, thoughts proper) and thoughts as the intentional contents of such acts (that is, ideas).
- Crane notes that much recent philosophy has been interested in propositional attitudes: belief, desire, hope, etc. He rejects the Propositional Attitude Thesis that all intentional states are propositional attitudes, since neither all conscious states, nor all thoughts (ideas), are propositional attitudes.
- Not all thoughts involve the same intentional modes – wondering, imagining and considering are kinds or ways of thinking. Thinking is a determinable concept, of which wondering, imagining and considering are determinates. Crane draws an analogy with another determinable concept – being coloured. Being red is a way of being coloured, which requires being a particular colour and a particular shade, but these are not extras to being coloured.
- The second distinction is between thoughts and beliefs. While “I think that …” can be used as synonymous with “I believe that …”, this doesn’t mean that thoughts and beliefs are identical, since wondering, imagining or considering are not ways of believing. Thoughts and beliefs belong to different metaphysical categories since thoughts are mental acts (and therefore events) while beliefs are dispositions (and therefore states). Crane now defends an important but unorthodox thesis about belief – that there is no such thing as a conscious belief.
- To establish this thesis, Crane discusses belief, which is a state – a property instantiated by a believer. Beliefs aren’t events that happen or have temporal parts. It is the paradigmatic propositional attitude. Beliefs are of the form “belief that p”, where the proposition p is true or false. Beliefs are distinctive in that the attitude – the intentional mode – of belief entails a commitment to the truth of the proposition believed. Belief’s relation to truth – holding something to be true – is central to its concept.
- Belief is related to judgement and assertion. Not all beliefs are formed as a result of judgement – perception, unconscious inference and innateness are alternatives. Belief ←→ Judgement as Intention ←→ Decision. Assertion is the linguistic expression of belief.
- Moore’s paradox is the form “I believe that p, but not-p” (ie. the holding of false beliefs). This is not paradoxical in itself – we all hold beliefs that, unbeknownst to us, are false – but we’d never rationally make such a statement. Assertion is the expression of belief, so asserting that not-p is to express my believe that not-p, so it would be irrational simultaneously to assert not-p and my belief that p.
- This isn’t the case with the other attitudes. “I want that p, but not-p” isn’t irrational – indeed it would be irrational if p.
- What agents do depends on what they believe, want and intend. Rational agents take account of how they believe the world is. They avoid goals they are unlikely to achieve because the world is against them. Hence, an agent’s beliefs impact both what their goals are and which they try to achieve.
- Beliefs have actual and potential consequences – but don’t have any particular consequences, but only those given other states of mind, especially desires.
- The functionalist theory of mind claims that mental states are individuated by their causal roles – the distinctive pattern of their relations to other mental states and to actions. Crane’s ideas are similar to, but independent of, functionalism which:
- Typically gives a reductive definition of the mental, and
- Sees the mind as a causal mechanism.
That people act on beliefs and desires is independent of functionalism.
- It is obvious that not all your beliefs need be in your stream of consciousness in order to have actual or potential consequences, not even those that are currently guiding your action. Beliefs need not be conscious at all in order to guide action. So, is there a valid distinction between dispositional and occurrent beliefs? If so, since occurrences are events, the conscious (occurrent) beliefs would have to be acts or events, while the non-conscious ones (dispositional) would be mental states. Crane doesn’t doubt belief-states, but denies that there are conscious belief- events13.
The Note for the next Section is here14.
In-Page Footnotes
Footnote 11:
- This is the write-up as it was when this Abstract was last output, with text as at the timestamp indicated (12/02/2015 16:48:00).
- Link to Latest Write-Up Note.
Footnote 13: What about coming to believe, or forming a belief?
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