Conscious intentionality

William Seager

pp. 33-49

in: Denis Fisette (ed), Consciousness and intentionality, Berlin, Springer, 1999

Abstract

To say that consciousness necessarily possesses intentionality is to say that all states of consciousness necessarily have an intentional object towards which they are directed or are about. Consciousness does not possess intentionality, then, if it is possible to be conscious without being conscious of anything. This is one of the few issues in the philosophy of mind that can rightly be settled by introspection; it is clear from conscious experience that when one is conscious one is invariably conscious of something or other. In fact, any state of consciousness involves a multitude of objects.