Virtuous Thoughts: The Philosophy of Ernest Sosa by John Turri

Author:John Turri
Language: eng
Format: epub, pdf
Publisher: Springer Netherlands, Dordrecht

3.1 Kinds of Concepts and Feldman’s Inferentialism

Let us turn now to investigating an alternative proposal for solving the problem of the speckled hen that hinges on distinguishing between different kinds of concepts. We have so far neglected to discuss a crucial part of Sosa’s presentation of the problem of the speckled hen in which he distinguishes among three different kinds of concepts: Indexical, phenomenal-recognitional, and SGA (simple geometrical and arithmetical). Let us consider each in turn.

An Indexical concept of an experiential quality is the kind of concept one would employ if one were to attend to some feature of experience while thinking a thought expressible as I am experiencing thusly. One will thereby have formed a belief about an experiential quality that matches the determinacy of these properties in experience. (“Attention,” Sosa says, “is the index finger of the mind.”)

Indexical concepts make possible beliefs about experiential qualities that superior and inferior introspectors are both justified in believing in the speckled hen examples. Assuming that my experience has a determinate number of speckles, I can form a reliable belief that I have an experience as of that many speckles, so long as I intend with the Indexical to pick out the exact number of speckles presented in experience.

As Sosa notes, referring to an experiential quality by way of an Indexical concept is a very thin way of thinking of an experiential quality. Having an Indexical concept of 48 speckledness does not imply that one is able to reidentify the property nor does it imply that one understands any words in language for the number 48 or for the property of being speckled. Sosa distinguishes between Indexical and thicker phenomenal-recognitional concepts: Thicker [phenomenal-recognitional] concepts go beyond thin Indexical ones at least in requiring some ability to recognize the commonality in a diversity of items that co-exemplify some feature. Possession of such a [phenomenal-recognitional] concept would involve sensitivity, when appropriately situated, to the presence or absence of that feature. (125)

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