Thalia Wheatley - What is Intentionality?

'Intentionality' is a philosophical term that describes the elements of mental states that are 'directed' at things or ideas—the fact that thinking, feeling, hoping, believing, desiring are 'about' things. How can physical brain processes—electric currents and chemical concentrations—be 'about' things? Intentionality, some claim, is a problem for physicalists.



Thalia Wheatley is an Associate Professor of Psychological and Brain Sciences at Dartmouth College.


Closer to Truth presents the world’s greatest thinkers exploring humanity’s deepest questions. Discover fundamental issues of existence. Engage new and diverse ways of thinking. Appreciate intense debates. Share your own opinions. Seek your own answers.

[nicodubn]

CTT is an amazing tv program. It makes us think, deeply, about who we are, what we are, what we are doing and why we're doing it. Everytime I watch full episodes or segments, I come out or feel like I come out a bit more knowledgeable about our world, and at the same time, way more confused and perplexed than I was before hitting that Play button. Thank you to Robert and all his guests for this contents.

[ryanprice]

How many misunderstandings of what she said are there? Keep checking the comments here to find out!

[faresdaradkeh]

'intentionality' was defined as the ability of the human mind to refer to objects outside itself

Feeling isn't the whole purpose, but you can't have purpose without feeling. Without feeling, it's just an "act".

[ch.tah.]

Her gaze @ the beginning. Very n'tuned...

[jamesruscheinski]

Maybe purpose accomplished through use of energy, with intentionality and agency provided by direction of energy?

[AlexADalton]

Uh...this isn't really the intentionality (e.g. aboutness) that is difficult to explain in modern consciousness studies.

[youtubetrailerpark]

I'm hypnotized by her beauty. Her words, not so much.

[jamesruscheinski]

Are purposeful actions and intentional willing conscious? Do purposeful actions become unintentional if done out of habit? Is intentional willing some kind of urge or knee-jerk reaction? Can intentional willing become self-fulfilling prophecy? Intention almost seems reaction to something external. Purpose more internally derived. Maybe two different areas of brain.

[jamesruscheinski]

When human brain directs energy between neurons could provide feeling of intentionality and agency?

[jamesruscheinski]

might intentionality try to figure out the reason something is being done or the reason to do something?

[mikedziuba]

I don't think exceptions should make the rule.

Most of the time, people truly and fully intend to do what they do. It's only in some exceptional circumstances people can either mislead themselves or have other people mislead them into thinking that they've intended to do something, when this isn't true.

Sometimes people falsely confess to a crime they didn't commit. A lot of times this happens under interrogation, emotional pressure, and even torture. And sometimes people with mental problems might convince themselves that they've done it, when this isn't true.

But just because such cases exist, doesn't mean all criminals don't intend what they do. In most cases, they truly intend to do it, and the courts should take this into account. The courts are there to differentiate between false intent and true intent. That's what the trial is for. And courts don't usually take people's word for it. They look for evidence and base their decisions on evidence.

So, when somebody is on trial for a pre-meditated murder for example. Then the murderer might've written out a detailed plan and a checklist of things to do before and after the murder. If such notes are found, then this would be evidence of a premeditated murder, provided that there is also evidence that this person has actually committed the murder. Because there is a remote possibility that one person might've been planning the murder, but then someone else murdered the victim before the planner could do it.

[johnxantoro]

She seems to work with a pretty toothless and useless academic definition of "intention". She defines real intentions as that, what a person actually does. So when I actually go on the toilet, I have intended to do so. When I go on to read a certain book, I intended to do so (even if the main cause was hypnosis and I didn't think I intended it). When I intend something, that can't physically happen, it's a false intention. For instance when I intend to move a tree via telekinesis, it won't work.
But this approach really false short of the internal reality. First of all, most actions are not intended as we commonly understand it. Not just reflexes but almost all motions. I might intend to eat lunch now but I don't intend how I move knife and fork or how I carry the plate. What does it mean to say "I intended to move the spoon in this specific way"? It means nothing, because there wasn't any kind of thought (intention) behind it. It was an automation. For the word "intention" to have meaning there has to be a thought. It's very frequent that humans do things they didn't intend. A person might intend to go on a diet and yet binge on cake all night. Did he intend to binge on cake or go on a diet? Now there it gets tricky and interesting, because seemingly it was both. First there was the intention of the diet but then in front of the cake, the intention to eat the cake arose. Intention is an internal thing only, it's pointless to link "objective action" to it. If somebody cuts through the illusion of free will completely, "intention" will be a vastly different thing than for somebody who thinks he controls and intends everything.

[xspotbox]

Intentionallity might be one of the keys to understand consciousness better, but than again so is the emotional intelligence, both phenomena are related and can be manipulated. Anything can trigger an emotional response, but the way we feel about something will shape our intentions. And our intentions will cause different actions, looping back into our emotional evaluation state of mind.
Can't manipulate one without affecting the other. In matter of fact, this is how we know when we're being manipulated, by tracking subtle behavioral changes that are following own intentions. This is also why we can feel guilty for something bad happening around us even if we had nothing to do with it, and also why we don't feel guilty most of the times, we're primary interested only in things that relate to us directly. It's because there's a process going on inside our minds separating causal links, without shaping of our personal morals we would be like robots, completely absent of free will and personal dreams.

[eudoramcqueen]

Okaaay. I’m totally lost! Sigh. Well maybe next year😅

[cvsree]

All this confusion is because we are in a lower state of consciousness

Yoga helps us to graduate through 8 levels of consciousness

Average person experiences only 3 of these 8 states: awake, dream and deep sleep states

Start Yoga today and explore the next 5 levels

[kallianpublico]

Will is not intention. Will is particular to each individual, it is exclusive. Intention comes before will. Howso? Because the individual cannot will what isnt possible. A lungfish can breathe air, a regular fish will ultimately die.

[junkjunk]

what was all that ?
i have no idea
i got nothing

[tomkwake]

Intention precedes all physical motion, try getting out of bed without intending to do so, you can't! What they are really discussing is being aware of the "intention", which is "free will". The courts are interested in the intention behind the free will, not just having the free will or the behavior that has been done. I've also performed hypnosis on individuals, and it is a process that shortcuts the "conscousness' of free will.

The reason why physical brain processes—electric currents and chemical concentrations can be 'about' things, is because, things = energy, and the brain has a large amount of neurons, which are sense receptors to energy. Thus the fact that thinking, feeling, hoping, believing, desiring are 'about' things, means that it is a fact that thinking, feeling, hoping, believing, desiring are forms of 'energy' things.

[fluffysheap]

Well, at first, I was excited because I thought maybe she was going to make a strong point in favor of materialism, something like altering intentionality by magnetic stimulation or some kind of drug or something.

Nope, it's hypnosis. Meaningless.