Kengo Miyazono (Hokkaido University) & Uku Tooming (University of Tartu), "Imagination as a Generative Source of Justification"
Noûs, 2024
By Kengo Miyazono & Uku Tooming
In recent years, the epistemic role of imagination has become a hot topic in the philosophy of imagination. In particular, there has been debate about whether imagination can justify beliefs and provide knowledge (Kind 2018, Kind & Kung 2016). While historically, imagination has been considered a source of justification for metaphysical possibilities, more recent work has examined whether it can also justify beliefs about everyday matters. For instance, it seems plausible that imagination can help us determine whether a piece of furniture will fit through a door (as suggested by Kind 2013) or whether we can jump over a mountain stream (as argued by Williamson 2016). Imagination seems to be crucially involved in helping us to form beliefs about the future, and its contribution seems to be justificatory as well as psychological.
Our recent paper, “Imagination as a generative source of justification”, contributes to this debate by exploring how imagination justifies beliefs. Our central question is: does imagination justify beliefs by generating new justification or by preserving prior justification?
We can distinguish between two kinds of justificatory sources: generative and preservative. A generative source of justification can generate new justification that goes beyond prior justification provided by other sources. Perception is a typical example of a generative source. For instance, if Naomi perceives a flower in front of her, she gains perceptual justification for believing that there is a flower in front of her. This justification is new and goes beyond any prior justification from other sources. In contrast, a preservative source of justification only preserves prior justification provided by other sources; it cannot generate new justification. Memory is sometimes considered a preservative source (although we are not committed to this view). If Naomi remembers a flower in her garden, she acquires mnemonic justification for believing that the flower was in her garden. However, this justification merely preserves the prior justification provided by perception when she initially saw the flower.
With the generative/preservative distinction at hand, we can formulate two competing hypotheses about imagination. “Generationism about imagination” says that imagination is a generative source of justification, while “preservationism about imagination” says that it is a preservative source of justification.
In our paper, we defend generationism about imagination, arguing that imagination generates new justification that goes beyond prior justification provided by other sources.
Our argument for generationism is based on a key premise called “INACCESSIBILITY.” According to INACCESSIBILITY, imagination is constrained by “imaginative constrainers” (i.e., prior representations that constrain the development of a scenario in imagination) that are inaccessible to other belief-forming processes. In other words, only imaginative processes can use imaginative constrainers to form beliefs, while other processes like inferential processes cannot. We argue that INACCESSIBILITY, along with other premises, supports generationism.
We will now explain (A) why INACCESSIBILITY is supportive of generationism, and (B) why INACCESSIBILITY is plausible.
(A) Let us think about Williamson’s (2016) hunter case, in which the hunter uses imaginative simulation to come to the conclusion that he can successfully jump over a mountain stream. Preservationism implies that the hunter was already justified before the imaginative simulation to believe that he can successfully jump over the stream, and imagination only preserves this justification. Generationism, in contrast, implies that the hunter was not justified before the imaginative simulation to believe that he can successfully jump over the stream, and the justification to believe it is generated in the imaginative simulation.
Now, if INACCESSIBILITY does not hold, the hunter’s could have inferred, even before the imaginative simulation, that he can successfully jump over the stream. For, his inference system has access to relevant information in the imaginative constrainers (e.g. information about how physical objects move in the air, how gravitational force works, etc.). This implies that the hunter was already justified by inference to believe that he can successfully jump over the stream even before the imaginative simulation, which supports preservationism (see this paper for more details). If INACCESSIBILITY holds, in contrast, the hunter could not have inferred, before the imaginative simulation, that he can successfully jump over the stream. For, his inference system does not have access to relevant information in the imaginative constraints. This implies that the hunter was not justified by inference to believe that he can successfully jump over the stream before the imaginative simulation, which supports generationism.
(B) The truth of INACCESSIBILITY is an empirical issue. While we acknowledge that there is no conclusive evidence, we argue that INACCESSIBILITY has a significant amount of plausibility in light of research from three areas: mental simulation, core cognition, and intuitive physics.
Mental Simulation: Research on mental simulation, such as Schwartz and Black's (1999) studies, suggests that people use imagination to predict how physical systems will behave. For instance, in the cup-tilting experiment, participants were better at predicting the outcome when they mentally simulated the action rather than simply reasoning about it verbally. This suggests that their imagination was constrained by information not available to conscious reasoning.
Core Cognition: Research on core cognition indicates that humans possess systems of core cognition that are dedicated to specific representational domains and rely on different principles (Spelke & Kinzler 2017). For example, our understanding of physical objects is governed by principles like cohesion (objects move as wholes) and continuity (objects move on unobstructed paths). These principles constrain our imagination of physical scenarios, while not available to conscious reasoning about them.
Intuitive Physics: Research on intuitive physics has uncovered physical principles that constrain our perception and imagination, and allow us to make predictions about how events will unfold (Kubricht et al. 2017). These principles, which may or may not align with actual physics, guide our mental simulations of physical events. For instance, when imagining the trajectory of a thrown object, we intuitively apply principles that may not be accessible to our conscious reasoning.
References
● Kind, A. (2013). The heterogeneity of the imagination. Erkenntnis, 78, 141–159. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10670-011-9313-z
● Kind, A. (2018). How imagination gives rise to knowledge. In F. Macpherson & F. Dorsch (Eds.) Perceptual Imagination and Perceptual Memory (pp. 227–246). Oxford: Oxford University Press.
● Kind, A., & Kung, P. (2016). Introduction: The puzzle of imaginative use. In A. Kind & P. Kung (Eds.) Knowledge through Imagination (pp. 1–37). Oxford: Oxford University Press.
● Kubricht, J. R., Holyoak, K. J., & Lu, H. (2017). Intuitive physics: Current research and controversies. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 21, 749–759. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tics.2017.06.002
● Schwartz, D. L., & Black, T. (1999). Inferences through imagined actions: Knowing by simulated doing. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, 25, 116–136. https://doi.org/10.1037/0278-7393.25.1.116
● Spelke, E. S., & Kinzler, K. D. (2007). Core knowledge. Developmental Science, 10, 89–96. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-7687.2007.00569.x
● Williamson, T. (2016). Knowing by imagining. In A. Kind & P. Kung (Eds.) Knowledge through Imagination (pp. 113–123). Oxford: Oxford University Press.