The influential philosopher Daniel Dennett is best known for his distinctive theory of mental content, his elucidation of how the complex components of mental processing seem to come together in the relatively coherent narratives that we tell ourselves about ourselves and in his vivid accounts of how to think about minds in their evolutionary setting. The essays in this collection step back to ask: Do the complex components of Dennett´s work on intentionality, consciousness, evolution, and ethics themselves come together into a coherent philosophical system? The essays, which grew out of a conference attended by Dennett, consider evolution, intentionality, consciousness, ontology, and ethics and free will.
Introduction: The Dennettian Stance.
Daniel Dennett´s Views on the Power and Pervasiveness of Natural Selection: An Evolutionary Biologist´s Perspective.
Good Tricks and Forced moves, or, The Antinomy of Natural Reason.
Reading Mother Nature´s Mind.
Indeterminacy and Realism.
Real Patterns and Surface Metaphysics.Where Do Dennett´s Stances Stand? Explaining Our Kind of Mind.
Rainforest Realism: A Dennettian Theory of Existence.
Popping the Thought Balloon.
Phenomenology and Heterophenomenology: Husserl and Dennett on Reality and Science.
Judgments and Drafts Eight Years Later. Zombies Explained.
Content, Interpretation, and Consciousness.
Dennett on Ethics: Fitting the Facts against Greed for the Good.
With a Little Help from My Friends.