Adam Carter (2022) recently proposed that a successful analysis of knowledge needs to include an autonomy condition. Autonomy, for Carter, requires a lack of a compulsion history. A compulsion history bypasses one’s cognitive competences and results in a belief that is difficult to shed. I argue that Carter’s autonomy condition does not cover partially autonomous beliefs properly. Some belief-forming processes are partially bypassing one’s competences, but not bypassing them completely. I provide a case for partially autonomous belief based on processing (...) fluency effects and argue that partially autonomous beliefs only amount to knowledge in some cases. I finally suggest how to adjust the autonomy condition to capture partially autonomous belief properly. (shrink)

A promising recent approach for understanding complex phenomena is recognition of anticipatory behavior of living organisms and social organizations. The anticipatory, predictive action permits learning, novelty seeking, rich experiential existence. I argue that the established frameworks of anticipation, adaptation or learning imply overly passive roles of anticipatory agents, and that a fictionalist standpoint reflects the core of anticipatory behavior better than representational or future references. Cognizing beings enact not just their models of the world, but own make-believe existential agendas as (...) well. Anticipators embody plausible scripts of living, and effectively assume neo-Kantian or pragmatist perspectives of cognition and action. It is instructive to see that anticipatory behavior is not without mundane or loathsome deficiencies. Appreciation of ferally fictionalist anticipation suggests an equivalence of semiosis and anticipation. (shrink)

Considering the current advancements in biometric sensors and other related technologies, as well as the use of bio-inspired models for AI improvements, we can infer that the swarm intelligence paradigm can be implemented in human daily spheres through the connectivity between user gadgets connected to the Internet of Things. This is a first step towards a real Ambient Intelligence, but also of a Global Intelligence. This unconscious connectivity may alter the way by which we feel the world. Besides, with the (...) arrival of new augmented ways of capturing and providing information or radical new ways of expanding our bodies, we can be very close to a change which may radically affect our experience of ourselves and of the feeling of collectivity. We call it the techno-phenomenological turn. We show social implications, present challenges, and and open questions for the new kind of swarm intelligence-enhanced society, and provide the taxonomy of the field of study. We will also explore the possible roadmaps of this next possible situation. (shrink)

Dieser Artikel befasst sich mit einigen falschen Auffassungen in Bezug auf ‘privilegierte’ Zugänge zu eigenen Erfahrungen aus der Perspektive der ersten Person, verweist auf die Grenzen solcher Unmittelbarkeit und zweifelt am solipsistischen Geheimnis der Subjektivität. Ausgehend von der Überzeugung, dass sich die Gleichstellung von ‘Blickwinkel’ und ‘Perspektive’ als problematisch erwiesen hat, stellt der Verfasser die These auf, dass wir unterschiedliche Perspektiven aus ein und demselben Blickwinkel haben können. Als gestaltgewordene, in die Umwelt eingebettete und erkenntnisfähige Personen praktizieren wir den Austausch (...) perspektivistischer Standpunkte über die eigene Subjektivität in unserem Lebensalltag leichter und öfter, als wir dies in unseren Theorien zuzugeben bereit sind. Die Art der Methodologie, zu der auch der objektivistische Zugang der dritten Person gehört, ist außerstande, die Irreduktibilität zwischen dem Subjektiven und dem Empirischen zu revidieren, setzt jedoch voraus, dass die Vernunft dem intersubjektiven Raum geöffnet ist, in dem das Irreduktible immer noch weitervermittelt, verglichen und ergänzt werden kann. (shrink)

The book edited by Massimiliano Cappuccio and Tom Froese is aimed at understanding non-sense in cognition and the process of sense-making. The authors of twelve chapters included in the book focus on different aspects of sense-making in diversified aspects of cognition. The texts included in the book show that sense-making is one of the most important aspects of cognition in general. They put the enactive perspective to the problem, which influences the overall reception of the book. Since enactivism has strong (...) philosophical implications, not everyone will agree with the positions proposed by the authors, and some of the chapters are non-canonical even in their views on enactivism. However, even readers not accepting this approach might find the book interesting and thought provoking. (shrink)

Review of Rob Wilson?s Boundaries of the Mind: The Individual in the Fragile Sciences: Cognition.

Humans coordinate with other people and technological resources in order to become integrated into distributed cognitive systems and engage the world in ways beyond their naked capacities. This paper extends the distributed cognitive framework towards human and dog partnerships at a sheepdog trial, arguing that by scaffolding the sheepdog's cognitive limitations and inability to tackle the trial independently, the human handler forms with the canine partner an interspecies cognitive system. The handler serves as a higher-order cognitive resource integrated through the (...) use of commands and complementing the sheepdog's own species-specific skills. The process and structure of support reflects parent - child interaction as framed in the developmental literature. However, scaffolding in this instance is a permanent support structure that is situation dependent; the handler must equally be aware of when the dog's initiative and skills can be advantageously exploited. This paper draws on ethnographic illustrations of the training methods and detailed descriptions of on-field interactions to support these claims. Data at this level of analysis also provides evidence of the reciprocally affecting and co-determining role of each partner as they engage the sheep, and coordinate in ways that blur the boundaries between their two species, supporting broader perspectives in the human-animal literature. (shrink)

Experts in Artificial Intelligence (AI) development predict that advances in the dvelopment of intelligent systems and agents will reshape vital areas in our society. Nevertheless, if such an advance isn't done with prudence, it can result in negative outcomes for humanity. For this reason, several researchers in the area are trying to develop a robust, beneficial, and safe concept of artificial intelligence. Currently, several of the open problems in the field of AI research arise from the difficulty of avoiding unwanted (...) behaviors of intelligent agents, and at the same time specifying what we want such systems to do. It is of utmost importance that artificial intelligent agents have their values aligned with human values, given the fact that we cannot expect an AI to develop our moral preferences simply because of its intelligence, as discussed in the Orthogonality Thesis. Perhaps this difficulty comes from the way we are addressing the problem of expressing objectives, values, and ends, using representational cognitive methods. A solution to this problem would be the dynamic cognitive approach proposed by Dreyfus, whose phenomenological philosophy defends that the human experience of being-in-the-world cannot be represented by the symbolic or connectionist cognitive methods. A possible approach to this problem would be to use theoretical models such as SED (situated embodied dynamics) to address the values learning problem in AI. (shrink)

In this paper, I consider Hilary Putnam’s argument for the prima facie acceptance of robotic consciousness as deserving the status of mind. I argue that such an extension of consciousness renders the category fundamentally unintelligible, and we should instead understand robots as integral products of an extended human consciousness. To this end, I propose a test from conceptual object permanence, which can be applied not just to robots, but to the innumerable artifacts of consciousness that texture our existences.

In this paper, I explore the question of agency in spontaneous action via a phenomenology of musical improvisation, drawing on fieldwork conducted with large con- temporary improvising ensembles. I argue that musical improvisation is a form of ‘participatory sense-making’ in which musical decisions unfold via a feedback pro- cess with the evolving musical situation itself. I describe how musicians’ technical expertise is developed alongside a responsive expertise, and how these capacities complicate the sense in which habitual action can be viewed (...) as pre-conscious or ‘automatic.’ Nevertheless, I shall argue that the self-awareness required for expert improvisation does not amount to highly reflective deliberation, arguing instead that the practice of musical improvisation involves an exercise of practical rationality, akin to what Aristotle called phronēsis. Musical decisions – as an expressive form of sense-making – are guided by feelings of ‘rightness’ that are experienced directly and intuitively, responding to the norms and reasons that are embedded in the instruments, sounds, and practices of a particular (sub)culture. (shrink)

In order to account for how organisms can apprehend the contents of the external representations they manipulate in cognizing, the endorsement of representationalism fosters a situation of what I call cognitive overdetermination. I argue that this situation is problematic for the inclusion of these external representations in cognitive processing, as the hypothesis of extended cognition would like to have it. Since that situation arises from a commitment to representationalism (even minimal), it only affects the viability of representationalist versions of extended (...) cognition. (shrink)

People increasingly form beliefs based on information gained from automatically filtered Internet ‎sources such as search engines. However, the workings of such sources are often opaque, preventing ‎subjects from knowing whether the information provided is biased or incomplete. Users’ reliance on ‎Internet technologies whose modes of operation are concealed from them raises serious concerns about ‎the justificatory status of the beliefs they end up forming. Yet it is unclear how to address these concerns ‎within standard theories of knowledge and justification. (...) To shed light on the problem, we introduce a ‎novel conceptual framework that clarifies the relations between justified belief, epistemic responsibility, ‎action, and the technological resources available to a subject. We argue that justified belief is subject to ‎certain epistemic responsibilities that accompany the subject’s particular decision-taking circumstances, ‎and that one typical responsibility is to ascertain, so far as one can, whether the information upon which ‎the judgment will rest is biased or incomplete. What this responsibility comprises is partly determined by ‎the inquiry-enabling technologies available to the subject. We argue that a subject’s beliefs that are ‎formed based on Internet-filtered information are less justified than they would be if she either knew how ‎filtering worked or relied on additional sources, and that the subject may have the epistemic ‎responsibility to take measures to enhance the justificatory status of such beliefs.‎. (shrink)

This paper considers some foundational concepts in ecological psychology and in enactivism., and traces their developments from their historical roots to current preoccupations. Important differences stem, we claim, from dissimilarities in how embodied experience has been understood by the ancestors, founders and followers of ecological psychology and enactivism, respectively. Rather than pointing to differences in domains of interest for the respective approaches, and restating possible divisions of labor between them in research in the cognitive and psychological sciences, we call for (...) a deeper analysis of the role of embodiment in agency that we also undertake. Awareness of the differences that exist in the respective frameworks and their consequences, we argue, may lead to overcoming some current divisions of labor and responsibility, and contribute to a more comprehensive and complementary way of dealing with a broader range of theoretical and practical concerns. While providing some examples of domains, such as social cognition and art reception, in which we can observe the relative usefulness and potential integration of the theoretical and methodological resources from the two approaches, we demonstrate that such deeper synergy is not only possible but also beginning to emerge. Such complementarity, as we envisage, conceives of ecological psychology that allows felt experience as a crucial dynamical element in the explanations and models that it produces, and of an enactive approach that takes into consideration the ubiquitous presence of rich directly perceived relations among variables arising from enactments in the social and physical world. (shrink)

What explains people's propensity to ask existential questions that they have little hope of resolving, such as: Why are we here? What, if any, is our purpose? What is the structure of the universe? That humans engage in these endeavors has long puzzled evolutionary theorists, as they go beyond the immediate demands of fending for ourselves, seeking safety, finding food, and reproducing, which occupy the daily lives of other animals. In this book, philosopher Helen De Cruz draws on a wide (...) range of disciplines and thinkers, from Aristotle and 12th-century Muslim philosopher Ibn Tufayl to Jewish thinker Abraham Heschel and science writer Rachel Carson, showing how awe and wonder lie at the heart of such existential questions. She argues that there is an emotional basis to this drive for inquiry, as wonder and awe are epistemic emotions that help us think about big-picture questions and that motivate the answers we provide to those questions. (shrink)

I defend a model of the musically extended mind. I consider how acts of “musicking” grant access to novel emotional experiences otherwise inaccessible. First, I discuss the idea of “musical affordances” and specify both what musical affordances are and how they invite different forms of entrainment. Next, I argue that musical affordances – via soliciting different forms of entrainment – enhance the functionality of various endogenous, emotiongranting regulative processes, drawing novel experiences out of us with an expanded complexity and phenomenal (...) character. I argue that music therefore ought to be thought of as part of the vehicle needed to realize these emotional experiences. I appeal to different sources of empirical work to develop this idea. (shrink)

This chapter describes a perspective on emotion, according to which emotions are: 1. Designed to function in a social context: an emotion is often an act of relationship reconfiguration brought about by delivering a social signal; 2. Forms of skillful engagement with the world which need not be mediated by conceptual thought; 3. Scaffolded by the environment, both synchronically in the unfolding of a particular emotional performance and diachronically, in the acquisition of an emotional repertoire; 4. Dynamically coupled to an (...) environment which both influences and is influenced by the unfolding of the emotion We draw heavily on ‘transactional’ accounts of emotion proposed by some contemporary psychologists. Although these authors do not, to our knowledge, conceive their work as a contribution to the ‘situationist’ literature that is the focus of this volume, we contend that their proposals constitute a fairly exact, affective parallel to situationist ideas about cognition. The primary aim of this chapter is to demonstrate that a situated approach to emotion already exists and is backed by a substantial experimental literature. (shrink)

Just as bodily actions are things you do with your body, mental actions are things you do with your mind. Both are different from things that merely happen to you. Where does the idea of mental action come from? What are mental actions? And why do they matter in philosophy? These are the three main questions answered in this paper. Section 1 introduces mental action through a brief history of the topic in philosophy. Section 2 explains what it is to (...) be a mental action in terms of intentional action. Section 3 argues that the fact that we can perform mental actions has some striking consequences concerning mental content. Section 4 shows how mental action helps to explain some important facts about self-knowledge and the normativity of thought. The conclusion mentions two further fruitful avenues for philosophical research on mental action. (shrink)

After a brief summary of Andy Clark's book, Supersizing the Mind I address Clark's approach to language which I argue to be inadequate. Clark is criticized for reifying language, thus neglecting that it is an interpersonal activity, not a stable system of symbols. With a starting point in language as a social phenomenon, I suggest an ecological approach to the extended mind hypothesis, arguing against Clark's assumption that the extended mind is necessarily brain-centered.

A common presupposition in epistemology is that the processes contributing to the generation of knowledge do not extend beyond the knower's skin. This paper challenges this presupposition. I adduce a novel kind case that causes trouble for a number of even the most promising accounts of knowledge in current literature (virtue epistemological and modal accounts), at least so long as the presupposition is in place. I then look at a couple of recent accounts of knowledge that drop the presupposition and (...) expressly allow the relevant processes to extended beyond the knower's skin. While these accounts can handle the problem case, they encounter difficulties elsewhere: extension occurs too easily and so the accounts predict knowledge where they ought not. Finally, I offer a novel way of extending epistemology and argue that it can steer clear of the problems on both sides. (shrink)

Our aim is to provide a topography of the relevant philosophical terrain with regard to the possible ways in which knowledge can be conceived of as extended. We begin by charting the different types of internalist and externalist proposals within epistemology, and we critically examine the different formulations of the epistemic internalism/externalism debate they lead to. Next, we turn to the internalism/externalism distinction within philosophy of mind and cognitive science. In light of the above dividing lines, we then examine first (...) the extent to which content externalism is compatible with epistemic externalism; second, whether active externalism entails epistemic externalism; and third whether there are varieties of epistemic externalism that are better suited to accommodate active externalism. Finally, we examine whether the combination of epistemic and cognitive externalism is necessary for epistemology and we comment on the potential ramifications of this move for social epistemology and philosophy of science. (shrink)

In this paper, we evaluate the pragmatic turn towards embodied, enactive thinking in cognitive science, in the context of recent empirical research on the memory palace technique. The memory palace is a powerful method for remembering yet it faces two problems. First, cognitive scientists are currently unable to clarify its efficacy. Second, the technique faces significant practical challenges to its users. Virtual reality devices are sometimes presented as a way to solve these practical challenges, but currently fall short of delivering (...) on that promise. We address both issues in this paper. First, we argue that an embodied, enactive approach to memory can better help us understand the effectiveness of the memory palace. Second, we present design recommendations for a virtual memory palace. Our theoretical proposal and design recommendations contribute to solving both problems and provide reasons for preferring an embodied, enactive account over an information-processing treatment of the memory palace. (shrink)

In this paper, I analyze a type of externalist enactivism defended by Riccardo Manzotti. Such radical versions of enactivism are gaining more attention, especially in cognitive science and cognitive robotics. They are radical in that their notion of representation is purely referential, and content is conflated with reference. Manzotti follows in the footsteps of early causal theories of reference that had long been shown to be inadequate. It is commonly known that radical versions of externalism may lead to difficulties with (...) the notion of representation, especially if they cannot help themselves with the notion of syntax. I argue that a type of externalism present in Manzotti’s enactivism may well lead to anti-representationalism. (shrink)

According to proponents of the extended mind, bio-external resources, such as a notebook or a smartphone, are candidate parts of the cognitive and mental machinery that realises cognitive states and processes. The present chapter discusses three areas of ethical concern associated with the extended mind, namely mental privacy, mental manipulation, and agency. We also examine the ethics of the extended mind from the standpoint of three general normative frameworks, namely, consequentialism, deontology, and virtue ethics.

How does the integration of mixed reality devices into our cognitive practices impact the mind from a metaphysical and epistemological perspective? In his innovative and interdisciplinary article, “Minds in the Metaverse: Extended Cognition Meets Mixed Reality” (2022), Paul Smart addresses this underexplored question, arguing that the use of a hypothetical application of the Microsoft HoloLens called “the HoloFoldit” represents a technologically high-grade form of extended cognizing from the perspective of neo-mechanical philosophy. This short commentary aims to (1) carve up the (...) conceptual landscape of possible objections to Smart’s argument and (2) elaborate on the possibility of hologrammatically extended cognition, which is supposed to be one of the features of the HoloFoldit case that distinguishes it from more primitive forms of cognitive extension. In tackling (1), I do not mean to suggest that Smart does not consider or have sufficient answers to these objections. In addressing (2), the goal is not to argue for or against the possibility of hologrammatically extended cognition but to reveal some issues in the metaphysics of virtual reality upon which this possibility hinges. I construct an argument in favor of hologrammatically extended cognition based on the veracity of virtual realism (Chalmers, 2017) and an argument against it based on the veracity of virtual fctionalism (McDonnell and Wildman, 2019). (shrink)

Critics of the target article objected to our account of art appreciators' sensitivity to art-historical contexts and functions, the relations among the modes of artistic appreciation, and the weaknesses of aesthetic science. To rebut these objections and justify our program, we argue that the current neglect of sensitivity to art-historical contexts persists as a result of a pervasive aesthetic–artistic confound; we further specify our claim that basic exposure and the design stance are necessary conditions of artistic understanding; and we explain (...) why many experimental studies do not belong to a psycho-historical science of art. (shrink)

L'ingegneria concettuale è una branca della filosofia caratterizzata da un approccio normativo nei confronti della rappresentazione. Assunzione fondamentale è che i nostri dispositivi rappresentazionali possano essere difettosi. Si configura dunque come l'attività che consiste nell'identificare i difetti in tali dispositivi e mettere in atto strategie di miglioramento. Verranno illustrate le questioni fondamentali a cui una teoria di ingegneria concettuale deve rispondere: in cosa consiste esattamente questa attività? Come possiamo attuarla? Quali meccanismi regolano la formazione dei dispositivi rappresentazionali? Possiamo influire su (...) tali meccanismi? Verrà inoltre presentata un'obiezione all'ingegneria concettuale e varie risposte. -/- Conceptual engineering is a branch of philosophy characterised by a normative approach towards representation. The fundamental assumption of it is that our representational devices can be defective. Conceptual engineering is then the activity consisting of identifying the defects of such devices and putting in place ameliorative strategies. This paper illustrates the fundamental issues for a theory of conceptual engineering: what does this activity consist of? How can we implement it? What mechanisms regulate the formation of representational devices? Can we have an influence over those mechanisms? Moreover, it will be presented an objection to conceptual engineering and various responses to it. (shrink)

In this chapter I present the thesis of Proper Embodiment: the claim that (at least some of) the details of our physiology matter to cognition and consciousness in a fundamental way. This thesis is composed of two sub-claims: (1) if we are to design, build, or evolve artificial systems that are cognitive in the way that we are, these systems will have to be internally embodied, and (2) the exploitation of the particular internal embodiment that allows systems to evolve solutions (...) with greatly decreased computational complexity – and thus to be flexible and adaptive in the ways that are characteristic of cognitive systems – means that the orthodox distinction between algorithm and implementation is undermined. Evolved cognitive systems are therefore likely not to instantiate the distinction between phenomenology, algorithm, and implementation. The leaky levels evident in evolved cognitive systems motivate an extension of orthodox embodied cognitive science to the internal, affective, “gooey” realm that has so far only been embraced by those in the enactive tradition. This suggests that if we are to build artificial systems that will be genuinely cognitive they will have to incorporate parts of the gooey realm currently considered to be “mere implementation.”. (shrink)

Mysterianism has become a popular stance in philosophy of consciousness and other philosophical subdisciplines. The aim of this paper is to show that mysterianism is not justified, mainly because its inclination to epistemic defeatism and the misunderstanding of the division of epistemic labour. In the first part, I will present the history of mysterianism in the 19th and 20th century philosophy. Then, in the second part, I will point out how epistemic defeatism is founded in the unwarranted philosophical futurology. The (...) third part will deal with the division of labour in society, language and knowledge. Because of the division of epistemic labour, the understanding is distributed among numerous agents without possibility of individual comprehension. Finally, I will coin the term “ignorance illusion” that plays the central role in the mysterians’ worldview. (shrink)

This chapter explores properties that bind individuals, knowledge, and communities, together. Section ‎‎1 introduces Hardwig’s argument from trust in others’ testimonies as entailing that trust is the glue ‎that binds individuals into communities. Section 2 asks “what grounds trust?” by exploring assessment ‎of collaborators’ explanatory responsiveness, formal indicators such as affiliation and credibility, ‎appreciation of peers’ tacit knowledge, game-theoretical considerations, and the role moral character ‎of peers, social biases, and social values play in grounding trust. Section 3 deals with establishing (...) ‎reliability standards for formation and breaching of trust. Different epistemic considerations and their ‎underpinning of inductive risks are examined through various communication routes within a ‎discipline, between disciplines, and to the public. Section 4 examines whether a collective entity can ‎be trusted over and above trust that is given to its individual members. Section 5 deals with the roles ‎technological artifacts play in distributed research and collective knowledge. It presents the common ‎view in which genuine trust cannot, in principle, be accorded to artifacts, so as an opposite view. We ‎show that what counts as a genuine object of trust is relevant to debates about the boundaries of ‎collective agency and as a criterion for extended cognitive systems.‎. (shrink)

The role of the body in cognition is acknowledged across a variety of disciplines, even if the precise nature and scope of that contribution remain contentious. As a result, most philosophers working on embodiment—e.g. those in embodied cognition, enactivism, and ‘4e’ cognition—interact with the life sciences as part of their interdisciplinary agenda. Despite this, a detailed engagement with emerging findings in epigenetics and post-genomic biology has been missing from proponents of this embodied turn. Surveying this research provides an opportunity to (...) rethink the relationship between embodiment and genetics, and we argue that the balance of current epigenetic research favours the extension of an enactivist approach to mind and life, rather than the extended functionalist view of embodied cognition associated with Andy Clark and Mike Wheeler, which is more substrate neutral. (shrink)

This paper engages the question of the extended mind hypothesis, specifically in terms of memory and mnemonics. I use the case of an external object which is set to trigger a memory internally, but is not the memory, to explore the idea of extension versus distribution. I use the example of tzitzit, which is a garment worn by observant Jewish men, where is states in scripture that seeing the tassels attached to the garment are supposed to trigger a specific memory. (...) The point of the essay is that extension is merely a metaphysical commitment, and that this commitment leads to some ethical issues. (shrink)

The statement everyone wants to live a fulfilled and happy life may seem simple, self-evident, and even trivial at first glance. However, upon closer philosophical analysis, can we unequivocally assert that people are truly focused on well-being? Assuming they are, the question becomes: what guidelines should be followed and how should one behave in order to achieve true well-being and attain their goals? One popular viewpoint is that cultivating moral virtues and personal qualities is essential for a life of "true" (...) well-being, rather than mere pleasure. This perspective is not particularly original, as it was advocated quite clearly by Aristotle. However, we must ask: what guarantees that virtue will lead to well-being? Can we really ignore the common-sense doubt that virtue (and moral life), as Kant points out, may not be rewarded with any form of well-being or "happiness" in the broadest sense during our earthly existence? How might we address this doubt? If questions about the relationship between happiness and virtue have been asked since ancient times, why don't we have definitive answers yet? Perhaps there is something wrong with the questions themselves, as is often the case in philosophy. Views on this relationship have influenced the modification of theories that philosophers have put forth in order to provide satisfactory answers. One such theory is the renewed and modernized ethics of virtue, which places the greatest emphasis on building an individual's moral character, assuming that Aristotelian character virtues such as courage, honesty, generosity, prudence, self-control, and compassion will enable us to lead a happy and fulfilling life. "Virtues" refer to a wide range of "excellences" or activities that individuals can use to perfect themselves. For example, an ordinary person might accept that courage can make their life more fulfilling, but it's important to recognize that virtues cannot be acquired overnight. Furthermore, many people believe that virtues are innate qualities that one either possesses or lacks. In contrast, ethics of virtue provides guidance and instructions for developing virtues over extended periods of time, as well as for continuously "practicing" the development of moral characteristics that will make us better individuals. The central and most significant concept in ethics of virtue is the golden mean, which can be interpreted in various ways. Essentially, ethics of virtue offers a path to a life filled with pleasure, harmony, and virtuous action. However, this collection of essays, Virtues and Vices: Between Ethics and Epistemology, is not exclusively concerned with virtues or ethics. Knowledge, as well as the processes of belief formation and justification of those beliefs, are also essential to ethics of virtue. Going back to the systematic Greek philosopher and his teacher, we can emphasize that virtues and knowledge are inseparable. Without the epistemology of virtues, even a thematic collection like this one would be incomplete. The Epistemology of Virtue is a relatively new branch of philosophy that has emerged as a response to questions about the value-neutrality of science. For a long time, the separation of values and scientific inquiry has been viewed as the correct methodological approach. However, it is clear that every scientist is also a human being with their own virtues and flaws. It is naive to assume that a scientist can leave their values and moral qualities outside the laboratory and treat their colleagues in the team differently than they would treat other people in their everyday life. Taking this into account, we can notice that Epistemology of Virtue is a theory that examines the influence of virtues on the processes of acquiring knowledge. Epistemic virtues refer to qualities that enable individuals to acquire knowledge and make reliable judgments. These virtues include traits such as openness to diverse testimonies and arguments, critical thinking, a tendency to question one's own assumptions, and the ability to identify errors in one's own thought processes. Just like in virtue ethics, the Epistemology of Virtue raises the question of how we can cultivate the necessary virtues and how these virtues can have a positive impact on both individuals and society. The field also explores how epistemic virtues can be put into practice, such as in educational settings, scientific research, and various social activities. Finally, we turn to a topic that is often overlooked in philosophy - human flaws. While ethics typically views flaws as the opposite of virtues, requiring correction both individually and socially, the Epistemology of Virtue questions what happens when flaws occur in knowledge-related qualities. Do these flaws also need to be eliminated, or are they an inherent part of the process of acquiring knowledge and making judgments? At first glance, prejudices, stereotypes, dogmatism, conformism, closed-mindedness towards arguments and evidence, as well as uncritical acceptance of authority, can all hinder our ability to acquire knowledge. Epistemologists view these qualities as vices, rather than flaws like ethicists do. The Epistemology of Vices is the newest of the three branches of philosophy covered in this thematic collection, and it examines the ways in which false and untrue beliefs develop and persist in society. This area of study seeks to answer questions about how people form delusions and whether it is possible to overcome them. On the other hand, the Epistemology of Virtue is like the "older brother" that supervises these vices. It contributes to the investigation and overcoming of vices by developing virtues that enable individuals to more accurately assess the truthfulness of their beliefs. However, even though vices can have a destructive impact on knowledge acquisition, the question remains: are vices always detrimental in every context? Conversely, can virtues be detrimental? For example, does a virtue like solidarity sometimes hinder the efficient formation of true beliefs in time-sensitive situations such as finding a vaccine to combat a virus pandemic? Can vices be useful? Can stubbornness and uncooperativeness sometimes help a research team by allowing two sides to reach the same goal through different paths? Within this collection, some of these questions will receive answers, some of which may confirm existing impressions, while others may surprise readers. The thematic collection, Virtues and Vices: Between Ethics and Epistemology, consists of four interesting chapters and 21 papers that cover the selected topic through the prism of philosophical disciplines such as ethics, epistemology, the history of philosophy, philosophy of mind, political philosophy, and philosophy of science. In this introduction, we will not discuss the contents of the articles so as not to disrupt the intended integral approach to reading the collection. A significant feature of this collection is the continuity that extends from one paper to another, from topic to topic, and from problem to problem. Lastly, we would like to express our gratitude to the Faculty of Philosophy at the University of Belgrade for their support in realizing this collection, as well as to our colleagues from the Department and Institute of Philosophy who have made this collection a relevant and significant achievement with their contributions. We are also thankful to the reviewers of the collection as a whole, as well as to the referees of individual articles, who have provided us with detailed comments and remarks that have made this collection clearer and more comprehensive. We owe a special thanks to our colleagues from Zagreb, Rijeka, and Maribor, whose exceptional papers have contributed to making this collection an unabashed international contribution to debates about the ethics and epistemology of virtues and vices. (shrink)

According to Longtermism, our acts’ expected influence on the expected value of the world is mainly determined by their effects in the far future. There is, given total utilitarianism, a straightforward argument for Longtermism due to the enormous number of people that might exist in the future, but this argument does not work on person-affecting views. In this paper, we will argue that these views might also lead to Longtermism if Prudential Longtermism is true. Prudential Longtermism holds for a person (...) if and only if our acts’ overall influence on that person’s expected well-being is mainly determined by the acts’ effects in the far future. We argue that (due to a small chance of anti-ageing and uploading) there could be an enormous amount of prudential value for some contemporary person in the far future and that value may be so large that it dominates their overall expectation of lifetime well-being. (shrink)

These preprints were automatically compiled into a PDF from the collection of papers deposited in PhilSci-Archive in conjunction with the PSA 2018.

To what extent should we focus on implicit bias in order to eradicate persistent social injustice? Structural prioritizers argue that we should focus less on individual minds than on unjust social structures, while equal prioritizers think that both are equally important. This article introduces the framework of transactive memory into the debate to defend the equal priority view. The transactive memory framework helps us see how structure can emerge from individual interactions as an irreducibly social product. If this is right, (...) then debiasing interventions are structural interventions. One upshot is that the utility of the individual versus structural distinction is not apparent for the purposes of intervention. (shrink)

(1) An introduction to the principles of conceptual modelling, combinatorial heuristics and epistemological history; (2) the examination of a number of perennial epistemological-methodological schemata: conceptual spaces and blending theory; ars inveniendi and ars demonstrandi; the two modes of analysis and synthesis and their relationship to ars inveniendi; taxonomies and typologies as two fundamental epistemic structures; extended cognition, cognitio symbolica and model-based reasoning; (3) Plato’s notions of conceptual spaces, conceptual blending and hypothetical-analogical models (paradeigmata); (4) Ramon Llull’s concept analysis and combinatoric (...) spaces; (5) Gottfried Leibniz’s development of compositional analysis and synthesis as a general modelling method and a paradigm for ars inveniendi; (6) Fritz Zwicky’s revival of the morphological method of analysis and construction, and its subsequent computerised applications. (shrink)

People display recognizably characteristic behavioral patterns across time and situations, with a given degree of regularity. These patterns may justify the attribution of personality traits. It is arguably the commonsense view that the proper explanation of these behavioral regularities is given by intrinsic properties of the agent’s psychology. In this paper, I argue for an externalistic view of the causal basis of personality-characteristic behaviors. According to the externalistic view, the relevant behavioral regularities are better understood as the result of a (...) systematic interaction between features internal to the agent and environmental-situational factors. Moreover, if the premise is granted that people are typically able to exercise a certain degree of control over the environmental-situational conditions they find themselves in, the resulting picture is of active sort of externalism, as people may at times engage in selection and manipulation of environmental-situational conditions as a way of managing their own behavioral tendencies. (shrink)

The potential to collect brain data more directly, with higher resolution, and in greater amounts has heightened worries about mental and brain privacy. In order to manage the risks to individuals posed by these privacy challenges, some have suggested codifying new privacy rights, including a right to “mental privacy.” In this paper, we consider these arguments and conclude that while neurotechnologies do raise significant privacy concerns, such concerns are—at least for now—no different from those raised by other well-understood data collection (...) technologies, such as gene sequencing tools and online surveillance. To better understand the privacy stakes of brain data, we suggest the use of a conceptual framework from information ethics, Helen Nissenbaum’s “contextual integrity” theory. To illustrate the importance of context, we examine neurotechnologies and the information flows they produce in three familiar contexts—healthcare and medical research, criminal justice, and consumer marketing. We argue that by emphasizing what is distinct about brain privacy issues, rather than what they share with other data privacy concerns, risks weakening broader efforts to enact more robust privacy law and policy. (shrink)

What we know is enabled and constrained by what we are. Extended and enactive approaches to cognitive science explore the ways in which our embodiment enables us to relate to the world. On these accounts, rather than being merely represented in the brain, the world and our activity in it plays an on-going role in our perceptual and cognitive processes. In this chapter I outline some of the key influences on extended and enactive philosophy and cognitive science in order to (...) generate a sense of the conceptual space in which this research is going on. I focus on the concepts of sense-making, Umwelts, affordances, cultural niches, epistemic actions, environmental scaffolding, and mental institutions. Despite differences in focus and detail these influences share an underlying world-view; that cognition is relational and world-involving. This way of thinking has clear resonances with dominant approaches in non-Western philosophy. The purpose of this chapter is thus to generate in the reader a sense of this shared extended-enactive world-view in order to open up a space for communication between approaches. (shrink)

Socially extended knowledge has recently received much attention in mainstream epistemology. Knowledge here is not to be understood as wholly realised within a single individual who manipulates artefacts or tools but as collaboratively realised across plural agents. Because of its focus on the interpersonal dimension, socially extended epistemology appears to be a promising approach for investigating the deeply social nature of epistemic practices. I believe, however, that this line of inquiry could be made more fruitful if it is connected with (...) the critical notion of epistemic responsibility, as developed in feminist responsibilism. According to feminist responsibilists, at the core of epistemic responsibility is a critical disposition toward correcting epistemic injustice. This epistemic idea is highly relevant to the epistemological context of illness, where patient testimony is often disregarded. Hence, though restricted to the epistemological context of the experience of illness, this chapter delves into epistemic injustice and its robust mechanisms. I thus explore what responsible epistemic practices should involve in order to redress that injustice and how epistemic responsibility should be socially extended. The discussion proceeds as follows. First, by relying on Arthur Frank’s innovative work on illness narratives, I focus on chaotic bodily messages from patients overwhelmed by suffering and then explain why these messages should count as genuine narratives or testimonies despite their inarticulateness. Second, I elaborate on how epistemic injustice concerning such narratives (i.e., chaos narratives) is produced and reproduced, in particular how both a dominant sociocultural norm and our inherent vulnerability can contribute to its production and reproduction. Finally, I propose an extended form of epistemic responsibility that ameliorates this aspect. Laying particular emphasis on the epistemic role of mature empathy, I characterise the extended epistemic responsibility in terms of extended empathic knowledge. (shrink)

Abstract:This paper considers novel ethical issues pertaining to near-future artificial intelligence (AI) systems that seek to support, maintain, or enhance the capabilities of older adults as they age and experience cognitive decline. In particular, we focus on smart assistants (SAs) that would seek to provide proactive assistance and mediate social interactions between users and other members of their social or support networks. Such systems would potentially have significant utility for users and their caregivers if they could reduce the cognitive load (...) for tasks that help older adults maintain their autonomy and independence. However, proactively supporting even simple tasks, such as providing the user with a summary of a meeting or a conversation, would require a future SA to engage with ethical aspects of human interactions which computational systems currently have difficulty identifying, tracking, and navigating. If SAs fail to perceive ethically relevant aspects of social interactions, the resulting deficit in moral discernment would threaten important aspects of user autonomy and well-being. After describing the dynamic that generates these ethical challenges, we note how simple strategies for prompting user oversight of such systems might also undermine their utility. We conclude by considering how near-future SAs could exacerbate current worries about privacy, commodification of users, trust calibration and injustice. (shrink)

In current philosophy of mind, there is lively debate over whether emotions, moods, and other affects can extend to comprise elements beyond one’s organismic boundaries. At the same time, there has been growing interest in the nature and significance of so-called existential feelings, which, as the term suggests, are feelings of one’s overall being in the world. In this article, I bring these two strands of investigation together to ask: Can the material underpinnings of existential feelings extend beyond one’s skull (...) and skin? To begin, I introduce and adopt a componential-systemic view of extended affectivity. In doing so, I specify the vehicle externalist criteria for extension employed in my analysis. I then define what existential feelings are and pinpoint several key issues in their potential extension. More specifically, I identify sensorimotor ‘know-how’ as a possibly extending component of existential feeling and posit it as the fulcrum of my argument. Finally, I move on to consider the extension of existential feeling via sensory substitution, especially through so-called Tactile Visual Sensory Substitution (TVSS) devices. Informed by both philosophical and empirical studies, I argue that, under certain conditions, (a) the agent’s implicit sensorimotor processing and a TVSS device can become coupled into a new systemic whole, which in turn (b) reconfigures the material underpinnings of the agent’s pre-intentional world-experience. This, I conclude, counts as a cogent case for extended existential feeling. (shrink)

In this thesis, I investigated the self in autism using tools from philosophy and experimental cognitive science. Our self-representation shapes how we act in the world, and the feedback we receive in turn shapes how we represent ourselves. In the predictive processing framework I use, autism is characterised by differences in modelling or predicting the world under uncertainty which impacts both perception and action. Findings from the thesis show that individuals with more autistic traits are more prone to act early (...) in the face of rising uncertainty. The thesis also raises questions about the appropriate core features of autism. (shrink)