Discussions concerning the modularity of the pain system have been focused on questions regarding the cognitive penetrability of pain mechanisms. It has been claimed that phenomena such as placebo analgesia demonstrate that the pain system is cognitively penetrated; therefore, it is not encapsulated from central cognition. However, important arguments have been formulated which aim to show that cognitive penetrability does not in fact entail a lack of modularity of the pain system. This paper offers an alternative way to reject the (...) modularity of the pain system, which is independent from, but consistent with, the presence of cognitive penetration. It is proposed that, given the current knowledge regarding the functioning and the structure of the pain system, there are good reasons to accept that certain central cognitive mechanisms are part of the pain system. It is argued that such a ‘cognitive constitution’ of the pain system entails that the pain system is not modular. (shrink)

One of the crucial characteristics of the olfactory modality is that olfactory experiences commonly present odours as pleasant or unpleasant. Indeed, because of the importance of the hedonic aspects of olfactory experience, it has been proposed that the role of olfaction is not to represent the properties of stimuli, but rather to generate a valence-related response. However, despite a growing interest among philosophers in the study of the chemical senses, no dominant theory of sensory pleasure has emerged in the case (...) of human olfaction. The aim of this paper is to develop an argument based on the way in which olfactory valence is neurally encoded; one that demonstrates an advantage of the indicative representational approach to olfactory valence over approaches that characterise valence in terms of desires or commands. The argument shows that it is plausible to understand olfactory valence, at least in part, in terms of indicative representations. (shrink)

The paradox of pain is that pain is in some ways like a bodily state and in other ways like a mental state. You can have a pain in your shin, but there is no denying that you are in pain if it feels like you are. How can a state be both in your shin and in your mind? Evaluativism is a promising answer. According to evaluativism, an experience of pain in your shin represents that there is a disturbance (...) in your shin, and that it is bad that this disturbance is there. Thus, the experience brings you to tend to your shin by telling you something about the state of your shin. But the paradox of pain still confronts evaluativism in the form of the killing the messenger objection: The evaluativist has a nice story about our body‐directed responses to pain, like tending to wounds, but this story does not explain responses to pain, like taking painkillers, that seem to be experience‐directed. Evaluativists have offered accounts of experience‐directed responses to pain, but I will argue that these accounts conflict with the Transparency thesis—the claim that we can only access our experiences inferentially. Evaluativism and Transparency are natural bedfellows, so this is a problem for evaluativists. Having argued as much, I will go on to develop a new evaluativist account of taking painkillers, which does not conflict with Transparency. I call it naïve evaluativism. According to naïve evaluativism, we experience painkillers as making tissue damage or disruption less bad, and absent further reflection, that is, why we take them. (shrink)

In The Pursuit of Unhappiness, Daniel Haybron has defended an emotional state theory of happiness, according to which happiness consists in a broadly positive balance of emotions, moods, and mood propensities. In this paper, I argue that Haybron’s theory should be modified in two ways. First, contra Haybron, I argue that sensory pleasures should be regarded as constituents of happiness, alongside emotions and moods. I do this by showing that sensory pleasures are sufficiently similar to emotions for them to be (...) included within the class of happiness-constituting states. Second, I argue that a plausible theory of happiness should not include mood propensities, since their inclusion is either counterintuitive or unnecessary. (shrink)

I respond to an objection recently formulated by Barlassina and Hayward against first-order imperativism about pain, according to which it cannot account for the self-directed motivational force of pain. I am going to agree with them: it cannot. This is because pain does not have self-directed motivational force. I will argue that the alternative view—that pain is about dealing with extramental, bodily threats, not about dealing with itself—makes better sense of introspection, and of empirical research on pain avoidance. Also, a (...) naturalistic theory of body-involving commands falls straightforwardly out of our most prominent naturalistic metasemantic accounts, while the token-reflexive contents that would underlie self-directed motivation are more problematic. (shrink)

L'hédonisme axiologique a une longue histoire en philosophie. Pourtant, il garde une mauvaise réputation qui lui vaut d’être parfois écarté sans ménagement de la discussion philosophique. Cet article se propose de défendre l'hédonisme axiologique en exposant les principaux arguments en sa faveur et en répondant aux principales critiques et confusions dont il fait l'objet. Une attention particulière sera portée aux arguments établissant la spécificité du plaisir et du déplaisir par rapport à toutes les autres choses — amitié, savoir, justice, etc. (...) — dont on pourrait argumenter la valeur finale.While axiological hedonism has a long history in philosophy, it also has a bad reputation, which has led to it being discarded without proper examination of its plausibility. In this article, I defend axiological hedonism by presenting the main arguments in its favour as well as the criticisms and confusions to which it has been subjected. I pay special attention to the arguments that hint at the specificity of pleasure and displeasure in comparison with other things — friendship, knowledge, justice, etc. — that might be argued to have final value. (shrink)

Pain is unpleasant. Given that pain is the paradigmatic example of an unpleasant experience, I aim to shed light on what pain and unpleasantness are by trying to understand what it means for a pain to be unpleasant, what the structure of unpleasantness is, and by tackling several problematic aspects of the relation between pain and unpleasantness. By doing this, I will also provide a general account of what it means for an experience that might not be a pain to (...) be unpleasant. The thesis is organised into seven chapters and divided by three main themes: i) what the unpleasantness of pain consists in, ii) how we can account for the great phenomenal diversity among experiences of unpleasantness, and iii) which cases suggest that there could be pains that are not unpleasant. Broadly, the first two chapters deal with the first theme, the third and fourth chapter with the second theme, and the fifth and sixth chapter focus on the third theme. In the final chapter I offer a conclusion of the three main themes by providing my own view on the unpleasantness of pain. According to this account, an unpleasant experience is something felt, it is a phenomenal property of mental states, and this property should be understood using the determinable determinate distinction. By doing all of this, this thesis will provide a detailed understanding of the nature of pain and unpleasantness. (shrink)