Research Group
in Analytic Philosophy

Abstract

Philosophers of mind and ethicists have recently become intrigued by norms ofattention. That is, how (if at all) can we appropriately evaluate whether someone is attending well or poorly? I argue that philosophers with disparate views implicit share a consensus about the normative problem that attention must solve. Attention norms must tell us how to limit our attention, so that we attend to what is relevant and ignore what is irrelevant in our current context. In a slogan, attention norms are relevance norms. But relevance norms can become viciously circular, insofar as they can reinforce our mistaken assumptions about what is relevant in our context. From such cases of circular attention, I argue that attention norms cannot just be relevance norms. Rather, I argue that the overarching attention norm must be a Balancing Norm. That is, attentional agents should balance between (a) constrained modes of attention that focus on what seems relevant in your current context and (b) spontanoeus modes of attention that allow you to explore information that initially seems irrelevant. My paper begins to sketch a balancing norm of attention, explaining (among other things) the descriptive and normative profile of constrained vs spontaneous modes of attention, why attention norms are neither straightforwardly epistemic nor practical, and how “balancing” is context-sensitive, and a vague project.