Naturalizing Intentionality between Philosophy and Brain Science. A Survey of Methodological and Metaphysical Issues (1969-2011)

To give an account of intentionality in terms of the concepts and methods of natural science has been considered as a crucial step towards a naturalization of mental phenomena in general, and as such it has been pursued by a large number of naturalist philosophers and cognitive scientists. Starting from the late 1960s the problem has been addressed in very different, reductionist (Dennett, Millikan: § 2) and antireductionist ways (e.g. Searle, Chalmers, Putnam: § 3). The development of these philosophical programs has benefited from the contemporary technical and theoretical progresses of neuroscience, and leading scientists such as Changeux, Edelman and Damasio have presented articulated proposals of naturalization of intentionality (§ 4). A common element of philosophical investigations turns out to be the reference to a still undeveloped neuroscientific theory. This reference belongs to the legacy of early XXth century anti-metaphysical “scientific philosophy”. In spite of this dominant philosophical approach, neuroscientists present their pioneering researches on intentionality with the help of metaphysical frameworks of the past, including Aristotelism, materialism, emergentism and Spinozism. The final section of the paper examines this peculiar “paradox” of naturalization programs, by considering some critical exchanges about the neurobiological approach (§ 5) and by reviewing the role of metaphysical paradigms for different approaches to this issue (§ 6).