Computation, Representation, and Content in Noncognitive Theories of Perception

Abstract

Recent discussions in the philosophy of psychology have examined the use and legitimacy of such notions as ‘representation’, ‘content’, ‘computation’, and ‘inference’ within a scientific psychology. While the resulting assessments have varied widely, ranging from outright rejection of some or all of these notions to full vindication of their use, there has been notable agreement on the considerations deemed relevant for making an assessment. The answer to the question of whether the notion of, say, representational content may be admitted into a scientific psychology has often been made to hinge upon whether the notion can be squared with our ‘ordinary’ or ‘folk’ style of psychological explanation, with its alleged commitment to the idiom of beliefs and desires.¹ The emphasis on ‘folk psychology’ in arguments concerning the status of various concepts within scientific psychology is unfortunate, because it runs afoul of the ideal that the philosophy of psychology, by analogy with the philosophy of biology and the philosophy of physics, should have at its core the discussion of ongoing psychological theories.² For while it may be admitted that the status of appeals to ‘folk psychology’ in order to justify a role for the belief-desire idiom within psychology proper is a matter that is of interest in its own right, it is not at all clear that mainstream experimental psychology has adopted either the language or the conceptions of ‘belief-desire’ psychology.

This paper is a shortened version of ‘Representation and Content in Some (Actual) Theories of Perception,’ Studies in History and Philosophy of Science, in press. An earlier version was presented to the Society for Philosophy and Psychology in Chicago, with Zenon Pylyshyn commenting, and was discussed in Daniel Dennett’s philosophy of psychology seminar at Tufts (April, 1981). A revised version was presented to the Second International Congress on Event Perception (Vanderbilt, 1983), and served as the basis for my contribution (1984), with Stephen Kosslyn. More recent versions have been presented at the University of Pennsylvania, the University of Maryland, and Duke. I am grateful for helpful remarks and criticisms on these occasions, and also for the comments of numerous individual colleagues, among whom I must especially thank Peter Achinstein, Wilda Anderson, Rose Ann Christian, Norbert Hornstein, Patricia Kitcher, and Ed Reed.