Dennett+(WK3)

=Intentional Systems Theory=

by: Daniel Dennett
Intentional Systems theory is a theory about how and why we are able to make sense of the behaviors of so many complicated things by considering them as agents. Bridging the chasm between personal level folk psychology and the activities of neural circuits is a staggering task of imagination that benefits from this principled relaxation of the conditions that philosophers have tried to impose on human belief and desire. Intentional systems theory also permits us to chart the continuities between simpler animal minds and our own minds, and even the similarities with process of natural selection that discover all the design improvements that can thereby be discerned.

Intentional Systems Theory is the analysis of the meaning of terms like believe desire expect decide and intend. we use these words to interpret explain and predict the behavior of humans, animals, and objects.

Dennett writes, "The intentional stance is, by definition, the strategy of interpreting the behavior of an entity (person, animal, artifact, whatever) by treating it as if it were a rational agent who governed its 'choice' of 'action' by a 'consideration' of its 'beliefs' and 'desires'...scare-quotes...may be set aside in the interests of exploiting their central features: their role in practical reasoning, and hence in the prediction of the behavior of practical reasoners (p.1)."

-"The central epistemological claim of intentional systems theory is that when we treat each other as intentional systems, using attributions of beliefs and desires to govern our interactions and generate our anticipations, we are similarly finessing our ignorance of the details of the processes going on in each other's skulls (and our own!) and relying, unconsciously, on the fact that to a remarkably good first approximation, people are rational (p.5)."

In order to better understand "Intentional Systems Theory", Dennett contrasts the theory with two others - (1) "Physical Stance" and (2) Design Stance".

-Physical Stance: Predicting the behavior of a thing on the basis of what "...we know about the laws of physics and the physical constitution of the things in question..."(the construction of physics devise our prediction) This stance is most often used for things that are neither alive nor artifacts.

-Design Stance: Predicting the behavior of a thing on the basis of how it is designed and what its function is based on its design. (design entity that chooses if something happens then it will react accordingly) Dennett uses the example of an alarm clock (i.e., based on what I know of the design of the clock, if I push button A, the clock will do function B, and so on...).

-Intentional Stance: Prediction the behavior of "an agent of sorts, with beliefs and desires and enough rationality to do what it ought to do given it's beliefs and desires." (the designed thing can rationalize) In this stance, these intentional (mental?) precursors to the action are mostly assumed, and not explained.

Dennett ranks the three stances in terms of "riskiness", on the basis of the fragility of assumptions which come with each. Physical stance is least risky. Design stance is more risky than the physical stance, but less risky than the intentional stance, because Design Stance assumes the object has a design and will not malfunction. Intentional stance is the riskiest, as its assumption is based on the competency of the agent in question.

In intentional systems theory we interpret that a thing can truly have a mind, beliefs, desires or a mental state. Interpreting behavior of an entity and their role in practical reasoning in a prediction of behavior.

Intentional stance has two orders. First order is one whose behavior is predictable by attributing beliefs to desires. The second order is predictable only if it is attributed to beliefs about belief or belief about desires.

Another aspect of intentional system theory is attributed toward natural selection."The process of natural selection is a blind, foreseeable, purposeless process of trial and error." He also mentions that "when evolution discovers a regularity or consistancy in the environment, it designs adaptations that tacitly presuppose that regularity; when there is expectable variation instead of constancy, evolution has to go to the expense of specifying the adaptive response to the various different conditions." In short, a static change in the environment will cause creatures to be able to survive in this new environment, while something that is variable will make creatures able to deal with any of these circumstances and decide the best course of action in these various events.

Artificial design as in computers can have various intentional stances. One example is a computer can be programmed to make controlled decisions (if one and one equals two, then two minus one equals one). Another example is that artificial intelligence can be programmed to act in a alphabetic research direction.

Intentional systems theory permits us to chart the continuities between simpler animal minds, the human mind, and natural selection while avoiding focus on the underlying design elements.