Having Thought: Essays In The Metaphysics Of Mind

The unifying theme of these thirteen essays is understanding. In the first group of essays John Haugeland addresses mind and intelligence. Intelligibility comes to the fore in a set of "metaphysical" pieces on analog and digital systems and supervenience. In the third set of papers Haugeland elaborates and then undermines a battery of common presuppositions about the foundational notions of intentionality and representation. The final group contains the most recent essays. Here the earlier themes come together around the fundamental problem of the metaphysics of the mind: What is objective knowledge, and how is it possible? The answer, broached in an exploratory way, amounts to a contemporary revival of transcendental constitution -- an idea prominent in the history of philosophy, but largely absent from the recent literature.

The unifying theme of these thirteen essays is understanding. What is it? What does it take to have it? What does it presuppose in what can be understood? In the first group of essays John Haugeland addresses mind and intelligence. Intelligibility comes to the fore in a set of "metaphysical" pieces on analog and digital systems and supervenience. In the third set of papers Haugeland elaborates and then undermines a battery of common presuppositions about the foundational notions of intentionality and representation. Finally, the fourth and most recent group of essays confronts the essential character of understanding in relation to what is understood. The necessary interdependence between personality and intelligence is developed and explained, specifically in the conditions of the possibility of objective scientific knowledge.