Sven Bernecker

This paper criticizes the widespread view whereby a second-order judgment of the form ‘I believe that p ’ qualifies as self-knowledge only if the embedded content, p, is of the same type as the content of the intentional state reflected upon and the self-ascribed attitude, belief, is of the same type as the attitude the subject takes towards p. Rather than requiring identity of contents across levels of cognition self-knowledge requires only that the embedded content of the second-order thought be an entailment of the content of the intentional state reflected upon. And rather than demanding identity of attitudes across levels of cognition self-knowledge demands only that the attitude of the intentional state reflected upon and the attitude the subject self-attributes share certain features such as direction of fit and polarity.

Hilary Putnam has famously argued that “we are brains in a vat” is necessarily false. The argument assumes content externalism (also known as semantic externalism and anti-individualism), that is, the view that the individuation conditions of mental content depend, in part, on external or relational properties of the subject’s environment. Recently content externalism has given rise to the hypothesis of the extended mind, whereby mental states are not only externally individuated but also externally located states. This chapter argues that when content externalism is combined with the extended mind hypothesis it is robbed of its anti-skeptical power. Given the extended mind hypothesis, the supercomputer and the envatted brain can be regarded as aspects of the extended mind of the evil scientist. On this view, the thought contents of the coupled brain–computer–scientist system do not differ from those of a normal human. But without a difference in thought contents Putnam’s anti-skeptical argument crumbles.

This paper addresses the question whether introspection plus externalism about mental content warrant an a priori refutation of external-world skepticism and ontological solipsism. The suggestion is that if thought content is partly determined by affairs in the environment and if we can have non-empirical knowledge of our current thought contents, we can, just by reflection, know about the world around us -- we can know that our environment is populated with content-determining entities. After examining this type of transcendental argument and discussing various objections found in the literature, I argue that the notion of privileged self-knowledge underlying this argument presupposes that we can learn, via introspection, that our so-called thoughts are propositional attitudes rather than contentless states. If, however, externalism is correct and thought content consists in the systematic dependency of internal states on relational properties, we cannot know non-empirically whether or not we have propositional attitudes. Self-knowledge (apropositional attitude) is consistent with us lacking the ability to rule out, via introspection, the possibility that we don't have any propositional attitudes. Self-knowledge provides us with knowledge of what is in our minds, but not that we have minds. Hence, the combination of externalism with the doctrine of privileged self-knowledge does not allow for an a priori refutation of skepticism and is therefore unproblematic.

Tyler Burge and other externalists about mental content have tried to accommodate privileged self-knowledge and to neutralize skepticism about one's ability to authoritatively know one's present thoughts. I show that, though Burgean compatibilism explains knowing it is p I believe, it doesn't explain how I can have privileged knowledge that the state I occupy is a state of believing rather than, say, a state of doubting. Moreover, given externalism, self-knowledge of attitudinal component is vulnerable to a certain kind of error and so doesn't have the same kind of privilege as self-knowledge of current content.

Memory occupies a fundamental place in philosophy, playing a central role not only in the history of philosophy but also in philosophy of mind, epistemology, and ethics. Yet the philosophy of memory has only recently emerged as an area of study and research in its own right. The Routledge Handbook of Philosophy of Memory is an outstanding reference source on the key topics, problems and debates in this exciting area, and is the first philosophical collection of its kind. The forty-eight chapters are written by an international team of contributors, and divided into nine parts: The nature of memory The metaphysics of memory Memory, mind and meaning Memory and the self Memory and time The social dimension of memory The epistemology of memory Memory and morality History of philosophy of memory. Within these sections, central topics and problems are examined, including: truth, consciousness, imagination, emotion, self-knowledge, narrative, personal identity, time, collective and social memory, internalism and externalism, and the ethics of memory. The final part examines figures in the history of philosophy, including Aristotle, Augustine, Freud, Bergson, Wittgenstein and Heidegger, as well as perspectives on memory in Indian and Chinese philosophy. Essential reading for students and researchers in philosophy, particularly philosophy of mind and psychology, the _Handbook_ will also be of interest to those in related fields, such as psychology and anthropology.

This paper explains and defends Reinhold’s epistemology of disagreement. The concept of agreement is of central importance for Reinhold’s philosophy. He attempts to settle the most basic disputes among post-Kantian philosophers by offering intermediate positions that reconcile the seemingly incompatible views. Moreover, Reinhold argues for epistemic objectivism, that is, the thesis that a group of philosophers sharing the same information and respecting each other’s opinion may not reasonably disagree. If the members of such a group search for truth then they must converge toward consensus. Disagreement is irrational.

According to the standard view, the causal process connecting a past representation and its subsequent recall involves intermediary memory traces. Yet Bertrand Russell and Ludwig Wittgenstein held that since the physiological evidence for memory traces isn't quite conclusive, it is prudent to come up with an account of memory causation-referred to as nmemic causation—that manages without the stipulation of memory traces. Given mnemic causation, a past representation is directly causally active over a temporal distance. I argue that the stipulation of memory traces is indeed indispensable for analyzing mernory causation.

This paper argues for an overlooked dimension in the metaphysical microstructure of knowledge. The connection between knowledge and truth is even deeper than generally acknowledged. Knowledge, I argue, supervenes not only on a specific (namely modal) relation between the proposition p’s truth and an agent’s belief that p, but also on specific relations between the proposition’s truthmaker and the belief’s justification-maker. S knows that p only if the states of affairs referred to by S’s reasons for believing that p are identical with, causally related to, or grounded in the states of affairs that make p true.

Die Leitfrage der Untersuchung ist, ob die externalistische These von der extra-mentalen Konstitution propositionaler Gedankeninhalte mit der Cartesischen Theorie der Selbstgewißheit der eigenen Gedanken vereinbar ist. Anhand von Burges Theorie des privilegierten Selbstwissens wird gezeigt, daß die mit dem Externalismus verträgliche epistemische Asymmetrie zwischen Selbst- und Fremdzuschreibungen von Einstellungen um vieles eingeschränkter ist als von Cartesianern behauptet wird. Einerseits kann man sich hinisichtlich der mit den eigenen propositionalen Inhalten notwendigerweise verbundenen Gegebenheitsweisen oder Attitüden irren. Andererseits kann durch Introspektion allein nicht entschieden werden, ob man überhaupt über intentiolnale Zustände verfügt, d.i. ob die eigenen Gehirnzustände Träger propositionaler Ghalte sind. Zum Schluß wird ein schwacher Begriff des Selbstwissens entwickelt, der mit dem Externalismus kompatibel ist und den Grundgedanken der Autorität der ersten Person bewahrt.