A partir du renvoi à la « maxime de Platon » insérée dans l’avant dernière page de la première édition de L’interprétation du rêve, l’auteur expose d’abord les convergences entre la conception du rêve de Platon présentée dans La République et les intuitions qui fondent l’édifice métapsychologique freudien. A la lumière des sources textuelles citées par Freud et de ses intérêts, l’auteur avance ensuite l’hypothèse selon laquelle Freud aurait non seulement omis de reconnaître la généalogie théorétique platonicienne de la « (...) via regia menant à la connaissance de l’inconscient », mais aussi utilisé le dialogue antique comme source d’inspiration tacite pour la composition de L’Interprétation du rêve. (shrink)

Este texto compara duas possibilidades epistêmicas de se construir conhecimento a partir da experiência registrada pelos sentidos: a defendida por Tomás de Aquino e a proposta por David Hume. O objetivo do texto é mostrar em que se separam autores assumidos como tão distanciados um do outro, mas que principiam aparentemente de uma noção cognoscitiva que parte da apreensão dos sentidos. O texto defende, por um lado, que os pressupostos ontológicos de Tomás de Aquino geram um modelo em que a (...) forma migra da matéria para o intelecto. Portanto, em relação ao conhecimento empírico, não há forma no intelecto que não tenha sido retirada da matéria já informada. Por outro lado, o projeto anti-metafísico de David Hume retira de todos os dados coletados pelos sentidos toda e qualquer informação que seja prévia, exigindo, assim, um uso da linguagem em que memória e imaginação se defrontem com dados que não estavam previamente ordenados. O debate ontológico, portanto, é examinado a partir de uma investigação semântica, em que se avalia o uso dos termos linguísticos em vista dos pressupostos epistemológicos de cada sistema filosófico. (shrink)

Some philosophers search for the mark of the cognitive: a set of individually necessary and jointly sufficient conditions identifying all instances of cognition. They claim that the mark of the cognitive is needed to steer the development of cognitive science on the right path. Here, I argue that, at least at present, it cannot be provided. First (§2), I identify some of the factors motivating the search for a mark of the cognitive, each yielding a desideratum the mark is supposed (...) to satisfy (§2.1). I then (§2.2) highlight a number of tensions in the literature on the mark of the cognitive, suggesting they’re best resolved by distinguishing two distinct programs. The first program (§3) is that of identifying a mark of the cognitive capturing our everyday notion of cognition. I argue that such a program is bound to fail for a number of reasons: it is not clear whether such an everyday notion exists; and even if it existed, it would not be able to spell out individually necessary and jointly sufficient conditions for cognition; and even if it were able to spell them out, these conditions won’t satisfy the desiderata a mark of the cognitive should satisfy. The second program is that of identifying a mark of the cognitive spelling out a genuine scientific kind. But the current state of fragmentation of cognitive science, and the fact that it is splintered in a myriad of different research traditions, prevent us from identifying such a kind. And we have no reason to think that these various research traditions will converge, allowing us to identify a single mark. Or so, at least, I will argue in (§4). I then conclude the paper (§5) deflecting an intuitive objection, and exploring some of the consequences of the thesis I have defended. (shrink)

Structural representations are increasingly popular in philosophy of cognitive science. A key virtue they seemingly boast is that of meeting Ramsey's job description challenge. For this reason, structural representations appear tailored to play a clear representational role within cognitive architectures. Here, however, I claim that structural representations do not meet the job description challenge. This is because even our most demanding account of their functional profile is satisfied by at least some receptors, which paradigmatically fail the job description challenge. Hence, (...) the functional profile typically associated with structural representations does not identify representational posits. After a brief introduction, I present, in the second section of the paper, the job description challenge. I clarify why receptors fail to meet it and highlight why, as a result, they should not be considered representations. In the third section I introduce what I take to be the most demanding account of structural representations at our disposal, namely Gładziejewski's account. Provided the necessary background, I turn from exposition to criticism. In the first half of the fourth section, I equate the functional profile of structural representations and receptors. To do so, I show that some receptors boast, as a matter of fact, all the functional features associated with structural representations. Since receptors function merely as causal mediators, I conclude structural representations are mere causal mediators too. In the second half of the fourth section I make this conclusion intuitive with a toy example. I then conclude the paper, anticipating some objections my argument invites. (shrink)

Esse texto procura investigar a seguinte questão: como pode ser conduzido um processo de Esclarecimento que não seja apenas individual, mas social e político? Uma resposta para esta questão pode ser obtida na medida em que concebemos o conceito de autonomia como fundamento da estratégia do Esclarecimento, que aqui será compreendido como um processo arquetípico de educação da humanidade. Nosso objetivo é mostrar que a proposta de educação elaborada por Kant tem de ser compreendida de um ponto de vista cosmopolita.

Introduzione alla raccolta di saggi di Rahel Jaeggi "Forme di vita e capitalismo", curata e tradotta da Marco Solinas. L'introduzione presenta una breve panoramica del pensiero dell'autrice e si sofferma sul suo progetto incentrato sulla critica immanente del capitalismo come forma di vita.

Across two studies, one of which was pre-registered, we find that a simple questionnaire that measures intellectual virtue and vice predicts how many fake news articles and conspiracy theories participants accept. This effect holds even when controlling for multiple demographic predictors, including age, household income, sex, education, ethnicity, political affiliation, religion, and news consumption. These results indicate that self-report is an adequate way to measure intellectual virtue and vice, which suggests that they are not fully immune to introspective awareness or (...) “stealthy” in the sense that Cassam (2015) argues. This is an important methodological result and may pave the way for future research on intellectual virtue and vice. (shrink)

Advocates of the Person-Centered Healthcare (PCH) approach say that PCH is a response to a failure of caring for patients as persons. Nevertheless, there are many human subjects falling to fulfill the requirements of a traditional philosophical definition of personhood. Hence, if we take, PCH seriously, a greater clarification of the key terminology of PCH is urgently needed. It seems necessary, for instance, that the concept of the person should be extended in order to include those individuals with insipient or (...) immature levels of consciousness, as well as those who are severely and permanently mentally handicapped. In this article, we will depart from some well-known philosophical concepts of what it means to be a person and try to offer a broader and more inclusive meaning. We suggest that persons are human beings with a socially recognized biography, which implies to recognize as persons individuals with necessities, but also with narratives about their interests and claims, expressed sometimes by other people related to them. This is particularly the case of individuals that suffer from severe disorders of consciousness. For those, is not only care that matters; respect matters too. Caregivers should therefore not only sympathetically care for the well-being of these people; they should also be concerned to respect their interests and claims by interpreting them empathetically, in the light of their biographical story. Our conclusion is that, in order to be coherent, PCH must consider individuals with severe disorders of consciousness as persons and we think that our revised concept of personhood fits with this requirement. (shrink)

Higher-order evidence appears to have the ability to defeat rational belief. It is not obvious, however, why exactly the defeat happens. In this paper, I consider two competing explanations of higher-order defeat: the “Objective Higher-Order Defeat Explanation” and the “Subjective Higher-Order Defat Explanation.” According to the former explanation, possessing sufficiently strong higher-order evidence to indicate that one’s belief about p fails to be rational is necessary and sufficient for defeating one’s belief about p. I argue that this type of explanation (...) is defective or at best collapses into the other type of explanation. According to the latter explanation, Believing that one’s belief about p fails to be rational (in response to higher-order evidence about p) is necessary and sufficient for defeating one’s belief about p. I argue that this type of explanation is better suited to explain higher-order defeat given that what one is rational to believe partly depends on the relations among one’s doxastic attitudes. Finally, I address an peculiar feature of the Subjective Higher-Order Defeat Explanation: higher-order defeat becomes contingent on one’s response to the higher-order evidence. (shrink)

AI-based technologies are increasingly pervasive in a number of contexts. Our affective and emotional life makes no exception. In this article, we analyze one way in which AI-based technologies can affect them. In particular, our investigation will focus on affective artificial agents, namely AI-powered software or robotic agents designed to interact with us in affectively salient ways. We build upon the existing literature on affective artifacts with the aim of providing an original analysis of affective artificial agents and their distinctive (...) features. We argue that, unlike comparatively low-tech affective artifacts, affective artificial agents display a specific form of agency, which prevents them from being perceived by their users as extensions of their selves. In addition to this, we claim that their functioning crucially depends on the simulation of human-like emotion-driven behavior and requires a distinctive form of transparency—we call it emotional transparency—that might give rise to ethical and normative tensions. (shrink)

Michael Tye proposed a way of understanding the content of hallucinatory experiences. Somewhat independently, Mark Johnston provided us with elements to think about the content of hallucination. In this paper, their views are compared and evaluated. Both their theories present intricate combinations of conjunctivist and disjunctivist strategies to account for perceptual content. An alternative view, which develops a radically disjunctivist account, is considered and rejected. Finally, the paper raises some metaphysical difficulties that seem to threaten any conjunctivist theory and to (...) lead the debate to a dilemma: strong disjunctivists cannot explain the subjective indistinguishability between veridical and hallucinatory experiences, whereas conjunctivists cannot explain what veridical and hallucinatory experiences have in common. This dilemma is left here as an open challenge. (shrink)

The most prominent theories of perceptual content are incapable of accounting for the phenomenal particularity of perceptual experience. This difficulty, or so I argue, springs from the absence of a series of distinctions that end up turning the problem apparently unsolvable. After briefly examining the main shortcomings of representationalism and naïve realism, I advance a proposal of my own that aims to make the trivial fact of perceptually experiencing a particular object as such philosophically unproblematic. Though I am well aware (...) of the sketchy and schematic way in which my proposal is advanced and the other alternatives are criticized, I hope this paper is still worth its ink at least insofar as it is capable of pointing to a novel and promising way out of old and resilient difficulties that have been haunting philosophers of perception. If not a fully developed theory, at least I deliver here a sketch that, or so I sell, is worth the bet. (shrink)

Why are mistaken beliefs about Covid-19 so prevalent? Political identity, education and other demographic variables explain only a part of individual differences in the susceptibility to Covid-19 misinformation. This paper focuses on another explanation: epistemic vice. Epistemic vices are character traits that interfere with acquiring, maintaining, and transmitting knowledge. If the basic assumption of vice epistemology is right, then people with epistemic vices such as indifference to the truth or rigidity in their belief structures will tend to be more susceptible (...) to believing Covid-19 misinformation. We carried out an observational study (US sample, n = 998) in which we measured the level of epistemic vice of participants using a novel Epistemic Vice Scale. We also asked participants questions eliciting the extent to which they subscribe to myths and misinformation about Covid-19. We find overwhelming evidence to the effect that epistemic vice is associated with susceptibility to Covid-19 misinformation. In fact, the association turns out to be stronger than with political identity, educational attainment, scores on the Cognitive Reflection Test, personality, dogmatism, and need for closure. We conclude that this offers evidence in favor of the empirical presuppositions of vice epistemology. (shrink)

Radical enactivists claim that cognition is split in two distinct kinds, which can be differentiated by how they relate to mental content. In their view, basic cognitive activities involve no mental content whatsoever, whereas linguistically scaffolded, non-basic, cognitive activities constitutively involve the manipulation of mental contents. Here, I evaluate how this dichotomy applies to imagination, arguing that the sensory images involved in basic acts of imaginations qualify as vehicles of content, contrary to what radical enactivists claim. To argue so, I (...) leverage what has appropriately been dubbed a “compare to prototype” argument. Hence, I will first identify, within the enactivist literature, the general functional profile of a vehicle of content complying with the austere standard of contentfulness radical enactivists adhere to. Provided such a profile, I will show, relying on a mixture of reasoning and empirical evidence, that basic sensory images satisfy it, and thus that they can rightfully be identified as vehicles of content. This, I claim, provides a sufficient reason to identify the sensory images involved in basic acts of imagination as vehicles of content, thereby denying that basic imagination does not involve mental content. (shrink)

A central feature of experimental development economics is the use of randomized controlled trials (RCTs) to evaluate the effectiveness of prospective socioeconomic interventions. The use of RCTs in development economics raises a host of ethical issues which are just beginning to be explored. In this article, I address one ethical issue in particular: the routine use of the status quo as a control when designing and conducting a development RCT. Drawing on the literature on the principle of standard care in (...) medical research ethics, as well as considerations of distributive justice in non-ideal circumstances, I argue that the practice of using the status quo as a control is ethically justifiable. However, I add an important qualification based on the natural duty of rescue to address the concern that my account is overly permissive. (shrink)

The article is focused on Honneth’s teleology of history, presented as a historical process of gradual realization of an immanent normative ‘telos’, and not only as a form of axiological evaluation...

A view that emancipates free will by means of quantum indeterminism is frequently rejected based on arguments pointing out its incompatibility with what we know about quantum physics. However, if one carefully examines what classical physical causal determinism and quantum indeterminism are according to physics, it becomes clear what they really imply–and, especially, what they do not imply–for agent-causation theories. Here, we will make necessary conceptual clarifications on some aspects of physical determinism and indeterminism, review some of the major objections (...) against libertarian conjectures, and show that there is no conceptual incompatibility preventing us from taking a ‘quantum-libertarian’ approach to the problem of free will. In particular, we will illustrate the possible role of self-causation (causa sui) as a potential solution to otherwise apparently incompatible or even paradoxical statements concerning free will and quantum indeterminism. (shrink)

I discuss Clark’s predictive processing/extended mind hybrid, diagnosing a problem: Clark’s hybrid suggests that, when we use them, we pay attention to mind-extending external resources. This clashes with a commonly accepted necessary condition of cognitive extension; namely, that mind-extending resources must be phenomenally transparent when used. I then propose a solution to this problem claiming that the phenomenal transparency condition should be rejected. To do so, I put forth a parity argument to the effect that phenomenal transparency cannot be a (...) necessary condition on cognitive extension: roughly, since internal cognitive resources can fail to be transparent when used, by parity, external resources can fail to be phenomenally transparent too. Further, I argue that phenomenal transparency is not even a reliable indicator of cognitive extension; hence its absence should not be considered a problem for Clark’s extended mind-predictive processing hybrid. Lastly, I consider and allay a number of worries my proposal might raise, and conclude the paper. (shrink)

Cognitive Robotics can be defined as the study of cognitive phenomena by their modeling in physical artifacts such as robots. This is a very lively and fascinating field which has already given fundamental contributions to our understanding of natural cognition. Nonetheless, robotics has to date addressed mainly very basic, low­level cognitive phenomena like sensory­motor coordination, perception, and navigation, and it is not clear how the current approach might scale up to explain high­level human cognition. In this paper we argue that (...) a promising way to do that is to merge current ideas and methods of 'embodied cognition' with the Russian tradition of theoretical psychology which views language not only as a communication system but also as a cognitive tool, that is by developing a Vygotskyan Cognitive Robotics. We substantiate this idea by discussing several domains in which language can improve basic cognitive abilities and permit the development of high­level cognition: learning, categorization, abstraction, memory, voluntary control, and mental life. (shrink)

The extended mind thesis claims that a subject’s mind sometimes encompasses the environmental props the subject interacts with while solving cognitive tasks. Recently, the debate over the extended mind has been focused on Markov Blankets: the statistical boundaries separating biological systems from the environment. Here, I argue such a focus is mistaken, because Markov Blankets neither adjudicate, nor help us adjudicate, whether the extended mind thesis is true. To do so, I briefly introduce Markov Blankets and the free energy principle (...) in Section 2. I then turn from exposition to criticism. In Section 3, I argue that using Markov Blankets to determine whether the mind extends will provide us with an answer based on circular reasoning. In Section 4, I consider whether Markov Blankets help us track the boundaries of the mind, answering in the negative. This is because resorting to Markov Blankets to track the boundaries of the mind yields extensionally inadequate conclusions which violate the parity principle. In Section 5, I further argue that Markov Blankets led us to sidestep the debate over the extended mind, as they make internalism about the mind vacuously true. A brief concluding paragraph follows. (shrink)

The notion of schema has been given a major role by Recanati within his conception of primary pragmatic processes, conceived as a type of associative process. I intend to show that Recanati’s considerations on schemata may challenge the relevance theorist’s argument against associative explanations in pragmatics, and support an argument in favor of associative (versus inferential) explanations. More generally, associative relations can be shown to be schematic, that is, they have enough structure to license inferential effects without any appeal to (...) genuine inferential processes. Associative processes are thus able to explain a number of pragmatic and linguistic phenomena which have instead been thought to require specialized inferential processes. (shrink)

The purpose of this article is to examine two important issues concerning the agency theory of causality: the charge of anthropomorphism and the relation of simultaneous causation. After a brief outline of the agency theory, sections 2–4 contain the refutation of the three main forms in which the charge of anthropomorphism is to be found in the literature. It will appear that it is necessary to distinguish between the subjective and the objective aspect of the concept of causation. This will (...) lead, in section 5, to contrast two kinds of anthropomorphism, one which has been rightly rejected by modern science and one which is fully compatible with the objective reality of the causal processes. Finally, section 6 will apply the preceding considerations to simultaneous causation. On the one hand, in a basic sense, there can be no simultaneous causal relations. On the other hand, simultaneous causation arises when we consider the natural change by abstracting from the agent and from her/his projects of interven.. (shrink)

Husserl’s phenomenology of imagination embraces a cluster of different theories and approaches regarding the multi-faced phenomenon of imaginative experience. In this paper I consider one aspect that seems to be crucial to the understanding of a particular form of imagination that Husserl names pure phantasy. I argue that the phenomenon of Ego-splitting discloses the best way to elucidate the peculiarity of pure phantasy with respect to other forms of representative acts and to any simple form of act modification. First, I (...) unravel the phenomenological distinctions which, respectively, oppose phantasy to perception, on the one hand, and phantasy to other forms of the so-called “intuitive re-presentations”. Second, I introduce the difference between presentative and representative acts, arguing that this cannot help us to single out the defining feature of phantasy experiences. The third section draws again an important distinction between pure phantasy and neutrality modification, which allows me to finally determine an internal trait of phantasy experiences, which Husserl refers to as the “Ego-splitting”. In this way, I hope to contribute to a refined characterization of Husserl’s phenomenology of imagination. (shrink)

Many philosophers claim that the neurocomputational framework of predictive processing entails a globally inferentialist and representationalist view of cognition. Here, I contend that this is not correct. I argue that, given the theoretical commitments these philosophers endorse, no structure within predictive processing systems can be rightfully identified as a representational vehicle. To do so, I first examine some of the theoretical commitments these philosophers share, and show that these commitments provide a set of necessary conditions the satisfaction of which allows (...) us to identify representational vehicles. Having done so, I introduce a predictive processing system capable of active inference, in the form of a simple robotic “brain”. I examine it thoroughly, and show that, given the necessary conditions highlighted above, none of its components qualifies as a representational vehicle. I then consider and allay some worries my claim could raise. I consider whether the anti-representationalist verdict thus obtained could be generalized, and provide some reasons favoring a positive answer. I further consider whether my arguments here could be blocked by allowing the same representational vehicle to possess multiple contents, and whether my arguments entail some extreme form of revisionism, answering in the negative in both cases. A quick conclusion follows. (shrink)

[This is a pre-print; please cite the published version] This paper employs structural topic modeling (STM) to describe the academic philosophy landscape in Brazil. Based on a public national database, a corpus consisting of 12,515 abstracts of monographs defended in philosophy graduate programs between 1991 and 2021 was compiled. The final STM model identified 74 meaningful research topics, clustered into 7 thematic categories. This study discusses the prevalence of the most significant topics and categories, their trends across three decades, and (...) their (positive or negative) association with the supervisor's gender. Results show the first empirical evidence that Brazilian philosophical research exhibits a greater focus on philosophers than on specific themes or problems. Moreover, by visualizing the variations in topic prevalence over time, it was possible to track the rise or decline of the major interest categories and topics. Finally, results also show which topics are more influenced or less influenced by gender. (shrink)

In this paper, I first examine the classification of mental derangements contained in Kant’s "Anthropology from a Pragmatic Point of View", in order to highlight the role played by imagination in their pathogenesis. Later, on the basis of this examination, I reflect on the origins of critical philosophy, which can be seen as an attempt to construct a control device for the imagination structured as a systematic, organic space.

Der vorliegende Aufsatz behandelt zwei Bereiche, deren Zusammenhang in der aktuellen Husserlforschung zu Unrecht in Vergessenheit geraten zu sein scheint: Zum einen konturiere ich den Habitusbegriff und das damit verbundene Problem der Habituskonstitution im Spätwerk E. Husserls. Zum anderen dient das Ergebnis dieser ersten Untersuchung dann als Grundlage für die Frage nach dem Wesen des Ich in der genetischen Phänomenologie. Die Untersuchung besteht aus drei Teilen: Zuerst stelle ich, um die Bedeutung des Begriffs „Habitus“ zu klären, Ingardens Interpretationsalternativen der Habituskonstitution (...) vor. Im Anschluss daran werde ich mich mit dem sogenannten „transzendentalen Okkasionalismus“ befassen, der eine der zuvor vorgestellten Alternativen Ingardens aufgreift und weiterführt. Der „transzendentale Okkasionalismus“ vertritt die These, dass die habituellen Eigenschaften des Ich durch den einfachen Vollzug der Akte entstünden. Weil diese These als Interpretation des Habitusbegriffs bei Husserl weit verbreitet ist, muss sie als Lösungsansatz in Erwägung gezogen werden. Jedoch zeigt eine genaue Lektüre der Forschungsmanuskripte Husserls, dass dieser scheinbare Lösungsansatz einen dort wichtigen Begriff außer Acht lässt: die „Geschichte des Ich“. Diese wird im dritten und letzten Teil dieses Aufsatzes näher betrachtet und erläutert. Husserl selbst hob nämlich einen wesenhaften Zusammenhang zwischen den mannigfaltigen Erfahrungen des Ich hervor, durch den die Bezeichnung der Habituskonstitution als „Okkasionalismus“ nicht zutreffend sein kann. Aus diesem Grund geht dieser Beitrag über die reine Wiedergabe der Habitusproblematik in Husserls Phänomenologie hinaus und beschreibt eine Auffassung der transzendentalen Subjektivität, die aus dem Spätwerk Husserls stammt. (shrink)

The standard view of classical cognitive science stated that cognition consists in the manipulation of language-like structures according to formal rules. Since cognition is ‘linguistic’ in itself, according to this view language is just a complex communication system and does not influence cognitive processes in any substantial way. This view has been criticized from several perspectives and a new framework (Embodied Cognition) has emerged that considers cognitive processes as non-symbolic and heavily dependent on the dynamical interactions between the cognitive system (...) and its environment. But notwithstanding the successes of the embodied cognitive science in explaining low-level cognitive behaviors, it is still not clear whether and how it can scale up for explaining high-level cognition. In this paper we argue that this can be done by considering the role of language as a cognitive tool: i.e. how language transforms basic cognitive functions in the high-level functions that are characteristic of human cognition. In order to do that, we review some computational models that substantiate this view with respect to categorization and memory. Since these models are based on a very rudimentary form of non-syntactic ‘language’ we argue that the use of language as a cognitive tool might have been an early discovery in hominid evolution, and might have played a substantial role in the evolution of language itself. (shrink)

This study evaluates the relationship between mental health and academic motivation among third-year college TES grantees. Thus, correlational design was employed to determine if there is a significant relationship between mental health and academic motivation among 150 third-year TES grantees. Statistical findings reveal that the r coefficient of 0.52 indicates a moderate positive correlation between the variables. The p-value of 0.00, which is less than 0.05, leads to rejecting the null hypothesis. Hence, a significant relationship exists between mental health and (...) academic motivation of third-year college TES grantees. Implications were discussed in the study. (shrink)

According to some critics, Aristotle’s elenctic defence (elenchos, elenchus) of the Law of Non-Contradiction (Metaphysics IV) would be ineffective because it viciously begs the question. After briefly recalling the elenctic refutation of the denier of the Law of Non-Contradiction, I will first focus on Filippo Costantini’s objection to the elenchus, which, in turn, is based on the dialetheic account of negation developed by Graham Priest. Then, I will argue that there is at least one reading of the elenchus that might (...) not be viciously question-begging. In doing so, I will leverage, reinterpret and adjust the distinction between two senses of epistemic dependence, offered by Noah Lemos and originally based on some thoughts about George Edward Moore’s ‘proof of an external world.’ The key point of my counter-objection to recover the elenchus is to use the distinction between a necessary-condition relation between propositions (p only if q) and a grounding relation between facts (the fact that an epistemic agent S believes that p is grounded in the fact that S believes that q), where p and q are the content of S’s beliefs. (shrink)

According to the extended cognition thesis, an agent’s cognitive system can sometimes include extracerebral components amongst its physical constituents. Here, we show that such a view of cognition has an unjustifiably anthropocentric focus, for it tends to depict cognitive extensions as a human-only affair. In contrast, we will argue that if human cognition extends, then the cognition of many non-human animals extends too, for many non-human animals rely on the same cognition-extending strategies humans rely on. To substantiate this claim, we (...) will proceed as follows. First (Sect. 1), we will introduce the extended cognition thesis, exposing its anthropocentric bias. Then, we will show that humans and many non-human animals rely on the same cognition-extending strategies. To do so, we will discuss a variety of case studies, including “intrabodily” cognitive extensions such as the spinal cord (Sect. 2), the widespread reliance on epistemic actions to solve cognitive tasks (Sect. 3) and cases of animal cognitive offloading (Sect. 4). We’ll then allay some worries our claim might raise (Sect. 5) to then conclude the paper (Sect. 6). (shrink)

Austin's theory of performatives has recently inspired much literature on political correctness, based on the idea that they can be essential for the individuals' identity construction, but also for oppression and offence. In this paper I intend to analyze the power but also the limitations of performatives: we should refrain from attributing them magical efficacy, insofar as their power is actually constrained by objective conditions. This invites a revision of post-modern theories according to which any speech creates its own «regime (...) of truth», without any chance for an objective analysis of ideology. (shrink)

The paper aims to provide a critical analysis of Marx’s normative conception, both in terms of his economicistc mistakes and in relation to the normative principles implied in his general theoretical framework. The attention is then focused on Marx’s immanent critique of capitalism, also in relation to the normative interpretation of socialism recently presented by Axel Honneth; the Author highlights as Marx’s concept of freedom is linked to the idea of liberation from forced labour.

The article focuses on Patočka early phenomenological thought developed around the concept of the natural world. More precisely, the aim of the article is to explore Patočka recently published manuscript studies and fragments, dating from the first half of the 1940s, in which Patočka attempts to establish a deeper living correlation between man and world based on a certain metaphysical conception of nature which is not, as for Husserl, just one of the horizons which experiencing creates around itself, nor it (...) is just a basis on which the harmony of experiencing and its evironment must develop, but in which nature also includes an aspect which is closed and alien to subjectivity. In this way, the article shows that Patočka makes a step beyond of Husserl's and Heidegger's schemes of a correlation of life and world, understanding and being. The article thus shows that Patočka early writings throw a certain amount of light on his later phenomenological work that had been most notably developed from 1960s onwards. (shrink)

Discussione di "Alienazione", di Rahel Jaeggi, Roma: 2105.

The essay aims to analyse the gradual historical process of the partial overlap, replacement and expansion of the theoretical paradigm of depression with respect to that of melancholy. The first part is devoted to analysing some of the central features of the multivalent thematizations of melancholy drawn up during modernity, also with relation to the spirit of capitalism (in its Weberian acceptation). This is followed by an overview of the birth of the modern category of depression, and the process that (...) during the twentieth century led to its transformation into a theoretical and nosological paradigm which in the end replaced that of melancholy. The second part is the attempt to draw up a Zeitdiagnose: the aim is to assess the ‘depressive’ psychosocial impact exercised by particular socio-economic mechanisms and cultural trends, with particular reference to what has been defined as the ‘new spirit of capitalism’, as well as the new forms of individualism and their paradoxical dynamics. In conclusion, I will form a bridge between the history of the two aforesaid paradigms and the contemporary psychosocial dynamics correlated to the phenomenon today interpreted as a ‘depression epidemic’. Der Aufsatz zielt darauf, der Prozess der historischen Überlagerung, Substitution und Verbreitung des theoretischen Paradigmas der Depression gegenüber jenem der Melancholie darzustellen. Im ersten Teil wird versucht, einige der einschneidenden Eigenschaften der Thematisierungen der Melancholie in der Frühen Neuzeit anzugeben, auch im Verhältnis zum Geist des Kapitalismus. Nachdem eine Skizze der Entstehung der moderne Kategorie der Depression, geht es darum, den Verlauf nachzuzeichnen, der im 20. Jahrhundert zu ihrer Transformation in ein weitläufiges theoretisches Paradigma geführt hat, das schließlich jenes der Melancholie ersetzt hat. Der zweite Teil stellt den Versuch dar, eine Zeitdiagnose umzureißen: An dieser Stelle ist die psychosoziale Bedeutung bestimmter sozioökonomischer und kultureller Mechanismen zu untersuchen, unter besonderem Hinweis auf das, was als »der neue Geist des Kapitalismus« bezeichnet worden ist, sowie auf neue Formen des Individualismus und ihre paradoxen Dynamiken. Abschließend wird eine Brücke geschlagen, zwischen der Geschichte der beiden bezeichneten Paradigmen und der zeitgenössischen psychosozialen Dynamiken, die mit dem als »depressive Epidemie« interpretierten Phänomen verbunden sind. (shrink)

This paper treats of Husserl’s phenomenology of happiness or eudaimonia in five parts. In the first part, we argue that phenomenology of happiness is an important albeit relatively neglected area of research, and we show that Husserl engages in it. In the second part, we examine the relationship between phenomenological ethics and virtue ethics. In the third part, we identify and clarify essential aspects of Husserl’s phenomenology of happiness, namely, the nature of the question concerning happiness and the possibility of (...) a phenomenological answer, the power of the will, the role of vocation, the place of obligation, the significance of habituation, the necessity of selfreflection and self-criticism, the importance of sociability and solidarity, the impact of chance and destiny, and the specter of regret. In the fourth part, we establish the inextricable linkage between Husserl’s metaethics and his metaphysics. In the fi ft h part, we provide a provisional exploration of his conception of the connection between happiness and blessedness. We acknowledge that there is an extensive literature on Husserl’s phenomenological ethics, and our study has benefitted greatly from it, but we also suggest that our holistic approach critically clarifies his description of happiness, virtue, and blessedness by fully recognizing that his phenomenological metaethics is embedded in his phenomenological metaphysics. (shrink)

Analisi della possibile influenza esercitata dalla lettura di Platone su Freud, e in particolare della teoria del sogno come via per conoscere dei desideri precedentemnte "repressi" esposta nella "Repubblica".

In this contribution, I explore the possibility of characterizing the emergence of time in causal set theory (CST) in terms of the growing block universe (GBU) metaphysics. I show that although GBU seems to be the most intuitive time metaphysics for CST, it leaves us with a number of interpretation problems, independently of which dynamics we choose to favor for the theory —here I shall consider the Classical Sequential Growth and the Covariant model. Discrete general covariance of the CSG dynamics (...) does not allow us to individuate a single history of the universe (defined by a causal history of different causal sets), thereby making the claim that ‘the past exists’ at best problematic. In addition, because the evolution of the universe in CSG dynamics leads to an outward branching causal tree, it becomes impossible to determine a proper ‘line of becoming’, thereby blurring the presentists’ claim that only the present exists. Similarly, the covariant approach runs into the same, if not even more severe problems, since each configuration of the universe would amount to a set of possible causal sets, thereby making the individuation of a single configuration of the universe —and thus the physical interpretation of the theory— implausible. (shrink)

A common style of argument in the literature on free will and moral responsibility is the Manipulation Argument. These tend to begin with a case of an agent in a deterministic universe who is manipulated, say, via brain surgery, into performing some action. Intuitively, this agent is not responsible for that action. Yet, since there is no relevant difference, with respect to whether an agent is responsible, between the manipulated agent and a typical agent in a deterministic universe, responsibility is (...) not compatible with the truth of determinism. In response, some theorists have argued that there is a relevant difference, and have developed two sorts of accounts of that difference: bypassing views, and manipulator-focused views. Manipulator-focused views suggest that the difference concerns the presence of a manipulator, whereas bypassing views suggest that the relevant difference concerns the fact that the action issues from attitudes that the manipulated agent acquired in a way that bypassed her capacities for control over her mental life. One sort of case used to decide between these sorts of accounts is a case of machine induction, which is just like a manipulation case, yet the change in the agent is the result of some natural force. Against the received view, Xiaofei Liu argues that such cases pose problems for bypassing views, and favor manipulator-focused views instead. This paper addresses Liu’s arguments, as well as a variety of cases, concluding that cases of machine induction do not provide motivation for a bypassing theorist to adopt a manipulator-focused view. (shrink)

A common distinction is the one drawn between individuals and kinds. On the one hand, individuals are entities such as the chair where I am now sitting, my cat Aristotle, the particles that compose the chair and my cat, and the 2023 Rugby World Cup, that is, particular objects or events. On the other hand, kinds are entities such as chairs, cats, and world-cup finals, that is, roughly, groupings of particular objects or events. Granting this distinction and the assumption that (...) at least some entities have at least some essential properties, one faces two distinct types of questions: (1) what is essential to an individual? (2) what is essential to a kind? After giving a short discussion of the difference between individuals and kinds, this chapter will tackle the first question and consider various possibilities of what may count as essential to an individual. (shrink)

According to the current scientific paradigm, what we call ‘life’, ‘mind’, and ‘consciousness’ are considered epiphenomenal occurrences, or emergent properties or functions of matter and energy. Science does not associate these with an inherent and distinct existence beyond a materialistic/energetic conception. ‘Life’ is a word pointing at cellular and multicellular processes forming organisms capable of specific functions and skills. ‘Mind’ is a cognitive ability emerging from a matrix of complex interactions of neuronal processes, while ‘consciousness’ is an even more elusive (...) concept, deemed a subjective epiphenomenon of brain activity. Historically, however, this has not always been the case, even in the scientific and academic context. Several prominent figures took vitalism seriously, while some schools of Western philosophical idealism and Eastern traditions promoted conceptions in which reality is reducible to mind or consciousness rather than matter. We will argue that current biological sciences did not falsify these alternative paradigms and that some forms of vitalism could be linked to some forms of idealism if we posit life and cognition as two distinct aspects of consciousness preeminent over matter. However, we will not argue in favor of vitalistic and idealistic conceptions. Rather, contrary to a physicalist doctrine, these were and remain coherent worldviews and cannot be ruled out by modern science. (shrink)