O presente artigo busca situar o leitor em alguns dos debates atuais acerca da memória episódica no âmbito da filosofia da memória. A memória episódica consiste na capacidade de lembrar daquilo que o sujeito vivenciou ao longo de sua vida. Um dos maiores problemas em filosofia da memória é estabelecer o que é uma memória episódica, e distingui-la de outros estados mentais, como a imaginação. As principais teorias que visam resolver tal problema são a Teoria Causal da Memória e a (...) Teoria Simulacionista da Memória. Causalistas insistem que deve haver um vínculo causal entre uma experiência vivida pelo sujeito no passado e a memória dessa experiência. Simulacionistas, em contrapartida, sustentam que tal vínculo causal não é necessário, pois uma memória é o resultado de um processo de simulação que combina elementos de várias memórias para formar um cenário que representa a experiência passada. Outro debate em filosofia da memória trata dos objetos da memória episódica, nele busca-se descobrir com o quê entramos em contato quando lembramos de um evento passado. Nesse debate as posições filosóficas mais defendidas são o Realismo Indireto e o Realismo Direto; o primeiro afirma que entramos em contato com representações do evento passado, já o último sustenta que entramos em contato diretamente com o evento passado. Esse artigo apresenta também teorias da psicologia sobre consolidação de memórias episódicas e a teoria da Mental Time Travel, afim de embasar o leitor, respectivamente, acerca dos mecanismos formadores da memória e do debate sobre a função da memória episódica. (shrink)

No presente artigo apresentarei a teoria do mental time travel, sendo esta uma teoria relativamente recente que coloca a memória episódica como uma forma de viajar mentalmente no tempo. Apresentarei também as duas teorias que disputam acerca da natureza dos processos de mental time travel, a saber, o continuísmo e o descontinuísmo. O continuísmo é a teoria onde afirma-se que a imaginação e a memória são ocorrências mentais do mesmo tipo, e que a única diferença existente entre ambas é a (...) orientação temporal, pois na memória o indivíduo viaja mentalmente para o passado e na imaginação ele viaja mentalmente para o futuro. O descontinuísmo é a teoria que afirma que, para além da orientação temporal, há uma diferença de tipo entre a memória e a imaginação. Além disso, farei uma exposição das semelhanças e concordâncias existentes entre o continuísmo e o simulacionismo, sendo esta última uma teoria mais ampla sobre a natureza da memória episódica, cuja tese central afirma que a memória episódica é fruto de um sistema de simulação. Explicarei também porque o descontinuísmo é compatível com a teoria causal da memória, sendo esta a teoria que afirma que a memória deve possuir uma conexão causal com o passado. (shrink)

The purpose of this chapter is to determine what is to remember something, as opposed to imagining it, perceiving it, or introspecting it. What does it take for a mental state to qualify as remembering, or having a memory of, something? The main issue to be addressed is therefore a metaphysical one. It is the issue of determining which features those mental states which qualify as memories typically enjoy, and those states which do not qualify as such typically lack. In (...) sections 2 and 3, I will discuss the two main existing conceptions of the conditions that a mental state must satisfy to count as an episode of remembering. The first of these approaches is backward-looking. It puts forward conditions that strictly concern the aetiology of the mental state. I will argue that the conditions offered by the backward-looking approach are both too strong and too weak: They rule out mental states which, intuitively, count as memories while including mental states which, intuitively, do not qualify as memories. The second approach is forward-looking. It puts forward conditions that only concern the use that the subject makes of the mental state while forming beliefs about their own life. I will argue that the conditions proposed by the forward-looking approach are both too weak and too strong as well. However, the discussion of the two approaches will allow us to extract some helpful lessons on the constraints that any proposal about the nature of remembering should respect. An alternative approach aimed at incorporating those lessons will be offered in section 4 by drawing on the literature on functionalism. In section 5, I will argue that this approach can, on the one hand, accommodate as memories those mental states which indicate that the backward-looking approach and the forward-looking approach are too strict while, on the other hand, excluding those mental states which suggest that the two alternative approaches are too permissive. Accordingly, I will conclude that construing memory along functionalist lines is a satisfactory approach to the nature of remembering. (shrink)

Are those judgments that we make on the basis of our memories immune to error through misidentification? In this paper, I discuss a phenomenon which seems to suggest that they are not; the phenomenon of observer memory. I argue that observer memories fail to show that memory judgments are not IEM. However, the discussion of observer memories will reveal an interesting fact about the perspectivity of memory; a fact that puts us on the right path towards explaining why memory judgments (...) are indeed IEM. The main tenet in the account of IEM to be proposed is that this aspect of memory is grounded, on the one hand, on the intentionality of perception and, on the other hand, on the relation between the intentionality of perception and that of memory. (shrink)

Memories are mental states with a number of interesting features. One of those features seems to be their having an intentional object. After all, we commonly say that memories are about things, and that a subject represents the world in a certain way by virtue of remembering something. It is unclear, however, what sorts of entities constitute the intentional objects of memory. In particular, it is not clear whether those are mind-independent entities in the world or whether they are mental (...) entities of some kind. The purpose of this chapter is to map the different positions on this issue, and to highlight the virtues and difficulties for each of the options. In Section 2, I will specify the question of what the intentional objects of memory are by clarifying the relevant notions of memory and intentional object. In Section 3, I will motivate the significance of identifying the intentional objects of memory by exploring the relations between, on the one hand, the intentionality of memory and, on the other hand, the phenomenology and the epistemology of memory. In Section 4, I will consider two natural candidates for being the intentional objects of memory, namely, worldly entities and mental entities, and I will raise some concerns for each of the two candidates. A promising alternative will emerge, in Section 5, as preserving the virtues of the two original candidates while avoiding their difficulties. The alternative will concern a certain combination of worldly and mental entities; a combination that involves both causal and truth-making relations. I will conclude by sketching how the alternative candidate can shed some light on the phenomenological and epistemological issues raised in the third section. (shrink)

Episodic memory has a distinctive phenomenology. One way to capture what is distinctive about it is by using the notion of mental time travel: When we remember some fact episodically, we mentally travel to the moment at which we experienced it in the past. This way of distinguishing episodic memory from semantic memory calls for an explanation of what the experience of mental time travel is. In this paper, I suggest that a certain view about the content of memories can (...) shed some light on the experience of mental time travel. This is the view that, when a subject remembers some fact episodically, their memory represents itself as coming from a perception of that fact. I propose that the experience of mental time travel in memory is the experience of representing one of the elements in this complex content, namely, the past perceptual experience of the remembered fact. In defence of this proposal, I offer two considerations. Firstly, the proposal is consistent with the idea that memories enjoy a temporal phenomenology (specifically, a feeling of pastness). Secondly, the proposal is consistent with the possibility that some of our other cognitive capacities might yield an experience of mental time travel which can be oriented towards the future. I argue that the received conception of mental time travel is in tension with those two ideas. (shrink)

The central concept of this edited volume is "blended cognition", the natural skill of human beings for combining constantly different heuristics during their several task-solving activities. Something that was sometimes observed like a problem as “bad reasoning”, is now the central key for the understanding of the richness, adaptability and creativity of human cognition. The topic of this book connects in a significant way with the disciplines of psychology, neurology, anthropology, philosophy, logics, engineering, logics, and AI. In a nutshell: understanding (...) better humans for designing better machines. It contains a Preface by the editors and 12 chapters. (shrink)

This paper is an introduction on the Causal Theory of Memory, one of the most discussed theories in philosophy of memory in the present days. We begin with Martin & Deutscher’s formulation of the theory, in which the authors present three criteria in order for a given mental state to be considered an instance of memory, amongst them, the famous causal criterion, which stipulates that a memory must be causally connected to the past experience. Subsequently, we discuss if these criteria (...) are necessary and sufficient for memory and we present two theories that complement these criteria with an epistemic and a phenomenological criterion, i.e., the Causal Epistemic Theory and the Causal Autonoetic Theory. We then introduce the concept of memory traces, which are, according to Martin & Deutscher, the causal link between the memory and the past experience which created this memory; we present the model of traces as structural analogues and the model of distributed traces and discuss the problems which arise for each of these models of traces. Afterwards we focus on the concept of causality and present the Causal Procedural Theory, which offers a different conception of causality that does not focus on the memory traces, but on causal process itself. Lastly, we present the theory called Discontinuism, a theory about the relation between memory and imagination, which follows directly from the Causal Theory of Memory. (shrink)

The connection between brain and mind is an important scientific and philosophical question that we are still far from completely understanding. A crucial point to our work is noticing that thermodynamics provides a convenient framework to model brain activity, whereas cognition can be modeled in information-theoretical terms. In fact, several models have been proposed so far from both approaches. A second critical remark is the existence of deep theoretical connections between thermodynamics and information theory. In fact, some well-known authors claim (...) that the laws of thermodynamics are nothing but principles in information theory. Unlike in physics or chemistry, a formalization of the relationship between information and energy is currently lacking in neuroscience. In this paper we propose a framework to connect physical brain and cognitive models by means of the theoretical connections between information theory and thermodynamics. Ultimately, this article aims at providing further insight on the formal relationship between cognition and neural activity. (shrink)

This book offers a philosophical account of memory. Memory is remarkably interesting from a philosophical point of view. Our memories interact with mental states of other types in a characteristic way. They also have some associated feelings that other mental states lack. Our memories are special in terms of their representational capacity too, since we can have memories of objective events, and we can have memories of our own past experiences. Finally, our memories are epistemically special, in that beliefs formed (...) on the basis of our memories are protected from certain errors of misidentification and justified in a way which does not rely on any cognitive capacity other than memory. The aim of the book is to explain these features of memory. It proposes that memories have a particular functional role which involves past perceptual experiences and beliefs about the past and suggests that memories have a particular content as well; they represent themselves as having a certain causal origin. The book then accounts for the feelings associated with our memories as the experience of some of the things that our memories represent; things such as our own past experiences, or the fact the memories originate in those experiences. It also accounts for the special justification for belief afforded by our memories in terms of the content that memories have. The resulting picture is a unified account of several philosophically interesting aspects of memory. (shrink)

"Thinking a university for the 21st century" is the name of the research group at San Dámaso University (Madrid) that promotes this book. Over the last few years this group has held regular meetings to discuss the raison d'être of the university: what is a university?, what is its purpose?, what episodes of academic life have been most inspiring in the past?, which difficulties does university life face today?, what will be the future of the university?, what do we want (...) it to become? These are some of the questions that have been asked over the years and which now take the form of writing. Several of the contributions contained in this book have a certain historical orientation: the authors examine the highlights of the search for and communication of knowledge, from antiquity to the present day. Great figures such as Socrates, Thomas Aquinas, Vitoria, Newman, Ratzinger and Ortega are featured in these pages. However, this is not a history of university life in the past, but a reflection on the future. The examples of the past set us on the road to the university of the future. Such is the intention of this group of researchers, linked to different Spanish universities and also experienced in other institutions outside our country: they have gathered here to discuss the university we want to build in our present, with an eye to the future. (shrink)

Alex Byrne and Jordi Fernández propose two different versions of a transparency theory of self-knowledge. According to Byrne, we self-attribute beliefs by an inference from what we take to be facts about the world (following a rule he calls BEL). According to Fernández, we self-attribute the belief that p on the basis of a prior mental state, a state which constitutes our grounds for the belief that p (thereby realizing a procedure he calls Bypass). In this paper, I present (...) the two theories in outline and discuss various objections concerning their normative (Can the procedure give us knowledge?) and metaphysical aspects (Is the procedure functional?). I conclude that especially the metaphysical objections against Bypass are somewhat more difficult to counter than those against BEL and that the modifications required of Fernández’s theory make it very similar to Byrne’s. -/- Alex Byrne y Jordi Fernández proponen dos diferentes versiones de la teoría de la transparencia del autoconocimiento. Según Byrne, para autoatribuir creencias inferimos qué es lo que creemos a partir lo que tomamos como hechos sobre el mundo (siguiendo una regla que Byrne llama BEL). Según Fernández, autoatribuimos la creencia de que p con base en un estado anterior a esta creencia, un estado que fundamenta la creencia de que p (realizando un procedimiento que él llama Bypass). En este artículo expongo las dos teorías y discuto objeciones que conciernen su aspecto normativo (¿puede el procedimiento darnos conocimiento?) y metafísico (¿es funcional el procedimiento?). Concluyo que en especial las objeciones metafísicas son más graves en el caso de Bypass que en el de BEL y que las modificaciones requeridas de la teoría de Fernández la asemejan mucho a la de Byrne. (shrink)

This paper presents and discusses design studio outcomes developed in response to a studio brief linked to the Fun Palace Futures initiative of the Royal British Institute of British Architects (RIBA) in honour of architect Cedric Price and artist Joan Littlewood. The studio brief was collaboratively developed by the authors. Its core question was: How could the thoughts that guided the development and design of the Fun Palace – a project that was never built but is still today cited (...) as a model for thinking flexible and open architecture – be re-interpreted and renewed for the future? This line of thinking guided the initial and experimental research phase, during which students developed an understanding of what indeterminacy is or could be. The paper shows that through the translation of some of the essential principles of the Fun Palace project into pedagogical instruments, students were enabled to approach the questions of indeterminacy in an open and innovative manner. The paper argues that the use of a variety of media, which often went far beyond the conventional architectural pallet, and the introduction of media shifts were crucial in assisting the students in developing their own tools for creating a new kind of open and flexible architecture. The paper presents this pedagogic approach. We show that the conditions of indeterminacy, uncertainty, chance and change, hold potential for framing the design and creation of a new kind of dynamic architecture, and for initiating experimental architectural thinking in a design studio setting. (shrink)

This paper responds to recent developments in the field of sensory augmentation by analysing several technological devices that augment the sensory apparatus using the tactile sense. First, I will define the term sensory augmentation, as the use of technological modification to enhance the sensory apparatus, and elaborate on the preconditions for successful tactile sensory augmentation. These are the adaptability of the brain to unfamiliar sensory input and the specific qualities of the skin lending themselves to be used for the perception (...) of additional sensory information. Two devices, Moon Ribas’ Seismic Sense and David Eagleman’s vest, will then be discussed as potential facilitators of aesthetic experiences in virtue of the tactile sensory augmentation that these devices allow. I will connect the experiences afforded by these devices to the Kantian categories of the mathematical and the dynamical sublime, and to existing accounts of tactile sublimity. Essentially, the objects these devices make sensible, earthquakes for the Seismic Sense and digital information for the vest, produce pleasurable feelings of potential danger, awe, and respect. The subsequent acclimation to this new way of sensing and the aim to comprehend its sensed object are then discussed as possible objections to the interpretation of these experiences as sublime, and as aesthetic in general. To exemplify these issues and concretise my thesis of tactile sensory augmentation as a trigger of the sublime, I will outline an experiment to use the vest as an aid for faster decision making on the stock market. (shrink)

European Computing and Philosophy conference, 2–4 July Barcelona The Seventh ECAP (European Computing and Philosophy) conference was organized by Jordi Vallverdu at Autonomous University of Barcelona. The conference started with the IACAP (The International Association for CAP) presidential address by Luciano Floridi, focusing on mechanisms of knowledge production in informational networks. The first keynote delivered by Klaus Mainzer made a frame for the rest of the conference, by elucidating the fundamental role of complexity of informational structures that can be (...) analyzed on different levels of organization giving place for variety of possible approaches which converge in this cross-disciplinary and multi-disciplinary research field. Keynotes by Kevin Warwick about re-embodiment of rats’ neurons into robots, Raymond Turner on syntax and semantics in programming languages, Roderic Guigo on Biocomputing Sciences and Francesco Subirada on the past and future of supercomputing presented different topics of philosophical as well as practical aspects of computing. Vonference tracks included: Philosophy of Information (Patrick Allo), Philosophy of Computer Science (Raymond Turner), Computer and Information Ethics (Johnny Søraker and Alison Adam), Computational Approaches to the Mind (Ruth Hagengruber), IT and Cultural Diversity (Jutta Weber and Charles Ess), Crossroads (David Casacuberta), Robotics, AI & Ambient Intelligence (Thomas Roth-Berghofer), Biocomputing, Evolutionary and Complex Systems (Gordana Dodig Crnkovic and Søren Brier), E-learning, E-science and Computer-Supported Cooperative Work (Annamaria Carusi) and Technological Singularity and Acceleration Studies (Amnon Eden). (shrink)

This paper is a presentation and critical introduction to the monographic section “Knowledge, Memory and Perception”. Three of the papers included in this section deal with questions concerning the sources and forms of empirical knowledge. Two of them (Olga Fernández, Jordi Fernández) focus on the problem of the intentional content of perception and of episodic memory, respectively. Manuel Liz, in turn, intends to develop a stable version of direct realism about perception. Murali Ramachandran, in contrast, looks for a definition (...) of knowledge that is immune to Gettier-style counterexamples. Against Williamson, he holds this is a genuine and important problem. These contributions to the monographic section are exposed, commented, and criticized in detail. (shrink)

In the field of Evidence Law the relation between truth and law has been a somewhat non- debated topic in the past years. It is a given that such a connection exists and, it is understood as the notion of the ascertainment of the truth of disputed questions of fact through legal evidence. The thesis that I have reconstructed in this paper has been presented by Prof. Jordi Ferrer who grounds the connection between truth and law in the role (...) of the legal system as a tool for guiding the behavior of the governed. I call this thesis the theory of the structural clause of truth. In this paper I shall present a possible reconstruction of this theory, I shall raise two objections against it and I shall present five possible interpretations of the relation between truth and law. (shrink)