Abstract
The focus of this paper is introspection of phenomenal states, i.e. the distinctively first-personal method through which one can form beliefs about the phenomenology of one’s current conscious mental states. I argue that two different kinds of phenomenal state introspection should be distinguished: one which involves recognizing and classifying the introspected phenomenal state as an instance of a certain experience type, and another which does not involve such classification. Whereas the former is potentially judgment-like, the latter is not. I call them, respectively, reflective introspection and primitive introspection. The purpose of this paper is to argue that primitive introspection is a psychologically real phenomenon. My main argument for the existence of primitive introspection is an argument from phenomenal-concept acquisition. By assuming that the capacity to classify or recognize a phenomenal state as an instance of an experience type (e.g. pain experience) maps into one’s possession of the relevant phenomenal concept (e.g. PAIN), I argue that if all introspection involved classification, most phenomenal concepts could not be acquired. I conclude that, if we are to avoid radical nativism about phenomenal concepts, we must accept the existence of non-classificatory introspection (i.e. primitive introspection).
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Notes
The scope of introspection of phenomenal states partly depends on which conscious mental states have phenomenology. One example concerns cognitive states such as thoughts and occurrent beliefs. Whether these states can be the target of introspection of phenomenal states depends, at least partly, on one’s stance about the existence and nature of cognitive phenomenology. Here I remain neutral on this point. For those who believe that there is cognitive phenomenology, what I say may apply to introspection of the phenomenology of cognitive states too.
Thanks to Susanna Schellenberg for suggesting the label ‘primitive introspection’ to me.
What I really believe is the stronger thesis that only primitive introspection is the immediate product of an introspective act (reflective introspection somehow depends on primitive introspection). However, arguing for this claim would require, beside the argument I present here, an account of the relationship between primitive introspection and reflective introspection, as well as an explanation of how and why one grounds the other, which clearly exceeds the scope of a single paper. I therefore grant that reflective introspection too can be the immediate product of an introspective act. In any case, this is only peripherally relevant to my present purpose, which is to defend the thesis that primitive introspection is one such immediate product.
Thanks to the anonymous referee for this objection.
By ‘deploying’ a concept I mean exercising it. ‘Applying’ a concept is a way to deploy it. When you imagine a unicorn, you may deploy the concept unicorn, even though you do not apply it to anything. When you see a table, and recognize it as a table, you not only deploy the concept table, but also apply it to what you see.
One may object that there is at least one concept which is already possessed by the subject prior to introspecting and is deployed while introspecting at all times: the concept experience. Now, for one thing, even if subjects who are capable of introspection typically possess the concept experience, that they necessarily deploy it when they introspect is arguable. Moreover, this objection does not seem very pressing, given the point I want to make here, i.e. that primitive introspection does not involve classifying what is introspected as an instance of any experience type. For when you deploy the concept experience, you classify your experience as an experience, but not as an instance of any more specific experience type.
I assume that propositions are structured and have concepts as their constituents. On other views of propositions (Stalnakerian or Russellian, for example), the claim that primitive introspection is non-propositional may be false. As noted, what is most important for my distinction is that primitive introspection does not involve deployment of previously possessed phenomenal concepts.
Although this will be important for some developments of the work grounded in the distinction between primitive introspection and reflective introspection.
Provided that we assume a non-atomistic view of concepts. On a non-atomistic view, concepts can be built up compositionally from other concepts: bachelor, for instance, may be built up compositionally from unmarried and male. On an atomistic view, instead, no concepts are composite.
Arguably, two qualitatively different phenomenal states (phenomenal states with different qualitative phenomenal properties) are phenomenal states of different kinds.
On the atomistic view, all phenomenal concepts are basic.
The innate conceptual representations posited by core cognition are abstract in kind and limited in number. They belong to three domains: objects (including representations of causal and spatial relations), numbers, and agents (including representations of goals). Even though the latter domain may include some folk psychological concepts (goal, attentional state, etc.), core concepts surely do not include a great number of phenomenal concepts. Indeed, they only include a few (plausibly not more than 1%).
Thanks to Andrew Lee and Emile Thalabard for drawing my attention to this objection.
Nota bene: extrapolation is different from composition. That phenomenal-blue7 is acquired by extrapolation from phenomenal-blue6 and phenomenal-blue8 does not imply that phenomenal-blue7 is built up by composition from phenomenal-blue6 and phenomenal-blue8.
Accordingly, color experience consists in representing objects as having the disposition to cause a certain type of experience (under standard conditions). For instance, an experience as of a red poppy consists in representing the poppy as having the disposition to cause a reddish experience (under standard conditions). Clearly, a prima facie worry for dispositionalist accounts of color experience is circularity (cf. Boghossian and Velleman 1989). See Peacocke (1984) for a reply to this objection.
For an alternative objection, see Block (1996: 33): “I can have an experience whose representational content is that my partner is having a very pleasing experience down there that changes in intensity, and although that may be pleasurable for me, it is not pleasurable in the phenomenally impressive way that graces my own orgasms”.
Kind's argument focuses in particular on variations in phenomenal intensity that have no plausible intentional correlates.
These correspond to the two main representationalist accounts of emotional phenomenology. See e.g. Prinz (2004).
I owe this objection to the anonymous referee.
Unless we adopt a view, such as Prinz’s (2011), on which an experience can only be conscious if it is attended to. On views of this kind, the notion of having an experience collapses into the notion of introspecting an experience (as conceived here).
Defenders of the HOT theory of consciousness (Rosenthal 1997) might disagree. The higher-order representation being a thought, on this view, it is propositional and conceptual and thereby allows for recognition. However, arguably, the HOT theory faces a similar challenge to that faced by conceptualism about introspection, i.e. that of explaining phenomenal-concept acquisition. Plausibly, to acquire a phenomenal concept c one must, at the very least, have a conscious C-experience. But if having a conscious C-experience requires possessing c (i.e. the phenomenal concept that partly constitutes the unconscious thought that makes a C-first-order representation conscious), it is mysterious how we come to possess phenomenal concepts at all. I thus would not recommend my objector to take the HOT theory as a basis for the claim that phenomenal concepts can be acquired via the mere having of an experience.
My reflection on this point has benefitted from conversation with Luca Gasparri.
For one thing, infallibility is usually defined as a property of judgments. Primitive introspection being non-propositional, the most ambitious thesis one could defend in this respect is that primitive introspection possesses a property which is analogous to infallibility but which applies to non-propositional states. Thanks to Andrew Lee for making this clear in my mind.
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Acknowledgements
This work was supported by the French National Research Agency’s Grants ANR-10-IDEX-0001-02 PSL and ANR-10-LABX-0087 IEC. For extensive comments to previous drafts of this paper, I am extremely grateful to Uriah Kriegel, long and numerous conversations with whom made a fundamental contribution to this paper. I’m also grateful to David Chalmers, Jim Pryor, Charles Siewert, and Andrew Lee for their comments to a previous draft. I have benefitted from presenting parts of this paper at the Doc’in Nicod (IJN, Paris) and at the Washington Square Circle (NYU). I am grateful to the audiences there, and especially to François Recanati, Michael Murez, Luca Gasparri, Paul Egré, Enrico Terrone, Andrew Lee, Dan Hoek, Chris Scambler, Arden Koehler, Alma Barner, and Ben Holguin. The paper benefitted also from being presented at the “Consciousness and Introspection” seminar at the Université Paris-Sorbonne (Paris), at the “Introspection and Self-Knowledge” seminar at the Université de Lille 3 (Lille), at the PLM4 conference at the Ruhr University (Bochum), and at the “Introspection Sucks!” workshop at the University of Antwerp. I am grateful to the audiences there and particularly to Pascal Ludwig, François Kammerer, Matthias Michel, Emile Thalabard, Arnauld Dewalque, Denis Seron, Bertille de Vlieger, Michele Palmira, Tobias Schlicht, Sascha Fink, Manuel Martínez Merino, Bence Nanay, Adriana Renero, Katia Samoilova, Kranti Saran, and Eric Schwitzgebel.
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Giustina, A. Introspection Without Judgment. Erkenn 86, 407–427 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10670-019-00111-8
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10670-019-00111-8