Review - Hidden Resources
Classical Perspectives on Subjectivity
by Dan Zahavi (Editor)
Imprint Academic, 2004
Review by Richard de Blacquiere-Clarkson
Jun 18th 2005 (Volume 9, Issue 24)

Hidden Resources is the book format of a themed issue of the Journal of Consciousness Studies, the theme being 'to what extent can the current discussion of consciousness in mainstream cognitive science and analytical philosophy of mind benefit from the resources found in the Kantian and post-Kantian tradition, in phenomenology and in hermeneutics' (Introduction, v). Perhaps unsurprisingly, the univocal answer in this collection of papers is that these 'mainstream' analytic discussions stand to benefit quite a lot from a bit of Continental wisdom, although the relationship isn't entirely one-sided.

Dan Zahavi's introductory chapter 'The Study of Consciousness and the Reinvention of the Wheel' serves as a suitable opening for the pages ahead, giving a brief summary of each article after reminding us that even the most reductive naturalist still needs an account of what it is he is trying to reduce, and listing a few of the most pressing questions for anyone attempting to form one.

In 'Kant, Cognitive Science and Contemporary neo-Kantianism' Andrew Brook argues that some of the most characteristic elements of Kant's model of the mind have been taken up by cognitive science, in particular self-consciousness without self-representation, the unity of consciousness and modeling the mind as a complex set of functions which synthesize sensory inputs and concepts. These themes are held to be present in Shoemaker, Perry and Strawson, but most of the discussion of contemporary thinkers is given to neo-Kantians Quassim Cassam and Susan Hurley, though Brooks' criticisms essentially amount to the complaint that they aren't Kantian enough.

Arne Grøn's article 'The Embodied Self' makes a convincing case for looking to Kierkegaard to solve a problem for the increasingly popular 'embodied, embedded' approach to cognition: given that we are necessarily both physically embodied, and embedded in a social context which scaffolds or even constitutes part of our thought, what is it to be a human being, to be a 'self'? Kierkegaard's post-Hegelian approach, according to which the human mind is a synthesis of psyche and body which 'exteriorizes' itself through personal history and language, bears more than passing resemblance to recent work on embodiment, and the answer Grøn derives from him is in essence fairly simple. Selfhood lies in the process of a relation relating itself to itself; it contains a certain duality in that to be a person, a self, is not only to be what you are, but to relate to yourself as well. Thus we are neither substances or 'inner centers', and our own embodiment and finite history in the world is both inevitable and an automatic matter of concern for us. Although relatively simple to state, this formulation is likely to be deeply obscure to many analytic philosophers and cognitive scientists, but is at least suggestive of an account of selfhood which is both in principle compatible with embodied cognition and quite radically different from most work in the area.

Peter Poellner's 'Self-deception, Consciousness and Value' argues that Nietzsche's concept of ressentiment -- a conscious but unacknowledged self-deception about one's own values - cannot be accommodated by current theories of self-deception, and so should be reformulated to be closer in spirit to Sartrean bad faith. As such, ressentiment is dependent upon a pre-reflective recognition of the values it is concerned with, and Poellner argues it no longer supports Nietzsche's critical claim that moral values as obligations to others are based on ressentiment. Thus despite the general theme of applying resources from continental traditions to analytic debates this chapter does exactly the converse, to surprisingly good effect.

In 'Back to Brentano?' Dan Zahavi observes the recent rediscovery of Franz Brentano's philosophy, and questions whether it can be put to use in providing an alternative to higher-order theories of consciousness. These theories hold that the consciousness of a mental state consists in another thought or perception being directed towards that state, but as Zahavi argues lack plausibility when applied to first-personal self-reference. Brentano advocated a one-level theory of consciousness according to which all intentional, i.e. object-directed, thoughts are also at the same time directed towards oneself in a secondary, 'oblique' mode. But this account is well-known to equivocate over whether this secondary mode takes a distinct object from the primary mode, and so it is questionable whether it really is one-level or not. Zahavi argues forcefully that less equivocal one-level theories have been advanced by Husserl, Heidegger and Sartre, so although we need to go back to work rooted in Brentano's thought, as far as Brentano himself is a step too far.

Sonja Rinofner-Kreidl's article 'Representationalism and Beyond' advances a phenomenological critique of Thomas Metzinger's self-model theory of first-person perspective, which opens with neat summaries of some differences between cognitive science and phenomenology, and the inability of a strongly naturalist position to question its own assumptions. Unfortunately, the discussion of Metzinger's theory is less well presented, with the initial formulation somewhat unclear and several important details only introduced late in the discussion. Rightly or wrongly, this gives the impression that Metzinger isn't being represented fairly, and detracts from the otherwise quite promising criticisms made.

John Drummond's subtle and insightful ''Cognitive Impenetrability' and the Complex Intentionality of the Emotions' seeks to supplement and so develop Peter Goldie's recent theory of emotions by drawing on Husserlian phenomenology, and does so admirably. He characterises emotional experiences as being due to a complex interplay of pre-reflective bodily feelings, apprehension of those feelings as likeable or dislikeable, and an object-oriented 'condition' such as joy or fear. According to this framework puzzling 'cognitively impenetrable' emotions - ones which are rational but disproportionate or inappropriate - derive their force from previous experience (such as of a traumatic event) retained in current consciousness, but are inappropriate insofar as they are not warranted by the later experience which triggers them.

Louis Sass' 'Affectivity in Schizophrenia' develops phenomenological accounts of the principal kinds of schizophrenic experience and attempts to show that each is compatible with a diminished emotionality and preserved affective but non-emotional responses. Descriptively, the accounts provided are plausible, although brief, although the suggestion made that phenomenology may actually explain these schizophrenic anomalies is rather less so.

In 'Belief and Pathology of Self-Awareness' Josef Parnas contributes to the classification of delusions by questioning the almost ubiquitous assumption in cognitive science that they arise from false beliefs, contrasting 'empirical' delusions which appear to fit this form with 'autistic-solipsistic' delusions which are metaphorical reports of altered structures of experience. The former, he claims, apply particularly in cases of paranoia, the latter in schizophrenia.

Shaun Gallagher's 'Hermeneutics and the Cognitive Sciences' presents a broad overview of these two disciplines, and argues that there are clear cases where they interface and can valuably contribute to each other: understanding everyday objects by employing schemas and prototypes, relating computational models to ill-defined or heavily contextualised activities, and interpersonal understanding. Although these examples emphasise most strongly how hermeneutics can contribute to cognitive science, Gallagher also illustrates how the converse is true in discussing the influence of empirical research on mirror neurons on his own interaction theory of interpersonal understanding. As such, this chapter is perhaps the most accessible to those with a limited knowledge of phenomenology or hermeneutics.

Lastly, Dieter Teichert's 'Narrative, Identity and the Self' compares Ricoeur's concept of narrative personal identity and Dennett's narrative self as a center of gravity, and argues well for the slightly surprising conclusion that the two are largely compatible in the sense of not being directly contradictory, at least until applied to the realms of social interaction and ethics. As such, it seems odd to say that they really are compatible at all, but the point remains that these two philosophers are less distant than they might superficially appear.

All of the chapters are at least suggestive of ways in which resources from the so-called continental traditions can be applied to debates in analytic philosophy of mind and the cognitive sciences, although only Grøn's and Drummond's contributions achieve the depth of discussion necessary to be actually illustrative of this claim. Nevertheless, the contents of this volume achieve well their intended aim, to serve as 'appetizers' (Introduction, v) to these traditions and the ways they can be drawn on.

 © 2005 Richard de Blacquiere-Clarkson

Richard de Blacquiere-Clarkson is writing a Ph.D. dissertation in Philosophy, titled " The Metaphysics of Mental Representation' at Durham University, UK.