Collective intentionality

You can't play football on your own.

And if you send 36 players onto a field, with each trying to kick the ball between the goal posts, but that does not amount to a game of football.

But 18 people trying together to kick the ball between the posts, with another 18 trying together to stop them - there's the makings of a game.

So it is clear that there is a difference between "I am trying to kick a goal" and "We are trying to kick a goal". Collective intent is not simply the concatenation or addition of individual intents. Collective intent is shared; collective intentionality is shared.

Searle introduced the term in his paper "Collective intentions and actions". The argument there is that collective intentions are not reducible to individual intentions and beliefs, and yet happen in an individual's mind. There is no supernatural linking of minds here, just the intent to work as a group.

Briefly and dogmatically, Searle contends that

• We-intentions do not reduce to I-intentions; they are basic,
• We-intentions happen in individuals
• We-intentions have as a background that there are others who may engage in the collective exercise
• We-intentions have an intent and a propositional content, S(p), that aligns with the force and propositional content of speech acts, F(p).

Next: Status Function

Status Functions

Suppose you are selling tea, and a customer offers to trade a blank piece of paper for a cuppa; You would presumably refuse; but if that piece of paper is a $5 note you might accept. In what exactly does the difference between these two pieces of paper lie?

The difference is in the status of the note in relation to our shared intentional attitudes. It is our collective attitude that gives some pieces of paper a special role. The paper counts as $5; it has a status function.

Again, it is not my intention alone that makes the paper a note; it is our intention, together with all the background paraphernalia of banks and credit and so on, that makes it a fact that the note is worth $5.

Or consider your car. You exchanged funds for it, signed the appropriate paper, have suitable documentation; and as a result you may within certain guidelines do with the car as you please. If someone else takes the car without your say so, then you have certain rights and may make a claim against them.

That is, you own the car. And you do so as a consequence of our collective intent, that certain things count as your property under specified circumstances. Your ownership is a status function. And it exists because of our collective intent.

That the bishop stays on the same colour is a result of its status as a bishop. Where it to move down a file, it would cease to count as a bishop. That Zelenskyy is Ukraine's President is status function; he counts as President as a result of our shared intentionality.

A status function is created by a declaration similar to

X counts as Y in C

Money counts as legal tender in our economy; This piece counts as a bishop in chess; Zelenskyy counts as the Ukraine's president in Ukrainian government.

A status function requires collective intentionality; and it is had not as a result of some physical structure, but as a result of our collectively imposing and recognising that status.

You might notice the relation to declarative utterances. A declarative makes something the case by declaring it to be so. Recall that declaratives are curious in having two directions of fit: a declaration sets out how things are, yet how things are changes to match the declaration.

Next: Institutions

I'm sorry if I missed any discussion on this but I'm not sure that the distinction drawn in the OP works - or at least, works in any way which is not somewhat arbitrary.

To take what I assume are 'non-institutional' facts:

The bishop is made of wood
The laptop has a keyboard
Zelenskyy is human — Banno

That that piece of wood is a bishop, or that that thing is a laptop, or that humans are these kinds of things - these are just as much 'institutional' as "This laptop belongs to me", etc, no? That is, for anything to count as something is to always introduce a degree of 'institution' that cannot be so easily set off from 'non-institutional' facts. To "count-as" (judgements) is simply always 'institutional' by virtue of being judgements at all.

But to the degree that there is something that seems to distinguish the first set of examples from the second, I don't think its the presence of absence of 'sociality'. It seems to me to be what we can take for granted or not, given the (relatively stable) forms of life which we have. That we don't (generally) put into question what is (read: "counts as") human, is because we are not under attack by shape-shifting aliens which make line hard to demarcate (for example). But this doesn't mean that such judgments cannot ever come into question, and which would rely on the explicit introduction of 'institutions' to adjudicate.

(Searle in general like to make these very dumb distinctions that basically turn empirical contingencies into transcendental distinctions. He is a very bad philosopher. He similarly fucked up Austin and it's not surprising to see this repeated here).

That that piece of wood is a bishop, or that that thing is a laptop, or that humans are these kinds of things - these are just as much 'institutional' as "This laptop belongs to me", etc, no? That is, for anything to count as something is to always introduce a degree of 'institution' that cannot be so easily set off from 'non-institutional' facts. To "count-as" (judgements) is simply always 'institutional' by virtue of being judgements at all. — StreetlightX

It's not clear what you are claiming here. A piece of wood will be a piece of wood regardless of what we say about it. That is counts as "a piece of wood" - that we use those words to talk about it - I understand that Searle would agree indeed an institutional fact. So are you here just denying realism?

But to the degree that there is something that seems to distinguish the first set of examples from the second, I don't think its the presence of absence of 'sociality'. It seems to me to be what we can take for granted or not, given the (relatively stable) forms of life which we have. — StreetlightX

Again, this is unclear to me. Do you think you could play chess without pieces that count as bishops? What could it mean to take it for granted that this was a bishop? Isn't that just to grant the special status that Searle is talking about?

That we don't (generally) put into question what is (read: "counts as") human, is because we are not under attack by shape-shifting aliens which make line hard to demarcate (for example). — StreetlightX

Sure. Again, I don't see that Searle would deny this, nor that it runs counter to his account.

It won't do simply to assert that he is a bad philosopher. Doing so would be bad philosophy.

To be sure, there are issues to consider here. I don't see that you have raised them. See for example the discussion with Tony Lawson, who while accepting much of Searle's ontology, remains critical.

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/309139894_Some_Critical_Issues_in_Social_Ontology_Reply_to_John_Searle

Briefly and dogmatically, Searle contends that
We-intentions do not reduce to I-intentions; they are basic, — Banno

Interesting thread and posts, thanks.

Does Searle develop arguments for this point above? It seems debatable. For instance, if one of the teams doesn't want to play the other one, there's no collective intention to play. So it seems that individual intentions can aggregate into collective ones.

In the article cited above, he uses only a general argument, that we-intentions depend on cooperation, but mere I-intentions are insufficient for cooperation; hence we-intentions cannot be reduced to I-intentions (p.406). It is the inadequacy of I-intentions to achieve a cooperative goal that implies we-intentions. In later works he provides more examples.

See the entry in SEP:

Suppose you intend to visit the Taj Mahal tomorrow, and I intend to visit the Taj Mahal tomorrow. This does not make it the case that we intend to visit the Taj Mahal together. If I know about your plan, I may express (or refer to) our intention in the form “we intend to visit the Taj Mahal tomorrow”. But this does not imply anything collective about our intentions. Even if knowledge about our plan is common, mutual, or open between us, my intention and your intention may still be purely individual. For us to intend to visit the Taj Mahal together is something different. — https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/collective-intentionality/

A piece of wood will be a piece of wood regardless of what we say about it. That is counts as "a piece of wood" - that we use those words to talk about it - I understand that Searle would agree indeed an institutional fact. So are you here just denying realism? — Banno

The point is that it's 'counting as' all the way down. This isn't denying realism because the world is quite indifferent to what we say about it, and nothing about how we speak about the world has any bearing on its being as it is (Devitt). But insofar as there is always a 'how', all facts are institutional facts. It is just the case that some things make those 'institutions' more keenly felt than others. But those 'some things' are totally contingent and do not lend themselves to the kind of (faux-)principled distinction that Searle would like to draw.

The point is that it's 'counting as' all the way down. — StreetlightX

Well, presuming realism, no, since at the base the bishop is a piece of wood; that's what realism holds, that there are things that are the case even if unsaid. So yes, what we say about the wood has no bearing on the wood; the institutional facts start when we decide that "this counts as wood".

I must say, it seems to me that you have grabbed hold of the least interesting part of the argument.

since at the base the bishop is a piece of wood — Banno

And you think what we call wood is a theological given? Or that the role of a bishop is too? Word use is a human institution. It cannot be otherwise.

it seems to me that you have grabbed hold of the least interesting part of the argument. — Banno

Of the existence of a class of facts called 'institutional facts' as distinct from not-institutional facts? Surely this would be the heart of the matter.

you think what we call wood is a theological given? Or that the role of a bishop is too? Word use is a human institution. It cannot be otherwise. — StreetlightX

This is what I was getting at right back on the first page when I wrote...

isn't "the bishop is made of wood" institutional too by virtue of the institutional fact that "that's the kind of thing 'wood' is". — Isaac

I gotb the impression @Banno, that you were amenable to such an interpretation?

Amenable, but uninterested perhaps?

Word use is a human institution. It cannot be otherwise. — StreetlightX

Neither I nor Searle, as I understand him, would suggest otherwise.

Then how to parse the implication - and correct me if I am wrong - that the following are not 'institutional facts'?:

The bishop is made of wood
The laptop has a keyboard
Zelenskyy is human

For us to intend to visit the Taj Mahal together is something different. — https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/collective-intentionality/

Yes, but we could agree to visit the Taj Mahal together, in which case it seems that my intention and yours have coalesced into a collective intention. And then, if you change your (individual) mind, or I change my (individual) mind, this would affect the collective intention.

There could be nuances. Let's say that Nancy and Bob are in an organized trip to India, and Bob gets romantically interested in Nancy but not vice versa. Nancy really wants to visit the Taj Mahal. Bob doesn't really care for Mogol architecture but wants to spend time with Nancy, so he proposes that they see it together and she agrees. Do they share a collective intention?

My plan was to show that there are institutional facts. Searle has argued extensively that language consists in institutional facts - in which he outlines a path from biology through action and individual intent to group intent and social facts. So we are jumping the gun, if you like.

The bishop is made of wood — StreetlightX

A realist would say that the bishop is made of wood, regardless of how we might present that using our social institutions.

But frankly, the last thing I would like to see here is the thread degenerate into yet another bloody discussion of realism.

A realist would say that the bishop is made of wood, regardless of how we might present that using our social institutions. — Banno

I don't understand your position. You agree that word use is a human institution. And then you go on to exclude a class of said uses on the basis of a commitment to realism. One of these cannot hold. Which one is it?

The words are a human institution, the wood isn't. That's realism. I can't see why that is confusing. And as I said, I am not interested here in this line of thought. I'm more interested in cooking dinner and replying to .

It's a key point, and given time I will see if I can present a more extensive example Searle uses.

I can't see why that is confusing. — Banno

The point is that what you - and Searle - would like to restrict to a class of facts holds for all facts, in fact all language use, and that the distinction between 'intuitional' and 'non-institutional' is arbitrary and unrigorous.

Your objection is that you think this somehow threatens realism. As if realism turns even slightly on how we use words. You have forgotten your Devittian lesson. Such I suppose is what happens when one listens to someone like Searle. Realism has nothing to do with any of this and is in no way threatened by recognizing the institutional ground of all facts.

I think it's tempting now to say that Searle and Austin were stating the obvious and making a big logical fuss out of simple observations about language. But they were working against a background and a history of rather fierce logical positivism and the view that we must be either stating facts or talking nonsense. I'm thinking of A J Ayer.

I think it's more the case that "this is a bishop" is an institutional fact but that "this is wood" isn't.

I think it's more the case that "this is a bishop" is an institutional fact but that "this is wood" isn't. — Michael

But we're not obligated by God to group all the products of trees into one grouping are we? Maybe the material from Oak is not the same thing as the material from Beech. There need be no such thing as 'wood'. It's an institutional fact that there is.

Right, but on what grounds do we draw this distinction? I mean, I understand the intuition. Presumably 'this is wood' is 'non-institutional' because there is a set of, call them, scientific grounds by which we can demarcate wood from not-wood and so on. But that we appeal to such grounds (and not others) is itself not a scientific fact. That is nowhere written in the Book of Nature, as per what @Issac said.

Consider a group of Harvard Business School students on graduation day.

In one possible world, they each individually decide to go out into the world and make as much money as possible, for the good of humanity.

In the other, they meet and agree to go out into the world and make as much money as possible, for the good of humanity.

Are these two different? Well, it seems that in the first, each says "I am going out to get rich". In the second, "We are going out to get rich". We-intentionality is different to I-intentionality.

But we're not obligated by God to group all the products of trees into one grouping are we? Maybe the material from Oak is not the same thing as the material from Beech. There need be no such thing as 'wood'. It's an institutional fact that there is. — Isaac

Then let's use a simpler example; "this is iron" and "this is a bishop."

In the case of the former we're describing an object's chemical composition, in the case of the latter we're describing an object's role in a game. An object's chemical composition doesn't depend on human institutions; the atoms that make it up are what they are regardless of what we think or say or do. But an object's role in a game very much depends on us.

In the case of the former we're describing an object's chemical composition — Michael

No, we're assigning an institutional grouping to the entire collection of sensory data the object has (the realism part - we're assuming there is definitely an object with the properties our senses seem to detect). Is an object with 26 protons and 27 neutrons still iron? We've just decided it is. It could have been otherwise. We call it an isotope of iron rather than give it some completely new name.

So saying "this is iron" is saying that this is the sort of thing iron is. What sort of thing is and isn't iron is an institutional fact. We decide what criteria we want to use to determine membership of that class of materials.

No, we're assigning an institutional grouping to the entire collection of sensory data the object has (the realism part - we're assuming there is definitely an object with the properties our senses seem to detect). Is an object with 26 protons and 27 neutrons still iron? We've just decided it is. It could have been otherwise. We call it an isotope of iron rather than give it some completely new name.

So saying "this is iron" is saying that this is the sort of thing iron is. What sort of thing is and isn't iron is an institutional fact. We decide what criteria we want to use to determine membership of that class of materials. — Isaac

I agree that how we use words is an institutional fact, but whether or not an object satisfies the meaning of those words might not be. The word "bishop" refers to the role an object plays in a game, which is an institutional fact. The word "iron" refers to the chemical composition of an object, which isn't an institutional fact.

We can't turn lead into gold just by deciding that it's gold, but we can turn a stone into a bishop just by using it as such on a chess board.

We can't turn lead into gold just by deciding that it's gold, but we can turn a stone into a bishop just by using it as such on a chess board. — Michael

Of course we can turn lead into gold just by deciding that it's gold. We only need say that the definition of gold is now anything with between 79 and 82 protons. Voilà, lead is now gold.

Of course we can turn lead into gold just by deciding that it's gold. We only need say that the definition of gold is now anything with between 79 and 82 protons. Voilà, lead is now gold. — Isaac

By "turning lead into gold" I mean changing the chemical composition of an object such that it goes from satisfying what we currently mean by "lead" to satisfying what we currently mean by "gold".