Third-Person Self-Knowledge, Self-Interpretation, and Narrative

227 Pages·2018·2.37 MB·English

by  Patrizia Pedrini, Julie Kirsch

Contributions To Phenomenology 96
Patrizia Pedrini · Julie Kirsch Editors
Third-Person
Self-Knowledge,
Self-Interpretation,
and Narrative
Contributions To Phenomenology
In Cooperation with The Center
for Advanced Research in Phenomenology
Volume 96
Series Editors
Nicolas de Warren, KU Leuven, Belgium
Ted Toadvine, Pennsylvania State University, PA, USA
Editorial Board
Lilian Alweiss, Trinity College Dublin, Ireland
Elizabeth Behnke, Ferndale, WA, USA
Rudolf Bernet, Husserl Archive, KU Leuven, Belgium
David Carr, Emory University, GA, USA
Chan-Fai Cheung, Chinese University Hong Kong, China
James Dodd, New School University, NY, USA
Lester Embree, Florida Atlantic University, FL, USA
Alfredo Ferrarin, Università di Pisa, Italy
Burt Hopkins, University of Lille, France
José Huertas-Jourda, Wilfrid Laurier University, Canada
Kwok-Ying Lau, Chinese University Hong Kong, China
Nam-In Lee, Seoul National University, Korea
Rosemary R.P. Lerner, Pontifcia Universidad Católica del Perú, Peru
Dieter Lohmar, University of Cologne, Germany
William R. McKenna, Miami University, OH, USA
Algis Mickunas, Ohio University, OH, USA
J.N. Mohanty, Temple University, PA, USA
Junichi Murata, University of Tokyo, Japan
Thomas Nenon, The University of Memphis, TN, USA
Thomas M. Seebohm, Johannes Gutenberg-Universität, Germany
Gail Soffer, Rome, Italy
Anthony Steinbock, Southern Illinois University at Carbondale, IL, USA
Shigeru Taguchi, Hokkaido University, Japan
Dan Zahavi, University of Copenhagen, Denmark
Richard M. Zaner, Vanderbilt University, TN, USA
Scope
The purpose of the series is to serve as a vehicle for the pursuit of phenomenological
research across a broad spectrum, including cross-over developments with other
felds of inquiry such as the social sciences and cognitive science. Since its
establishment in 1987, Contributions to Phenomenology has published more than
80 titles on diverse themes of phenomenological philosophy. In addition to
welcoming monographs and collections of papers in established areas of scholarship,
the series encourages original work in phenomenology. The breadth and depth of
the Series refects the rich and varied signifcance of phenomenological thinking for
seminal questions of human inquiry as well as the increasingly international reach
of phenomenological research.
The series is published in cooperation with The Center for Advanced Research in
Phenomenology.
More information about this series at http://www.springer.com/series/5811
Patrizia Pedrini • Julie Kirsch
Editors
Third-Person
Self-Knowledge,
Self-Interpretation,
and Narrative
Editors
Patrizia Pedrini Julie Kirsch
Department of Letters and Philosophy Department of Liberal Arts
University of Florence D’Youville College
Florence, Italy Buffalo, New York, USA
ISSN 0923-9545 ISSN 2215-1915 (electronic)
Contributions To Phenomenology
ISBN 978-3-319-98644-9 ISBN 978-3-319-98646-3 (eBook)
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-98646-3
Library of Congress Control Number: 2018958002
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Preface
S elf-Knowledge: A Plea for Closer Dialogue
1
Between the Analytic Tradition and Phenomenology
This is a book about a much thrown-around topic in analytic philosophy of mind
and epistemology: self-knowledge. In particular, it focuses on third-person self-
knowledge, that is, the kind of self-knowledge that a subject can achieve by taking
into account the evidence offered by his or her verbal and/or non-verbal behavior,
and his or her other mental states. Such evidence can help the subject reach a knowl-
edge that he or she could not access directly, without inference from the evidence.
When a subject is able to access directly his or her own mental states, he or she is
said to have frst-person self-knowledge. Our project is to investigate third-person
self-k nowledge rather than frst-person self-knowledge because the literature has
devoted comparatively less attention to the former. Furthermore, third-person self-
knowledge shows interesting connections with self-interpretation and narrative that
should be explored. For when a subject has to assess the evidence offered by his or
her verbal and/or nonverbal behavior, and his or her other mental states, in order to
get to know what mental states he or she really has, a certain amount of interpreta-
tive work has to be done, and relying on narratives is part of the rationalizing opera-
tion to which evidence can be subjected. All this will be explained at length in Chap.
1, and more specifcally throughout the contributions assembled in the book.
However, although this is a book primarily inspired by the methodology with
which analytic philosophy of mind and epistemology address the topic, our explora-
tion of the connection between third-person self-knowledge, self-interpretation, and
narrative brings to light important overlaps with analogous topics discussed in other
philosophical traditions — phenomenology, in particular. None of the chapters
engage directly with it, so a systematic comparison of that overlap is not part of this
project, even if some chapters, as the reader will see, appeal to traditions that are not
1 The preface’s author is Patrizia Pedrini. Julie Kirsch offered useful comments and approved it
as coeditor of the book.
v
vi Preface
simply contemporary analytic philosophy of mind and epistemology, but rather
hermeneutics, cognitive science, and psychoanalysis. Virtually all contributions,
however, more or less tacitly assume the analytic methodology. Yet all readers who
are familiar with the phenomenological tradition will fnd that the topics addressed
in the book can be of the utmost interest for the scholarship of phenomenology. A
few words on how related studies in phenomenology address some of the general
issues that this book tackles are thus in order. While doing this, we will try to offer
some thematic and terminological clarifcations, which may be useful for seeing
exactly what it is that phenomenology tends to study, what the analytic tradition
may be taken to add or, more specifcally, focus on, and how and why both disci-
plines might beneft from more direct cooperation with a view to reaching a better
understanding of the phenomenon of self-knowledge as a whole.
Prominent in the phenomenological tradition is the discussion of phenomena
referred to, respectively, as consciousness and self-consciousness. Although it may
be immediately apparent that consciousness and self-consciousness importantly
bear on self-knowledge, we should not assume without argument that the focus is
exactly the same, even if most theories regarding consciousness and self-
consciousness that are offered in the phenomenological tradition are highly instruc-
tive and can easily become very fruitful in terms of advancing analytic philosophy
2
of mind. First, what in phenomenology goes under the name of consciousness is
often the so-called pre-refective consciousness, while the so-called refective self-
consciousness is a more advanced state of mind, involving more complex psycho-
3
logical capacities. Pre-refective consciousness is analyzed as an intrinsic feature of
any felt experience a subject may go through. Among them there may not be states
to which analytic philosophy of mind tends to attach phenomenal qualities, the
“what it is like” to have them, such as sensations. In phenomenology, the quality of
being “experienced” seems to be attached to much more than sensations. Be that as
it may, the felt experience is given to the subject in an already structured form, in
4
ways to be qualifed, including intentionality, or directedness at an object. The pre-
refective experience is not, however, typically refected upon — that is, it is not
typically thematized by the subject having it, it is not “objectual” to itself. It is a
very primary form of consciousness, and there need not be any higher-order mental
5
state (be it perceptual or thought) making it conscious as such.
2
A valuable attempt to show the fruitfulness of dialogue between philosophy of mind and phenom-
enology is offered by Gallagher & Zahavi, 2007. In Chap. 3 they develop a detailed overview of
the topic of consciousness and self-consciousness in phenomenology.
3
Recently, Moran (2017) has discussed Husserl’s project of transcendental self-knowledge, with
clarifcations about the bearing of such discussion on the phenomenon of pre-refective and refec-
tive awareness.
4
It should be noted that when the term “intentionality” is used in philosophy of mind, it can have
two meanings depending on the context: either it refers to the capacity of a subject to conceive
voluntary actions or it can refer to the directedness at content that a mental state can have. The
latter meaning is close to what phenomenology calls “intentionality.”
5
Cf. Gallagher & Zahavi, 2007, Chap. 3.
Preface vii
Yet consciousness can be said to qualify as self-conscious in a weak sense in so
far as the subject’s experience occurs within the frst-person perspective. The frst-
person perspective that is relevant here is itself a weak frst-person perspective, as it
does not involve the capacity of the subject to attribute said experience to him- or
herself via a conceptual, linguistic, and/or refective act. But it counts as a frst-
person form of consciousness because the subject experiences it as his or her own
(see Gallagher & Zahavi 2007; see also Pedrini 2015a, 2015b for failures of the
sense of “mine-ness” in abnormal conditions of otherwise conscious thoughts).
In order for a subject to be able to attribute the experience to him- or herself in
conceptual form, refection must come in: whenever a subject takes his or her felt
experience as the object of his or her refection, and tries to interpret or ponder it,
the subject is engaging in refective self-consciousness, this time within a strong
frst-person perspective (see Baker 2000, 2007, 2013).
As we have said, according to phenomenology, pre-refective consciousness is
not unstructured. Rather, it proves to be already signifcant, that is, it proves to have
an internal structure that is conferred upon it by the very subject’s interaction with
the physical and/or social world, as well as by his or her being an incarnate subject,
a subject with a highly specifc psychological constitution and a narrative identity.
This directly stems from a conviction widely voiced by phenomenology, according
to which experience displays essential characteristics that can be investigated by a
6
very precise philosophical methodology.
Of course, the subject may not be thematically aware of such structure at the time
of its occurrence. And it is not clear that, while making it the object of the subject’s
refection, the structure can be refected upon without distortion or loss. Husserl
(1966a, 1966b, 1973, 1984) and other leading phenomenologists (Sartre 1956,
1957; Merleau-Ponty 1962) discuss this at length, showing an awareness of topics
that analytic philosophy of mind has come to discuss much later. In particular, it will
strike the reader that some of the frontier topics discussed in this book have their
precedents in the phenomenological tradition, such as the analysis of the knowledge
we can obtain of our own “internal evidence,” which amounts to conscious states
that become the object of our own self-interpretative endeavors (they are discussed
by Coliva, Chap. 2, and Pedrini Chap. 4), or the knowledge we can obtain of other
conscious mental states we may have, such as intuition (see McGahhey and
Leeuwen, Chap. 5), memories (see Kirsch, Chap. 6 ), and so on.
Husserl and others were also interested in understanding how self-consciousness
stems from pre-refective consciousness, but overall it might not be unfair to say that
analytic philosophy of mind and epistemology have raised very troublesome episte-
mological questions connected with how we get to know what we feel, think, desire,
intend, and so on. This focus on epistemology may not be immediately apparent
when one pays heed to the phenomenological literature on self-consciousness.
6
It would be interesting to explain further the details of phenomenological analysis, including the
methodology of the “epochè,” etc. Addressing this issue, however, would lead us too far from our
present purposes.
viii Preface
Admittedly, most phenomenologists think that pre-refective consciousness is a
necessary, though not suffcient condition of self-consciousness, and that it can
hardly amount to a form of knowledge. Some have clearly maintained that it is not
transparent (see Ricour 1966; Sartre 1956). What seems to be agreed upon, how-
ever, is that the endeavor of refectively articulating our pre-refective conscious
experience requires interpretation. This is one of the most interesting overlaps with
the focus of this book. When philosophy of mind and epistemology discuss third-
person self-knowledge, as the reader will see, they try precisely to explain how we
can get to know some of our mental states that are not transparent to us, or not
immediately identifed and conceptualized by the subject having them, so that self-
interpretation comes in.
Third-person self-knowledge of already conscious mental states, which requires
interpretation, is a somehow quite new issue in philosophy in mind. For several
decades, third-person self-knowledge was mainly considered to have its main focus
on verbal and non-verbal behavior, or on unconscious mental states. On this specifc
aspect we think that closer dialogue between the two traditions should be initiated,
as it could be most fruitful to both. Although this book does not develop this dia-
logue as such, we strongly encourage its opening.
An invitation to cooperate also comes from other projects and studies. Some are
derived from historically minded researches that have shown that phenomenology
and analytic philosophy have a common root. Famously, Michael Dummett (1993)
suggested that it was time for scholars to overcome any ideological barrier viewing
analytic philosophy and phenomenology as strongly opposed and conceived as sep-
arate traditions. The idea that philosophy of mind, in particular, has little in common
with a tradition, sometimes referred to as the “continental” tradition, that started
with Franz Brentano, was then developed by Edmund Husserl, and later on followed
7
by Martin Heidegger, Jean-Paul Sartre, and Maurice Merleau-Ponty, was mainly
guided by unilateral interpretations of the history, leading projects, methodologies,
and concepts used in both traditions. However, Husserl has also inspired leading
analytic philosophers such as Rudolf Carnap, Gilbert Ryle, Wilfrid Sellars, Hilary
8
Putnam, John Searle, and Jerry Fodor. One of the reasons that may have led schol-
ars to neglect this infuence is the fact that phenomenology is often — wrongly —
associated with “introspectionism,” whose rejection was the central intellectual
program of analytic philosophy at its outset. But all those acquainted with phenom-
enology are aware that phenomenology is not the heir of the introspectionist
approach. This prejudice has been an impediment to a correct reading of both tradi-
tions and an obstacle to cooperation between them as well.
7
In the Italian edition of The Phenomenological Mind by Gallagher and Zahavi, which I translated
(2009), I wrote an “Afterword” in which I drew an outline of those historiographical studies, cf.
Pedrini 2009a.
8
For the relation between Husserl and Carnap, see M. Friedman 1999; between Husserl and Ryle,
see Livingston 2005, Thomasson 2002, pp. 115–142; between Sellars and Husserl, see Thomasson
2005; between Husserl and Putnam, see Putnam 1981, 1983, 1987; between Husserl and Searle,
see Mulligan 2003, pp. 261–286, and Dreyfus 2000, pp. 287–302. See also Fodor 1982, pp. 277–
303 for the relation between Fodor and Husserl.
Preface ix
In recent years several scholars have attempted to remedy this by encouraging
9
integration and collaboration between the two traditions. Some of these attempts
emphasized how “anti-psychologism,” that is, the independence of logic from the
psychic sphere, was a goal common to both traditions. Both Husserl and Frege took
this idea from Hermann Lotze, under whom Frege studied in Göttingen and to
whom Husserl dedicated his Logical Investigations (2001). Lotze, inspired by Kant
and elaborating further on Plato’s theories of ideas, was engaged in a struggle
against widespread nineteenth-century naturalism. He explained how several
notions, including the notion of a priori, fully escape a purely psychological treat-
ment. While Frege elected language as the medium between mind and logical
objects, Husserl developed the idea that judgments and logical structures are already
prepared by experience itself, that is, contents of thought and their logical relations
are objectively present in experience before linguistic thought and propositional
10
attitudes capture them. Thus, since its very beginning, phenomenology attempted
to study the mind by approaching it with a non-psychologistic and non-naturalistic
method, with the same spirit with which analytic philosophy rejected introspection-
ism. Well before the Vienna Circle, logical empiricism and positivism, Franz
Brentano had tried to open up a new approach to psychology. In his Psychology
from an Empirical Standpoint (1973), Brentano expressed dissatisfaction with the
11
idea that the mind was to be studied through a sort of “inner observation.” For this
reason, he drew an important distinction between what he dubbed “genetic psychol-
ogy” and “descriptive psychology”: while the former is described as the empirical
study of mental phenomena through experiments and statistical methodology, which
make it possible to elaborate laws and causal explanations, the latter is not aimed at
fnding any cause-effect laws, or at any psychological episode in particular. Rather,
it tries to distinguish and classify basic kinds of mental phenomena by fnding their
essential characteristics and mutual relations. Thus, a central focus of Husserl’s
Logical Investigations (2001), directly stemming from Brentano’s ideas, is the cata-
loguing of mental states and the answering of questions such as “What is a percep-
tion, a judgment, an emotion?”, “What is the relation between emotion and
judgment?”, “What is it that makes an emotion regret?”, and so on. In this way,
Brentano’s descriptive psychology precedes genetic psychology, in so far as study-
ing the causes of a perception, an emotion, a memory, etc. presupposes that we
understand what seeing, remembering, feeling, etc. are. Husserl made it clear that
this approach has nothing to do with introspection. Rather, it is the study of the
essences of mental states.
9
See Føllesdal 1958; Monthly 1982, 1985; Willard 1984; Sommer 1985; Cobb-Stevens 1990;
Smith 1982.
10
In the analytic tradition, there seems to be a primacy of the predicative form of thought over the
non-predicative form. Tugendhat (1976, pp. 94) claims that this is the major difference between the
analytic tradition and phenomenology.
11
In Pedrini (2009b) I analyzed the Cartesian model of self-knowledge vis-à-vis the observational
perceptual models of it. I tried to explain to what extent the perceptual model of self-knowledge
could be derived from the Cartesian model of self-knowledge, although the latter has been gener-
ally taken to be opposed to it.