Philosophy of Mind Seminar (Friday - Week 3, TT24)

Abstract: In this paper I consider the prospects for the claim that joint attention is an ‘essentially communicative’ relation. This suggestion is sometimes motivated on the basis of a dilemma which is said to face the view that joint attention is a form of shared perceptual experience. I argue that if this indeed constitutes a genuine dilemma for the perceptual account, then a parallel dilemma will also apply to the communicative account as it is standardly formulated. Finally, I will argue that a way forward may be available if we think of the communicative relation in question as a specific form of perceptual interaction.