Consciousness and the Atomic Bomb

The atomic bomb was invented and produced because the Allies feared that Germany was on the brink of developing just such a bomb. After World War II a cold war between Russia and America led to the proliferation of atomic weapons and their increased destructive power. An arms race rapidly led to enormous stockpiles of ridiculously powerful weapons capable of destroying the planet. The result was widespread fear and anxiety, crippling economic conditions, and a general worsening of international relations. It would have been far better for all concerned had the arms race never occurred, but it was impossible to reach an agreement that would stop it, mainly because of lack of trust. We are still living with this nuclear arms race. Each side feels it must balance its weaponry against the weaponry of the other side, even if the outcome is bad for everyone—dangerous, expensive, and anxiety producing. If there were a central planner, it would be possible to avoid an arms race, by simply reducing or eliminating altogether the stockpiles on each side, thus maintaining military parity while avoiding the excesses of large nuclear arsenals. But no such central planner exists, so the arms race spirals out of control in a kind of vicious positive feedback loop. More people will die more horribly in case of conflict and the production of weapons diverts resources from more beneficial goals. There is nothing good about an arms race, but it is distressingly easy for them to develop.

            Biologists have adopted the concept of an arms race to describe the relations between animal species.  [1]Arms races are ubiquitous in the animal world, the case of predator and prey being the most obvious. As the predator gets faster the prey has to get faster, and as the prey speeds up, so must the predator. Natural selection favors faster predators, but also faster prey, and in turn faster predators, and then even faster prey. Equilibrium is reached only when both sides cannot get any faster, or when the cost of getting faster is outweighed by other factors. Thus the legs of predator and prey are under selective pressure to get longer and sleeker, even if the chance of breaking them increases, and even if longer legs divert resources from other worthwhile aims (more offspring, better balance, bigger brain). If there were a central planner this biological arms race could be halted, to the mutual benefit of the animals locked in it, but there is no such planner, so the arms race spirals to greater and greater extremes. Natural selection pushes animals to improve their weaponry (e.g. enormous antlers) in competition with other animals, even though it would be better to reduce the weaponry on both sides. The process is irrational from the point of view of everyone’s welfare, but the logic of the situation prevents a more sensible solution. Each animal in effect thinks, “I don’t want my antlers any bigger, but if the others are going to make bigger antlers I will have to as well”. The entire biological world runs on such arms races once you analyze it: every animal is trying to outdo other animals, with the result that adaptations occur that would not occur if there were a central planner. Instead of spending all their resources reproducing, like any good self-replicator, organisms have to manufacture ways of outdoing the weaponry of their rivals. They stockpile armaments instead of growing families. They have to or they will perish at the hands (or teeth) of others. It’s not survival of the fittest but survival of the most heavily armed—even if that just means the fleetest legs or the most aerodynamic wings. Remember that prey animals are as dangerous to predators as predators are to prey, since the ability of prey to escape spells death for the predator. The legs of an antelope are as dangerous to a cheetah as the jaws of a cheetah are to an antelope. If a prey species were to evolve a cloak of invisibility that would be the end for the local predators: they could survive only by in turn developing eyes capable of seeing through the cloak. So the basic concept of evolution should be “the survival of the well-armed”: one animal will have a greater chance of reproducing than another if it is better armed than the other. And being armed better will always exact a cost in resources and a danger in outcome (the bigger and sharper the antlers the more damage they can do). If natural selection could find a way to evolve actual guns and bombs, it would no doubt do so—then the cheetah would not have to run after its prey at all. Indeed, if natural selection could evolve nuclear weapons, it would do that too (given that it had a competitive advantage), even if that meant the destruction of the planet—since natural selection has no foresight. Arms races seldom lead to anything inherently good.

            So far, so familiar: where does consciousness come into all this? As follows: consciousness is a weapon in an arms race. The logic of the biological arms race applies to the mind, and in particular to consciousness. Consciousness evolves as a response to the evolution of consciousness in rivals and foes, as atomic bombs “evolve” as a response to other atomic bombs. The process is no doubt extremely complex, as all evolutionary change is, but the outlines should be clear enough: consciousness was invented in an arms race, and it developed new forms as a result of a continuing arms race—as it was pitted against other consciousness. There was no need for consciousness except in the context of an arms race, and consciousness is not in itself of unique biological value—it is not an optimal solution to a reproduction problem. Consciousness is like cumbersome antlers or long brittle legs, not a trait of an ideal reproduction machine (the kind preferred by a hypothetical central planner). Why do I say this? First, we have to understand why consciousness evolved to begin with. I mean basic sentience—seeing, hearing, smelling, etc. It evolved, plausibly, because of predator avoidance: a prey animal needs to detect its predator if it going to have a chance of surviving, and so it develops sentience.  [2] It also needs to feel pain if it is to react appropriately to the attacks of predators. Almost all animals are prey to some animal at some point in their lives, even big cats, so an ability to consciously sense danger and respond to it is critical. But this leads to an arms race, because the predator now needs to get better at spotting its prey and then tracking it. The better the prey gets at predator-avoiding sentience the better the predator needs to get at prey-tracking sentience; and so it goes in a circle of positive feedback, just like the evolution of legs. Why is the vision of eagles so acute? It’s because their prey are so good at camouflage and other kinds of self-concealment. But it takes resources to manufacture and maintain high-resolution eyes that could be spent on other things, and likewise for elaborate camouflage; it would be better for both predator and prey if it were not necessary to devote so much energy to outdoing the other. There is an arms race going on and hence a need to be always one step ahead of the enemy, no matter the cost in other respects. Consciousness (the mind) therefore obeys the same “irrational logic” as other biological arms races. If we move to higher forms of consciousness, such as sophisticated reasoning about the future, we have the same story: each individual has to outdo other individuals in the game of reproductive rivalry, and hence there is a premium on more advanced forms of consciousness. Brains are selected in a biological arms race, as well as bodies, thus producing brains that are more elaborate than if there were no arms race going on. If animals were at peace with each other, not in a state of mortal competition, then their brains would not need to be as finely engineered as they are, and their consciousness correspondingly not so well developed (if developed at all).

            Although it is not easy to prove, I suspect that there would be no consciousness on earth if there were no arms races within and across species. This is because an efficient reproduction machine does not need consciousness (as with the bacteria that lived on earth for a couple of billion years before anything like consciousness emerged). It is only when organisms enter into arms races that luxury goods, like brains and minds, become necessary. Self-replication by itself has no tendency to produce consciousness. Atomic bombs are not produced in times of peace and harmony, and the same is true of conscious minds, because of their biological costliness. Consciousness is not an adaptation in the service of reproduction per se; it is an adaptation to the threats to reproduction caused by other organisms—just like big antlers and long legs. Animals would be better off without these adaptations, if it weren’t for the danger posed by others—just as we would all be better off without atomic bombs, if it weren’t that others insisted on possessing them.

            There are two reasons for this. First, as noted, consciousness, and with it a complex brain, is a very costly adaptation, using up vast amounts of the animal’s energy reserves—like atomic bombs and super-fast legs. That energy could be diverted to reproduction, ensuring more offspring (which is what the genes ultimately prize). Consciousness is a distraction from the prime biological imperative—as atomic bombs are a distraction from the prime political imperative to improve the wellbeing of citizens. Maybe some faint glimmerings of sentience would be useful independently of arms races, but most of it results from the necessity to outperform rivals and enemies. If they didn’t have it, you wouldn’t need it. As things stand, animals are armed to the teeth with consciousness in all its varieties, human beings in particular (and we certainly need it in spades to outsmart our natural predators). But second, consciousness introduces bad things into the world—it is by no means an unmixed blessing. For a primary modality of consciousness is pain, and with it fear and anxiety; consciousness brings suffering. The selfish genes don’t care about that: what matters from their point of view is maximum survival, and pain is a useful way to persuade animals to act so as to bring that about. Pain was selected because it maximizes gene reproduction, and individual suffering be hanged. No humane central planner would allow such a thing, especially given the amount of suffering nature contains. Animal consciousness, as it exists, brings pain; it does so because in the biological arms race pain enlarges the arsenal of weapons at the genes disposal. Consciousness is a key armament in the unending biological wars, but it can be hell to have it. Consciousness will help you win battles, but only because it can cause you pain—that is simply how the genes protect themselves from enemy fire. They build a body that houses them and that feels pain as a means of self-preservation: they make you suffer so that they may continue. Pain is really just another armament in the arms race—but one that harms the possessor of it. Pain protects the organism by making it miserable. We would be better off without it, but the arms race keeps it in existence.

            So consciousness is costly, painful, and unnecessary (relative to the prime biological imperative)—yet it exists. It exists because animals are locked in arms races from which they cannot escape, there being no all-powerful central planner. It doesn’t exist because it’s somehow a good thing; it’s like the atomic bomb in being an ultimately pointless outcome of a runaway arms race. Even simple sentience is not a good thing, especially given that pain is part of it. If a benevolent deity had decided to experiment with a self-replicating world, inventing DNA and sexual reproduction, there would be no need to allow arms races with their attendant drawbacks; so there would be no pressure to invent consciousness with its attendant drawbacks. A biological world without suffering would be far preferable to the world in which we live. If an arms race began to develop in this experimental world, the deity could step in to nip it in the bud, preventing each side from a massive build-up of expensive and nasty weapons (poisonous stings, ripping teeth, piercing horns, etc). Predator species would agree not to cull beyond a certain proportion of the prey species, while prey species would agree to give themselves up voluntarily in the same proportion—thus avoiding all the high speed chases, broken legs, daily anxiety, and wasted resources. Similarly, if consciousness started to gain a foothold because of a burgeoning arms race, both parties could make an arrangement, supervised by the deity, whereby an accommodation was reached obviating the need for consciousness. If the conflict had to do with territory, for example, it could be contractually agreed to share territory in a certain way, instead of fighting for it with every weapon at one’s disposal, including consciousness (perceiving, thinking, etc). This would no doubt be a sleepier world hovering just on the border of consciousness, but it would contain a lot less suffering and be far more economical of precious biological resources. A world without runaway arms races would be a world without any consciousness to speak of. It is only the egregious build-up of weapons in an arms race that causes consciousness to be propelled into existence. In an ideal world consciousness would be banned by international treaty, much like the atomic bomb. Anything good about it is strictly adventitious.  [3]

Co

  [1] There is a good discussion of this in Richard Dawkins, The Greatest Show on Earth (New York: Free Press), pp.382-90, from which I borrow.

  [2] I defend this theory in Prehension: The Hand and the Emergence of Humanity (Cambridge, Mass.: The MIT Press), chapter 11. Other explanations for the origin of sentience may be defended, but the argument I give here will be essentially the same under these other explanations.

  [3] Of course, it is not to be denied that consciousness can have valuable side effects, such as art, science, and brotherly love. I have been speaking only of strict biological value, which is measured by number of offspring and gene proliferation. One consequence of the view proposed here is that a world without biological arms races is a more highly populated world, since energy can go into reproduction instead of arms build-up. Thus consciousness has the side effect of keeping the population down.  We may also be glad that we have consciousness, but that does not negate the fact that it arose as a side effect of an arms race.

Attributes of the Self

I say that I think and I say that I weigh 150 lbs: I ascribe mental and physical characteristics to myself. But there is a significant asymmetry in what I mean by these attributions: when I say that I weigh 150 lbs I am saying that my body weighs 150 lbs, but when I say that I think I am saying that I think. If I weigh 150 lbs, that is only in virtue of the fact that my body does (I would wear approximately 2 lbs if I became a brain in a vat). But it is not in virtue of something else that I think—as it were, the real subject of thinking. You might wonder whether I think in virtue of my mind thinking, as I have a weight in virtue of my body having that weight, but it is surely a category mistake to say that my mind thinks: my mind is not another entity that really does the thinking—it is more like the thinking itself. The Cogito does not read: “I think with my mind, therefore my mind exists”. Nor do I say, “My mind has been thinking hard all day”, which might provoke the retort, “And what were you doing?” Thus the self is the proper subject of mental attributes: I think and see and feel and imagine and will. But the body is the proper subject of physical attributes: my body weighs 150 lbs, my body has a certain shape and size, my body contains a heart and kidneys. I can only be said to have these attributes derivatively, by dint of possessing a certain body. We can use the word “I” loosely to include the body, but strictly speaking it is the body itself that has the attributes predicated. Similarly, we sometimes use “I” even more inclusively, as when one driver says to another, “I almost crashed into you then”; but it would be quite wrong to insist that the referent of “I” here has automobile characteristics (“I have four wheels”). We can register this asymmetry by saying that I have mental attributes directly while I have physical attributes indirectly.  [1]

            I am inclined to conclude that sentences like “I weigh 150 lbs” are actually false when taken strictly and literally, though we take such falsehood in our stride, since we know how to correct for it—as in “My body weighs 150 lbs”. And that is not because I have a different weight, such as the weight of my brain; it is because I don’t have any weight. I am not identical to my body, so its weight is not automatically mine; the only sense in which I can truly be said to have weight is that I stand in a certain relation (the “having” relation) to a material body that has weight. For what weight do I have—the weight of my whole body, the weight of my brain, the weight of the part of my brain that generates my mental life? Attributing weight to selves is just a convenient but false way to talk: the referent of “I” is really weightless. But attributing mental characteristics to selves is perfectly fine and proper: the referent of “I” does think, feel, etc. Ordinary language is somewhat misleading, but the deceptive appearance is not deep—we can easily paraphrase the misleading appearance away. According to the paraphrase, it is the body that is the subject of predication; the self comes into it only via the “having” relation. So the self does not instantiate physical attributes in the immediate way that it instantiates mental attributes: I don’t have weight, shape, and size—though I do think, feel, and imagine. I perform mental acts but I don’t perform digestive acts—my body does (though I can say, “I have indigestion”).

            This commonsense conclusion has a philosophically startling consequence: the self is not a physical thing. The self could only be a physical thing if it had physical attributes, but it does not—it has exclusively mental attributes (intrinsically, inherently, non-derivatively). That is why it is conceptually easy to detach the self from the body—by brain swaps, partial brain swaps, and more exotic forms of self-transfer. We recognize that the self does not have the attributes of the body: it is not a physical thing, despite its close involvement with a physical thing. To be sure, we can ascribe physical attributes to the self in the vernacular, but it is false to suggest that the self is thereby a psychophysical entity, directly possessing both mental and physical attributes—as if it were physical in logically the same way it is mental.  [2] But to repeat, it is the body, which is numerically distinct from the self, that bears physical attributes. Nothing like this is true of mental attributes—they attach directly to the self (not to the mind). The thing that thinks is not the thing that digests—I think but I don’t digest. This is not to say that the self is an immaterial substance in the classic Cartesian sense (though we can rightly say that the self is not material); indeed, much the same argument could be given against such an idea, since there will be properties of the immaterial substance that also cannot be attributed to the self (whatever recondite properties they may be). The point is just that it is a category mistake to attribute to the self, qua the self, physical attributes. The self has a psychological nature, reflected in its psychological attributes, but it does not have a physical nature, reflected in its (sic) physical attributes.  [3]

            Perhaps this will not seem so surprising, rooted as it is in commonsense conceptions, but it has a further consequence that bites deeper, namely that it undermines materialism about mental states. Suppose we agree that selves don’t have physical attributes: then we have grounds for constructing a reductio of classic type-identity theory. For if mental attributes are identical to physical attributes, then selves will have physical attributes, since they have mental attributes and these are identical to physical attributes. For example, if pain is identical to C-fiber firing, then a self in pain will also be a self that instantiates the physical attribute of C-fiber firing. Or again, if I am thinking and thinking is identical with a physical attribute, then that attribute will be attributable to me in just the way thinking is, i.e. directly. But selves don’t have physical attributes in this direct way. Therefore type-identity theory must be false. If we call the physical attribute X, then we should be able to say that I X just as we say that I think—since Xing just is thinking. But that is either nonsense or a misleading way of saying something like this: “My brain is Xing”. Here we appeal to the “having” relation between self and body, rather as we say, “I am digesting, i.e. my gut is digesting”. But now the alleged identity is not between being in pain and C-fiber firing but between being in pain (an attribute of the self) and having a brain that contains C-fiber firing (also an attribute of the self). I have the attribute of having a brain that contains a certain physical state, and that attribute is what the identity concerns—not the attribute of C-fiber firing itself. I don’t have the latter attribute–my brain does–so that attribute cannot be identical to the attribute of having a pain, which I have. In short: mental attributes belong to selves, but physical attributes do not, so the former cannot be the latter. Mental and physical attributes are instantiated by different things—selves and bodies, respectively—and hence cannot be identical (by Leibniz’ law).

            But what about a revised form of materialism that identifies mental attributes with the complex attribute of having a brain containing a certain material state? That is not the way materialism is typically formulated, but at least it is meaningful to attribute such an attribute to the self—I do have a brain that contains C-fibers. However, it is unappealing to identify a relatively simple attribute like pain with the complex relational attribute of having a brain that contains C-fiber firing: we are introducing a relation between self and brain in order to specify the nature of the simple (monadic) attribute of pain. Moreover, this relation itself is left unexplained: for what is it for a self to “possess” a brain? Is this a physical relation? It seems not to be, since no physical account has been given of the self or of the “possessing” relation. There was a pleasing simplicity to the idea that pain is just a brain state, but it turns out that this view violates the principle that selves don’t have physical attributes. And it is plain nonsense to attribute brain states to the self in the way that we attribute mental states to the self: I am the subject of thinking, but I am not the subject of whatever brain state underlies thinking—my brain is. For type-identity materialism to work we would need to identify the self with the brain, so that whatever is true of the brain is thereby true of the self; but such an identification runs into well-known problems of its own.  [4] Perhaps we could say that materialism about mental states can work only if materialism about the self can, which is doubtful. What is true is that I have a brain with those attributes, just as I have a heart with other physical attributes: but states of that brain are not states of me any more than states of my heart are states of me.

            What I have been opposing is a kind of double aspect view of the self: the reference of “I” has both a mental and a physical nature captured in the range of predications we make employing personal pronouns and names. It is quite true that I can be said to think and to weigh 150 lbs, but on closer examination these predications have very different analyses: the former is direct predication while the latter is indirect predication. I can be said to weigh 150 lbs only in the sense that I have a body with that weight, rather as I can be said to be worth X amount of money only in the sense that my possessions are worth X amount of money (I am not worth M). These physical attributes are extrinsic to me as an individual self and they can be shed without loss of identity. By contrast, my mental attributes belong to me inherently, not in virtue of some further entity associated with me, as it might be my mind. I have a mind, but it is not my mind that thinks, feels, and so on: I do these things. Thus I am connected to my mental attributes more intimately than I am connected to my (so-called) physical attributes. It is not an exaggeration to say that I have no physical attributes: I do not weigh 150 lbs, though I am close to something that does. No doubt it is this logical fact that underlies flights of imagination in which the self floats completely free of all physical embodiment, whereas no one supposes that the self can escape its psychological nature. In the imagination there can be disembodied selves, but there cannot be “disemminded” selves—there cannot exist a self without mental attributes of any kind, even in the most extravagant fiction. Thus my inner nature is to be mental, but it is not in my inner nature to be physical. Simply: I am not a physical thing.  [5]

Colin McGinn            

  [1] What about bodily actions—aren’t they attributes of the self and yet physical? Yes I perform actions as much as I think or have sensations, but no they are not physical attributes: actions are intentional events and hence partake of the directness proper to all mental attributes.

  [2] P.F. Strawson’s famous treatment of the self in Individuals is an instance of this type of view, except that he prefers to speak of the “person”. I don’t think this terminological decision changes the issue, and for various reasons I find the concept of a person unhelpful in these discussions.

  [3] If I exist as a brain in a vat, is my physical nature determined by the physical attributes of my brain? But do Ihave such attributes at all—am I really gray and wrinkled and soggy? No, I merely have a brain with these attributes.

  [4] Should it be the whole brain or just the parts that underlie mentality? What about brain bisection? How much of the brain can a person lose and survive? What if we gradually replace the cells of the brain with artificial components?

  [5] This is not to allow that disembodiment is really possible, but the necessity for a body is not a point about the attributes a self can be said literally to instantiate. The self is not a physical thing precisely (and only) in the sense that it has no physical attributes, but only mental attributes. Yet it might still require physical embodiment in order to exist.

Anti-Referentialism

I introduce the neologism of the title to refer (!) to a particular type of philosophical position—namely, one which contests whether a particular class of expressions is genuinely referential. It is supposed that there is apparent reference for the class in question but the position denies that such apparent reference is genuine reference. Thus we are subject to delusions of reference—or there is illusory reference. Reference occurs more narrowly than is generally assumed; it is harder to bring off than we tend to suppose. Reference is demanding and its demands can fail to be met, even when we naively think they are met. Here are some examples: reference to the non-existent, reference to abstract entities like numbers, reference to elementary particles and other unobservable entities, reference to selves (“I”), feature-placing sentences (“It’s raining”), definite descriptions (Russell), predicates and properties, logical connectives (Frege), any referring terms at all (Quine), ethical terms (expressivism), mental terms (eliminativism). In all these cases it has been supposed that the conditions for reference to occur are not satisfied—thus we have anti-referentialism (compare anti-realism).  [1]

            Let me distinguish three types of reason for claiming anti-referentialism. The first is simply that we cannot have reference without the existence of what is referred to: if a speaker refers to an object x, then x must exist. Thus whenever the existence of certain entities is denied we have anti-referentialism: fictional names, numerals and numbers, denials of the existence of the self or particles, denials of the existence of mental states. The expressions in question would be referential if the entities existed, but they don’t. By contrast, we have a second type of view: there is no question that the denoted entity exists, but the term for it is not really semantically a singular term. Thus, according to Russell’s theory of descriptions, there is a queen of England but “the queen of England” doesn’t refer to her—because it is simply not a genuine referring term. It quantifies, not refers. This is a bit like the “it” in “it’s raining”: it looks syntactically like a referring device, but that appearance is misleading—the word merely enables us to form a complete sentence without having any reference in itself. There is also the view that abstract singular terms, like  “triangularity”, are not referring terms, being mere shorthand for the corresponding predicate (“triangular”). Third, we have the view that the necessary conditions for a word to refer to an entity are not met, even though the word is name-like and the entity exists. Thus you might have a name for a person and there are persons (including that one) but you cannot fulfill the conditions for achieving reference to that person, because you don’t have enough identifying information to single the person out from all others. Or it might be held that numbers exist and we have names that purport to stand for them, but the absence of causal relations between speakers and numbers precludes our referring to them, granting the correctness of a causal theory of reference. There is nothing wrong with the entities ontologically and our putative names are really names, but it is just that the conditions that enable reference are not met—we can’t refer to those entities with those names.

            I am particularly interested in the third type of reason for anti-referentialism. We can envisage several types of rationale for adopting such a view, none of them uncontroversial: in addition to the two just mentioned (problems of identification and problems of causation), there are empiricist worries (we need sense experience of the entity) and worries about ostensive definition (we can’t point to the entity). Then too we have more radical and general worries, such as Quinean indeterminacy of reference and Kripke-Wittgenstein skepticism about reference—no reference is possible. What we need is some clear and uncontroversial theory of reference so that we can decide whether a particular case meets the conditions for genuine reference. I don’t have any such theory, but I do think it is important to distinguish two possible sorts of theory: restrictive theories and liberal theories. Restrictive theories will make reference difficult to achieve, so that only in certain special cases will we have genuine reference; while liberal theories will make reference easy to achieve, so that reference is virtually unlimited. The first type of view is typified by empiricism—as in Russell’s position that only entities with which we are directly acquainted can be genuinely referred to (“logically proper names”). The second type of view would allow that any entity of any type can be referred to, no matter how remote temporally or spatially, no matter how unobservable, no matter how causally inert, no matter how elusive to pointing, no matter how private. According to this liberal view, anything can be referred to and all reference is on a par. We might compare the two views of reference to two similar views of truth: a restrictive view and a liberal view. According to the restrictive view, truth only applies to limited and select subject matters, say the physical world of observable bodies (not to sentences about atoms or values or modalities, etc). According to the liberal view, truth is completely promiscuous and applies to every subject matter you care to mention—fictional truth, moral truth, mathematical truth, aesthetic truth, etc. Of course, in both cases—truth and reference—we can envisage intermediate positions, depending on theoretical predilection.

            The case of reference to the mind is especially interesting because it is so unobvious what to say. First, let me make clear that I am not considering anti-realism about the mind—I am assuming realism but wondering about referentialism. Granted that we really have sensations, thoughts, feelings, and so on, can we refer to them? Are the conditions for reference satisfied in this case? It is natural to suppose that they are, but the question still needs to be asked. Wittgenstein poured cold water on the idea, preferring to view psychological utterances as expressive; but there is a question whether he put his finger on what is really problematic about such putative reference. So let us ask how (alleged) mental reference differs from other kinds of reference. Consider demonstrative reference to a particular animal, e.g. a cat—as in “that cat is stealthy” said while observing a cat about to pounce. What is notable is that such reference occurs in a context in which many other referential viewpoints are possible: referring from different angles, at different distances, with varying clarity of view, with the cat half-concealed—an indefinite number of referential perspectives. Yet a single animal is successfully picked out, despite all the variation. There is constancy of reference but variability of perspective. When we have the ability to pick things out like this we have the power to pierce through variation and home in, arrow-like, on singularity. We can also track the animal as it moves through space and time, preserving referential constancy. Reference is invariant under transformations of position and perspective. But notice that all this is lacking in cases where philosophers have doubted reference: obviously so in the case of things that don’t exist, but also for abstract entities, values, atoms, etc. We don’t have the multiple perspectives, the variations in context, the tracking through space and time, the singularity amidst diversity. And when such things are lacking we are apt to feel skeptical about whether genuine reference is occurring. That is not to say that we are right to reject reference in these cases; it is just to explain certain philosophical tendencies. These are the features that correlate with our comfort level about attributions of genuine reference; and they are not particularly doctrinaire, nor wedded to some sort of theory. They form our paradigm of reference.

What is striking is that in the case of supposed mental reference we also lack these features, quite conspicuously. Take “this thought” or “this pain”, where these purport to refer to mental states of the speaker. The assumption is that these terms refer to thoughts and sensations in just the sense in which “that cat” refers to a cat. But all the characteristic marks of a paradigm case of demonstrative reference are lacking: there is no variation of spatial perspective, no perceptual presentation, no possibility of concealment, no tracking through space and time. What we appear to have is a bare unmediated confrontation between a speaker and an inner state: the subject is aware of the inner state and simply utters the words in question, purporting to pick it out. But as Wittgenstein asks, what makes this reference and not merely mouthing a sound when you experience something inside you? Surely it is not sufficient to refer to an inner state that one utters a sound in its presence, or else a parrot could perform such reference simply by making a noise. What is needed to achieve reference is a whole background and context within which reference can intelligibly occur. It doesn’t occur by magic or sheer will. My suggestion, then, is that the features I gestured at (they need refinement and supplementation) are what are lacking in cases of apparent mental reference—and that is why attributing reference to mental words strikes us less than straightforward.  [2]We find ourselves uneasy with the concept of reference in this case, not quite sure what to say. It seems like a degenerate example of reference, or reference by courtesy. We can’t form a clear conception of what it involves, as we can for reference to ordinary material objects. It feels somehow “queer” (to use Wittgenstein’s word). I try to focus on a passing thought and intone the words “this thought” hoping thereby to ensnare that elusive particular: but do I stand in any intelligible relation of reference to my mind when I perform this ceremony? Could I go on to name the thought in question? Why don’t I have names for my mental states?

            What should we say about this? We might decide to get tough with ourselves and declare that mental reference simply does not exist and is impossible, since the necessary conditions of reference do not obtain in this case. That seems clear enough and not without motivation: extreme, though understandable.  Or else we speak of weak and strong reference, or some such irenic philosophical terminology. Or we airily suggest that nothing hangs on the question, that it is purely verbal, that it doesn’t matter: we can say that we refer to our inner states if we like, so long as we acknowledge the very different forms that reference can take (much the same can be said about truth). I won’t attempt to adjudicate between these responses; what I have wanted to do here is articulate the issue and explain the intuitions that people have had about reference. In our “craving for generality” (Wittgenstein again) we are apt to assume a greater uniformity in our concepts than is warranted by a careful consideration of the facts, and it can be salutary to point to differences in the conditions under which they are applied. No conceptual revision may be called for in the end, just greater sensitivity to variety; we can keep talking the same way but cultivate a keener awareness of differences. Sameness of word does not imply sameness of nature. We use the word “refer” in application to many areas of language, but it may not possess the unity we assume. We tend to picture reference as something like a beam of light or a cord connecting word to object, but it may have no more unity than the various moves in chess—lots of different ways to achieve a goal (winning the game or saying something true).

            Here is one area in which these reflections might be helpful: the question of identity statements linking mental and physical terms, as in “pain is C-fibre firing” or “this pain is that C-fiber firing”. If we took the tough view, these would be declared meaningless, since one term is not a referring term at all—no true identity could be asserted by such a sentence. It would be like saying, “the true is identical to the beautiful” where “the true” is taken to denote the truth-value True (Frege). If we took the more deflationary view, then we would be coupling a word that refers in one way with a word that refers in another way: that would account for the oddity of this kind of identity statement. It would be misleading to compare it to a statement like “water is H2O”, where both terms are clearly referring terms. A better analogy would be, “I am this body”, in which there is real doubt about whether that is an identity statement, because of the peculiarities of “I”. The point is that we should be careful in trying to understand what such sentences express, given the uncertainties attaching to mental reference. Just because an expression looks referential doesn’t mean that it is referential. The philosopher’s term “reference” is a term of art and covers all manner of cases (or doesn’t, as the case may be). Our very idea of the mental may be shaped and distorted by the assumption that mental terms function like standard referring terms: they may be referential in only the most minimal and trivial sense (they allow us to “talk about” certain subject matters). There is really all the difference in the world between “that cat” and “this thought”: the relations between word and object are totally different in the two cases. Calling both “reference” without qualification is bound to invite misunderstanding.  [3]

Colin McGinn

  [1] Just as with anti-realism, we can have local anti-referentialism and global anti-referentialism: the local kind is selective, the global kind denies reference of any kind.

  [2] I am well aware that I am by no means being original in stating such a view, though the point has not been used in the context of a general discussion of anti-referentialism (that I am aware of).

  [3] I have tried to remain neutral on the question of mental reference, being content merely to set out the issue, but I must confess to an urge to reject the whole idea outright. I am acquainted with my mind, to be sure, but I don’t denote anything in it. However, I will resist this urge, purgative as it may be.