Theory of mind

The fate of modern western philosophy involves, it seems, the conflict (and attempt at harmonization) between psychology, logic and the perceived 'laws of nature'.  It has always had strong tendency to dualisms, meta-isms (confusing going beyond something with overcoming it),  reductionisms (in the materialist or idealist directions) or ad hoc amalgmations, constructions, neologisms (intensionality, schematism, etc). There has always been a deep confusion and misguided mixture between the mental and the logical which seems hardwired into the terms themselves like 'concept' and 'idea'.  Schopenhauer accuses Kant of a heilosen Vermischung der intuitiven und abstrakten Erkenntnis. Frege and Husserl both struggled with this. Earlier analytic philosophy likewise attempted to evade the psychological in ways less cogent. It seems that by trying to analyze the psychological and the logical the mind inevitably puts both into each one of them and also into their very relationship.

Let us drop  logicism, psychologism and meaning-as-use for the moment, and drop all reductionist dogma. Let us engage in the philosophy of mind, starting from basic, down-to-earth, common-sense considerations.  From the most basic and obvious and neglected it is possible to ascend to the most subtle, all-encompassing and unexpected.  An organic system-theoretic thinking about the larger role of sensation and perception and its multilateral connection without any artificial assumptions. Bringing in the importance of the body and physiology to the mind without trying to restrict or reduce the mind.  For the mental has a continuous gradation (analogous to the gradations in energy and frequency in physics) of yet qualitatively distinct levels all bearing an organic inter-dependence.

While we distinguish between formal and conceptual-philosophical clarity we hold that in philosophy both are even more indispensable and fundamental than in mathematics. Clarity and transparency are the highest virtues in philosophy. And, without implying completeness or achievement,  formal clarity in philosophy would be, in perspective, a huge step forward. We do not see modern philosophy as excelling ancient philosophy in clarity or rigour nor do we see "analytic" philosophy (excluding some notable exceptions) as exhibiting greater clarity (formal or conceptual) than "continental" philosophy. Lack of clarity, formal, conceptual, not to mention deductive, has been the original sin of modern philosophy.  The clearest philosophical "concept" is still murkier and vaguer than the most complex scientific or mathematical one.  There is hardly a single example of a definite philosophical proof. The idea of focusing on the analysis of language as a surrogate for philosophy is circular  (the metalanguage is not less complex than the object language) and leads to even greater confusion and ambiguity. This is in ironic and tragic contrast to the huge development of mathematics in the direction of formal and deductive clarity. 

We need a new language for philosophy. And we need a new methodology and a new form of intuition and insight.

If it is one of the tasks of philosophy to break the domination of the word over the human spirit by laying bare the misconceptions that through the use of language often almost unavoidably arise concerning the relations between concepts and by freeing thought from that with which only the means of expression of ordinary language, constituted as they are, saddle it, then my ideography, further developed for these purposes, can become a useful tool for the philosopher. -  Frege, Begriffsschrift, Preface.

There have been two really significant discoveries and projects in philosophy. The first, objective, corresponds to Leibniz's idea of a characteristica universalis, calculus ratiocinator and mathesis universalis. This objective philosophy was, although this is little known, given substantial and valuable development in the earlier work of Edmund Husserl (though mixed and alongside other concerns and investigations: the unfortunate mixture and confusion we discussed above). It is thanks to the pioneering work of Claire Ortiz-Hill that the purely objective Husserl has been unearthed and brought to light. This aspect of Husserl is not incompatible with formalization and with Leibniz's project, rather it amounts to a substantial contribution to it. It offers devastating arguments against Carnap and Quine within an illuminating historical perspective on Fregean extensionalism.  We equate this objective Husserl with the Leibnizean project of a formal philosophy and it is an urgent task to gather together all subsequent significant work which can be seen as contributing to this project (for instance, Zalta's project).

This is no vague utopian project.  A modal type theory with special distinguished metaphysical predicates (for platonic participation, abstract objects, representation, relativization, etc.) can already accomplish something. There is nothing wrong with initial modesty, with employing weaker or partial systems first to elaborate solid results in axiomatic philosophy. Type theory is a kind of paradise of thought and yields substantial results - this without claiming any type theory to be complete or absolute.

We posted previously about a Hegelian interpretation of the various interrelated systems of type theory. Zalta's book Axiomatic Metaphysics book can be given a Hegelian interpretation. Indeed three systems are presented in order of successive strength, each subsuming the previous one. These three systems are deployed to formalize three successively more complex ontologies which also reflect a historical progression: the Platonic theory of forms, Leibniz's theory of possible worlds and monads and Frege's theory of objects, concepts and senses. To do: embed all these systems in dependent type theory or more specifically in Coq.

The second really significant progress in philosophy was Husserl's discovery of transcendental consciousness, which we might conveniently called the 'subjective' Husserl.  It is our task to unearth to true meaning of Husserl's discovery and to guard it against subsequent misunderstandings and appropriations (existentialist, naturalist, etc.).  The objective and subjective Husserl do not contradict each other, they are complementary, though the subjective Husserl remains the most profound, all-encompassing and important perspective. The key to re-establishing the 'subjective' Husserl against modern philosophical aberrations lies in its connection to ancient philosophy, specially ancient Eastern philosophy.

Pippin is right to criticize a reading of Kant’s Deduction that takes there to be a nonconceptual content that (1) is in and of itself objectively valid and (2) is built upon by means of subsequent acts of judgement (or understanding), such as for example Robert Hanna (2008) believes. Such readings do not make sense in the Kantian context, where it is precisely the goal of the Deduction to demonstrate how it is possible that we can determine, a priori , how thought content and sensory content hook up inwardly , which justifies our conceptual claims about empirical objects. If the contribution by sensible content, more precisely, ‘transcendental content’, were really supplied ‘from the outside’, one would be none the wiser from any argument in the Deduction that supposedly showed how we are justified in making claims about objects, how pure concepts are justifiably (necessarily) employed in any judgement that says that some a is F. If it were true that such content is supplied from the outside, Kant could not have shown the fundamental intimacy between the pure concepts and empirical knowledge of objects, precisely the goal of the Deduction. Apperception and Self-Consciousness (2021).

Also we need to take heed of Bolzano's and Brentano's criticism of Kant's notion of analyticity. True logics form a tightly-knit organic whole or family (there is nothing remotely arbitrary about when a formal system constitutes or not a genuine logic).  Thus analyticity = a certain type of logical consequence. There is minimal analyticity, intuitionistic analyticity, classical analyticity, linear analyticity, relevant analyticity, etc.  Kant's notion is mistaken in the literal sense (which seems to betray strictly monadic thinking). However 'containment' can be given an interpretation in terms of 'unpacking' definitions and constructive type theory. This will be elaborated in our theory of definition and proof. We will examine Robert Hanna's slightly pedantic and convoluted treatment of analyticity in 'Kant and the Foundations of Analytic Philosophy'.  Hanna is spot on about 'microstructure'.  However the framing of analyticity in terms of necessary extensional equivalence is at least questionable as is several features of what he says about formal logic in general.

We have finally the correct purification and separation between the objective and the subjective. But both belong intrinsically to our 'rationality'. But wait...what happened to 'formalism is not clarity' ?  This clarity cannot be sought for directly in the objective beyond the axiomatic-deductive method. The subjective Husserl gives the sought for clarity, that is, shows it, rather than expresses it.

Gödelianism (see M. van Atten and J. Kennedy, The Philosophical Development of Kurt Gödel) postulates that there can be more than one valid method for attaining philosophical truth, more specifically,  both Husserl's transcendental subjectivism and Leibnizean objectivism can be equally valid and complementary philosophical paths. For Gödel the Kantian project extends to all possible minds, not just to the conditions of the specifically human mind.