A Kantian stance on the intentional stance

I examine the way in which Daniel Dennett (1987, 1995) uses his 'intentiona l' and 'design' stances to make the claim that intentionality is derived fr om design. I suggest that Dennett is best understood as attempting to suppl y an objective, nonintentional, naturalistic rationale for our use of inten tional concepts. However, I demonstrate that his overall picture presuppose s prior application of the intentional stance in a preconditional, inelimin able, 'sense-giving' role. Construed as such, Dennett's account is almost i dentical to the account of biological teleology offered by Kant in The Crit ique of Judgement, with the consequence that Dennett's naturalism is untena ble. My conclusions lead to doubts concerning the legitimacy of any account attempting to naturalise intentionality by extracting normativity from bio logy and also point to a novel account of biological function.