What do you think?
Rate this book
Origins of Objectivity
Tyler Burge presents a substantial, original study of what it is for individuals to represent the physical world with the most primitive sort of objectivity. By reflecting on the science of perception and related psychological and biological sciences, he gives an account of constitutive conditions for perceiving the physical world, and thus aims to locate origins of representational mind. Origins of Objectivity illuminates several long-standing, central issues in philosophy, and provides a wide-ranging account of relations between human and animal psychologies.
624 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 1, 2010
9 people are currently reading
207 people want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews
August 31, 2017
Two factors brought me to this book. First is my background in embodied cognition and interest in learning about other theories of externalism; Burge's view of "anti-individualism" (that representational content constitutively depends on causal relationships between an individual and the environment) seemed promising. Second is my fascination over the question of how we come to perceive objectivity (entities as definite objects). Burge's book defied my expectations in both delightful and disappointing ways.
This 557 page book has the first 283 pages solely dedicated to presenting other theories on objective representation by influential analytic philosophers of mind (Strawson, Evans, Davidson, and Quine). So more than half the book is criticism of others that indirectly supports Burge's own theory. He only directly argues for his own theory in chapter 9, which is 70 pages long. The rest of the second half is dedicated to presenting empirical studies that have been wrongly interpreted in his opinion.
Surprisingly, I found his criticisms on Strawson, Evans, Davidson, and Quine the most enlightening part of this book. These philosophers at first seem to have radically differing accounts on objective representation (perceiving things as mind-independent entities). However, Burge does a terrific job showing how they all commit the same mistake of hyper-intellectualizing perceptual systems; all four philosophers assume that individuals must represent the criteria that enable objective representation in order to have objective representation. For example, Strawson assumes that language is a prerequisite to having objective representation, and an individual must employ linguistic abilities in order to perceive things as objective, mind-independent entities. After Burge's thorough arguments against these philosophers, it is undoubtable that their arm-chair philosophizing and ignorance of empirical perceptual psychology has detached them from reality. I believe this criticism extends to analytic philosophy as a whole when it tries to make arguments about natural phenomena.
Burge is adept at this deconstruction. But, I think he fails in giving a positive account for objective representation. His argument (although implicit throughout these hundreds of pages) essentially hinges on one mere concept: perceptual constancy. At first is might seem glorious that this one empirical finding can do so much theoretical work; it is the dream of scientific frugality. Perceptual constancy is the phenomenon by which an organism's perceptual systems can represent the same content despite varying environmental conditions. For example, a piece of paper can be constantly perceived as white, despite being moved between differing light sources that change the color in a literal sense. Burge believes perceptual constancy mechanisms explain objective representation because they are able to distinguish between proximal stimulation and distal environmental causes and have veridicality conditions. A thing becomes an objective entity when it can stably persist throughout motion and time, and when there is the possibility of misrepresenting it.
However, I believe Burge's utilization of perceptual constancy to account for objective representation ultimately fails. He makes his argument by showing that simple organisms that do not have perceptual systems capable of perceptual constancy only respond to immediate stimuli in fixed ways. Because they respond only to immediate stimuli, and do not have perceptual constancy mechanisms that deduce distal environmental causes, these organisms cannot fail at their responses. So, as Burge's argument goes, there is no basis of veridicality conditions, and their experiences cannot be described as objective representation. However, I think it is quite obvious that these basic perceptual systems can still fail, relative to immediate stimuli, and there is no conceptual impossibility for a simple organism to perceive these stimuli as objective entities. I see no need for the ability to perceive distal environmental causes in order to have objective representation.
I would recommend this book to people interested in criticizing analytic philosophy, and especially analytic philosophy of mind. People looking for a positive account of objective representation might want to go else where. I would recommend John Haugeland as an analytic philosopher who gives not only convincing accounts of the preconditions of objectivity, but also has beautiful, deep wisdom (his metaphysics also has ethical entailments), which most analytic philosophers lack.
This 557 page book has the first 283 pages solely dedicated to presenting other theories on objective representation by influential analytic philosophers of mind (Strawson, Evans, Davidson, and Quine). So more than half the book is criticism of others that indirectly supports Burge's own theory. He only directly argues for his own theory in chapter 9, which is 70 pages long. The rest of the second half is dedicated to presenting empirical studies that have been wrongly interpreted in his opinion.
Surprisingly, I found his criticisms on Strawson, Evans, Davidson, and Quine the most enlightening part of this book. These philosophers at first seem to have radically differing accounts on objective representation (perceiving things as mind-independent entities). However, Burge does a terrific job showing how they all commit the same mistake of hyper-intellectualizing perceptual systems; all four philosophers assume that individuals must represent the criteria that enable objective representation in order to have objective representation. For example, Strawson assumes that language is a prerequisite to having objective representation, and an individual must employ linguistic abilities in order to perceive things as objective, mind-independent entities. After Burge's thorough arguments against these philosophers, it is undoubtable that their arm-chair philosophizing and ignorance of empirical perceptual psychology has detached them from reality. I believe this criticism extends to analytic philosophy as a whole when it tries to make arguments about natural phenomena.
Burge is adept at this deconstruction. But, I think he fails in giving a positive account for objective representation. His argument (although implicit throughout these hundreds of pages) essentially hinges on one mere concept: perceptual constancy. At first is might seem glorious that this one empirical finding can do so much theoretical work; it is the dream of scientific frugality. Perceptual constancy is the phenomenon by which an organism's perceptual systems can represent the same content despite varying environmental conditions. For example, a piece of paper can be constantly perceived as white, despite being moved between differing light sources that change the color in a literal sense. Burge believes perceptual constancy mechanisms explain objective representation because they are able to distinguish between proximal stimulation and distal environmental causes and have veridicality conditions. A thing becomes an objective entity when it can stably persist throughout motion and time, and when there is the possibility of misrepresenting it.
However, I believe Burge's utilization of perceptual constancy to account for objective representation ultimately fails. He makes his argument by showing that simple organisms that do not have perceptual systems capable of perceptual constancy only respond to immediate stimuli in fixed ways. Because they respond only to immediate stimuli, and do not have perceptual constancy mechanisms that deduce distal environmental causes, these organisms cannot fail at their responses. So, as Burge's argument goes, there is no basis of veridicality conditions, and their experiences cannot be described as objective representation. However, I think it is quite obvious that these basic perceptual systems can still fail, relative to immediate stimuli, and there is no conceptual impossibility for a simple organism to perceive these stimuli as objective entities. I see no need for the ability to perceive distal environmental causes in order to have objective representation.
I would recommend this book to people interested in criticizing analytic philosophy, and especially analytic philosophy of mind. People looking for a positive account of objective representation might want to go else where. I would recommend John Haugeland as an analytic philosopher who gives not only convincing accounts of the preconditions of objectivity, but also has beautiful, deep wisdom (his metaphysics also has ethical entailments), which most analytic philosophers lack.
January 27, 2011
Burge's book is interesting for a number of reasons, not least because it weaves together the many threads that he's been spinning for the past few decades: many of his major papers in the philosophy of mind find an echo here. Burge's imagination and diligent study of the scientific literature make for a number of very interesting claims. Ultimately he is interested to carve out a unique explanatory space for psychological (representational) explanation.
Where the book suffers is in its dogmatic assertive style. Rather than offering carefully presented positions, Burge often prefers to simply state a conclusion or an opinion and move on. Trying to find deductive arguments for his points is often quite painful, with reconstructions often having to span scores of pages if not whole chapters in search of supporting premises. Burge's engagement with the literature tends to be somewhat selective, with various authors you'd expect to see seriously engaged with (e.g. Bennett, Millikan) barely mentioned (if at all). Though the length of the book argues against engagement with everyone whose views are relevant to Burge's position (given its breadth, there are many), numerous repetitive segments could have been, at the least, edited down. Rather than a third restatement of why protozoa do not represent, or why arthropods do, I would have appreciated a more detailed treatment of (inter alia) propositional attitudes, constitutive/a prior explanation & warrant, and a better connection of his theory of action with the rest of the literature. Burge sets aside robots and groups of organisms, yet other philosophers are seriously interested in these topics. A wider scope (with more examples, test cases, or even thought experiments) would have been greatly appreciated.
All in all, it's an inspiring (if flawed) attempt at finding a middle ground between the extrema of so-called "hyper-intellectualized" and radically reductionist views. Worth reading if you're interested in Burge, Quine, Davidson, Dretske, and so forth. It might not be worth the investment if such is only a side interest.
Where the book suffers is in its dogmatic assertive style. Rather than offering carefully presented positions, Burge often prefers to simply state a conclusion or an opinion and move on. Trying to find deductive arguments for his points is often quite painful, with reconstructions often having to span scores of pages if not whole chapters in search of supporting premises. Burge's engagement with the literature tends to be somewhat selective, with various authors you'd expect to see seriously engaged with (e.g. Bennett, Millikan) barely mentioned (if at all). Though the length of the book argues against engagement with everyone whose views are relevant to Burge's position (given its breadth, there are many), numerous repetitive segments could have been, at the least, edited down. Rather than a third restatement of why protozoa do not represent, or why arthropods do, I would have appreciated a more detailed treatment of (inter alia) propositional attitudes, constitutive/a prior explanation & warrant, and a better connection of his theory of action with the rest of the literature. Burge sets aside robots and groups of organisms, yet other philosophers are seriously interested in these topics. A wider scope (with more examples, test cases, or even thought experiments) would have been greatly appreciated.
All in all, it's an inspiring (if flawed) attempt at finding a middle ground between the extrema of so-called "hyper-intellectualized" and radically reductionist views. Worth reading if you're interested in Burge, Quine, Davidson, Dretske, and so forth. It might not be worth the investment if such is only a side interest.
July 25, 2012
This book is both demanding and rewarding. It is demanding because it is long, and because Burge is long-winded, and because it takes Burge forever to cash out the claims he makes at the outset. For instance, it take Burge over 250 to start arguing for his own view (the beginning is just historical analysis), and over 400 pages to get to the empirical data that he mentions over and over in the book.
This book is rewarding, though, because his main theses--(a) that one need not represent any conditions for representation in order to represent, (b) that representation is constitutively tied to environmental conditions--are painstakingly developed and rigorously defended.
This book is rewarding, though, because his main theses--(a) that one need not represent any conditions for representation in order to represent, (b) that representation is constitutively tied to environmental conditions--are painstakingly developed and rigorously defended.
August 10, 2012
I was pretty disappointed -- Burge is one of my philosophical heros. Maybe it was just too much of a slog...
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews