I will be writing on concepts or, more correctly, concept and objects. In Christopher Peacocke’s terms, it will be “a theory of thought” as applied to concepts and objects.
In this essay I will be speaking of concepts in the psychological sense of the word. That is, concepts as the contents of thoughts. (This, in itself, is not a denial of other notions or forms of concepts.) My task is to determine how people think about the world. More precisely, it is an attempt to show the relation between mental concepts and the world of objects and the ramifications this has on various issues.
I will focus on the “dualism” of concepts and objects which is thrown up by such issues as conceptual criteria of identity of concepts and objects, the intensionality of concepts, and the putative primacy of ontology of objects over concepts of objects and so on.
Concepts before Objects
Do concepts come from “classifying together objects of a certain kind”, or are the concepts themselves used as tools to do so? Which comes first: the concepts or the “things of a certain kind”? This parallels a primary question in the philosophy of science. Which comes first, theory or observation? The metaphysical realist would say that concepts (and theories) are determined by - or a result of - noticing similarities and distinguishing kinds. But without prior concepts how would we recognise such similarities? How would we know that two things were similar unless they already came under concepts that made them, as it were, similar? Concepts tell us what is similar to what. They don’t grow out of the similarity. There must be something about the objects that make us class them together. So certain concepts must already be in place. Of course this doesn’t stop us applying or deploying new concepts to objects (and observations). We don’t randomly pick out two objects or things and see if they are similar and then apply concepts to them. If concepts, or a theory (i.e., a set of linked concepts), don’t guide us, we may as well compare a frog with a car or a star with a photon (even they share the concept [object] or the concept [thing]).
Just as observations are “theory-laden” from the start, so objects and things are concept-laden from the start. Travel the world and you won’t find a place that you don’t automatically, or non-cognitively, conceptualise. Even in outer space this would be the case. And also at other possible worlds, depending on how alien they are conceived to be. (How alien can another possible world be?)
The concept [cat] is not simply derived from an analysis of the physical structure of particular cats. Concepts must come first. If it were simply a case of physical analysis, then if one particular cat had three legs and a big wart on its nose, then such things would become atomic conceptual criteria of the molecular concept [cat]. And resemblance doesn’t escape prior concepts. Take an analyser of cats who comes across two ginger ones. The ginger of one cat resembles the ginger of the other. Therefore being ginger becomes a conceptual criterion of identity for cats. If we were doing philosophy of science, and not the “theory of thought”-cum-ontology, we would say that prior theories of cats would make us dispense with observations of gingerness as being a – necessary – criterion of identity for being a cat (if we need to bring in the modal term “necessary” at all).
Of course concepts can’t be determining everything about experience, observation and the ontological scrutiny of objects otherwise there would never be conceptual change. The point is, though, that prior concepts will help determine change too. Unconceptualised phenomena don’t determine conceptual change. However, there’s nothing to stop us thinking that there’s something wrong with a particular concept, orgroup of concepts (a theory), or a whole set of conceptual criteria of identity for an object.
Concept/Object Dualism
The theory of the concept is part of the theory of thought and epistemology, a theory of the object or objects is part of metaphysics and ontology. (Peacocke, 1989)
Christopher Peacocke, above, wrote that
the theory of the concept is part of the theory of thought and epistemology
whereas
a theory of the object or objects is part of metaphysics and ontology.
This particular taxonomy could quite possibly be too neat and tidy. What if it entails a “dualism of scheme and content” (see Davidson)? More specifically, what if it entails a dualism of concepts and objects? The idea seems to be that at first we have ontology. In our ontology we talk about “uninterpreted” objects. And then, later, we apply concepts to unconceptualised objects.But what if one can’t have cognised objects without concepts? Objects exist without concepts, sure, they are therefore mind-independent, but they can’t be cognised. That is, they can’t be known, seen, spoken of etc without concepts. This is why I talk about the conceptual criteria of identity for concepts not objects. The reasoning behind this is as follows. If concrete objects require conceptual criteria of identity in order to be cognised as the objects that they are, then so too do the mental concepts that belong - or are applied - to objects. In fact this way of putting it implies that there can be a temporal or epistemic distinction: the concrete object, unconceptualised, comes first, and then the concepts are applied. Perhaps, however, there are no unconceptualised concrete objects that are cognised, known, seen or spoken of. And to talk about unknown, unseen or unspoken concrete objects is to talk about - virtually - nothing.
The conceptual criteria of identity which are applied to object x can be the very same conceptual criteria which are applied to concept [C] ofx. When you use one, you could use the other and vice versa. This is not a commitment to the impossibility of mind-independence or the numerical or any strict identity between mental concepts and concrete objects (or objects and their concepts). Take this reason why not. Mental concepts are intensional. This means that two different concepts could be applied to the same object. Consequently this means that one person’s conceptual criteria of identity for object x may not necessarily square with another person’s conceptual criteria for concept [C] of x.
Modes of Presentation and Their Objects
Christopher Peacocke’s phrase “modes of presentation of a property” clearly implies that the property exists separately from “modes of presentation”. However, we cognise nothing of this presentation-free property. We can only cognise it through modes of presentation. The property cannot be known, seen, spoken of, etc., from Nowhere. There is no ontology without modes of presentation. In a certain sense, there is no ontology at all if it is taken, as it were, as First Philosophy to Peacocke’s “theory of thought” (i.e., Second Philosophy?).
However, the intensional nature of concepts is seen as Peacocke’s (or Frege’s) “modes of presentation of a property”. Here again we have a dualism of “presentation” and property presented. This time instead of the same object x we have the same property. Different modes of presentation, or concepts, can be applied to the same property without any ontological commitment, on our part, to the putative unconceptualised primacy of the property. The property, as I said about object x earlier, could be the victim of hundreds of modes of presentation. Indeed it may be the case that certain modes of presentation could be deemed epistemically or scientifically correct and others incorrect. The property, however, still wears conceptual clothes when it is cognised.
Peacocke’s “dualism of scheme and content” can also be seen between the psychological concepts (or his modes of presentation), on the one hand, and the ontological concept – and primacy? – of a property to which modes of presentation refer on the other. (This is a reworking of Frege’s “sense” and “reference” distinction.) Peacocke himself explains this dualism when he says he wants
to distinguish properties from modes of presentation of properties (1983).
He does so by arguing that
only the properties themselves…enter causal explanations.
I would agree that the property is causal in a way that modes of presentation (MOP) are not. This causal independence from MOP of properties doesn’t mean that the property can be given up to us free from MOP. (Just as Ned Block can indeed distinguish what he calls “access-consciousness” from “phenomenal-consciousness” [1995] and yet we can say that they always occur together.) Peacocke is correct to distinguish the property from MOP of it. However, the property is only cognised under MOP and therefore under concepts. This is like Spinoza’s ontological monism squared with conceptual dualism (mind as a “mode” or attribute of matter). Similarly, Davidson, learning from Spinoza, does the same with slightly different terms. We can say that Davidson’s matter squares with Peacocke’s “property” and Davidson’s mentality with Peacocke’s MOP. The MOP do indeed depend on their properties, whereas the property doesn’t depend on MOP. Similarly, the mind depends on the brain. However, the properties do depend on MOP when it comes to our cognitions of them. In that aspect there’s no real distinction. The property, therefore, is like Davidson’s mentality, which can’t exist without the brain. The parallel, though, is inverted. Peacocke’s property depends on minds when cognised, whereas Davidson’s mentality depends on matter. This point is clinched by saying that Peacocke’s mind-independent (MI) property, which exists, is like Wittgenstein’s “wheel which is not part of the mechanism”. It serves no purpose other than to be the subject of statements about mind-independence itself. Apart from that, it is vacuous.
The point is not an idealist one. MI properties do indeed exist, but they may as well not do. This will sound like philosophical philistinianism (or a vicious cut of Occam’s razor) only to those who don’t accept or know the arguments that led up to this position.
We cannot escape from causal forces. They exert their influence no matter what. But the facts or statements we utter about such causal forces are dependent on our concepts. Sheer brute force causes us to make particular assertions. Concepts help determine the interpretation of causal forces. We can, therefore, respond in different ways to the same causal forces depending on pre-existing concepts. We can accept the causation, that is, retinal stimulation, etc. As Davidson puts it:
…causation is not under a description, but explanation is.
We can also accept the causal independence of phenomena. The problem may be that we can describe the same causal processes in different ways, depending on our prior concepts and the concepts which already belong, as it were, to those causal forces. Wilfred Sellars said that
it takes a long time…for the causal links to whip us properly correspondent shape…
Is this why Peacocke talks about properties and not objects? Like his introduction of “causal explanations”, there is no elaboration. I will say that properties are in a sense philosophical constructs like sense-data, etc. This is not to say that properties don’t exist according to some ontological taxonomical scheme (they are part of the “furniture of the world”), but if we are doing Peacocke’s “theory of thought”, we don’t cognise properties, we cognise objects, events – i.e., particular individuated objects, events , etc.
Although I feel uncomfortable about adhering too closely to a particular philosopher, Davidson says that “interpretation”…depends on “external events and objects” not “patterns of sensory stimulation” (this is Davidson’s reference to Quine’s position).
Peacocke’s reference to “causal explanations” also parallels, to some extent, a position from Crispin Wright. Take this passage:
The hope must be either that we can yet win through to some purified notion of an observation statement [or property], one that does not include ‘theory-ladenness’… (1992, 167-8)
The above quote shows us that Wright is attempting to make a scheme/content distinction, or separation, like Peacocke’s property/MOP distinction. Wright is explicit about this. Whereas Peacocke appears to stress the ontological primacy of the property over MOP (which belong to a “theory of thought”), Wright stresses ‘input’:
…differences of opinion…can be satisfactorily explained in terms of divergent ‘input’…different information… (31)
That is
If A goes in, S must come out.
If we can’t escape from MOP, or concepts generally, A (the property or the ‘input’) may well go in, but it is not necessary that S comes out.
Can the property exist without MOP? Yes. Can the reference exist without “senses”? Yes. What can we cognise of this presentation-free property? Nothing. What can we cognise of the sense-less reference? Nothing. So what’s the point of them?
However, I accept the following dualism because it is non-epistemic - it is neuroscientific. Firstly we have
i)Visual sensations…form the output of this early modular processing, and stand ready to produce conceptual responses…[they] feed into the conceptual system. (1990)
And then
ii) Concepts get to work on them. But cognitively or epistemically we are not aware of .
In order to cognise an object as a particular object, concepts must be deployed and must have already have been applied. Cognising an object as a particular object entails individuation, differentiation and possibly identification of the object which itself entails the application of conceptual criteria of identity. Of course the object under scrutiny may well already have been individuated, etc. This wouldn’t stop new conceptual criteria being applied to it. The initial individuation of the object may have been crude and of little use.
The idea of putting ontology first before our conceptualisations of objects (“theory of thought”) implies that the objects under scrutiny will somehow impose concepts of themselves upon us. All we need to do is sit back and wait for the process to begin. This also implies a kind of algorithmic process between the object and the mind that will be invariant for a particular subject; and even invariant between subjects and the same object. That algorithmic process would be:
(the same) object (input) š (the same) concept/s (output)
