Abstract
The paper gives a new argument for anti-individualism in the philosophy of mind, based essentially on considerations given by Tuomela’s account of we- mode attitudes. It connects Tuomela’s work with a discussion that was shaped by Tyler Burge. The central argument of the paper differs from Burge’s arguments mainly in two respects: it does not rely on thought experiments, and it makes a clear case for a social version of antiindividualism that is based on considerations not to be found in the Burgean account. I then defend the argument against some possible objections.
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Notes
- 1.
I am aware that almost every version of individualism could be based on a kind of supervenience relation. To elaborate on these intricate connections would be the subject of a different paper, however.
- 2.
The terminology has never been clear in this area of discussion. Expecially the notion of individualism has so many different meanings that one should try to clarify them. I can’t do this here for reasons of space, and will stick for the rest of the paper to the terminology introduced once by Burge and later presented in the main text.
- 3.
All these papers are now collected in Burge 2007.
- 4.
It is interesting to note that Raimo Tuomela has written a very critical article about methodological solipsism at that time (Tuomela 1989). Thus he argued (in a different way) for nonindividualistic positions since long, before he turned to phenomena of collectivity.
- 5.
I’m skipping a lot of details and defence of these thought experiments here; see the almost endless discussion in Burge 1979 and for the second argument the no less famous paper from 1982, “Other Bodies”.
- 6.
The argument is elaborated in Rechenauer 1997. I there note that a very similar argument can be found in Block 1991. Block and I seem to differ mainly in that while he wants to keep very specific local explanations of action, I stick to the idea that psychological explanations must be possible across different individuals. In the end, Block’s position is an individualistic one, mine not.
- 7.
Maybe this is also what drives objections of the type (2).
References
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Acknowledgments
I have to thank both Raimo Tuomela and Tyler Burge, who both have had and still have a profound impact on my philosophical thinking since my student’s days.
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Rechenauer, M. (2017). Tuomela Meets Burge. Another Argument for Anti-Individualism. In: Preyer, G., Peter, G. (eds) Social Ontology and Collective Intentionality. Studies in the Philosophy of Sociality, vol 8. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-33236-9_13
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