7 February, Ruth MILLIKAN [WEBINAR]

7 February 2020
15-17 Greenwhich Mean Time 
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Ruth MILLIKAN

(University of Connecticut)

Mental Representation made simple

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Abstract

Contrary to current rumors that there is something suspicious about the notion of mental representation, I am persuaded that the description of “intentional icons” and of “representations” first presented in my Language, Thought and Other Biological Categories (1984) captures a central and also a remarkably simple causal-explanatory principle that is involved in the workings of perception, cognition and language. So I am going to return to this description, highlighting its outlines to bring out its simplicity and also, I hope, the obviousness and innocuous nature of this principle. I will add a few words about "intensionality" and why it is irrelevant to the naturalization of mental representation.