The Problem of Subjectivity and John McDowell's Direct Realism

In this paper the problem of subjectivity is analyzed within the context of direct realism of John McDowell. It is proposed to interpret the perspective character of conscious experience, the essential feature of subjectivity, in terms of intentionality. The problem of subjectivity arises due to the criticism of representationalism (or intentionalism) provided by radical enactivism that denies that the concept of content is important for the understanding of the nature of mental states. In the paper it is argued that McDowell's content-conceptualism can help us to preserve the notion of content without returning to classical representationalism. The paper examines McDowell's theory of content and subjective experience, its influence on the development of enactivism, the problems it faces and possible solutions of these problems. The article concludes with the thesis that the main shortcoming of this approach is that it doesn't provide an explanation of the nature of the normative aspects of human subjective experience. It is suggested that to overcome this shortcoming this approach should be supplemented with the activity theory developed in soviet psychology and theory of knowledge.