Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!psych.toronto.edu!christo From: christo@psych.toronto.edu (Christopher Green) Subject: Re: What does intentionality have that AI doesn't..... Message-ID: <1991Mar16.145847.28793@psych.toronto.edu> Organization: Department of Psychology, University of Toronto References: <13503@ccncsu.ColoState.EDU> <17153@venera.isi.edu> Date: Sat, 16 Mar 1991 14:58:47 GMT In article greenba@gambia.crd.ge.com (ben a green) writes: >I suggest that the term "intension" or "intention" is hopelessly >ambiguous and should be replaced by other terms according to what >is intended: > >In (1), intention is possessed by a person. >In (2), intension is possessed by a term. >In (3), intension is possessed by a sentence. >In (4), intension is possessed by mental state. > You've got this dead right (except that you haven't included the technical meaning of intenTion) and there's no ambiguity at all. The reason three things have are associated with intenSion is that ther's a long standing debate over whether the word or the sentence is the 'unit' of meaning and that mental states (many of them, anyway) are widely taken to be propositional attitidues. If so they're relations to propositions, propositions have meaning, and meaning just might be the intenSion of the proposition. -- Christopher D. Green Psychology Department e-mail: University of Toronto christo@psych.toronto.edu Toronto, Ontario M5S 1A1 cgreen@lake.scar.utoronto.ca