从心理内容到自我知识先验性的反个体主义

Anti-Individualism from Mental Content to Apriority of Self-Knowledge

若要获知自我的信念、欲望、怀疑等心理状态的内容,似乎只需通过内省而不必诉诸经验手段考察外部世界。然而心理内容反个体主义的出现冲击了这种传统看法,反个体主义主张对心理内容的界定依赖于个体所处的特定环境状况,若该观点成立则有可能得出关于自我心理内容的知识不可独立于经验而获得辩护的结论。围绕心理内容反个体主义能否与自我知识的先验性相兼容的问题,展开了一场持续多年的争论。但是争论双方均预设自我知识要么是先验的,要么不是先验的;而没有意识到还有一种可能,即自我知识有时候是先验的,有时候则不是。从心理内容反个体主义出发,借助对“孪生地球”情境作为相关可选项的认识论地位的考察,可分析出自我心理内容能否先验地获知是依赖于个体所处的特定认知环境的,从而得出知识论意义上的反个体主义。

In order to know what my mental content is,it seems that I need solely to introspect into my own mind without empirical investigation on the external world.However,this traditional view is being challenged by anti-individualism of mental contents,which argues that the individuation of mental contents is dependent on specific environmental states.If anti-individualism is right,then it may be followed by the conclusion that one cannot know one’s own mental contents a priori.Hence there has been a longstanding debate around whether mental content anti-individualism can be compatible with the apriority of self-knowledge.But both debating camps presuppose that self-knowledge is either a priori or else not a priori,while there is also a third possibility which has been neglected that self-knowledge is sometimes a priori but sometimes not a priori.In this paper I will draw support from the analysis of the twin earth situations as relevant alternatives of the real situation,concluding that whether mental contents of oneself can be known a priori is dependent on the specific epistemic environment one is in.So we can start from mental content anti-individualism and end up with epistemic anti-individualism.