9 Reflective stage (Rational spiritual animals). The primitive spiritual animal, as we have seen, is the new kind of animal that is possible only at the social level of biological organization. The behavior guidance system for its social level behavior is language. But it is just a primitive language of natural sentences, and there is another inevitable stage in the evolution of spiritual animals. There is a higher level of neurological organization that is both functional and possible, whose nature is evident in the grammatical structure of psychological sentences, the new kind of linguistic representations used at the reflective stage. Its function is easily understood by us, for we can reflect on how we use psychological sentences. But there is room to doubt the inevitability of the reflective stage. It may not seem possible in the relevant sense, for it is not obvious why the use of psychological sentences would evolve in the first place.

The nature of the higher level of neurological organization is evident in the difference between the grammar of natural sentences and the grammar of the new psychological sentences. Natural sentences have a simple grammar of subject and predicate (though many predications can occur in a single natural sentence). The grammatical subject of psychological sentences is restricted to subjective animals, a certain kind of object in space, and its predicate includes a verb of propositional attitude together with the name of the proposition (such as a naturalistic image) to which the attitude is taken. Such verbs of propositional attitude include “perceive,” “believe,” “imagine,” desire,” and “intend,” and what follows the verb is a word or sentence indicating the proposition toward which is the attitude is taken (that is, what is perceived, believed, etc.).

What shows that psychological sentences are on a higher level of neurological organization is not simply that natural sentences can be parts of them. Natural sentences may already be parts of natural sentences, for example, as phrases, clauses, and even modifiers as well as compound natural sentence (formed by conjunction). Psychological sentences indicate a higher level of organization because the natural sentences included in them are parts of a new kind of grammatical structure, which represents the proposition (that is, the meaning of the embedded sentence) as playing a certain role in causing the subject’s behavior or beliefs.

Psychological states are what is represented by the predicates of psychological sentences, and so psychological sentences represent objects as having psychological states, that is, as subjects. This is something beyond what natural sentences can do, for they represent only naturalistic states, or states of objects in space (such as objects having relations in space, objects having geometrical or other properties, and the like). (Thus, although natural sentences can describe spoken words and sentences as public objects, that is, as verbal behavior, they cannot represent them as words and sentences.)

The function of psychological sentences is to represent the causal roles that linguistic representations play in the processes of guiding the behavior of an animal subject, as a way of explaining the subject’s behavior (or beliefs). Beings like us can understand how the use of psychological sentences facilitates such explanations, because we can reflect on how we use them, for example, to “see into the minds” of other subjects.

By reflecting on how we know about other subjects, we know that we can often explain the causes of their behavior by putting ourselves in the other’s position and imagining what we would do. We take the beliefs and desires that would lead us to behave the same way as explaining the other’s behavior. Thus, when we know something about how others behave, we can generally figure out what desire is moving them and what their intentions are, for we can assume that they have beliefs about the world are generally held and believe whatever perception tells them about their particular situation. We see into their minds by inferring to the sets of beliefs and desires that best explains their behavior.

Psychological sentence also makes the users reflective, for they can be used to explain their own behavior (or beliefs). Though psychological states are just causes of the behavior (and beliefs) at work in the animal behavior guidance system, the capacity of the subject to reflect on those causes evolves into an important part of the very process by which they case behavior (or beliefs), and that earns them the special name, “reasons.” Reasons are causes that are represented as causes as part of their process of causing.

More generally, to be able to use psychological sentences is to have a faculty of “rational imagination.” It is a form of imagination, like those that have preceded it, except that it gives the user the ability to understand “rational causation.” They can see reasons as causes in other subjects, in themselves, or in general, that is, as arguments about what to do or what to believe. Thus, reflection makes the linguistic subject rational.

The most spectacular accomplishments of the reflective stage come from how the exchange arguments constitutes another form of reproductive causation, which is responsible for cultural evolution. Cultural evolution is another example of the reproductive global regularity we have called “gradual evolution.”

Though cultural evolution is contained within the spiritual animal, it works in basically the same way as biological evolution, that is, by how reproductive cycles of arguments add up in the space provided by a spiritual animal as time passes.

Since the use of psychological sentences includes the capacity to construct linguistic representations in which a conclusion comes together with reasons for it attached, it is possible to engage in a new kind of linguistic interaction: arguing. The exchange of arguments, as we shall see, gives rise to a new form of evolution by reproductive causation: cultural evolution. With the same kind of ontological cause as gradual biological evolution, the same kind of ontological effect follows, namely, the gradual evolution of culture toward natural perfection for reproducing organisms of its kind, that is, the natural perfection of arguments, which is to know the good, the true and the beautiful.

Cultural evolution is such an important part of the gradual change that takes place at the reflective stage that this section is divided into to main subsections: biological evolution and cultural evolution.

Biological evolution will show that the evolution of the reflective level of neurological organization is inevitable, by showing not only that it opens up a new range of powers to control relevant conditions, but also that it will eventually be tried out as a random variation in circumstances in which it is functional, so that is naturally selected.

Cultural evolution will show that cultural evolution is a form of reproductive causation that is contained in rational spiritual animals (by showing how arguments are “organisms” that impose natural selection on themselves by going through reproductive cycles). It will also show that, even under the most favorable conditions, gradual evolution of culture at the rational spiritual stage leads to a natural perfection for arguments of its kind that includes certain dichotomies that limit the power of reason to control relevant conditions.

Biological evolution of the reflective level. Primitive spiritual animals are a form of life, by our definition, because they are products of reproductive causation with the autonomous activity of going through reproductive cycles on their own. And as a form of life, they make themselves evolve by imposing natural selection on themselves. But the linguistic stage is merely the first stage in the gradual evolution of spiritual animals. It merely prepares the way for the reflective stage.

The reflective stage of evolution is the ninth stage, by our reckoning, in the series of stages leading up to beings like us. The organism that evolves at the ninth stage is the rational spiritual animal. The use of a primitive language, the behavior guidance system that accounts for the origin of spiritual animals at the previous stage, is transformed into a more powerful behavior guidance system, called “reason.” Indeed, reason is so good at controlling relevant conditions that it takes over the function of guiding all behavior, at the individual as well as the social level.

What makes reason the source of such great power powerful is that rational spiritual animals constitute a new form of reproductive causation, in which the arguments accumulated as culture evolve gradually in the direction of natural perfection for “organisms” of their kind. Since that includes knowing what is good, cultural evolution makes reason increasingly powerful.

It is cultural evolution during the reflective stage that leads to another stage of evolution, (stage 10, the philosophical stage), not biological evolution. The philosophical level of neurological organization does not require any genetic changes (that is, changes supplied by the mechanism of embryological development, the multicellular biological behavior guidance system). 

Revolutionary changes in evolution are, however, a reproductive global regularity. Like all previous evolutionary stages, the reflective stage is caused by a higher level of part-whole complexity about the reproducing organisms. It is a higher level of neurological organization in the series we are following.

The direction of evolution at every stage is natural perfection, or maximum holistic power, and the gradual evolution of primitive spiritual animals prepares the way for rational spiritual animals. When gradual evolution makes the nervous structures involved in using natural sentences reliable enough, it is possible for them to serve as parts of a larger structure in the nervous system, for using psychological sentences.

But the next stage is inevitable, according to reproductive causation, only if it is both functional and possible. Its functionality depends on the higher level of organization opening up a whole new range of powers that can evolve gradually over a long period as a result of the natural selection that they impose on themselves. And its possibility depends on whether the higher level of neurological organization can be tried out as a radical random variation on the structures of the organisms that are evolving at the previous stage.

The function of the reflective level of neurological organization is not very problematic, because it is exhibited so clearly in the grammatical structure of psychological sentences and the way in which they are used. But its possibility is less obvious.

Given the capacity of the mechanism of embryological development to try out random variations, the higher level of neurological organization itself is hardly an obstacle to the evolution of reason. But if the power of the reflective level comes mainly from the cultural evolution of arguments it constitutes, it may be hard to see how reason could evolve by the natural selection of a radical random variation on linguistic brains.

There is, however, something that that makes the evolution the reflective level is inevitable. As we shall see after considering more carefully the nature and function of the reflective level of neurological organization, an urgent need arises late in the linguistic stage of evolution that makes even a very simple and weak form of reflection crucial to controlling conditions that affect reproduction.

Function of the reflective level of neurological organization. The nature of the reflective level of neurological organization that causes the reflective stage of evolution is indicated by the grammar of the new kind of sentences that are used at this stage. But behind that linguistic structure, making the use of psychological sentences possible, is a new form of imagination: rational imagination. And like each of the previous evolutionary stages, the new kind of understanding that rational imagination affords is the source of the new powers that are acquired in the long period of gradual evolution at the reflective stage.

Psychological sentences. Psychological sentences, like natural sentences, have a simple subject-predicate grammar. But their grammatical subject refers only to subjective animals (or objects assumed to be like them), and the predicate is not of the kind found in natural sentences. Its meaning cannot be explained by simple predication.

The psychological predicate is made up of a verb of propositional attitude and the name of a proposition (a natural or psychological sentence) to which the attitude is taken.

Verbs of propositional attitude represent the causal roles that propositions play in guiding animal behavior. The propositional attitudes include perceiving, believing, remembering, imagining, desiring, and intending. But the kinds of verbs of propositional attitude fall into two basic groups, beliefs and desires, depending on whether the attitudes have to do with input to the behavior guidance system or selecting and generating its output.

Psychological predicates represent what are called “psychological states.” Thus, psychological sentences predicate psychological states of certain kinds of objects in space. The kinds of objects that have psychological states are animals with at least a subjective animal behavior guidance system (or objects thought to be like them), and thus, psychological sentences represent objects in space as subjects.

The psychological states picked out by psychological sentence are states that play causal roles in determining behavior and beliefs. They are causally relevant states of the subjective animal behavior guidance system.

Beliefs and desires combine, as we have seen, to give animal subjects intentions, which generate their bodily behavior. Desires determine the goals, and beliefs determine the means.

But beliefs also have causes in the animal behavior guidance system, for they can be caused by perceptions. The causal roles that perceptions play in determining beliefs can be as complex as those involved in determining behavior. Besides giving the subject beliefs about currently perceived objects, current perceptions can combine with already formed beliefs to change beliefs about currently unperceived objects. And perceptual reports made by others can have a similar effect.

The meanings of psychological sentences derive, therefore, from their use in explaining and predicting behavior (or beliefs). But in order to be used in that way, the speaker and listener must both have a faculty of imagination by which to understand explanations of behavior and beliefs.

Just as understanding the structure of space depends on spatial imagination, understanding structural causes depends on structural imagination, and understanding natural sentences depends on naturalistic imagination, understanding psychological sentence depends on a form of imagination. It will be called “rational imagination” (though it might just as well be called “psychological imagination,” “subjectivistic imagination” or even “reflective imagination”).

As the function of psychological sentences suggests, that new faculty of imagination is basically the subject’s own animal behavior guidance system. That is, the ability to think about psychological states as causes of behavior (or beliefs) in another subject, for example, comes from using one’s own brain to simulate the behavior guiding process in the other’s brain. To use a psychological sentence to represent the psychological state of another subject is to temporarily impose that psychological state on one’s own brain as an act of imagination while thinking of it as belonging to the other. The further changes it causes in one’s own brain state are then seen as happening in the other subject.

The grammar of psychological sentences is, therefore, and indication of a higher level of neurological organization in the faculty of imagination. The meaning of a natural sentence embedded in a psychological predicate is not merely conjoined with other predications as part of a complex naturalistic image. (Nor is it a disguised form of predication, like a clause or phrase.) Instead, the verb of propositional attitude represents the naturalistic image (or proposition) as playing some role in a behavior guiding process. The ability to use psychological sentences requires, therefore, a brain mechanism that handles natural propositions in a new way, one that is based on its already being a representation and that represents it as having a further role in guiding behavior.

Since the psychological sentence represents a new way of handling the meanings of whole sentences in the faculty of imagination, it can handle the meanings of psychological sentences in the same way. Thus, subjects can have beliefs and desires about the psychological states of subjects, such as desiring that someone love them and believing that they do not.

Rational imagination. The capacity to represent the world in some way depends on having a system that can represent what is actual against the background of what is possible. What is possible are changes of some kind that can occur as an effect or as a cause of what is supposed to be actual. The capacity to see the possible is provided, as we have seen, by the faculty of imagination, which evolves by stages in the animal behavior guidance system.

Form of imagination. In telesensory animals, the object is represented as a object of a certain kind only because it can also recognize objects of other kinds. But since the other possible kind of objects are not represented by images that can be called up from memory by covert behavior, telesensory animals lack imagination altogether. And the advent of imagination makes it possible to represent objects as having other aspects than just their kinds.

The subjective animal’s spatial imagination makes it possible to represent objects as being located in space, because it gives the animal a conception of space. With spatial imagination to can call up sequences of images that represent the effects of motion, it can see actual objects against the background of how they might be different because of their motion relative to one another.

The manipulative animal’s structural imagination makes it possible to represent objects in space as having geometrical structures, because it gives the animal a conception of geometrical structure. With structural imagination to call up sequences of images representing the consequences of manipulation, it can see the actual geometrical structures of objects against the background of how they might be different by manipulation.

The linguistic animal’s naturalistic imagination makes it possible to represent objects in space as having certain states, because it gives the animal the conception of a state of affairs. With naturalistic imagination to call up sequences of images representing the regularities among states involved in causal connections, it can see naturalistic states against the background of how things might be different as a result of efficient causation.

The reflective animal’s rational imagination likewise makes it possible to represent certain kinds of objects in space, namely, subjects, as having psychological states, because it gives the reflective subject the conception of a psychological state. The capacity to represent psychological states is the capacity to see having those states against the background of what other psychological states are possible, including not only how they are different from other possible psychological state, but also now they might cause or be caused by other psychological states.

The structure of the faculty of imagination. Imagination first evolved with the subjective animal as a higher level of neurological organization than telesensory animals, and we have seen how the two succeeding animal stages of evolution were caused (at least in part) by a higher level neurological organization within the faculty of spatial imagination. A brief review will show how rational imagination is just another level of part-whole complexity in that series.

The subjective animal uses input about its current bodily condition to assemble telesensory images as a local image representing objects in the local scene from the point of view of it body, and spatial imagination is the capacity to think about spatial relations among objects by using covert locomotion to call up from memory sequences of local images that represent the effects of motion relative to objects in its territory. We have seen how systems recognizable in the anatomical structure of the mammalian brain serves all the subfunctions required for spatial imagination, and that is the framework in which all the subsequent forms of imagination evolve.

Structural imagination is the capacity to think about the geometrical structures of objects in space by using covert manipulation to call up from memory sequences of telesensory images within a (perceived or imagined) local image that represent the results of objects rotating and interacting with one another. Its higher level of neurological organization was possible because it used the same mechanism for recording images together in sequences in memory as spatial imagination, except that instead of storing multiple sequences of local images as a map of the effects of locomotion in various direction in the entire territory, multiple sequences of telesensory images of objects were stored as an object image that had to be located within a local image.

Naturalistic imagination is basically the capacity to combine images of various kinds (telesensory images as well as local and object images from spatial and structural imagination) as parts of naturalistic images, which represent states of affairs in the natural world (for example, an animal being of a certain kind or behaving in a certain way).

Images that derive from lower levels of neurological organization are the meanings of the (nonlogical and nongrammatical) words used in natural sentences. The local image gives the object a location in the world (real or imaginary) and represents spatial relations among them, whereas object images (as well as telesensory and tactile images) represent kinds of objects according to their perceptible properties, geometrical structures or dispositions. (Such meanings can be more or less complex depending on how many different sequences of images are united in them)

The effect of combining such images in naturalistic imagination is to generate a new sequence of images, or a naturalistic image, which depends on them. The combination is asymmetrical, because there is a difference between using an image as the grammatical subject of natural sentences and using it as a predicate. The naturalistic image is the meaning of the natural sentence, which represents an object as being an object of a certain kind, as being located in a certain place, or as having some other naturalistic state. Thus, by using covert linguistic manipulation to construct naturalistic images, the subject can think about states of affairs in the world, and the effects of imposing it temporarily on the memory of one’s own sensory input system (the beliefs that accumulate with one’s map of the territory) are its implications, including its role as a efficient cause or effect.

But natural sentences are representations in the linguistic system of representation, and in order to serve their social function of coordinating behavior, it must be possible to represent the covert nonverbal behavior of naturalistic imagination publicly, as overt verbal behavior, including both words indicating the images (or meanings) that pick out objects, properties or relations in the world and grammatical markers for those words indicating how those meanings had been combined in naturalistic imagination (that is, as grammatical subject, predicate, etc.). The words and grammatical markers combined in the sentence must enable another language user to construct the same naturalistic image in her own naturalistic imagination.

Rational imagination is basically the capacity to use psychological images to represent the psychological states of subjective animals. Psychological images are the meanings of psychological sentences, and just as the structure of naturalistic images is evident in natural sentences, so the structure of psychological images is evident in psychological sentences. Rational imagination requires a higher level of neurological organization than naturalistic imagination in much the same way that naturalistic imagination was higher than both spatial imagination and structural imagination (and in contrast to how structural imagination is higher than spatial imagination, as indicated in the functional diagram of the reflective animal behavior guidance system).

Psychological images are made by combining naturalistic images (or psychological images) as parts of a larger (psychological) image, which represents the causal roles that those images play in causing behavior (and beliefs) in subjective animals. Psychological images are constructed in the sensory input system by linguistic behavioral schemata in the behavioral output system, and in both systems, it requires a higher level of neurological organization. By using covert nonverbal behavior to construct the meanings of psychological sentences, one temporarily imposes the psychological states one would attribute to another subject on one’s own brain, and the effects of those temporary beliefs or desires on one’s own beliefs and desires are the conclusions that follow from them. But since this is all predicated of some subject, the psychological state and its implications are seen as occurring in some subject.

There are two basically different kinds of psychological images, beliefs and desires (or intentions), because naturalistic (and psychological) images play two basically different roles in the sensory input system and the behavioral output system. The sensory input system contains the memory map of the animals territory and all the general and particular beliefs about the world that accumulate about its objects, including, at the rational stage, beliefs about some of those objects as subjects (with psychological states). Desires are basically dispositions to behave in certain ways towards objects of certain kinds, and they are represented like intentions, by behavioral schemata (and as images in the sensory input system of other bodies behaving appropriately). Reflective linguistic acts must, therefore, be able to impose the meanings of sentences on the brain in two basically different ways.

That is the nonverbal side of the reflective linguistic act, but since psychological sentences are representations in the linguistic system of representation, they must also serve its social function of coordinating behavior. Thus, the covert nonverbal behavior in rational imagination must be represented publicly in the speaker’s overt verbal behavior so that listeners can reconstruct the psychological image in their own imaginations, calling up sequences of images of the same kinds. (See below, Structure of reflective brain.)

Understanding of rational causation. The faculty of rational imagination is a way of understanding how psychological states are causes of behavior and beliefs. The sequences of images that are called up in rational imagination as a result of constructing a psychological image represent regularities that hold of subjective animals generally, because animal behavior guidance systems all work in basically the same way, with beliefs and desires determining intentions (and perception together with background beliefs determining new beliefs). With inferences built into the structure of rational imagination, the changes that occur in one’s own beliefs or intentions as a result of constructing a psychological image in rational imagination correspond to what would happen in other brains (though the fit is more detailed the more the other subject resembles a reflective subject, with rational imagination). But since it is a psychological image, it is the representation of some object as a subject, that is, as having the psychological state (as indicated by the grammatical structure of the psychological sentence). 

Rational imagination is, therefore, a way of understanding a kind of causal connections in the world. In this case, the causes have to do only with the behavior (or beliefs) of subjects, rather than the behavior of objects in space generally. Thus, just as spatial imagination affords an intuitive understanding of spatial causation, and structural imagination affords an intuitive understanding of structural causation, and naturalistic imagination affords an intuitive understanding of efficient causation, so rational imagination affords an intuitive understanding of rational causation.

Rational imagination can be used to predict the behavior of subjects in any situation. Several psychological states may have to be predicated of the subject to represent all the relevant beliefs about the situation he is in and the various desires (or longer range intentions) that are at work in him. They are all held together as parts of the psychological image. And they are all imposed at once as a temporary modification on one’s own worldview and goals, as if one were in the other’s situation. But they are parts of a psychological image, and so they are seen as states of the other subject. The changes that occur in one’s beliefs or intentions are the predictions one makes about the other subject, given those premises. The conclusions may be just inferences about what the subject would come to believe. But when it leads to new intentions, it is a prediction of the subject’s behavior.

But the understanding of rational causation can be used in other ways. When the other subject’s overt behavior is what is known, rational imagination can be used to infer the intention or motivating desire. Along with common background beliefs, the other subject is assumed to have whatever additional, relevant beliefs that come from where he is located. In order to discover his intentions, it is only necessary to compare possible sets of desires and beliefs and the intentions to which they would lead, for it is basically an inference to the best rational explanation of the behavior that is observed. Thus, one can “see into the other subject’s mind.”

Since psychological sentences can be used to understand one’s own beliefs and desires, as well as others, evolution at this stage leads to the ability to represent the causes of one’s own behavior, as causes of behavior, as part of the very process of causing the behavior. This means that subjective animals with the use of psychological sentences are reflective subjects.

It is not merely that reflective subjects monitor the desires and beliefs that are causing their behavior. More than that, as we shall see, the desire to submit to a leader’s instructions evolves into the desire to submit to reason, and thus, reflective subjects can do what they discover in rational imagination to be the best course of action, all things considered, even when it is opposed by strong, immediate desires to the contrary. That is the “autonomy of reason.”

This transformation of the causes of behavior in reflective subjects has given those causes a special name in ordinary language: “reasons.” Thus, reasons are causes. But they are causes of a special kind, because they depend on being represented as causes in order to be effective as causes of behavior (or beliefs) at all. That makes reflective subjects enormously powerful, for as we shall see, not only does it enable them to control the conditions that affect their reproduction, but to control other conditions that they see as good. It is an indication of the autonomy of reason.

From telesensory animals on, the animal behavior guidance system has had a conception of the object, and we have seen how it is enriched by stages with the conception of their locations in space, their geometrical structures, and their naturalistic states. That might be described as the evolution of the the “concept of the object.” But with the advent of rational imagination, the subject has the conception of the subject, that is, of objects as having psychological states. Since that is based on an way of understanding psychological states as causes or effects, that is, as reasons for the conclusions drawn by their animal behavior guidance systems, it means that a whole new world of facts opens up to reflective subjects. Reflective subjects can see into one another’s minds, and that begins an evolutionary stage in which they become increasingly powerful in controlling all the conditions that affect their reproduction, not only conditions in the natural world, but also conditions in a world of subjects who can all see into one another’s minds.