Knowing that I am Thinking [chapter]

Abstract

Introduction We often know that we are thinking, and what we are thinking about. Here ‘thinking’ is not supposed to be an umbrella term for cognition in general, but should be taken in roughly the sense of ‘a penny for your thoughts’: mental activities like pondering, ruminating, wondering, musing and daydreaming all count as thinking. In the intended sense of ‘thinking’, thinking is not just propositional: in addition to thinking that p, there is thinking of (or about) x. Belief is necessary but not sufficient for thinking that p: thinking that p entails believing that p, but not conversely.