The issues I raised in the previous sections can probably all be met in order to maintain the taxonomy suggested by Dokic and Arcangeli and to develop it further. Nevertheless, I think that the points I raised also allow for an alternative interpretation that offers a different perspective on a taxonomy of imaginings. Before summarising the results of this commentary, I would like to explore this alternative perspective on the topic. My two main claims are: (1.) that it is not helpful to involve the notion of re-creation in a taxonomy of imaginings, and that the taxonomy can be yielded without it; and (2.) that the specific way the self is (not) involved in imaginings distinguishes them from experiences rather than mirroring experiences.
Concerning the first point, it is neither necessary nor helpful to involve the notion of re-creation or any other metaphysical notion if the aim is to yield a phenomenological taxonomy of imaginative states (and I take this to be one of the aims of Dokic and Arcangeli’s paper). In order to yield such a phenomenological taxonomy, we can simply rely on our pre-theoretical classifications of imaginings as vision-like or action-like, and so forth. The notion vision-like and its cognates x-like can be understood as phenomenological notions here: to the imagining subject, what it is like to visually imagine an object is similar to what it is like to visually experience an object. That there are such similarities in phenomenal character is an interesting observation that allows us to build a phenomenological taxonomy. If one additionally accepts the idea of a cognitive phenomenology, this account allows us to capture cognitive imaginings as well, and to classify them according to their (cognitive) phenomenal character. Explaining why imaginings are vision-like or action-like, and what the metaphysical underpinnings of this phenomenological taxonomy may be is another task. These tasks should not be entangled.
One may worry that these pre-theoretical notions (such as vision-like) and opinions are too imprecise and not apt to yield a taxonomy of imaginative states that can ground further philosophical theorising. One answer to this worry is to expand a line of thought suggested by Fabian Dorsch. He considers the fact that we stably, effortlessly, and consistently “do group together a large variety of mental occurrences in the class of imaginings, while excluding many others” (Dorsch 2012, p. 6) to justify the idea that imaginings form a unified class of mental states. This line of thought can be adapted to ground a more fine-grained taxonomy of imaginings, based on our pre-theoretical opinions: we also stably, effortlessly, and consistently classify various imaginings as vision-like, audition-like, movement-like, and so forth. There are certainly borderline cases or instances of imaginings that combine several phenomenological aspects, but nevertheless this pre-theoretical classification is stable in the way described by Dorsch. I consider therefore this intuitive and pre-theoretical classification a helpful taxonomy of imaginings that can serve as a sufficiently justified starting point for further philosophical reflection. This pre-theoretical classification of imaginings that I suggest probably does not yield essentially different categories to the taxonomy suggested by Dokic and Arcangeli. It classifies imaginings according to their phenomenal character as vision-like, action-like, and so forth, which are all categories acknowledged by the authors. What I wish to claim is that in order to ground this taxonomy, it is not necessary or helpful to involve a metaphysical notion such as re-creation. It is sufficient to recur to our pre-theoretical classification of imaginative states.
The only category that is probably not reflected in this phenomenological taxonomy is the distinction between subjective and objective imagination, which, according to the authors, also “gives rise to phenomenologically different imaginings” (Dokic & Arcangeli this collection, p. 6). The reason for this is that there is a difference between the more fine-grained phenomenology and the more coarse-grained phenomenology of a mental state. By this I mean that we can distinguish various aspects of a mental state’s phenomenal character. Two different visual experiences of a red apple and a green apple respectively share the coarse-grained phenomenal character of being visual, but they differ in terms of their fine-grained phenomenal character: perceiving a red apple is phenomenally different from perceiving a green apple. The taxonomy I suggest above is concerned with the rather coarse-grained phenomenal character of imaginings that allows us to classify them as vision-like, action-like, and so forth. An even more coarse-grained phenomenal character would be the one which all types of imaginings have in contrast to cognitive state, for example. The distinction between objective and subjective imagination seems to reflect more fine-grained phenomenological categories than those that classify imaginings according to what their phenomenal character resembles. I am not sure whether there is a phenomenology of objectiveness (as opposed to subjectiveness) that, for example, unifies sensory imagination and cognitive imagination as opposed to proprioceptive imagination (as suggested by Dokic and Arcangeli). This shows that the account and methodology that I propose also faces certain challenges. One challenge would be to single out exactly which aspects of the phenomenology we take to be defining marks for a categorisation. Another challenge, for example, would be to point out that for this account we have to rely on introspective findings, whose epistemic status and reliability may be controversial. Nevertheless I think that pre-theoretical reflection based on phenomenological findings is an appropriate way to lay out a taxonomy of the mental states we classify as imaginings, since in principle it can be done stably, effortlessly, and consistently (see again Dorsch 2012, p. 6).
The second aspect I would like to address is the distinction between subjective and objective imagination. These notions introduced by Dokic and Arcangeli are very helpful, since they reveal the particular ways in which the self (or aspects of the self) is involved in imaginings. However, I think one can draw different conclusions from these observations than those presented by the authors. As I suggested in section 3, I think the best way to describe the point of view involved in imaginings is by adopting and expanding the notion of an empty point of view. It seems to me that imaginings do not involve the self in the same way as, for example, experiences do. I will explore this line of thought by pointing to the example of visual experiences as opposed to visual imaginings. The perspectival character of a visual experience has several aspects: it involves a distinct point of view that locates the perceiving subject in a determinate relation to its surrounding objects. Objects are therefore perceived as being close, far away, to the left, above, and so forth (see also Martin 2002, p. 408). In this sense the self is involved, since there is always an egocentric perspective. However, in imagination this kind of perspectivalness need not be fully realised. It seems possible to imagine an object without imagining it at a certain distance or at a certain position. If I perceive a tree, I perceive it far away to the left, for example. If I imagine a tree I can simply imagine the tree. I can imagine a tree in the distance to the left but this is something I deliberately add to the imagining. This thought can be expanded to other forms of imaginings as well. One way to capture this particular perspectival character of imaginings is to adopt the proposed notion of an empty point of view: while experiences involve the self in the sense of involving an egocentric perspective (which is a non-empty point of view), imaginings involve an empty point of view. This does not mean that one adopts, in imagining, the point of view of someone else (as opposed to the point of view of myself), but that this point of view is empty. One important difference between this notion of an empty point of view and Dokic and Arcangeli’s account is that it differentiates imaginings from experiences: regarding the point of view that is involved, imaginings differ importantly from non-imaginative experiential states, since the former may involve an empty point of view. In contrast to this, Dokic and Arcangeli seem to think that imaginings mirror non-imaginative states with respect to the nature of the point of view involved (again probably partly due to the notion of re-creation). Again, the approach that I suggest certainly faces challenges. One challenge is to demand that we spell out the notion of an empty point of view in more detail. So far, I have only pointed in the direction of how to capture certain particular features of imaginings. However, investigating this difference further seems like a promising way to clarify the nature of imaginings.
To sum up, I will briefly repeat the points I discussed in this commentary:
I suggested that we explore the notion of re-creation further, since it occupies a central place in the suggested taxonomy of Experiential Imagination. As I argued, this notion must either be spelled out or omitted from the taxonomy, since as an underdetermined notion it does not add to the explanatory basis. Furthermore, I showed that the authors seem to implicitly rely on different notions of re-creation instead of remaining neutral about it.
I pointed to some worries about the distinction between subjective and objective imagination. I suggested that we adopt the notion of an empty point of view to characterise the kind of self-involvement we find in experiential imaginings.
I formulated my doubts about the classification of cognitive imaginings as experiential imaginings due to their phenomenal character, which does not seem to be experiential in the sense that it does not involve an experiential perspective.
I concluded these considerations with my own interpretation of the findings. As I suggested, we can develop a phenomenological taxonomy of different types of imaginings by basing it on our pre-theoretical opinions about imaginings. We do not need to involve the notion of re-creation (or other non-phenomenological notions) in order to do this. Clarifying the metaphysical underpinnings of this taxonomy is a different task. Additionally, I interpreted reflections on the various ways the self is involved in imaginings as yielding the conclusion that imaginings differ from experiences in terms of how the self is (not) involved, rather than mirroring experiences, in this respect. Imaginings involve an empty point of view, while experiences have an egocentric point of view. I consider both these aspects relevant for any theory of imaginings.
Dokic and Arcangeli’s taxonomy has essentially contributed to further developing a theory of imaginings by revealing and illuminating relevant aspects of the nature of imaginings. Their observations have clearly uncovered a neuralgic aspect of imaginings, which is how the self is involved (or not involved) in imaginings. Furthermore, their taxonomy allows us to classify cognitive imaginings in terms of their phenomenal character and not, for example, with respect to what these are about. Although the taxonomy reveals how heterogeneous imaginings are, it therefore nevertheless offers a unified take on imaginings. Adopting Dokic and Arcangeli’s observations as a starting point for further investigations will certainly be very fruitful, and is sure to advance our understanding of the nature of imaginings.
Acknowledgements
I want to thank the editors of this volume and the anonymous reviewers for their valuable comments, which have all been very helpful.