Thoughts and oughts

    Authors

    M. Cash

    Comments

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    Abbreviated Journal Title

    Philos. Explor.

    Keywords

    normativity; mental content; meaning; naturalism; intersubjectivity; objectivity; rationality; mental causation; EVOLUTION; MIND; LANGUAGE; Philosophy

    Abstract

    Many now accept the thesis that norms are somehow constitutively involved in people's contentful intentional states. I distinguish three versions of this normative thesis that disagree about the type of norms constitutively involved. Are they objective norms of correctness, subjective norms of rationality, or intersubjective norms of social practices? I show the advantages of the third version, arguing that it improves upon the other two versions, as well as incorporating their principal insights. I then defend it against two serious challenges: (1) If content is constituted by others' normative judgments, how can content be causally efficacious? (2) This account appears to make having contentful thoughts a matter of people having contentful thoughts about your thoughts. That appears to be viciously circular and so can't be naturalistic.

    Journal Title

    Philosophical Explorations

    Volume

    11

    Issue/Number

    2

    Publication Date

    1-1-2008

    Document Type

    Article

    Language

    English

    First Page

    93

    Last Page

    119

    WOS Identifier

    WOS:000263140100002

    ISSN

    1386-9795

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