7.6—
Conflicts in the Notion of Representation

In the previous section it was argued that external impositions of interpretations to mental representations (through authoring intentions, interpretive acts, or conventions) would be irrelevant to the ascription of mental states to an organism, and to the ascription of semantic and intentional properties to an organism's mental states. Internal impositions of interpretations are likewise problematic, albeit for a different reason. The reason to be developed here is suggested by Thomas Reid (1983) and Edmund Husserl ([1913] 1931). Reid and Husserl both offer arguments against theories of mind that postulate representations as objects that me-

diate the mind's access to extramental objects. Both philosophers' arguments are directed primarily against Hume, but their objection to representational theories can, as Keith Lehrer (1989) has recently suggested, be marshaled against contemporary theories as well, including CTM.

Reid and Husserl both claim that representational theories postulate "immanent objects" that mediate perception and cognition in order to account for the intentionality of perceptual and cognitive states. They also claim that, for a theory to be truly representational, this "immanent object" must be interpreted or taken as standing for the extramental object. But in order for such an act of interpretation to be possible, Reid and Husserl argue, the subject must have some kind of access both to the representation and to the thing represented: If Jones uses a symbol S to stand for some object X —if he judges "S stands for X " or decides "S shall stand for X ," he must be cognizant of S , and he must also be cognizant of X . And his access to X must be independent of his access to S , since his acquaintance with X must precede the interpretive act that associates S with X . But this, argue Reid and Husserl, has the consequence that mental representation is possible only where there can be independent access to extramental objects. And this consequence undercuts the whole motivation for the postulation of mental representations, since these were introduced to explain how access to extramental reality is possible.

The Reid-Husserl objection is straightforwardly applicable to the variations on Fodor's account of cognitive states that we are presently considering. As formulated, it can stand as an attack upon the Actual Interpretation Version, since it addresses theories in which someone must interpret a representation as standing for an extramental object. According to such a theory, an organism O can be in a cognitive state A about some object X only if (1) O is in a functional relation R to a mental representation MP , and (2) O interprets MP as being about X . As Reid and Husserl point out, the appeal of representational theories lies largely in what is to be gained by saying that access to extramental reality is mediated by mental representations. But if the representations are only "meaningful" in the sense of being interpreted as being about extramental objects, then this motivation for a representational theory is undercut. In order to interpret MP as being about X, O must have access to MP and have independent access to X . If O is to apprehend MP and decide, "Aha! This is about X ," O must have some kind of access to X that is not mediated by MP . His access to X may be very distant and dim, and might well be mediated by something other than his access to MP . (For example, X might be a number with a very large decimal, and O

might know of X only under the aspect of being the limit of a particular series of rational numbers.) But in order for O to interpret a particular symbol MP as being about X , he must have some idea of X that is not mediated by his apprehension of that particular symbol. Otherwise interpreting MP as being about X amounts to forming the judgment "MP is about what MP is about."

Now the appeal of representational theories lies in large measure in what is to be gained by saying that access to extramental reality is mediated by representations. But if representation can take place only if someone actually interprets the representation as standing for a particular object, and this requires access to the object that is not mediated by the representation, then it turns out that representational accounts of intentionality are self-defeating. For if we postulate a representation MP in order to explain an organism O 's access to an object X , but the very definition of representation ensures that using MP to represent X presupposes having access to X that is not mediated by MP , then it is simply fruitless to explain access to objects by postulating mental representations. If there can be access to objects that is not mediated by representations, it is unnecessary to postulate such representations. If there cannot be access to objects that is not mediated by representations, there cannot be representations either, because one can only interpret a symbol as being about X if one has some independent idea of what X is.

Neither Reid nor Husserl develops the objection specifically against symbolic representations, and neither of them seems to realize that there are several senses in which an object can be said to be a symbolic representation in addition to the sense of actually being interpreted as referring to something else. But the objection can easily be adapted so as to be applicable to representational accounts based on conventions or authoring intentions as well. First, suppose that an organism O has a belief about Lincoln just in case (1) O is in a particular functional relationship R to a mental representation MP , and (2) O has a convention C whereby the representation MP is interpretable as being about Lincoln. To have such a convention, O must know about Lincoln in a way that is not mediated by MP . Similarly, suppose that O has a belief about Lincoln just in case (1) O is in a particular functional relationship R to MP , (2) O authored MP , and (3) O intended that MP be about Lincoln. In order for O to intend that MP be about Lincoln, O must know about Lincoln in a way that is not mediated by MP . In any of these cases, it is impossible to make sense of the notion of mental representation without supposing that the organism also has access to the thing represented

in a fashion that is not mediated by such a representation. But if this is the case, postulating that there is a mental representation through which O apprehends Lincoln is pointless. Thus any such representational account of intentionality is bound to be self-defeating.