AbstractThe purpose of this paper is to present a general mechanistic framework for analyzing causal representational claims, and offer a way to distinguish genuinely representational explanations from those that invoke representations for honorific purposes. It is usually agreed that rats are capable of navigation (even in complete darkness, and when immersed in a water maze) because they maintain a cognitive map of their environment. Exactly how and why their neural states give rise to mental representations is a matter of an ongoing debate. I will show that anticipatory mechanisms involved in rats’ evaluation of possible routes give rise to satisfaction conditions of contents, and this is why they are representationally relevant for explaining and predicting rats’ behavior. I argue that a naturalistic account of satisfaction conditions of contents answers the most important objections of antirepresentationalists.

中文翻译：

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预期机制中的满足条件

摘要本文的目的是提出一个分析因果表征主张的一般机制框架，并提供一种方法来区分真正的表征解释和那些出于敬意目的而调用表征的解释。人们通常认为老鼠能够导航（即使在完全黑暗的情况下，当沉浸在水迷宫中时），因为它们保持着环境的认知地图。他们的神经状态究竟如何以及为什么会引起心理表征，这是一个持续争论的问题。我将证明老鼠对可能途径的评估所涉及的预期机制会引起内容的满意条件，这就是为什么它们与解释和预测老鼠的行为具有代表性相关的原因。