The Paratactic Account of propositional attitude ascription

In this paper a new theory is offered of the concepts we use to think about thought-content in propositional attitude ascriptions – the Paratactic Account. According to the Paratactic Account, in a propositional attitude ascription a person is described as standing in an attitudinal relation to a representational entity – a content. In making a propositional attitude ascription, then, one refers to a content; according to the Paratactic Account, one does this by using a demonstrative concept, which demonstrates a tokening of the target content in one’s own thinking. The Paratactic Account is offered as a competitor to Peacocke’s Redeployment View, and to Russellian and Fregean accounts of the concepts used in propositional attitude ascriptions. It is defended as a superior account to these rivals in its capacity to explain subjects’ folk-psychological abilities and their intuitions about the correctness of propositional attitude reports. Keywords: propositional attitude ascription; representations; folk psychology; propositional attitude reports