Judith Carlisle

Are explicit mental states at a “higher level” than implicit mental states? Many philosophers and cognitive scientists have assumed that the explicit/implicit distinction implies that there are distinct levels of cognition – and that developing our understanding of levels could clarify the nature of the implicit/explicit distinction. Others have suggested that this assumption is unfounded – that explicit and implicit mental states are on the same level. What are the arguments used to support each side of this debate? Here I will taxonomize these arguments while attempting to clarify two questions as they arise within this debate. First, what is the sense of level in play? Is it levels of organization? Or levels of complexity, processing, or sophistication? Is it perhaps best explicated by reference to Marr’s division of the computational, algorithmic, and implementational levels? Second, what is the central contrast between the explicit and the implicit? Is it between the conscious and the unconscious? The intentional and the unintentional? The rational and the automatic? Answering these questions will hopefully clarify the nature of this debate and show where the true disagreement lies.

Many historians and cultural theorists argue that we cannot truly understand the effects of cataclysmic events on the course of history unless we posit the existence of collective trauma, a kind of trauma over-and-above the more familiar sort suffered by individuals. This argument relies on a core analogy, which we call the Individual Trauma Analogy (or ITA), drawing parallels between the trauma responses that both individuals and collectives undergo in response to threatening or harmful events. Our primary aim is to make this analogy explicit and plausible. We thus develop an account of collective trauma in which the collective trauma is (a) different in kind from individual trauma, and (b) does not rely on positing the existence of collective minds or mental states. We conclude by addressing the empirical question that remains: Is the ITA an effective guide for social interventions?