Interactive Knowing: The Metaphysics of Intentionality

I argue that the Parmenidean argument against the possibility of change initiated a metaphysical response that 1) has dominated Western thought since, and 2) creates aporia for understanding mental phenomena. A return to a process framework is consistent with historical trends, consistent with contemporary physics, and permits metaphysical emergence — most especially the emergence of normative function and representation: intentionality. I show that contemporary alternative models of representation are still caught in the classic assumptions and, in consequence, cannot model or account for the inherent normative issues. Intentionality focuses metaphysical problems whose history extends into antiquity. I will argue, in fact, that intentionality cannot be understood without transcending the metaphysical framework that has been inherited from the Greeks — specifically, the metaphysics of substance and particle. The focus will not be on exegesis and interpretation, but, instead, on the historical conceptual heritage, the aporia created by that heritage, and a model — the interactive model — that transcends those aporia. 1. SUBSTANCE AND PARTICLE Heraclitus famously argued that all is flux. Parmenides argued that, to the contrary, change is not possible. Roughly, for A to change into B, A would have to disappear into nothingness and B would have to emerge out of nothingness. Because nothingness cannot exist, change cannot occur. The argument against nothingness turned on the Greek notion that saying or thinking was akin to pointing at that which is said or thought. Nothingness cannot be pointed at, so it cannot exist, and, therefore, change cannot occur (Campbell, 1992; Gill, 1989). This may seem slightly quaint to modern ears, but, lest it be too easily dismissed, consider how much difficulty modern philosophers, from Russell through Fodor, have had attempting to account for false representation and representation of non-existents (Hylton, 1990; Fodor, 1990, 1990b, 1998, 2003). In any case, the Parmenidean argument was taken very seriously by contemporaries, and attempts to were made to respond to it. The Empedoclean notion of substance — earth, air, fire, and water — attempts to resolve the problem via substances which in fact do not change, thus satisfying the Parmenidean criterion, but that can nevertheless mix and remix in varying proportions, thus accounting for the appearance of change. Similarly, Democritus proposed atoms as Parmenidean wholes that did not change, but that could alter their configurations, thus accounting for appearance (Campbell, 1992; Gill, 1989; Guthrie, 1965; Taylor, 1997; Wright, 1997).