Title

Normativity Is The Mother Of Intention: Wittgenstein, Normative Practices And Neurological Representations

Keywords

Cognitive psychology; Intention; Neuroscience; Normativity; Representation

Abstract

To many philosophers, a scientific explanation of our contentful intentional states requires us to identify neurological representations that implement intentional states, and requires a reductive explanation of such representations' contents in terms of objective physical properties. From a Wittgensteinian point of view, however, contentful intentional states are normatively constituted within linguistic, social practices. These cannot be completely accounted for in purely physical terms. I outline this normative thesis, defending it from four objections: that it is not naturalistic, that social norms depend on optional desires to conform, that it over-intellectualizes having intentional states (so excludes animals and infants), and that it cannot account for the causal role of content. I explain the ramifications for scientific psychology and neuroscience, and for interpreting the results of such empirical research. Nothing is objectively a contentful representation, yet some brain states or processes can be normatively constituted as representations with content. © 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Publication Date

8-1-2009

Publication Title

New Ideas in Psychology

Volume

27

Issue

2

Number of Pages

133-147

Document Type

Article

Personal Identifier

scopus

DOI Link

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.newideapsych.2008.04.010

Socpus ID

61849123741 (Scopus)

Source API URL

https://api.elsevier.com/content/abstract/scopus_id/61849123741

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