Abstract
Beginning with Turing himself, many researchers have suggested that mental processes are Turing-style computations. Proponents typically develop this picture in conjunction with the formal-syntactic conception of computation (FSC), which holds that computation manipulates formal syntactic item s without regard to their representational or semantic properties. I explore an alternative semantically permeated approach, on which many core mental computations are composed from inherently representational elements. The mental symbols over which the computations operate, and hence the computations themselves, have natures inextricably tied to their representational import. We cannot factor out this representational import to generate an explanatorily significant formal syntactic remainder. I argue that the Turing formalism provides no support for FSC over the semantically permeated alternative. I then critique various popular arguments for FSC.
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Notes
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In addressing this question, I restrict attention to the Turing machine and kindred computational formalisms. I do not consider computation by neural networks, because I am concerned solely with classical versions of the doctrine that the mind is a computing system. For purposes of this paper, “computation” means “Turing-style computation.” See (Gallistel and King 2009) for a recent, detailed case that Turing-style models of the mind offer important advantages over neural network models.
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For representative modern treatments of the Russellian, possible worlds, and Fregean approaches, see (Salmon 1986), (Stalnaker 1984), and (Peacocke 1992) respectively. In (Rescorla 2012b), I develop a broadly Fregean version of semantically permeated CTM + RTM. Schneider (2011, p. 100) rejects a semantically permeated individuative scheme for Mentalese, partly because she thinks that such a scheme cannot handle Frege cases, i.e. cases where a thinker represents the same entity under different modes of presentation. Schneider mistakenly assumes that a semantically permeated scheme must type-identify mental symbols in Russellian fashion. She does not even consider an alternative Fregean approach that type-identifies mental symbols by citing externalistically individuated modes of presentation.
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Subtle issues arise concerning the “compounding devices” that generate complex Mentalese expressions. To ensure that complex Mentalese expressions are semantically permeated, we must isolate compounding devices with fixed compositional import. For preliminary discussion, see (Rescorla 2012b). This paper focuses on issues raised by the individuation of primitive Mentalese words.
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Around the mid-1990s, Fodor abandons narrow content. A constant element in his position is his emphasis upon formal syntactic types that underdetermine representational import. Aydede (2005) proposes that we type-identify Mentalese symbols partly by what he calls their “semantic properties.” However, he seems reluctant to develop this proposal in an externalist direction (p. 203, fn. 26). He instead inclines towards permeation by some kind of narrow content. Ultimately, then, Aydede’s proposal seems closer to Fodor’s (1981) view than to my view.
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For example, one might postulate a Mentalese demonstrative THAT that can only denote some demonstrated entity but whose particular denotation depends upon context. More specifically, one might propose that THAT does not have its denotation essentially but does have something like its character in the sense of (Kaplan 1989) essentially. This proposal individuates THAT partly by context-insensitive aspects of its representational import but not by context-sensitive aspects. Does the proposal classify THAT as semantically permeated? To answer the question, one requires a more precise definition of “semantic permeation” than I have provided.
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In (Rescorla 2012b), I offer a similar diagnosis for other mathematical models of computation, including the register machine and the lambda calculus. In each case, I argue that the relevant computational formalism is hospitable to semantically permeated individuation.
- 9.
For example, Gallistel and King (2009) mount a compelling case that dead reckoning manipulates symbols inscribed in read/write memory. (Rescorla 2013b) suggests that current science describes certain cases of invertebrate dead reckoning in non-representational terms. So these may be cases where formal-syntactic computational description is more apt than semantically permeated computational description.
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Chalmers (2011) combines his analysis with a systematic theory of the physical realization relation between physical systems and abstract computational models. The theory leaves no room for physical realization of semantically permeated models. In (Rescorla 2013a), I criticize Chalmers on this score by citing specific examples drawn from CS. In (Rescorla 2014b), I propose an alternative theory of the physical realization relation. My alternative theory applies equally well to semantically indeterminate computational models and semantically permeated computational models.
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Acknowledgments
I am indebted to audiences at UCLA, Columbia University, and the Southern Society for Philosophy and Psychology for comments when I presented earlier versions of this material. I also thank José Luis Bermúdez, Tyler Burge, Peter Carruthers, Frances Egan, Kevin Falvey, Juliet Floyd, Christopher Gauker, Mark Greenberg, Christopher Peacocke, Gualtiero Piccinini, and Daniel Weiskopf for helpful feedback.
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Rescorla, M. (2017). From Ockham to Turing – and Back Again. In: Floyd, J., Bokulich, A. (eds) Philosophical Explorations of the Legacy of Alan Turing. Boston Studies in the Philosophy and History of Science, vol 324. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-53280-6_12
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