- seCtIon sIx: seLF AnD otHeR
This is the attitude that Dennett urges us to adopt in his
method of heterophenomenology. It ‘neither challenges
nor accepts as entirely true the assertions of subjects, but
rather maintains a constructive and sympathetic neu-
trality, in the hopes of compiling a definitive description
of the world according to the subjects’ (1991, p. 83). The
people being studied may, like the Feenomanists, protest
‘But Feenoman is real’, ‘I really am having these qualia’, to
which you, the heterophenomenologist, can only nod
and reassure them that you believe they are sincere. This,
says Dennett, is the price we have to pay for the neu-
trality that a science of consciousness demands. While
heterophenomenologists accept people’s descriptions of
how things seem to them, ‘we have to keep an open mind
about whether our apparent subjects are liars, zombies,
or parrots dressed up in people suits’ (p. 83). An interesting comparison here is
that while traditional phenomenology remains agnostic about the reality of the
world, heterophenomenology remains agnostic about the reality of conscious
experiences.
What does this mean in practice? Dennett describes the method in three
steps. First, the data are collected. These might include brain scans, button
presses, or people’s descriptions of mental images or emotions. Second, the
data are interpreted. This step is unavoidable, and might include turning the
brain scans into coloured pictures, relating the button presses to the stimuli
presented, and turning the speech sounds into words that we write down
and understand as descriptions of mental images. Third, and this is the cru-
cial step, we adopt the intentional stance (Chapter 10). That is, we treat our
informant as a rational agent who has beliefs, desires, and intentionality. We
allow that she pressed the button because she wanted to tell us that she saw
the green blob, and spoke those words because she was trying to describe her
complex mental image or the powerful emotion she felt when you showed
her that picture.
There may be inconsistencies that have to be investigated or ironed out, but in
spite of these difficulties the method leads easily enough to the creation of a
believable fiction: the subject’s heterophenomenological world.
This fictional world is populated with all the images, events, sounds,
smells, hunches, presentiments, and feelings that the subject (apparently)
sincerely believes to exist in his or her (or its) stream of consciousness.
Maximally extended, it is a neutral portrayal of exactly what it is like to be
that subject – in the subject’s own terms, given the best interpretation we
can muster.
(Dennett, 1991, p. 98)According to Dennett, this is the basic method that has always been used in the
science of psychology, and he has not invented it but merely explained its ratio-
nale. Others claim that this kind of suspension of belief in the truth value of intro-
spective reports is not as mainstream in the study of consciousness as Dennett
makes out (e.g. van de Laar, 2008).WHAT IS IT LIKE TO BE
YOU, ALONE?FIGURE 17.5 • The feenomanologist collects his
data from the Feenomanists.