In Defence of a Sui Generis Disjunctivistic Account of the Mark of the Mental

Disjunctivism, the view that no single feature is common to all mental phenomena, has become more appealing as other proposals for a mark of the mental face difficulties. A revised form of disjunctivism is developed that avoids traditional problems. On this account, all mental states exemplify either intentional presentationality or phenomenal presentationality (or both). These two features are irreducible to each other but are species of the common genus of presentationality: presenting something to the subject. This presentationality uniformly marks the mental domain. The account is labeled 'sui generis disjunctivism' because it is in the spirit but not the letter of disjunctivism.

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Abstract

Within the debate on the mark of the mental, disjunctivism holds that no unique feature is common to all mental phenomena. Although once popular among philosophers supporting the “two-separate realms” view of the mind, nowadays, disjunctivism has fallen out of favour, often seen as denying the very existence of a mental mark. However, given the challenges faced by the most popular current alternative proposals, disjunctivism appears increasingly attractive. In this paper, we develop a revised form of disjunctivism that overcomes the problems traditionally associated with it without encountering the limitations of the alternative proposals. On our account, all mental states exemplify either intentional presentationality or phenomenal presentationality (or both). These two features, while irreducible to each other, are nevertheless similar enough to be considered species of the common genu s of presentationality as such: i.e., the feature of presenting something to the subject. The latter, thus, is what uniformly marks out the mental domain: mental states are mental in virtue of being presentational, either in the intentional or in the phenomenal sense (or both). As our account is in the spirit but not the letter of disjunctivism, we label it “sui generis disjunctivism”.