Biological Approaches to Mental Representation 553second here for illustrative purposes.
If we think of functions as selected dispositions, we can suggest that the content
of a representation,R, is not what causesRs so much as whatRs have the function
of being caused by. The idea is better expressed in terms of the functions of the
mechanisms that produce the representations. For instance, we might suggest that
R-representations refer toCs if certain mechanisms were adapted for responding
toCs by producingRs, or in other words if they were (in part) selected for their
disposition to be caused byCs to produceRs. My perceptual mechanisms plau-
sibly have the function of producing CATs in response to cats but they do not
plausibly have the function of producing CATs in response to newspapers. In this
way we have a way of explaining why CATs refer to cats and not newspapers,
despite the fact that both of them can cause CATs.
This is at best a second step (and it might be a misstep) toward a more complete
theory. Many problems remain. In the last section I outline a few of them,
along with some possible responses. However, this simple teleosemantic theory
illustrates an important insight, which is that by employing a descriptive notion
of a natural function, we can start to provide a distinction – a descriptive and
scientifically respectable distinction — between what happens in representational
systems and what is, so to speak, “supposed” to happen — we can start to develop
the beginnings of a naturalistic analysis, in other words, of correct and incorrect
representation.
3 THE GREAT DIVIDEThe theory described in the previous section is a simple one, with many problems.
But before we look at some of these, I want to suggest that we have a methodolog-
ical reason to take an especially close look at teleosemantics. The place to look
for this reason is neuroscience, which is where talk of representation first enters
the scientific picture if we start with sub-atomic physics and travel toward psy-
chology. However, this claim contradicts the popular idea that there is a Great
Divide between the “intentional” and “non-intentional” sciences, and so let’s take
a moment to consider this idea.
By “intentional sciences” I refer to sciences that study intentional systems as
intentional systems. Psychology and the social sciences are examples. Psychol-
ogists study the dynamics of intentional mental states within people and within
small groups of people and the social sciences, such as history, politics and eco-
nomics, study the dynamics of populations of people, construed as agents. By
“non-intentional sciences” I refer to sciences that either do not study intentional
systems at all (e.g., geology and cosmology) or do not study them as intentional
systems (e.g., physics and organic chemistry). In the latter kind of science, an
intentional process might be described, but it is not described as an intentional
process insofar as its intentional content plays no role in the description. Thus a
brain process might be described in terms of ion channels and synaptic excitation
and inhibition without mention of the fact that it is, say, a perception of a duck