Dennett's R&D Department

By Wayne Brown
To be extended and elabourated later. The "blind watchmaker" is a key idea ...

Dennett introduces improved terminology for the "blind watchmaker" - design without a designer. In a way, perhaps our own minds "design" this way - I think Dennett would say so. In this sense, there is no such thing as intention. That's a philosopher's substitute for reality, however: getting excited about a clever distinction that exists in language only.

But it does make sense to ask if all mind, including the blind watchmaker, exist in this space where "purposefulness" seems to be an emergent, after-the-fact phenomenon. "Teleological" descriptions are just another way of describing the situation, leaving us with emergent purposeful behavior not "owned" by any entity.

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