174 Giacomo Romano
though sometimes (cf. Kelemen 1999) we may have been willing to claim this. Likewise,
we usually take for granted the fact that the function of a glass is to contain a liquid: the
glass is for containing liquids, though we are not eager to claim that the glass causes a
liquid containment. In fact we may need to know the causal properties of the glass in
order to understand its function. We may, for instance, need to know that a glass has to
be made of waterproof material and that it has to have a solid, hollow, and compact struc-
ture. These properties can be considered necessary to cause the containment of liquids and
other incoherent substances. That is, we know that if an object, for example, a toy sponge
glass, does not possess these properties, it cannot be a glass. Possessing the concept of
“causality” is perhaps necessary to know for-ness; it is defi nitely not suffi cient.
The other condition presupposed by cognitive psychologists to account for for-ness, that
is, the mastery of a metaintentional capacity, is unnecessary and insuffi cient. Apparently
according to some intuitions as well as to a more theoretical bias, there is agency underly-
ing design, and “design” is the key concept that makes sense of functions and, more gener-
ally, of for-ness. Whenever a certain item is conceived as being for something, the hidden
hand of some agent is presupposed. An agent is supposed to have designed that item for
the purpose of being for something. The presupposition of an agency behind for-ness
requires that those who recognize that a certain entity is for something are able to ascribe
intentionality to the putative author who has designed it. For this reason, recognizing for-
ness involves a metaintentional capacity. Such an idea is the starting point for the hypoth-
eses of both German and Defeyter and Kelemen and Carey, and in a less immediate way,
for the original Dennettian idea of the Stance of Design.
Indeed Dennett has stretched the concept of “design” based on the concept of “designer”
far enough to identify Mother Nature as being a designer, that is, an intentional agent. He
does describe the design of Mother Nature in a somewhat metaphorical way, so that Mother
Nature is to be perceived as if she were a designer, even though she is not; but he does
not clearly defi ne the terms of his metaphor. Thus there is no clearness about what he
means by “designer” and “design” when he refers to nature and its work with intentional
concepts.
In fact the observation based on our experience of human facts can provide some ground
for the inference that each object produced by humans is there for a reason and is therefore
also made by someone. Yet there are no justifi ed steps that endorse the inference that
since human-made things are made for a reason, any object, also in nature, is made by
someone because it is made for something. Undoubtedly the lexicon used to describe
natural phenomena in terms of “design” and “designer” is charged with a heavy load of
intentionality, which is introduced by the kinship of these notions with the conception of
agency, and usually involves conscious deliberation. But nature does not consciously
deliberate; to describe natural facts with intentional jargon is deceptive because it improp-
erly depicts nature as an intentional subject. Nature is more properly described in raw
causal terms.