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Imagination in Thought and Action Imagination in Thought and Action Anna Ichino Thesis submitted to the University of Milan for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy May 2015 1 2 Abstract In this thesis I ask what the role of imagination is in our representation of the world and interactions with it. A standard answer to this question is that imagination has no direct role: imagination’s proper function is rather to allow us to disengage from reality; its motivating power, if it has any, is basically limited to children’s pretence. I argue that this standard answer is mistaken: imagination’s role is much larger than that. I consider a number of cases – including cases of superstitious and religious actions, or so-called ‘expressive behaviours’ – where we are moved to act by representational states that are not sensitive to real-world evidence, nor integrated in our whole system of beliefs. I argue that at least some degree of sensitivity to evidence and inferential integration are necessary for a state to count as belief; hence the representational states that play the relevant motivating role in the cases I consider cannot be beliefs. I suggest that imagination is the best alternative candidate. This supports an account of imagination according to which its functional profile is the same of belief with respect to emotional and behavioural outputs, while it critically differs from belief with respect to cognitive inputs (and related normative constraints). Imaginings dispose us to act and react in the same ways in which belief do; but they are not (nor ought be) formed and maintained in response to real-world evidence as beliefs are (and ought to be). On this view, many cognitions that are standardly classified as beliefs – like superstitious, ideological and religious ‘beliefs’ – turn out to be better understood as imaginings. Imagination does not just allow us to ‘escape’ from reality into fictional worlds, but plays a key, direct role in our representation of (and practical engagement with) reality. 3 4 This thesis is dedicated to my parents, who taught me to walk in the realm of imagination. 5 6 Acknowledgements This thesis would not have been possible without support and encouragements from many people, to whom goes my deepest gratitude. A first huge thanks is owed to my supervisors: Greg Currie, Stefano Predelli and Paolo Spinicci. Among many other things, I am especially grateful to Greg for all that I learnt from our co-writing, and for some of the best philosophical discussions I ever had in my life, to Stefano, for his invaluable support, feedbacks and encouragements – especially during this final year of writing; and to Paolo, for having started my interest in the philosophy of imagination, showing me how philosophy can go so deep and be so fun at the same time – and indeed for having encouraged me to undertake my PhD in the first place. A special thanks also to Dave Ingram, for the truly unique attention and patience with which he read and commented on the whole thesis, which was massively improved by that. Ema Sullivan-Bissett, too, provided massively helpful (and fun) feedbacks on various parts of this work. I haven’t managed (yet) to persuade her about any single proposition which is written here; but I thank her much, and I will never forget her amazing round-the-clock support in the last few days before my submission. My PhD mates and various members of staff at Nottingham have heard and read many parts of this work over the last years, helping me to improve it in several ways; I am very grateful to them – in particular to James Andow, Tom Baker, Mark Jago, Uri Leibowitz, Ben McGorrigan, Pendaran Roberts, and Jon Robson. A special thanks to Komarine Romdenh-Romluc for two super helpful annual reviews of my research, and for having always been so supportive and encouraging. Thank you also to Shen-y Liao and Kengo Myazono for very good comments, discussions and bibliographical suggestions. I am deeply grateful to Terence Cave for having involved me into his Balzan Project ‘Literature as an Object of Knowledge’ – and to all the participants into the project, who taught me how fruitful and fun interdisciplinary exchanges can be. In particular, I 7 thank Paul L. Harris for some great discussions about children’s pretence and religious cognition, which played an important role in the development of my ideas here. I am also grateful to Lisa Bortolotti for having me as a network member in her Project ‘PERFECT’ on the Pragmatic and Epistemic Role of Factually Erroneous Cognitions and Thoughts, which is an endless source of learning and inspiration. For a somewhat older debt, I would like to thank Clotilde Calabi and Gianfranco Mormino, who enabled some of my first experiences of real intellectual excitement. A big thanks then goes to my wonderful friends Donatella Donati and Jules Holroyd, for having shared with me most of the best as well as the worse moments of these last PhD years. In fact, I can’t thank them enough for their friendship and support; as I can’t thank enough all my friends and my family from which these PhD years have kept me much farther than I would have wanted, but who have nonetheless been always with me, really, in many ways. Finally, I am sincerely grateful to the University of Milan and the University of Nottingham for fully funding my doctoral studies. *** The work presented in Chapter 4, §5 was written with Greg Currie. It is part of a paper published in Analysis, 72, 4 (2012). I am grateful to my co-author and the editors of Analysis for permission to use that material, which here appears somewhat revised. 8 CONTENTS INTRODUCTION (p.12) Chapter 1: ACCOUNTS OF FOLK-PSYCHOLOGICAL STATES (p.14) 1. Matching folk-psychological assumptions (p.14) 2. Explanatory power (p.17) 2.1. ‘Accounts of folk-psychological states’ vs. ‘Folk-psychological accounts’ 2.2. How good are folk-psychological explanations? 2.2.1. Conservative accounts; 2.2.2. Revisionist accounts; 2.2.3. Eliminativist accounts. 2.3. Assessing explanatory power: more (or less) controversial cases 3. Folk psychology and scientific psychology (and other cognitive sciences) (p.23) Conclusion (p.24) Chapter 2: IMAGINATION AND BELIEF: SIMILARITIES (p.26) 1. Paradigmatic examples (p.27) 2. Same contents, regarded in the same way (p.29) 3. Regarding-as-true: phenomenal aspect (I) (p.30) 3.1. Real emotions or quasi-emotions? 3.2. Real desires or ‘make-desires’? 4. Regarding-as-true: phenomenal aspect (II) (p.36) 4.1. Feeling it true 4.2. Conditions of manifestation: the ‘occurrence condition’ 4.3. Imaginings which feel true… 4.4. ... And imaginings which feel false 4.5. Conditions of manifestation: the ‘occurrent meta-belief condition’ 4.6. Other relevant conditions of manifestation 4.7. Summing up 5. Regarding as true: cognitive aspect (p.47) Conclusion (p. 50) 9 Chapter 3: IMAGINATION AND BELIEF: WHERE IS THE DIFFERENCE? (p.52) 1. Input differences: sensitivity to evidence (p.52) 1.1. Inferential integration and holistic coherence 2. Output differences: dispositions to action (p.58) 2.1. Some doubts about output differences 3. Pretence (p.61) 3.1. The ‘Humean theory of motivation’ 3.2. A Humean account of pretence? 3.2.1 Some problems for the Humean view 3.3. The imagination-as-motivation view of pretence 3.4. Problems (and solutions) for the imagination-as-motivation view 3.4.1 Desires and desire-like imaginings: same motivating powers?; 3.4.2. Dead cats (and some tentative conclusions). Conclusion (p.77) Chapter 4: WISE PENS, EVIL CARDIGANS, THOUGHTFUL DOORS AND OTHER STRANGE THINGS (p.79) 1. Superstition and magic (p.80) 1.1. Other ‘magical’ actions 1.2. Magical thinking: general principles and particular contents 1.3. The explanatory options 2. The standard belief explanation (p.87) 2.1. Doubts on the doxastic status of superstitions: inferential evidence and holistic (in)coherence 2.1.1. Coherent superstitions? 2.2. Further doubts: other sources of evidence and the origin of superstitions 2.2.1. A natural mind design; 2.2.2. Supersense. 2.3. Belief: epistemic and pragmatic dimensions 2.3.1. What grounds for epistemic rationality norms? 2.4. Where are we? 3. A more sophisticated Humean story (p.102) 3.1. Emotion-driven beliefs and desires? 3.1.1. How plausible is this ‘sophisticated Humean account’ of my action? 3.2. Unpleasant superstitions 10 4. Superstitious imaginings (p.108) 4.1. The pervasiveness of superstitious thinking (and some conclusions about imagination’s motivating power) 5. Superstitious aliefs? (p.113) 5.1. What is an alief? 5.2. ‘Poison’ and ‘Not poison’ 5.3. The argument from hyperopacity Conclusion (p.119) Chapter 5: THE POWERS OF IMAGINATION (p.120) 1. Where are we? (p.120) 2. Velleman and I (p.123) 2.1. Velleman’s argument 2.2. Velleman unpacked and defended 2.3. Excusing conditions 2.3.1. Meta-cognitive factors: the ‘meta-cognition condition’; 2.3.2. Inferential network: the ‘know- how-to-do-that condition’’; 2.3.3. My challenge. 3. Velleman and I – and the legacy of the Standard View (p.136) Conclusions (p.138) Chapter 6: RELIGIOUS (SO-CALLED) BELIEFS AND IMAGINATION (p.144) 1. So-called “religious beliefs” (p.145) 2. Doxastic reasons (p.147) 3. Anti-doxastic reasons (p.148) 4. Religious imaginings (p.154) 4.1. Two forms of religious imaginings 4.1.1. Meta-cognitive mistakes: religious ‘beliefs’ as unrecognized imaginings; 4.1.2. Non-literal speaking: religious ‘beliefs’ as trusting imaginings. 4.2. Religious contents and imaginative contents Conclusion (p.160) REFERENCES (p.161) 11 INTRODUCTION This thesis offers an account of the imagination which is to some extent revisionary but not so revisionary that we have left the folk conception of the imagination entirely behind.
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