Content, non-conceptual

2. Varieties of non-conceptual content

The definition of non-conceptual content just given applies straightforwardly to some notions of content. States which carry ‘information’ (in Dretske’s (1981) sense) have non-conceptual contents, since a state’s carrying information is a matter of its co-varying in a nomic or reliable way with a certain phenomenon. For example: on this view we can say that a weather vane represents or indicates the direction of the wind. But it is obvious that the weather vane does not possess the concept of the direction of the wind.

However, it is debatable whether a state’s carrying information is sufficient for the state to have representational content in any interesting sense. For one thing, since nomic co-variation is present wherever there is causation, this theory stretches the notion of representation to the point where it can apply to almost everything in the universe. Another problem is that informational states seem incapable of representing incorrectly; but the possibility of incorrect representation seems essential to genuine representation. Something more must be added to turn mere informational states into states with genuine representational content (see Semantics, informational).

Two other kinds of state are claimed to have non-conceptual contents: states of the information-processing cognitive systems (for example the visual system) postulated by many psychological theories; and conscious perceptual experiences. Computational psychological theories claim that systems within the brain perform computations: that is, these cognitive systems compute functions by processing representations algorithmically. So the thinker (or the cognitive system) is in certain representational states, or states with content. These representational states are essentially specified in terms of certain concepts, but there is no need for the thinker to possess these concepts in order to be in these states. For example, Marr’s (1982) theory of vision analyses visual information processing in terms of complex mathematical concepts; one need not master these concepts in order to process visual information. So these computational states, if they exist, are non-conceptual (see Mind, computational theories of; Vision).

The other kind of states which have been attributed non-conceptual contents are conscious perceptual experiences. The general idea here is that in perception many aspects of the world are presented to the perceiver; yet there is no need to suppose that the perceiver has a distinct concept for each aspect of the world which is so presented. Consider colour experience: is it plausible that each of us has a distinct concept for each precise shade of colour we are able to perceive? If it is not, this can be a reason for holding that perceptual experiences have non-conceptual contents: perception has a ‘phenomenological richness’ which is not constrained by the concepts the perceiver has (Evans 1982: 229–; other motivations for attributing non-conceptual contents to experiences are offered in Crane 1992 and Martin 1992).

Given that experiences have non-conceptual contents, how should this be explained? One of the most detailed accounts has been given by Peacocke (1993: ch. 3). At one level, the content of a perceptual experience is what he calls a ‘scenario’: a set of ways of filling out the space around a perceiver with properties and relations – for instance, with colour and shape properties. The experience’s representational content is given by the scenario, because the experience is correct just in case the actual distribution of properties and relations around the perceiver belongs in the scenario. However, there is no requirement that the perceiver has all the concepts which essentially characterize the properties and relations in the scenario.

Opinions differ on whether the content of experience is wholly conceptual, wholly non-conceptual, or some mixture. Evans (1982) holds that it is wholly non-conceptual, while Peacocke (1993) holds that experiences can have many layers of content, some of which are conceptual and some non-conceptual (see Perception).