Books by michelle montague
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Papers by michelle montague
Sensations, Thoughts, Language: Essays in honor of Brian Loar, 2020
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Rethinking the Attitudes, 2022
Many mental states exhibit intentionality, the property of being about something, or of something... more Many mental states exhibit intentionality, the property of being about something, or of something in the sense of 'of ' exemplified by phrases like 'a view of Florence' or 'an account of the Battle of the Bulge'. Paradigm cases of intentional mental states include beliefs, desires, thoughts, hopes, fears, supposings, wonderings. Thus we say that a believes that p, fears that q, wonders whether r. The overall metaphysical situation seems plain. There is the subject, there is the content of the subject's mental state, and there is the subject's attitude to the content, the attitude that makes the mental state the particular kind of mental state it is-a belief, a want, a fear. The attitude/content distinction is standardly taken to be sharp: the attitude is no part of the content. The having of the attitude and the having in mind of the content are of course both properties of the subject, but the attitude is no part of the content. The standard account of the attitude/content distinction takes it (explicitly or implicitly) that the attitude is a relation of the subject to a content, and cannot therefore be part of the content. This is the orthodox picture. It is neat, natural, useful, and unproblematic for many purposes. I want nevertheless to question it. My primary concern is metaphysical; it is not clear to me that the correct (or best) description of the metaphysical nature of an intentional mental state should distinguish three elements in this way. In particular, it is not clear that it should treat the attitude/content distinction as sharp in this way. It may be said that one can endorse the orthodox view without taking on any such metaphysical commitment. It seems to me, however, that a leading version of the orthodox view does carry such a commitment, and this is what I'm going to discuss and challenge in what follows. I'll call it the 'Tripartite view' to signal its commitment to the three-part structure.
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Many contemporary philosophers have been concerned about whether there is a fundamental distincti... more Many contemporary philosophers have been concerned about whether there is a fundamental distinction between perception and cognition. Although I do not think there is a fundamental distinction between perception and cognition, at least given what I take perception to be, I do think there is a fundamental distinction between sense and cognition, which I will argue is best understood in terms of a distinction between two irreducible kinds of phenomenology: sensory and cognitive.
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In this paper the author discusses and defends a theory of consciousness inspired by Franz Brenta... more In this paper the author discusses and defends a theory of consciousness inspired by Franz Brentano, according to which every conscious experience involves a certain kind of immediate awareness of itself. All conscious experience is in a certain fundamental sense 'self-intimating'—it constitutively involves awareness of that very awareness. The author calls this 'the awareness of awareness thesis' , and she calls the phenomenon that it concerns 'awareness of awareness' (aoa for short). The author attempts to give a substantive description of what aoa consists in in two ways, first, by listing some of its positive features, and second, by comparing it and contrasting it with introspec-tion. The idea is that there are many different ways we can be aware of our experiences, introspection being one way, aoa being another, distinct way. By clarifying the distinction between aoa and introspection, we can get a better grasp of both phenomena. Keywords consciousness – awareness of awareness – introspection – phenomenological phenomena
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In this paper I respond to Martina and Wimmer's review of The Given, focusing on their criticisms... more In this paper I respond to Martina and Wimmer's review of The Given, focusing on their criticisms of the awareness of awareness thesis. The Given is an attempt to characterize essential features of what is given to us in experience. I argue that this characterization must appeal to three irreducible sui generis kinds of phenomenology: sensory, cognitive, and evaluative. Sensory phenomenology, familiarly, is the kind of phenomenology typically associated with our five sensory modalities (e.g., what it's like to see colors, hear sounds, feel textures, etc.), but also includes interoceptive phenomenology (e.g., bodily sensations). Cognitive phenomenology is a kind of phenomenology that is essentially over and above sensory phenomenology and is paradigmatically associated with conscious thought (although it is also present in cases of conscious perception and emotion). Evaluative phenomenology is a kind of phenomenology that emotional experiences have in virtue of being experiences of value or what we take to be of value. I argue that reference to each of these three kinds of phenomenology is necessary if one is to give an adequate account of human life. I don't, however, claim that this list is exhaustive. Understanding how phenomenology features in conscious experience requires understanding the nature of conscious experience itself, and in particular, the way in which consciousness is a self-intimating phenomenon. It is self-intimating in the sense that conscious awareness always involves – constitutively involves – an awareness of that very awareness. I call this the awareness of awareness thesis, and the phenomenon it concerns awareness of awareness (AOA). Franz Brentano is prominent among those who have argued for this thesis, and I call the overall view defended in the book " Brentanian " because it is inspired in part by his work. What (exactly) is the AOA thesis and why believe it? My attempt to answer these questions is the focus of Martina and Wimmer's insightful and rigorous review, and I will restrict my discussion accordingly.
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In this paper I consider Franz Brentano's theory of emotion. I focus on three of its central clai... more In this paper I consider Franz Brentano's theory of emotion. I focus on three of its central claims: (i) emotions are sui generis intentional phenomena; (ii) emotions are essentially evaluative phenomena; (iii) emotions provide the basis of an epistemology of objective value. I argue that all three claims are correct, and I weave together Brentano's arguments with some of my own to support them. In the course of defending these claims, Brentano argues that 'feeling and will' are united into the same fundamental class. I summarize two of his arguments for this claim, what I call 'the nature of desire' argument and 'the transition' argument. I show how a central plank of these arguments relies crucially on Brentano's epistemology of value. INTRODUCTION In this paper I consider Franz Brentano's theory of emotion. My interest is mainly philosophical, rather than historical, and I argue that his theory contains many correct insights about the nature of emotion. I focus on three of its central claims:
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In this paper I consider the uses to which certain psychological phe-nomena—e.g. cases of seeing ... more In this paper I consider the uses to which certain psychological phe-nomena—e.g. cases of seeing as, and linguistic understanding—are put in the debate about cognitive phenomenology. I argue that we need clear definitions of the terms 'sensory phenomenology' and 'cognitive phenomenology' in order to understand the import of these phenomena. I make a suggestion about the best way to define these key terms, and, in the light of it, show how one influential argument against cognitive phenomenology fails.
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Interpreted logical forms (ILFs) are part of providing a purely extensional semantics for proposi... more Interpreted logical forms (ILFs) are part of providing a purely extensional semantics for propositional-attitude reports. According to ILF theories, propositional-attitude verbs (e.g., believe, desire, think, hope) express relations between agents and ILFs. The ‘logical form’ part of an ILF is, roughly, a sentential complement (a syntactic item), which typically takes one of the following forms: ‘a is F,’ ‘a’s being F,’ or ‘that a is F.’ (Lexical items are part of an expression’s logical form.) The ‘interpretation part’ of an ILF is the assignment of referents to parts of the sentential complement.
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Books by michelle montague
Papers by michelle montague
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