Abstract

The content of an episodic memory is not identical with an episode. The former is remembered, but the latter is merely remembered*. Three arguments are developed to establish the distinctness of content and episode. First, if we fail to distinguish content and episode, we can make no sense of the idea of mental content. Second, contents and episodes answer to different standards of individuation. Third, and most important, we must distinguish content and episode if we are to accommodate the presence of self in episodic memory. Content remembered is constructed (or sculpted) from the episode remembered* by way of the imposition of modes of presentation on one or more component parts of the episode. This is a condition of possibility of episodically remembering. I am present in the content of my memory in a way I can never be present in an episode.