cannot have their contents individuated in terms of evolutionary function,
contrary to what the teleo-semanticist claims.
The point just made can also be put by saying:psychology is not a
historical science– psychology is interested in the present, and the way in
which our mindsnowoperate, not in the past, or the way in which our
minds got that way. (Even so-called ‘evolutionary psychology’ looks to the
past primarily to gain clues as to the modular structure of present mental
functioning. See Barkowet al., 1992. The fact that a science employs
historical methods or arguments does not make it a historical one in the
sense of employinghistorical principles of individuation.) So the notion of
function employed in psychology should be an a-historical, non-evolution-
ary one. Equally, one can say that physiology is not a historical science
either; its interest in hearts is an interest in what heartsnowdo. And note
that those who think that all functions are evolutionary will have to say
that Swampman lacks a heart too!
If teleo-semanticists insist that the content of a representation can derive
only from a function which has been selected for, then they are landed with
further awkward consequences. It is, for example, a matter of considerable
controversy within psychology and linguistics, whether our innate lan-
guage faculty was selected for and has a (historical) function – with
Chomsky and others lining up on one side, and Pinker and others on the
other. (Chomsky, 1988, thinks that our capacity for language may be some
sort of by-product of having a big brain; see Pinker and Bloom, 1990, and
Pinker, 1994, for the contrary case.) Yet both sides in this debate insist that
the language faculty contains innaterepresentations. Now on this matter
our own sympathies are veryWrmly with Pinker, that the language-system
hasevolved. But it would be strange indeed, if what looked like a substan-
tive scientiWc debate turned out to be trivially resolvable by philosophers,
on the grounds that the very property ofbeing a representationpresup-
poses a historical function.
Note that this objection does not involve a covert return to the idea that
teleo-semantics is being put forward as a piece ofa prioriconceptual
analysis. No, we allow that teleo-semantics is produced by philosophical
reXection in the light of substantive background beliefs, also – and crucial-
ly – involving reXection on the commitments of scientiWc practice in the
area. Our point is that since there is a substantive scientiWc debate over the
question whether the innate representations of the language-faculty have
evolved, those engaged in this debate cannot be believing that represen-
tational content is individuated in terms of selectional history, on pain of
irrationality. The debate on this issue suggests that thescientiWcnotion of
content cannot be a teleo-functional one, any more than is the folk-
psychological notion teleological.
174 Content naturalised