Cognitive phenomenology, translation and computing machines
Aleksandar Trklja · Philosophy of Translation · 2025
This paper advances Terence Horgan’s thesis that original intentionality is constitutively grounded in phenomenal consciousness and argues that this view is essential for understanding meaning in language and translation. Building on Searle’s Chinese Room thought experiment and Horgan’s progressive modifications of the experiment, the paper explores how the absence of phenomenal consciousness prevents models based on computing machines from achieving genuine understanding, even when equipped with complex rule-based systems or large language models (LLMs), engaged in real-world communication situations, and granted access to awareness. Central to this argument is the distinction between I-language and E-language and the proposal that morphophonological representations serve as cognitive scaffolds via the FINST (Fingers of Instantiation) mechanism. Through a novel translation-based extension of the Chinese Room scenario, the paper demonstrates that while such systems may simulate understanding through statistical pattern matching and gloss alignment, they lack the intentional and conceptual structures required for meaning. The analysis culminates in a two-tiered model of human-like understanding in language and translation distinguishing between low-level referential tracking and higher-order intentionality grounded in cognitive phenomenology.