Hume's naturalistic theory of representation

Hume is a naturalist in many different respects and about many different topics; this paper argues that he is also a naturalist about intentionality and representation. It does so in the course of answering four questions about his theory of mental representation: (1) Which perceptions represent? (2) What can perceptions represent? (3) Why do perceptions represent at all? (4) How do perceptions represent what they do? It appears that, for Hume, all perceptions except passions can represent; and they can represent bodies, minds, and persons, with their various qualities. In addition, ideas can represent impressions and other ideas. However, he explicitly rejects the view that ideas are inherently representational, and he implicitly adopts a view according to which things (whether mental or non-mental) represent in virtue of playing, through the production of mental effects and dispositions, the functional role of what they represent. It is in virtue of their particular causal roles that qualitatively identical ideas are capable of representing particulars or general kinds; substances or modes; relations; past, present, or future; and individuals or compounds. There are many species of naturalism. Doxastic naturalism, we may say, is the doctrine that belief formation is an operation of nature. Epistemic naturalism is the doctrine that beliefs can have epistemic authority and be rightful objects of assent in virtue of the ways in which they result from operations of nature. Explanatory naturalism is the program of trying to explain phenomena without appeal to anything outside of nature. Metaphysical naturalism is the doctrine that nothing exists outside of nature. No doubt there are other species of naturalism as well. Different versions of each of these species of naturalism result from different conceptions of what is, and what would not be, within the scope of ‘nature’—a term of which Hume remarks that “there is none more ambiguous and equivocal” (T 3.1.2.7). He notes, in connection with this remark, that the “natural” may be contrasted with the miraculous, the unusual, the artificial, the civil, and the moral; but for contemporary 1 References to “T” are to Hume (2000), with book, part, section, and paragraph numbers.