1992 Kluwer Academic Publishers. Printed in the Netherlands. Mind, consciousness, and cognition: Phenomenology vs. cognitive science*. NADER N. CHOKR.
Husserl Studies 9: 179-197, 1992. © 1992 Kluwer Academic Publishers. Printed in the Netherlands.
Mind, consciousness, and cognition: Phenomenology vs. cognitive science* NADER N. CHOKR Trinity University San Antonio, Texas With the explosion, in recent years, of the "cognitive revolution,''1 there has been a renewed and sometimes frenetic interest in the nature of the mind, consciousness, and cognition. Subsequently, a flurry of activities has led to various philosophical and scientific proposals seeking to explain these "last frontiers,"2 so to speak, in the advance of human knowledge and understanding. In the present essay, I propose to chart and delineate one particular context in which these issues are discussed: the debate between phenomenology and cognitive science. For this purpose, I first examine Husserl's "Phenomenological Conception of Mind" (hereafter PCM). 3 Even though Hussed's PCM falls short in terms of psychological explanation, 4 I argue that it has nevertheless made some significant contributions, and that it might even be of greater usefulness, if it is refined and improved in light of the versions of PCM which can be derived or extrapolated from the work of later phenomenologists (e.g., Heidegger, Medeau-Ponty, Gurwitsch, Schutz, Dreyfus), and in light of the recent developments in cognitive science. Secondly, I turn to what may be referred to as the "Cognitive Conception of Mind" (hereafter CCM), particularly the version which emerges most distinctively in Dennet's work.5 1 argue essentially that CCM might benefit as well from some of the main, yet often overlooked, insights of PCM. Finally, I conclude by making a few remarks about some possible avenues for interchanges between PCM and CCM, for, contrary to what is often assumed, I believe that they have a lot to share and contribute to each other, despite their differences.
* I would like to thank Steven Crowell from Rice University (Philosophy Department) for helpful comments and suggestions about my discussion of Hussed and other phenomenologists, and Edouard Philippe, also from Rice University (Electrical Engineering Department), for offering me the opportunity to formulate my views on cognitive science and artificial intelligence.
180
Preliminaries At its present stage, my project can only be programmatic. In fact it should be viewed as entertaining a big "IF...THEN .... "whereby certain theoretical consequences follow from a number of claims and interpretations. To dispel from the start some possible misunderstandings, some preliminary remarks are in order. Insofar as Husserl denies explicitly having any explanatory ambitions, it may be unfair to expect his theory to provide an explanation. And so, one may argue, it should not be surprising if it falls short on this score. In contrast to many phenomenologists however, I think that the distinction between description and prescription (or explanation) is a "spurious distinction" which philosophers of various persuasions have unfortunately taken for granted for a long time. 6 Consequently, I am assuming that Husserl's enterprise is not just descriptive - as though the inner workings of consciousness were accessible to some type of introspection - but also prescriptive, and thus explanatory. In the extreme case, if this assumption still seems unreasonable, one can always ask, I would argue, what (kinds of) explanations can reasonably be derived or extrapolated from his phenomenological descriptions. Insofar as the terminologies of PCM and CCM are radically different, perhaps even "incommensurable", one may object right from the start that it is very unlikely that they share anything in common, or that any fruitful relation or interaction can be established between them. Or else, one may object, as Dennett in fact does, that though their results bear a striking resemblance, their enabling assumptions are very different. 7 Thus, even though PCM and CCM are both presented as "theories of mind," the main concern in PCM is with consciousness, perception, appercep-
tion/apprehension, motivation, active and passive genesis, sedimentation and habitualities, etc., whereas in CCM, the focus is on cognition, symbols, expressions, computations, data structures, knowledge representation, control structures, search, generate-and-test procedures, and so on. Only recently has there been a serious interest in consciousness from a cognitive point of view. 8 In time however, I will show that PCM and CCM share more in common than it appears at first glance, or than it has been argued. Various possible avenues for interchanges between them can be the subject of further fruitful study. Though it would be worthwhile undertaking such a study, this task lies beyond the scope of the present essay. Nevertheless, as a step in this direction, I will beg!n by presenting Husserl's PCM (terminologically and methodologically speaking) in such a way that the rapprochement with CCM would make sense to someone already familiar with both PCM and CCM, and the issues discussed here. 9
181
A phenomenological conception of mind The PCM that I wish to present here arises from Husserl's concern with the nature of consciousness, and cognition. As is known, his major theoretical contribution rests upon his attempt to analyze the intentionality of the human mind. More precisely, it rests upon his attempt to specify the nature of the functional system that consciousness is, its responsibility in the way in which the objects of human awareness are presented to (or intended by) subjects, l0 I confine my discussion to Husserl's mature conception, in which consciousness, and subsequently the mind, is viewed as a functional system. And I focus in particular on the roles played by the notions of apperception~apprehension and motivation in his view of the system. In Ideas, Hussed argues that consciousness, the functional system responsible for the world as it is experienced by human subjects, must be understood as a "region of being" which operates in accordance with laws peculiar to it. 11 In some sense, the functioning of this system is concealed by its results. Human consciousness is focussed on the object of consciousness (the intentional object), not on the processes (whichever they are, psychological, physiological or otherwise) wich are responsible for the production or constitution of that object. Recall here the famous Hussedian slogan: "Consciousness is consciousness of something." If we want to make the functioning of the system itself an object of investigation, then we need a special kind of analysis, restricted presumably to the 'phenomenal' or "phenomenological' level. 12 Under the guidance of the object (as a "transcendental clue"), as it is intended by a subject, Hussed makes an attempt to re-construct the various operations of consciousness in virtue of which this consciousness and its corresponding object emerge. In the Cartesian Meditations, Husserl' s conception is such that consciousness is viewed as a functional system which, at any given time, consists of a set of connections and accomplishments "sedimented," or else, "stored in (short/long term) memory." Such a set, in accordance with laws governing what he calls "passive genesis," enables information provided by the physical environment to be intended (and become thus an object of consciousness) as having meaning or sense, - meaning or sense, which owes its formation precisely to the availability of connections and accomplishments sedimented or stored in, and accessible to, the system. 13 In his reflections on perception, Husserl showed something which is nowadays a commonplace in philosophical and psychological circles, namely, that we are aware of (or perceive) more than is evidently given of an object at any given time. TM To take a common example, imagine that you
182 walk into a room with an arm-load of books; you "see a table in the comer," and you simply go over and place the books upon it. This behaviour clearly reveals that the table was presented to you as having the property of "capable-of-supporting-books." Furthermore, the table has this significance for you, even though there is no full and direct experiential evidence that it has this property. By generalizing over this observation, we can then state that objects in the perceptual field are presented to consciousness in accordance with more or less articulated categories (i.e., physical object, having this or that property, this or that practical use, eliciting this or that kind of expectation or behaviour, etc.) which prefigure the way in which further experience of them will continue. That such prefiguration of the course of further experience is involved in ordinary awareness is revealed by the surprise one experiences upon an unexpected occurrence in "the flow of experience," or as Heidegger puts it, upon "a break in those referential contexts which circumspection discovers.''15 It is only at this point, when the books placed on the 'table' fall to the ground, that the implicit reference to subsequent experience of the objects in the perceptual field becomes explicit. You may thus realize that it was not a table after all, and this realization is based upon the failure of subsequent experience to conform to the implicit expectations you had upon seeing the table in the comer. The tradition in both psychology and philosophy against which Husserl proposed his conception of mind had attempted to explain the "surplus of information" involved in the articulation of the perceptual field by evoking some type of mental operations (i.e., quick judgements, simple or complex associations) performed on that which is presumably truly given in perception, namely sense-data. 16 The reason for this move was presumably straightforward. Given, on the one hand, that perception does involve a causal interaction between the physical environment and the subject, and on the other hand, that what we are aware of, at any given time, goes beyond the information given, i.e., beyond the information which could be provided by this interaction, it was held that the causal interaction provides the subject with sense-data, the lowest level of awareness, upon which inferences, or with which associations, can be made. For reasons which cannot be discussed within the limited scope of this essay, 17 Husserl argued that this approach to human awareness should be reversed. Instead of beginning with a theory of perception, [whereby ], he proposed that we begin with a thorough-going description of the perceptual field, as it is given to human awareness, and attempt to discern and reconstruct the functional system responsible for this field. Thus the "given" in perception was no longer taken to be what are in fact unobserved sense-data, but in contrast,
183 simply the object as intended by a subject. This object, in turn, becomes the (transcendental) guiding clue for an analysis of the functional system responsible for its being intended in just the way that it is intended by the subject. Husserl's reversal of the traditional approach resulted in what is known today as an expectation-driven theory of perception. Abstracting from the physical input to the sensory mechanisms, and turning instead (via the "phenomenological reduction") is to the intentional object as presented to a subject, Husserl argued in substance that the awareness of the object could (and should) be analyzed in terms of two co-constitutive moments: (i) a perceptive, and (ii) an apperceptive moment, both of which corresponding to aspects of the intentional object. To refer for a moment to the example given above, if one takes as the intentional object "the table-capable-ofsupporting-books," these conceptual distinctions can be illustrated as follows: corresponding to the perceptive moment of awareness would be that part or aspect of the table which is actually present to me; corresponding to the apperceptive moment would be all references beyond the actually presented part or aspect of the table, its unseen sides, its capability to support books, its being something one cannot walk through, etc. It is, of course, the implicitly contained references which one need not be aware of (and for the most part one is not) which account for the prefiguration of further experience mentioned earlier. Equally important however is the fact that these references are co-constitutive of the intentional object itself - as the expression "actually present part or aspect of the table" reveals. It is only insofar as these references beyond what is actually "given" have already been established, that we can draw the distinction between (i) what is actually given or perceived and (ii) what is otherwise apperceived. In short, the conceptual distinction between the perceptive and apperceptive moment presupposes the assignment of a functional character to that which is given in the perceptive moment by the context in which it is perceived. Thus there is a reciprocal determination between the actually and the apperceptively given aspects of the intentional object, the former determining the types of apperceptive aspects with which it can be combined, the latter determining the roles the former can play in such a combination. Having presented Husserl's approach to the analysis of perception, I now turn more explicitly to his mature conception of consciousness, i.e., the one he arrived at (in the 20' s) as a result of his inquiry into the functioning of the system below the "thematic" (or conscious) level, and that is, at the level of "passive genesis. ''19 It is worth noting that this kind of inquiry is nowadays the focus of considerable attention in cognitive studies. And Husserl is even viewed, by some, as a "precursor" in this respect.2°
184 According to Husserl, there are "sedimented" or "stored" in the system, perceptual patterns characteristic of object types, information about the values of objects (e.g., practical uses, elicited expectations and behaviours, etc.), the roles objects play in various contexts, etc. This information stored or sedimented in the system is the product of experience.21 More specifically, the information is the product of the way the system organizes input(s) from the (physical) environment. This organization takes place at two levels: (i) the active ("thematic" or conscious) level and (ii) the passive ("non-thematic" or non-conscious) level. Much structuring of environmental input occurs on the latter level. For example, the linking together of the perspectival or aspectual appearances of one object such that, once linked, the appearance of one side is intended as the appearance of an object, i.e., with implicit expectations of other sides and further appearances, is the product of "passive genesis." In order to account for this organization, Husserl appealed to the Humean notion of association. While, for Hume, this notion is atomistic and provides somehow an "invisible hand" whereby each idea "attracts" certain others - dispensing thus from the need to have an independent system, in Husserl, the concept is altered to take into account the role that the system plays in patterning input(s), patterning which makes association possible. Built upon this patterning is organization which takes place on the active level. To illustrate this with another example - having to do with concept learning and natural language understanding, we can say that the learning of a concept such as "pen-forwriting" requires that the connection between the pen and the use to which it is put, be noticed and made. This type of connection may be referred to as "apprehension," an accomplishment that Husserl attributes to the Ego. 22 Thus, one can characterize the system - once the organization referred to above has been achieved - as a "'field," in which, at any given time, objects can be intended as having values, properties, relations, hierarchies thereof, etc, that go beyond what is immediately given from the environment (e.g., the table is intended as capable of supporting books, the pen as good for writing) thanks to the information sedimented or stored in, and accessible to, or retrievable by, the system. Schematically, it could be represented like this: System
=
{
FieM
}.23
Objects How this system functions is not itself something I am conscious of. I see the table as something to put my books on, but not the processes (psychological, neurophysiological or otherwise) which make this intentional object possible. It is this inter-relation between information sedimented/stored in the system and the environmental input(s) in the formation
185 of the intentional object which is captured by the concept of motivation. The table-appearance can be intended as the appearance of a table only if information regarding the patterns characteristic of tables has been stored. The table-appearance motivates the intentional object "table," in virtue of one's having learned over time what tables look like and what they are for. Similarly, a child's learning the use of a pen presupposes that s/he has come to understand the purposive behaviour of subjects, the causal and other properties of objects in the scene, or scenario, and so on. In other words, to use a cognitive science terminology, he must have come to understand the schema, script, story or narrative, in which a pen is used.24 In either case, it is this organization of environmental input(s) achieved by the passive or non-thematic functioning of the system, which is responsible for what is intended. In both cases, the description of the functional system responsible for the formation, generally speaking, of the intentional environment, - i.e., the environment as interpreted, represented, and intended by the subject, which gives rise to expectation and behaviour, and which is to be distinguished from the physical environment, existing independently of its being an object for a subject - is itself independent of the descriptions of physical or neurophysiological transactions that take place in the brain. Rather, the question addressed (and which ought to be addressed) is what representations, frameworks and procedures must be posited in order to account for the intentional environment which engenders the observed behavior in human subjects with respect to a given intentional object (e.g., table, pen, glass, car, personal computer, etc.), independently of the "cashvalue" these representations, frameworks and procedures may have in terms of neurophysiology.25 It seems to me that, on this crucial point, Husserl, the phenomenologist, concurs with most cognitive psychologists or scientists, as is attested by the literature. When I enter a room with an arm-load of books and perceive a table in the comer, i.e., see-it-as-capable-of-supporting-books, and move toward it to put my books on it, I exhibit behaviour, the explanation of which rests upon my possessing a mental system capable of assigning a previously learned value to a physical stimulus. 26 Similarly, when a child manifests her understanding of the concept "pen-for-writing," or the proposition "a pen is for writing," and simply picks up a pen to write with it, s/he exhibits behaviour the explanation of which rests upon her possessing a system capable of assigning a previously learned value to a physical stimulus. To explain these occurrences, phenomenologists and cognitive scientists agree, it seems to me, that an attempt must be made to describe, or provide a model of, (i) how knowledge is stored and represented, (ii) how background knowledge is constituted and structured, (iii) how this background knowledge is accessed and put to use in a particular case, (iv) how it
186 determines the intentional environment, and to what extent, (v) how it shapes the physical input(s) from the physical environment to form an intentional object, and finally, (vi) how it is modified, and at what point, is it more or less radically restructured in the light of a new experience.27 And once again, the description or model here in question must be guided by the environment produced by the system, since it is not accessible by mere introspection. In short, what is at issue is the representation of knowledge, a representation which can account for the expectational (or simply intentional) character of human experience, or else, to use Husserl's terminology, for the role played by apperception/apprehension and motivation. However, as we shall see next, it is on this very point that CCM departs somewhat significantly from PCM.
Towards a cognitive conception of mind As we have seen, for Husserl, the "functional system" which is responsible for the constitution or construction of the intentional environment is irreducibly mental. That is to say, the fundamental concepts upon which the explanation of human consciousness and perception rests, the concepts of apperception~apprehension and motivation, are primitive or basic terms, which are not subject to further analysis. Thus, to refer to our example above, Husserl would argue that the child's having "pen-for-writing" as his intentional object rests upon his having previously apprehended this connection between the phenomenally presented pen and its practical use, an apprehension motivated, for example, by his seeing the pen beeing used for the purpose of writing, and thus eliciting a corresponding behaviour. His having acquired this 'meaning', in turn, enables the currently perceived pen, which is not now being used in this way, to motivate its being intended (or apprehended) as "for writing.'" If, however, we ask: just what is apprehension and motivation, or apprehension motivated? How can we explain the child's connecting the phenomenally given (pen) with its practical function (writing)? Explanation ceases. For Husserl, I would argue, it is simply the fact that apprehension and motivation occur, which is the mark par excellence of human consciousness, intentionality, cognition, perception, intelligence and rationality. And it is in virtue of these connections between events, objects, properties, utterances, actions, and so on, in virtue of all the products of motivated apprehension that the intentional environment is constituted, or constructed. The cognitive psychologist or scientist however is not content to stop at this point. His or her goal is not simply to point out, but precisely to explain how it is that phenomena like motivated apprehension come about.
187 Moreover, the necessity that s/he does so has been vehemently and eloquently argued for by Dennett.28 Let us see briefly how Dennett's argument goes. ff one argues with respect to the example given above that the child forms the intentional object "pen-for-writing" on the basis of his connecting the phenomenal object with its practical use, the "pen" he currently sees with his previous experiences of the pen, the following questions still remain: How is the connecting done? Who or what does the connecting? Since it is the child's intentional object that we wish to explain, one possible alternative is to posit within the child, more precisely within the child's mind [whereby mind = consciousness = functional system], a second and "smaller child," or as Husserl did, a "transcendental Ego,, who is then said to be responsible for the connecting. But as Dennett argues: Wherever we stop in our explanations at the intentional level, we have left over an unexplained instance of intelligence and rationality ... Wherever a theory relies on a formulation bearing the logical marks of intentionality, there is a little man (a homunculus) concealed.29 Furthermore, how this "little man," this homunculus, 3° this "smaller child," or this Ego, does the connecting is just as much a mystery as how the "larger child," or the mind does it. Thus, if one remains at this intentional level, one ends up not explaining anything, for, one must assume homunculi ad infinitum, whereby each of them serves to "explain" the intentionality, intelligence and rationality of the preceding one. Dennett's point, if I understand it correctly, is this: the psychological explanation of intelligent and rational behaviour cannot rest solely upon intentional terms like "apperception/apprehension," "motivation," "recognition," etc., for, it is just how the accomplishments that these terms describe take place within the that the cognitive psychologist wishes to (and should) explain. "Intentional theory (e.g., PCM, in the present context) is vacuous as psychology because it presupposes and does not explain rationality or intelligence.''31 According to Dennett however, this insufficiency of intentional explanation from the point of view of psychology has been widely felt, but it is widely misconceived.32 In order to make his point more perspicuously, Dennett finds it useful to distinguish three different stances: the design, the physical, and the intentional stance. (1) The design stance has to do with task performance, the function of the system, which is purpose-relative or teleological. This stance is generally adopted when making predictions about the behaviour of mechanical objects, or natural objects and phenomena. "Its essential feature is that we make predictions solely from knowledge or assumptions about the system's functional design, irrespective of the physical constitution or
188 condition of the innards of the particular object." (2) The physical stance describes the matter and workings of the system's hardware. Predictions here are based on the actual physical state of the system, and are worked out by applying whatever knowledge we have of the laws of nature. It is generally reserved for instances of breakdown, or malfunction, when the condition preventing normal operation is generalized and easily locatable, and also when the system is normally susceptible to a design stance explanation. (3) The intentional stance assumes rationality of the system. By rationality, Dennett means however nothing more than optimal design relative to a goal or optimally weighted hierarchy of goals, and a set of (logical) rules and constraints. This stance allows for (intentional) predictions of behaviour on the part of the (intentional) system, by ascribing to it, the possession of a certain amount of information, by supposing it to be directed by certain goals, and then by working out the most reasonable or appropriate course of action for the system on the basis of these ascriptions and suppositions. In effect, it is the stance which ascribes something like beliefs and desires to the system, e.g., to a chess-playing computer. 33 Now, if we ask: when should we expect the strategy of adopting the intentional stance to pay off?. The answer, according to Dennett, is "whenever we have reason to suppose the assumption of optimal design is warranted, and doubt the practicality of prediction from the design or physical stance. ''34 Elsewhere, he also states in substance that the intentional explanation and prediction of the behaviour of systems is not only common, but works when no other sort of explanation or prediction of their behaviour is either possible or manageable. And, he adds: "The decision to adopt the strategy is pragmatic, and is not intrinsically right or wrong.''35 In the end however, Dennett thinks that "the proper direction for theory builders to take whenever possible" is from (i) common-sense intentional explanations and predictions (i.e., from the intentional stance) to (ii) the more reliable design-stance explanations and predictions, which are forced on us anyway, when we discover that our subjects are imperfectly rational. For Dennett however, this migration is the proper direction to take independently of any such discovery. He writes in this respect: In the end, we want to be able to explain the intelligence of man, or beast, in terms of his design, and this in turn in terms of the natural selection of this design.36 This being said, Dennett still thinks that the intentional stance is certainly in accord with our intuitions, and that it is useful, methodologically speaking, to adopt such a stance, and its concomitant talk (i.e., ascriptions of beliefs, desires, volitions, goals, and plans; in short, of intelligence and rationality),
189 at least as a starting point, or, when all else fails. Hence, at the start, we will always talk as if entire "committees of fancy homunculi are concurring in their respective work to produce the intentional, intelligent, and rational behaviour of a given functional system. We thus run the risk of positing sub-systems, whose duties require them to be more "intelligent," "rational," or "knowledgeable" than the system of which they are to be parts. 37 But, one should try to reach a level where these entire committees of fancy homunculi are "discharged," and where there is no need to adopt the intentional stance. Here is how Dennett articulates this: One starts, (in AI), with a specification of a whole person or cognitive organism - what I call, more neutrally, an intentional system (...) and then breaks that largest intentional system into an organization of subsystems, each of which could itself be viewed as an intentional system (with its own specialized beliefs and desires) and hence as formally a homunculus. In fact, homunculus talk is ubiquitous in AI, and almost always illuminating... Homunculi are bogeymen only if they duplicate entire the talents they are rung in to explain (a special case of the risk mentioned above). If one can get a team or committee of relatively ignorant, narrow-minded, blind homunculi to produce the intelligent behaviour of the whole, this is progress. A flow chart is typically the organizational chart of a committee of homunculi (investigators, librarians, accountants, executives); each box specifies a homunculus by prescribing a function without saying how it is to be accomplished (one says, in effect: put a little man in there to do the job). If we then look closer at the individual boxes we see that the function of each is accomplished by subdividing it via another flow chart into still smaller, more stupid homunculi. Eventually this nesting of boxes within boxes lands you with homunculi so stupid (all they have to do is remember whether to say yes or no when asked) that they can be, as one says, 'replaced by a machine'. One discharges fancy homunculi from one's scheme by organizing armies of such idiots to the work. 38 Insofar as this argument is convincing and perhaps decisive, it would necessitate a revision or further development of PCM, in the light of CCM (Dennett's style). 39 In particular, PCM must abandon the notion that apperception/apprehension and motivation are primitive terms in psychology. It must be developed further and supplemented by models that will enable us to explain, for example, how an object can be seen as tablecapable-of-supporting-books, how new concepts (e.g., "pen-for-writing") are learned, and once learned, remain accessible to the system and play a causal role in constituting the intentional environment. Some further and more systematic discussion of CCM and comparison with PCM would put in proper perspective the kind of work that is being done today, and from which PCM can benefit. But, as I said earlier, this lies beyond the scope of the present essay, In the meantime, I would like, by
190 way of conclusion, to offer the following clusters of remarks. My analysis suggests that PCM and CCM, contrary to what is widely believed, in part perhaps because of Dreyfus's phenomenologically anchored writings (see references), share the following important commitments in their approach to the study of mind, consciousness, and cognition. (i)
The distinction between [a] physical environment, and [b] intentional
(ii)
There is a functional system within the subject by means of which the intentional environment acquires its 'meaning', interpretation, representation, or status as an intentional object for a subject. The functioning of this sytem is not accessible, by mere introspection, to the subject. As a result, the functioning of the system (e.g., how it represents knowledge, input(s) from the physical environment, how background knowledge available to the system is structured and made accessible in specific cases, etc.) must be inferred on the basis of the difference between [a] and [b] mentioned above, and on the basis of the connections and accomplishments of the system itself. Thus the "rational reconstruction" of the functioning of the system must be guided by a careful and systematic description of [b], i.e., the intentional environment. This resulting description of the functioning of the system is independent of the descriptions of the physical transactions in which it is realized.
environment.
(iii) (iv)
(v)
It should be noted that while (i), (ii) and (iii) enjoy today widespread support in both philosophy and cognitive psychology, (iv), more than any of the other points, clearly needs further argumentation and substantiation. As for (v), it has been rather strongly argued for by Dennett and Fodor,4° among others, and it is now widely accepted: intentional and design explanations are both legitimate and irreducible to, though not incompatible with, physical explanations.41 PCM can benefit from CCM, particularly from the recent research in cognitive psychology, in AI in particular, and the various attempts made to simulate, and to develop models about concept learning, natural language understanding, pattern identification and recognition. Note, however, that I do not envisage nor am I proposing that PCM borrows passively the concepts, models, and procedures that emerged recently in the fields just mentioned. Instead, I also believe that some of the best work in the phenomenological tradition can provide a new and fruitful basis for psychological explanation and modelling, and for further development of
191 CCM. I am here thinking, for example, of Heidegger's insistence that the practical concerns of the human subject play a decisive role in organizing his (mental) world; Schutz's study of types o f motivation; Gurwitsch's analyses of noematic systems, constituted by the pure objects of conscious experience; Merleau-Ponty's analysis of body and space, and its intrinsical connection to any real understanding of the mind. 42 Interestingly, Dennett characterizes his approach as hetero-phenomenology, which he contrasts with Husserl's auto-phenomenology. While the latter is concerned with determining one's own intentional objects by way of "some special somewhat introspectionist bit of mental gymnastics," the former is concerned instead with determining the intentional objects of another, from the outside, as it were. 43 The interchange that I am advocating here is possible, I believe, precisely because PCM and CCM share more in common, despite their differences (terminological and otherwise), than has been acknowledged in the literature. According to my analysis, this absence of acknowledgement is perhaps due to the fact that most serious criticisms and attacks against CCM, and AI research in particular, have often been formulated from the standpoint of phenomenology, or some phenomenologically-related point of view.44
No~s 1. The revolution here in question was presumably brought about as a result of convergent and interdisciplinary research programs in computer science, artificial intelligence, cognitive psychology, philosophy of mind, linguistics, mathematical logic, and communication/information theory. See Howard Gardner, The Mind's New Science: A History of the Cognitive Revolution (New York: Basic Books, 1985); see also R. and J. Lachman, "Information Processing Psychology: Origins and Extensions," in R. E. Ingrain, ed., Information Processing Approaches to Psychopathology and Clinical Psychology (New York: Academic Press, 1985). 2. Interestingly, Dennett writes: "Philosophers of mind and epistemologists have much to learn from recent work in cognitive psychology, but one of philosophy's favorite facets of mentality has received scant attention from cognitive psychologists, and that is consciousness itself, full-blown, introspecfive, inner-world, phenomenological consciousness. In fact, if one looks in the obvious places (the more ambitious attempts at whole theories, overviews of recent research, and more specialized work in such areas as attention and 'mental imagery') one find not so much a lack of interest as a deliberate and adroit avoidance of the issue. I think I know why. Consciousness appears to be the last bastion of occult properties, epiphenomena, immeasurable subjective states - in short, the one area of mind best left to the philosophers, who are welcome to it. Let them make fools of themselves trying to corral the quicksilver of 'phenomenology' into a respectable theory." See D. Dennett, "Toward a
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3.
4.
5.
6.
7. 8.
9.
Cognitive Theory of Consciousness," in Brainstorms: Philosophical Essays on Mind and Psychology (Cambridge, MA: MIT/Bradford Press, 1978), pp. 149-173. See also his most recent book, Consciousness Explained (Boston: Little Brown, 1991). To use a different terminology, I mean the broad functionalist conception, which Husserl developed on the basis of Brentano's insights concerning intentionality, and according to which the inputs and outputs that specify mental states are environmentally defined. A typical input might be given as "seeing-a-ripe-apple," a typical output might be "grasping-a-ripe-apple." By contrast, what is sometimes called a narrow functionalist conception would define the same input in terms of the sense-data (or 'retinal stimulations') it caused, and would specify the output as motor commands to the muscles of hand and eye. I.e., the explanation of an agent's mental states or behaviour by appeal to the agent's intentions, beliefs and desires. This kind of explanation normally works by showing the behaviour to be rational given those intentions, beliefs and desires. See later discussion of Dennett's views. I focus essentially on the following works by Daniel Dennett: [a] "Intentional Systems"; [b] "Artificial Intelligence as Philosophy and Psychology"; [c] "Toward a Cognitive Theory of Consciousness," in Brainstorms: Philosophical Essays on Mind and Psychology (Cambridge, MA: MIT/Bradford Books, 1978), pp. 3-22; 109-126; 149-173; "Three Kinds of Intentional Psychology [19811," in R. Healy, ed., Reduction, Time and Reality (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1981); reprinted in D. Dennett, The Intentional Stance (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1987), pp. 43-68. This paper was in its final stage, when Dennett's book Consciousness Explained (Boston: Little Brown, 1991) appeared. And so, I make little reference and use of this work herein. What I mean to say briefly is that any description always already presupposes some notion of what ought to be, and therefore, prescribes as well. Furthermore, the sense in which I identify (perhaps off-handedly) explanation with prescription is the following: clearly, not all prescriptions are explanatory; however, to offer an explanation of a given phenomenon is often, if not always, to prescribe that explanation for the phenomenon in question. See Nader Chokr, "Prescription vs. Description in the Philosophy of Science, or Methodology vs. History: A Critical Assessment," Metaphilosophy 17.4 (1986): 289-299. Reprinted in Terry Ward Bynum and William Vitek, eds., Applying Philosophy (London/New York: Basil Blackwell, 1988), pp. 78-88. See Dennett, "Beyond Belief," in The Intentional Stance (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1987), p. 153. See Dennett "Toward a Cognitive Theory of Consciousness," in Brainstorms, 1978, pp. 149-173; his most recent work, Consciousness Explained, 1991; see W. G. Lycan, Consciousness (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1987); see also note 2 above. In one sense, HusserI's PCM and Dennett's CCM represent, at the highest level of generality and simplification, two different approaches toward an intentional (belief-desire) psychology - that is, if one can interpret Dennett's view as being clearly in favor of intentional theory. Suppose we can distinguish the various kinds of differences between them in terms of (i) enabling set of assumptions, (ii) terminologies, (iii) methods and methodologies, and finally, in terms of (iv) substantive claims and results. I would then argue that
193
10.
11. 12.
13. 14.
concerning (iv) they bear a striking resemblance - as Dennett in fact admits. Concerning (iii) and (ii), whatever differences there are can be reduced or even dissolved, I would argue, by improving one or the other, PCM or CCM, after relevant evaluations. Finally, concerning (i), the most significant source of differences, this discussion is supposed to show to some extent which set of assumptions is more plausible or fruitful in today research. In one sense, Husserl's phenomenological project can be seen as a defense of (some sort of)functionalism. Thus, it would claim that the essential or defining conditions of mental states are what they do, not what they are, i.e., their causal interactions with inputs, other inner states, and outputs. Subjects are here considered as intentional systems, whose mental states and behaviour have a belief-desire (or intentional) explanation. As such, they exhibit intentional states, i.e., mental representations whose content can be, at least roughly, specified sententially or propositionally, and to which the subject takes some kind of (sentential or propositional) 'attitude' i.e., fear, hope, belief, desire and the like. One important question to raise however is whether it is really the case that in Husserl's analysis of the interrelations among intentional states, the relations are understood to be causal. My point here is that not all systematic, relational analyses are functional analyses. To be a functional analysis, the important relations must be causal. To the extent that the relations among intentional states are not defined in terms of causal interrelations, but rather in terms, perhaps, of "rational" or "analytical" inclusions or entailments, the analysis is not, strictly speaking, a functional analysis. However, and this is the point I am driving at, it may well map onto one, if the "rational" or "analytical" relationships map onto causal relations properly. See E. Husserl, Ideas: General Introduction to Pure Phenomenology (New York: MacMillan, 1962), #31. The kind of phenomenological analysis that Husserl had in mind, proceeds by some kind of introspection, whereby the outer world and all of its natural implications and presuppositions are supposed to be "bracketed" in a particular and peculiar act of mind known as epoche. The net result is presumably an investigative state of mind in which the phenomenologist becomes acquainted with 'the pure objects of conscious experience' (i.e., noemata), which are untainted by the usual distortions and amendments of theory and practice. In passing, it should be noted that, by many expert-accounts, this kind of analysis is extremely difficult, if not outright impossible to pull off. In fact, like any other attempts to strip away interpretation and reveal the 'basic' facts of consciousness' to 'rigorous' observation and 'pure' description (e.g., Impressionists in Art, Introspectionists in Psychology), phenomenology fails to provide a single, settled method that everyone could agree upon. Furthermore, and more specifically, one may ask quite legitimately whether phenomenological "bracketing" precludes investigation of the causal relationships among intentional states. See E. Husserl, Cartesian Meditations (The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1960), chapter 4. See J. Bruner, Beyond the Information Given (New York: Norton, 1973); J. J. Gibson, The Ecological Approach to Visual Perception (Boston: HoughtonMifflin, 1979); E. Rosch, "Principles of Categorization," in E. Rosch and B. B. Lloyd, eds., Cognition and Categorization (Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum
194 1978). 15. For further details, see Heidegger's analysis of the context of references and assignments in Being and Time (New York: Harper & Row, 1962), pp. 95-105. Heidegger writes: "When equipment cannot be used, this implies that the constitutive assignment of the "in-order-to" to a "toward-this" has been disturbed...But when an assignment has been disturbed - when something is unusable for some purpose, then the assignment becomes explicit... Similarly, when something ready-to-hand is found missing, though its everyday presence [zugegensein] has been so obvious that we have never taken any notice of it, tiffs makes a break in those referential contexts which circumspection discovers" (1962, p. 105, italics in the text). A good illustration of what Heidegger is talking about is that, paradoxical as it may be, one realizes, for example, after sitting in a room for a while, that the air-conditioner was working, when it suddenly stops. 16. The idea of the purely-given, i.e., sense-data, is nowadays widely rejected. See also note 3 for distinction for example between broad and narrow
functionalism. 17. For details, see Husserl's Ideas (1962), sections #36c; 41c; 85a; 92; 97b. It may seem that Husserl stillbuys into the picture, but does not assume that either the sense-data or the mental operations are directly accessible. What is directly accessible, for Husserl, are the perceptions, and we must start with them and infer to the components parts, especially the mental operations (or functional system). And so, one may argue that Husserl turns out to be at most methodologically, but not ontologically, distinguishable from relatively naive sense-data theorists. This account would be unfair to Hussed however. For, unlike sense-data theorists, he denies explicitly that what is actually given in perception is ever independent of the apperceptively given. One may ask: (i) doesn't the perceptual process have to begin with something? And (ii) doesn't that something have to be independent of the accretions added in the rest of the process? Husserl's short answers would go as follows: (i) yes, but (ii) that something is always already apperceptively constrained. See later discussion in text. 18. Phenomenology proper is characterized by Husserl as the 'critique of transcendental experience' (Ideas, 29); 'transcendental experience' is said to be a 'new kind of experience' (Ideas, 27), distinct from ordinary experience; and subsequently, the 'phenomenological reduction' is held to be the operation through the performance of which this 'new kind of experience' becomes accessible to us. 19. See Husserl, Cartesian Meditations (1960), 4th Meditation, pp. 77-80. 20. See, for example, H. Dreyfus, ed., "Husserl's Anticipation of Cognitive Science," in Husserl, Intentionality, and Cognitive Science (Cambridge. MA: MIT Press, 1982), pp. 9-14, esp. section II; D. Heinsen, "Husserl's Theory of the Pure Ego," in H. Dreyfus, ibid., 1982, pp. 147, 162, 164-165; see also H. Gardner, op. cit., 1985, pp. 78-85, 118-130). 21. In this respect, one could argue that Husserl is more of an empiricist than a Kantian: his whole notion of the apriori is in fact in many senses anti-Kantian; it conveys the idea of a "'material apriorf' discovered empirically. 22. This idea turns out in the second part of this essay to be the focal point of my critique of Husserl's PCM. 23. See A. Gurwitsch, The FieM of Consciousness (Pittsburgh: Duquesne Univer-
195
24.
25.
26.
27.
28.
29. 30.
sity Press, 1964). As indicated in the text, these letters stand respectively for values, properties, relations, hierarchies of relations, etc. See D. Rumelhart, "Schemata: The Building Blocks of Cognition," in J. Spiro, B.C. Bertram and W.F. Brewer, eds., Theoretical Issues in Reading Comprehension (Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum, 1980); see also R. Schank and R. Abelson, Scripts, Plans, Goals and Understanding (Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence Erlbanm, 1977). See P.S. Churchland, Neurophilosophy (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1986); P.M. Churchland, Matter and Consciousness (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1988); A Neurocomputational Perspective: The Nature of Mind and the Structure of Science (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1990). See also Nader Chokr, "Some Recent Developments in the Neurosciences and the Mind/Body Problem: A Philosophical Re-appraisal," Unpublished Manuscript (Houston, "IX: Rice University, 1989), pp. 1-32. A radically different research program, also worth investigating, is argued for by the Churchlands on the basis of recent developments in the neurosciences. Basically, they argue for an "eliminative materialism," whereby . My paper (1989) is an evaluation of some aspects of this program. See P. Winston, The Psychology of Computer Vision (New York: MacGrawHill, 1975); M. Minsky, "A Framework for Representing Knowledge," in J. Haugeland, ed., Mind Design (Cambridge, MA: M1T Press, 1981), pp. 95-128; J. Haugeland, Artificial Intelligence: The Very Idea (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1985); T. Winograd, '¢roward a Procedural Understanding of Semantics," Revue Internationale de Metaphysique 117-118 (1976): 260--303; H. Dreyfus, "Husserl's Anticipation of AI," "Husserl and A r s Problems," in Husserl, lntentionality, and Cognitive Science (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1982), sections IV, V, pp. 17-27. Philosophers who have been influenced by the Husserlian school of phenomenology have stressed the importance of this "background" of conscious experience, as the source of some special sort of 'intrinsic intentionality'. Typically however, they have described it as a mysterious or recalcitrant feature, defying explanation, rather than as the key to providing a cognitive or computational theory of mind. See H. Dreyfus, "A Framework for Mis-Representing Knowledge," in M. Ringle, ed., Philosophical Perspectives in Artificial Intelligence (Atlantic Highlands, NJ: Humanities Press, 1979), pp. 124-136; J. Searle, Intentionality: An Essay in the Philosophy of Mind (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1983). See Dennett, Brainstorms, 1978, pp. 2-22, esp. 12-15; pp. 123--4; The Intentional Stance, 1987, pp. 43-68. In accord with Dennett's conception, I think it is best to construe the cognitive scientist as carrying out a two-part project comprising (i) the formulation of a pure intentional theory - very much like what the phenomenologist does, and (ii) the solution to the engineering problem of embodying the intentional theory in a physical device - and this is clearly an empirical problem. Dennett, 1978, p. 12. A homunculus is a device within the mind whose states and operations are characterized in representational terms. Because Dennett posits the existence of such devices - even though they must ultimately be 'discharged', his view, like that of Lycan (1987) is called homuncularfunctionalism. See note 38, see also Kim Sterelny, The Representational Theory of Mind (London: Basil
196 Blackwell, 1990), pp. 13-17; 36-38; 168-169; 221-223. 31. See Dennett, 1978, p. 15; my addition in parentheses. 32. See Dennett, 1978, p. 13; in particular, his "Three Kinds of Intentional Psychology," 1987, pp. 43-68. In this context, it is worth nothing for example the defense of intentional psychology given by Patricia Kitcher, "In Defense of Intentional Psychology," Journal of Philosophy 81 (1984): 89-106. 33. Dennett, 1978, pp. 4; 4-5; 6-7. One may object to Dennett's view that there is a bit more to rationality than optimal design relative to a goal; instead, it is more like design for optimal and generalized goal-seeking; whatever goal may be sought, the rational being will seek an optimal path to it. 34. Ibid., p. 8. 35. Ibid., p. 7. 36. Ibid., p. 12. I must point out however that Dennett is not always very clear in this respect. Though he thinks that there must be appeal to intentional terms, he also suggests that we must have a theory about how intentional theory is grounded and embodied in physical stuff. 37. Ibid.,p. 112. 38. Ibid., p. 123--4; italics in text. Dennett is very clear on the dangers of tacitly positing undischarged homunculi. Note therefore the three elements which characterize his homuncular functionalism: (i) Functionalism: the essence of a mental state is what it does, not what it is. (ii) The mind is modular: minds are ensembles [see J. Fodor, The Modularity of Mind (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1983)]. Our general and flexible intelligence emerges out of the interactions of lesser and more specialized intelliganees that compose us. (iii) Apply (i) and (ii) recursively: each homunculus must in turn be seen as an ensemble of more specialized and hence simpler homunculi. And so on until we reach a level where the tasks the homunculi must carry out are so simple that they are psychologically primitive. 39. I do not want to give the impression that Dennett's views are without problems and difficulties. In fact, some of the points of contention with his views include: (i) his lack of clarity on whether he is an intentional realist or not; (ii) his creeping holism and behaviourism; (iii) his arguments against individualist psychology; (iv) his favorable position toward the intentional stance (on pragmatic grounds) - even though he does not fully support an intentional psychology as a scientific psychology; and finally (v) his linking the assumption of intentionality with the assumption of rationality, via the principle of charity. See Sterelny, op. tit., 1990, pp. 93-96; for some critical discussion of Dennett's views. 40. See Dennett, op. cit., 1978, pp. 4-7; 1987; see also J. Fodor, Psychological Explanation (New York: Random House, 1968); Representations (Cambridge, MA: M/T Press, 1981); "Precis of the Modularity of Mind." Behavioral and Brain Sciences 8 (1985): 1-42. It might be worthwhile exploring the positions that various psychological theories (e.g., behaviorism, eliminative materialism, Wundtian introspectionism, Freudianism, etc.) take concerning (i)-(v). 41. See Gardner, op. tit., 1985, pp. 78-86. 42. See Heidegger, Being and Time (New York: Harper & Row, 1962); A. Schutz, The Structures of the Life-World (Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1973); A. Gurwitsch, The Field of Consciousness (Pittsburgh: Duquesne University Press, 1964); Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Phenomenology of Perception (London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1962); The Primacy of Perception
197 (Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1964). For some details along this line, see H. Dreyfus, "Phenomenology and Artificial Intelligence," in J. Edie, ed., Phenomenology in America (Chicago: Quadragle Books, 1967), pp. 31-47; "Why Computers Must Have Bodies In Order To Be Intelligent?" Review of Metaphysics 11.1 (1967): 11-32. 43. See Dennett, 1987, p. 153. In this respect, one should note the objection formulated by Searle, according to which hetero-phenomenology leaves the real problems of consciousness untouched, because it starts out from the thirdperson point of view. "Remember, Searle admonishes, in these discussions, [we ought to] always insist on the first person point of view. The first step in the operationalist sleight of hand occurs when we try to figure out how we would know what it would be like for others" ("Minds, Brains and Program," The Behavioural and Brain Sciences 3 (1980): 417-457; 451; my additions). Dennett clearly disagrees with Searle's objection, as he argues in his recent work (1991, pp. 95-98). And so, the debate on this score is far from being conclusive. 44. See H. Dreyfus, "A Critique of Artificial Reason," in F. J. Crosson, ed., Human and Artificial Intelligence (New York: Appleton-Century Crofts, 1970), pp. 159-175; What Computers Can't Do? A Critique of Artificial Reason (New York: Harper & Row, 1972/1979); "From Micro-Worlds to Knowledge Representation: AI at an Impasse," in J. Haugeland, ed., Mind Design (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1981), pp. 161-204; "Introduction," in Husserl, Intentionality and Cognitive Science (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1982), pp. 1-27; "Misrepresenting Human Intelligence," in R. Born, ed., Artificial Intelligence: The Case Against (1987). See also J. Searle, Minds, Brains and Science (Boston: Harvard University, 1984); finally, see note 27.
