Anti-individualism and rationality

Abstract

Anti-individualists, which hold that subject's thoughts are not wholly individuated by her intrinsic states, are accused of undermining subject's ability to reason well and that they do not capture correctly the epistemic position of a thinking subject. These accusations are based on anti-individualist's rejection of transparency of thought content which allows that otherwise rational subjects may fail to make valid inferences, may have contradictory beliefs, and may make invalid inferences. By distinguishing between two kinds of anti-individualism, Fregean and non-Fregean, Jessica Brown (2004) argues that while Fregean anti-individualism better fits our intuitions about rationality it introduces an unavoidable internal friction between the endorsement of Frege's principle of content difference and rejection of transparency of difference of content, which renders it untenable. In his 2008 paper Sanford Goldberg tries to motivate these two principles on different grounds, thus providing an account of anti-individualism which is completely compatible with Frege's principle which should secure subject's rationality. We critically assess these claims to conclude that attempts to reconcile traditional notion of rationality and antiindividualism by way of saving validity of Frege's principle fail in their intentions.