Confabulation and Introspection
Today's post is by Adam Andreotta . He earned his PhD from the University of Western Australia in 2018. His research and teaching interests include: epistemology, self-knowledge, the philosophy of David Hume and the philosophy of artificial intelligence. Here, he introduces his article, " Confabulation does not undermine introspection for propositional attitudes ", that has recently appeared in the journal Synthese. For more of his work, see his PhilPapers profile . Most of us think there exists an asymmetry between the way we know our own minds, and the way we know the minds of others. For example, it seems that I can know that I intend to watch Back to the Future , or that I believe that Australia will win the Ashes, by introspection: a private and secure way of knowing my own mental states. If I want to know whether my friend intends to see Back to the Future or believes that Australia will win the Ashes, I need to ask them or observe their behaviour. This common-sens