The Philosophy of Daniel Dennett

401 Pages·2018·23.73 MB·English

by  Bryce Huebner

THE PHILOSOPHY OF DANIEL DENNETT

THE PHILOSOPHY
OF DANIEL DENNETT
Edited by Bryce Huebner
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CONTENTS
Acknowledgments vii
List of Contributors ix
Introduction: Dennettian Themes Will Not Go Away—bryce huebner xi
PART I Person- Level and Subpersonal Explanations 
1.1 Embodied Stances: Realism Without Literalism—Rebecca Kukla 3
1.2 Reflections on Rebecca Kukla—Daniel C. Dennett 32
2.1 The Many Roles of the Intentional Stance—Tadeusz Zawidzki 36
2.2 Reflections on Tadeusz Zawidzki—Daniel C. Dennett 57
3.1 Memory and the Intentional Stance—Felipe De Brigard 62
3.2 Reflections on Felipe De Brigard—Daniel C. Dennett 92
4.1 Representations and Rules in Language—Ray Jackendoff 95
4.2 Reflections on Ray Jackendoff—Daniel C. Dennett 127
PART II Conscious Experience 
5.1 Seeming to Seem—David Rosenthal 133
5.2 Reflections on David Rosenthal—Daniel C. Dennett 165
6.1 Is Consciousness a Trick or a Treat?—Jesse Prinz 171
6.2 Reflections on Jesse Prinz—Daniel C. Dennett 196
vi • Contents
7.1 Strange Inversions: Prediction and the Explanation
of Conscious Experience—Andy Clark 202
7.2 Reflections on Andy Clark—Daniel C. Dennett 219
PART III Evolution, Sociality, and Agency 
8.1 Towers and Trees in Cognitive
Evolution—Peter Godfrey-S mith 225
8.2 Reflections on Peter Godfrey- Smith—Daniel C. Dennett 250
9.1 Mother Culture, Meet Mother Nature—Luc Faucher
and Pierre Poirier 254
9.2 Reflections on Luc Faucher and Pierre Poirier—Daniel C. Dennett 290
10.1 Planning and Prefigurative Politics: The Nature of Freedom and
the Possibility of Control—Bryce Huebner 295
10.2 Reflections on Bryce Huebner—Daniel C. Dennett 328
11.1 Dennett on Breaking the Spell—Lynne Rudder Baker 331
11.2 Reflections on Lynne Rudder Baker—Daniel C. Dennett 345
Index 355
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This anthology has been in the works for quite a while, and I have accumulated
a great many debts in the course of editing it. First, I would like to thank Peter
Ohlin at Oxford University Press for taking on this project, and for nudging
it along when it seemed to be running into roadblocks. Second, I would like
to thank all the amazing people who contributed to this volume. The level of
engagement with Dennett’s work is astounding, and I have learned a great deal
from reading these essays! I hope that others will learn as much— as I think that
each of the contributions opens up numerous avenues for exploring the terrain
of Darwinian humanism, my preferred term for Dennett’s theoretical enterprise
(the section on consciousness is missing one planned article; the world conspired
against its completion, and I flag it only because it feels to me like a hole). I would
also like to thank everyone who served as external referees for the papers in this
volume; this includes Cameron Buckner, Ruth Kramer, Rebecca Kukla, Pete
Mandik, Amber Ross, Carl Sachs, and Tad Zawidzki; Felipe De Brigard deserves
a special acknowledgment in this regard, as he went above and beyond the call of
duty, reading multiple papers and offering deeply insightful comments on things
that I would have missed. I hope that I haven’t forgotten anyone.
Finally, and most importantly, I would like to thank Dan Dennett. His reflec-
tions here are characteristically insightful, and some of them open up exciting and
fruitful avenues for future investigations. Many of them point to new ideas that
he has developed in his new book, From Bacteria to Bach and Back. Having read a
draft of the manuscript, I can confirm that Dennett is pushing his project forward
and building on exactly the kinds of insights that his friends and critics have been
pushing him on. Dan has been an amazing mentor to me over the years. He has
introduced me to an incredible number of new ideas, supported me intellectually
and as a friend, and he has taught me about the importance of criticizing with
kindness. Just as importantly, Dennett has helped me to see that philosophers can
look ahead, chart out new territories, and uncover previously unacknowledged
possibilities. This is the deeply Darwinian insight that lies at the heart of the philo-
sophical project; and it’s also the reason why Dennettian themes will not go away.

CONTRIBUTORS
Lynne Rudder Baker Bryce Huebner
University of Massachusetts at Georgetown University.
Amherst.
Ray Jackendoff
Felipe De Brigard Tufts University.
Duke University.
Rebecca Kukla
Andy Clark Georgetown University.
University of Edinburgh.
Pierre Poirier
Université du Québec à Montréal.
Daniel C. Dennett
Tufts University. Jesse Prinz
Graduate Center, CUNY.
Luc Faucher
Université du Québec à Montréal. David Rosenthal
Graduate Center, CUNY.
Peter Godfrey- Smith
University of Sydney and Graduate Tadeusz Zawidzki
Center, CUNY. George Washington University.