Abstract

Fear and Uncertainty discusses Robert Gordon's thesis according to which fear is an epistemic - as opposed to factive - emotion inasmuch as S's fearing p requires S's being uncertain whether p or ~p, and also requires that the uncertainty implicit in fearing be of a non-deliberative or 'external' kind. Hansberg argues against both parts of this thesis, which purports to offer part of the structure of the emotion of fear. First, she says, Gordon cannot account for those cases of weakness of the will in which an agent fears that when the moment comes he himself will not act upon his own previous purpose. So an external uncertainty proves to be not so essential a requisite. Now, what about the uncertainty, whatever its form, condition? Hansberg finds several examples in which someone fears p even though he actually is certain that p (when one fears, for example, a medical treatment known to be painful, or when one fears one's own inminent death, say, by suicide). She also argues against Gordon's distinction between propositional fears and mere 'states of fear' with no semantic content, and disapproves of his inclusión of certain fears - like fear of a violent death, fear of injury to oneself, and many phobias - in the latter category. Those supposedly non-propositional states can, and often do, give rise to propositional states and intentional actions; so Gordon would have to explain how this is possible: some of those supposedly mere states of fear need a place in an explanation- by-reasons scheme. Finally, Hansberg claims that all fears do have a propositional structure, even though some fears have it in a concealed way. So, for example, if someone is afraid of death, he is afraid that he will die young, or that he will go to hell, and so on. Thus it is always possible to find propositional contents for fears which apparently have none, although in some cases this might be a difficult task. [Laura Lecuona]