Consciousness is arguably the most important area within contemporary philosophy of mind and perhaps the most puzzling aspect of the world. Despite an explosion of research from philosophers, psychologists, and scientists, attempts to explain consciousness in neurophysiological, or even cognitive, terms are often met with great resistance. In The Consciousness Paradox, Rocco Gennaro aims to solve an underlying paradox, namely, how it is possible to hold a number of seemingly inconsistent views, including higher-order thought (HOT) theory, conceptualism, infant and (...) animal consciousness, concept acquisition, and what he calls the HOT-brain thesis. He defends and further develops a metapsychological reductive representational theory of consciousness and applies it to several importantly related problems. Gennaro proposes a version of the HOT theory of consciousness that he calls the "wide intrinsicality view" and shows why it is superior to various alternatives, such as self-representationalism and first-order representationalism. HOT theory says that what makes a mental state conscious is that a suitable higher-order thought is directed at that mental state. -/- Thus Gennaro argues for an overall philosophical theory of consciousness while applying it to other significant issues not usually addressed in the philosophical literature on consciousness. Most cognitive science and empirical works on such topics as concepts and animal consciousness do not address central philosophical theories of consciousness. Gennaro’s integration of empirical and philosophical concerns will make his argument of interest to both philosophers and nonphilosophers. (shrink)

In The Dynamics of Meaning , Gennaro Chierchia tackles central issues in dynamic semantics and extends the general framework. Chapter 1 introduces the notion of dynamic semantics and discusses in detail the phenomena that have been used to motivate it, such as "donkey" sentences and adverbs of quantification. The second chapter explores in greater depth the interpretation of indefinites and issues related to presuppositions of uniqueness and the "E-type strategy." In Chapter 3, Chierchia extends the dynamic approach to the (...) domain of syntactic theory, considering a range of empirical problems that includes backwards anaphora, reconstruction effects, and weak crossover. The final chapter develops the formal system of dynamic semantics to deal with central issues of definites and presupposition. Chierchia shows that an approach based on a principled enrichment of the mechanisms dealing with meaning is to be preferred on empirical grounds over approaches that depend on an enrichment of the syntactic apparatus. Dynamics of Meaning illustrates how seemingly abstract stances on the nature of meaning can have significant and far-reaching linguistic consequences, leading to the detection of new facts and influencing our understanding of the syntax/semantics/pragmatics interface. (shrink)

This self-contained introduction to natural language semantics addresses the majortheoretical questions in the field. The authors introduce the systematic study of linguistic meaningthrough a sequence of formal tools and their linguistic applications. Starting with propositionalconnectives and truth conditions, the book moves to quantification and binding, intensionality andtense, and so on. To set their approach in a broader perspective, the authors also explore theinteraction of meaning with context and use (the semantics-pragmatics interface) and address some ofthe foundational questions, especially in connection (...) with cognition in general. They also introducea few of the most accessible and interesting ideas from recent research to give the reader a bit ofthe flavor of current work in semantics. The organization of this new edition is modular; after theintroductory chapters, the remaining material can be covered in flexible order. The book presupposesno background in formal logic (an appendix introduces the basic notions of set theory) and only aminimal acquaintance with linguistics. This edition includes a substantial amount of completely newmaterial and has been not only updated but redesigned throughout to enhance itsuser-friendliness. (shrink)

This interdisciplinary work contains the most sustained attempt at developing and defending one of the few genuine theories of consciousness.

Peirce is the father of semiotics. However, his theory was developed long before the developments in information theory. The codification procedures studied by the latter turn out to be crucial also for biology. At the root of both information and semiosis there are equivalence classes. In the case of biological systems, we speak of functional equivalence classes. Equivalence classes represent the grid that organism impose on biochemical processes and signals of the external or internal environment. The whole feedback circuit that (...) is built in this way allows information control. Symbolic systems represent another kind of dealing-with-information as far as they deal with the matching of our concepts with the world. (shrink)

We treat emergence via reference to four ideas: (1) the different levels of emergence are characterised by distinct conservation laws, (2) the emergence process starts from some instability, (3) the driving force of emergence is given by selection processes allowing canalisation of specific (emerging) paths, and (4) new forms of stability are determined by new kinds of operations. At a quantum-mechanical level entropy is conserved in an isolated system or at global level and the only allowed operations are local shifts (...) in order and disorder – that implies weakening and strengthening correlations. The stable state is here represented by a highly symmetric state. Emergence of the classical physical world arises when energy is conserved and allowable operations include building and breaking of physical-chemical connections. The stable state is here the energy minimum. Emergence of the biotic world implies that the conserved quantity is energy efficiency. Energy is no longer locally conserved. The allowed operations are those that are consistent with the survival (persistence) of the organism. The emergence of the mind is grounded in selecting those operations that are rational (in the sense of maintaining biological self-organisation). Here, the rational value of behaviour is the quantity of interest. Mounting the ladder of (both cosmic and biological) evolution means to have more and more selection of the possible outcomes (and therefore of the relative operations) but in a growing space of possibilities: if selection would reduce more and more the space of possibilities, the final result would be a rigid order; at the other extreme, if we had only expansion of the possibilities without selection, the final result would be disorder. So growing complexity can be understood as a path in the evolutionary landscape of the systems in which a balance of order and disorder is maintained although each level emerges as a result of the selection. (shrink)

Recently there has been a lively revival of interest in implicatures, particularly scalar implicatures. Building on the resulting literature, our main goal in the present paper is to establish an empirical generalization, namely that SIs can occur systematically and freely in arbitrarily embedded positions. We are not so much concerned with the question whether drawing implicatures is a costly option (in terms of semantic processing, or of some other markedness measure). Nor are we specifically concerned with how implicatures come about (...) (even though, to get going, we will have to make some specific assumptions on this matter). The focus of our discussion is testing the claim of the pervasive embeddability of SIs in just about any context, a claim that remains so far controversial. While our main goal is the establishment of an empirical generalization, if we succeed, a predominant view on the division of labor between semantics and pragmatics will have to be revised. A secondary goal of this paper is to hint at evidence that a revision is needed on independent grounds. But let us first present, in a rather impressionistic way, the reasons why a revision would be required if our main generalization on embedded SIs turns out to be correct. In the tradition stemming from Grice (1989), implicatures are considered a wholly pragmatic phenomenon and SIs are often used as paramount examples. Within such a tradition, 㳊 semantics is taken to deal with the compositional construction of sentence meaning (a term which we are using for now in a loose, non technical way), while pragmatics deals with how sentence meaning is actually put to use (i.e. enriched and possibly modified through reasoning about speakers’ intentions, contextually relevant information, etc.). Simply put, on this view pragmatics takes place at the level of complete utterances and pragmatic enrichments are a root phenomenon (something that happens globally to sentences) rather than a compositional one.. (shrink)

Various psychopathologies of self-awareness, such as somatoparaphrenia and thought insertion in schizophrenia, might seem to threaten the viability of the higher-order thought (HOT) theory of consciousness since it requires a HOT about one’s own mental state to accompany every conscious state. The HOT theory of consciousness says that what makes a mental state a conscious mental state is that there is a HOT to the effect that “I am in mental state M” (Rosenthal 2005, Gennaro 2012). In a previous (...) publication (Gennaro 2015), I argued that a HOT theorist can adequately respond to this concern with respect to somatoparaphrenia. Somatoparaphrenia is a “depersonalization disorder” which is characterized by the sense of alienation from parts of one’s body. It is a bizarre type of body delusion where one denies ownership of a limb or an entire side of one’s body. My focus in the chapter, however, is on “inserted thoughts” which is a common symptom of schizophrenia, although it will also be useful to contrast it with somatoparaphrenia. Schizophrenia is a mental disorder which most commonly manifests itself through auditory hallucinations, paranoid or bizarre delusions, or disorganized speech and thinking. Thought insertion is the delusion that some thoughts are not “one’s own” in some sense or are somehow being inserted into one’s mind by someone else. Graham and Stephens (2000), for example, have suggested that thought insertion should be understood as alienated self-consciousness or meta-representation. I argue that HOT theory has nothing to fear from this phenomenon either and can consistently explain what happens in this admittedly unusual case. (shrink)

Diego Velasquez's Las Meninas (The Maids of Honour) is an intriguing work of representational art. It seems to me that there are two central ways to analyse the painting as involving some kind of 'representation of a representation'.

El individuo tirano refiere al sujeto empoderado por la tecnología digital que, obsesionado con la autoafirmación y el control a través de las redes sociales, impone sus preferencias y opiniones sin considerar las consecuencias sociales, éticas y políticas. Esta conducta, sumada a un régimen de posverdad, fomenta el descreimiento en las instituciones, el aislamiento y la no aceptación de lo distinto, propiciando que los individuos descarguen entre sí de opiniones infundadas e instaurando una lógica amigo-enemigo que hace emerger la actitud (...) antipolítica y daña el tejido democrático. En paralelo, el capitalismo actual se caracteriza por el volumen masivo de capitales especulativos, generando crisis e inestabilidad. En este "capitalismo especulativo", el neoliberalismo desde abajo emerge como estrategia de adaptación de grupos sociales, evidenciando cómo el emprendedorismo ha cooptado a la clase trabajadora. Este artículo propone analizar cómo la convergencia del individuo tirano, el emprendedorismo y el capitalismo especulativo genera una torsión en las subjetividades contemporáneas. Esta se manifiesta en la precariedad de sus condiciones de vida, la aceptación pasiva frente a la incertidumbre, la autoresponsabilización ante el fracaso, el individualismo extremo y la credulidad en narrativas que exigen apostar al riesgo en busca de un futuro mejor. (shrink)

Consciousness is arguably the most important interdisciplinary area in contemporary philosophy of mind, with an explosion of research over the past thirty years from philosophers, psychologists, and scientists. It is also perhaps the most puzzling aspect of the world despite the fact that it is familiar to each of us. Consciousness also seems resistant to any straightforward physical explanation. This book introduces readers to the contemporary problem of consciousness, providing a clear introduction to the overall landscape and a fair-minded critical (...) survey of various theories of consciousness. Beginning with essential historical background to the problem of consciousness, Rocco Gennaro explores the following key topics and debates: the metaphysical problem of consciousness, including varieties of dualism and materialism; consciousness and neuroscience, particularly the question of whether consciousness can be reduced to brain activity or attentional mechanisms; representational and cognitive theories of consciousness; consciousness and psychopathology; animals, machines, and consciousness. Extensive use is made of interesting phenomena throughout the book, ranging from blindsight, synaesthesia, and change blindness to phantom limb syndrome, split-brain cases, and dissociative identity disorder. The inclusion of chapter summaries, annotated further reading, and a glossary make this book essential reading for anyone seeking a clear and informative overview of the problem of consciousness, not only in philosophy but related fields such as psychology and cognitive science. (shrink)

The mass/count distinction attracts a lot of attention among cognitive scientists, possibly because it involves in fundamental ways the relation between language (i.e. grammar), thought (i.e. extralinguistic conceptual systems) and reality (i.e. the physical world). In the present paper, I explore the view that the mass/count distinction is a matter of vagueness. While every noun/concept may in a sense be vague, mass nouns/concepts are vague in a way that systematically impairs their use in counting. This idea has never been systematically (...) pursued, to the best of my knowledge. I make it precise relying on supervaluations (more specifically, ‘data semantics’) to model it. I identify a number of universals pertaining to how the mass/count contrast is encoded in the languages of the world, along with some of the major dimensions along which languages may vary on this score. I argue that the vagueness based model developed here provides a useful perspective on both. The outcome (besides shedding light on semantic variation) seems to suggest that vagueness is not just an interface phenomenon that arises in the interaction of Universal Grammar (UG) with the Conceptual/Intentional System (to adopt Chomsky’s terminology), but it is actually part of the architecture of UG. (shrink)

In this study, we examine the influence of senior leadership on firms’ corporate social responsibility. We integrate upper echelons research that has investigated either the influence of the CEO or the top management team on CSR. We contend that functional experience complementarity between CEOs and TMTs in formulating and implementing CSR strategy may underlie differentiated strategies in CSR. We find that when CEOs who have predominant experience in output functions are complemented by TMTs with a lower proportion of members who (...) have experience in output functions, there is a pronounced effect on the community, product, and diversity dimensions of CSR. In turn, when output-oriented CEOs are complemented by output-oriented TMTs, we observe an effect on the employee relations dimension of CSR. Interestingly, we find no influence of CEO-TMT complementarity on the environment dimension of CSR. In general, our empirical results support the relevance of the interaction between CEOs and their TMTs in defining their firms’ CSR profile. (shrink)

There has been an explosion of work on consciousness in the last 30–40 years from philosophers, psychologists, and neurologists. Thus, there is a need for an interdisciplinary, comprehensive volume in the field that brings together contributions from a wide range of experts on fundamental and cutting-edge topics. The Routledge Handbook of Consciousness fills this need and makes each chapter’s importance understandable to students and researchers from a variety of backgrounds. Designed to complement and better explain primary sources, this volume is (...) a valuable "first-stop" publication for undergraduate or graduate students enrolled in any course on "Consciousness," "Philosophy of Mind," or "Philosophy of Psychology," as well as a valuable handbook for researchers in these fields who want a useful reference to have close at hand. The 34 chapters, all published here for the first time, are divided into three parts: Part I covers the "History and Background Metaphysics" of consciousness, such as dualism, materialism, free will, and personal identity, and includes a chapter on Indian philosophy. Part II is on specific "Contemporary Theories of Consciousness," with chapters on representational, information integration, global workspace, attention-based, and quantum theories. Part III is entitled "Major Topics in Consciousness Research," with chapters on psychopathologies, dreaming, meditation, time, action, emotion, multisensory experience, animal and robot consciousness, and the unity of consciousness. -/- Each chapter begins with a brief introduction and concludes with a list of "Related Topics," as well as a list of "References," making the volume indispensable for the newcomer and experienced researcher alike. (shrink)

Las experiencias de unio mystica alcanzadas por Plotino encuentran su reflejo en los escritos que los pensadores gnósticos utilizan en sus discusiones con este en Roma, tal como describen Zostrianos (NH VIII, 1) y Allógenes (NH XI, 3). A pesar de dicha rivalidad filosófica, es posible encontrar similitudes entre los testimonios si analizamos estas experiencias a través de su relación con los denominados Estados Alterados de Consciencia (EAC), concepto propuesto por la psicología de la religión. Tanto el corpus filosófico como (...) la tradición gnóstica describen este estado particular del alma (ψυχἠ) al detallar el proceso mistico. En dicho proceso destaca para ambos el cambio profundo en la consciencia del iniciado, aunque neoplatónicos y gnósticos difieren en los límites de identificación con la divinidad.De esta forma, a través del análisis textual y filológico, centraremos el presente trabajo en el estudio de la unio mystica en dos aspectos. Por una parte, en el proceso mismo seguido por el iniciado. Por otra, en el grado de unión o contacto del visionario-iniciado con el Absoluto o la divinidad. Dicho análisis subrayará los caminos comunes que impulsaban ambas escuelas de pensamiento en su búsqueda de lo trascendente, a la vez que planteará preguntas esenciales sobre dicho proceso que delimitarán claramente las diferencias entre las mismas. (shrink)

From past research it is well known that social exclusion has detrimental consequences for mental health. To deal with these adverse effects, socially excluded individuals frequently turn to other humans for emotional support. While chatbots can elicit social and emotional responses on the part of the human interlocutor, their effectiveness in the context of social exclusion has not been investigated. In the present study, we examined whether an empathic chatbot can serve as a buffer against the adverse effects of social (...) ostracism. After experiencing exclusion on social media, participants were randomly assigned to either talk with an empathetic chatbot about it (e.g., “I'm sorry that this happened to you”) or a control condition where their responses were merely acknowledged (e.g., “Thank you for your feedback”). Replicating previous research, results revealed that experiences of social exclusion dampened the mood of participants. Interacting with an empathetic chatbot, however, appeared to have a mitigating impact. In particular, participants in the chatbot intervention condition reported higher mood than those in the control condition. Theoretical, methodological, and practical implications, as well as directions for future research are discussed. (shrink)

This paper studies the distribution of ‘list readings’ in questions like who does everyone like? vs. who likes everyone?. More generally, it focuses on the interaction between wh-words and quantified NPs. It is argued that, contrary to widespread belief, the pattern of available readings of constituent questions can be explained as a consequence of Weak Crossover, a well-known property of grammar. In particular, list readings are claimed to be a special case of ‘functional readings’, rather than arising from quantifying into (...) questions. Functional readings are argued to be encoded in the syntax as doubly indexed traces, which straightforwardly leads to a Crossover account of the absence of list readings in who likes everyone?. Empirical and theoretical consequences of this idea for the syntax and semantics of questions are considered. (shrink)

Jean-Paul Sartre believed that consciousness entails self-consciousness, or, even more strongly, that consciousness is self-consciousness. As Kathleen Wider puts it in her terrific book The Bodily Nature of Consciousness: Sartre and Contemporary Philosophy of Mind, ‘all consciousness is, by its very nature, self-consciousness.’ I share this view with Sartre and have elsewhere argued for it at length. My overall aim in this paper is to examine Sartre's theory of consciousness against the background of the so-called ‘higher-order thought theory of consciousness’ (...) which, in turn, will shed light on the structure of conscious mental states as well as on Sartre's theory of consciousness and reflection. Another goal of this paper is, following Wider, to show how Sartre's views can be understood from a contemporary analytic perspective. Sartre's theory of consciousness is often confusing to the so-called ‘analytic Anglo-American’ tradition, but I attempt to show how this obstacle can be overcome against the backdrop of a specific contemporary theory of consciousness. (shrink)

Various psychopathologies of self-awareness, such as somatoparaphrenia and thought insertion in schizophrenia, might seem to threaten the viability of the higher-order thought (HOT) theory of consciousness since it requires a HOT about one’s own mental state to accompany every conscious state. The HOT theory of consciousness says that what makes a mental state a conscious mental state is that there is a HOT to the effect that “I am in mental state M.” I have argued in previous work that a (...) HOT theorist can adequately respond to this concern with respect to somatoparaphrenia and thought insertion. There is also Cotard syndrome which is a rare neuropsychiatric disorder in which people hold the delusional belief that they are dead, do not exist, or have lost their blood or internal organs. In this paper, I argue that HOT theory has nothing to fear from it either and can consistently account for what happens in such unusual cases. I analyze Cotard syndrome in light of my previous discussion of somatoparaphrenia and thought insertion, and argue that HOT theory can provide a somewhat analogous account without the worry of inconsistency. It is crucial to recognize that there are multiple “self-concepts” and levels of HOTs which can help to provide a more nuanced explanation. With regard to the connection between consciousness and self-consciousness, it is proposed that Cotard patients are indeed capable of having some “I-thoughts” about their bodies and mental states. (shrink)

I believe that there is a ubiquitous pre-reflective self-awareness accompanying first-order conscious states. However, I do not think that such self-awareness is itself typically conscious. On my view, conscious self-awareness enters the picture during what is sometimes called “introspection” which is a more sophisticated form of self-consciousness. I argue that there is a very close connection between consciousness and self-consciousness and, more specifically, between the structure of all conscious states and self-consciousness partly based on the higher-order thought theory of consciousness. (...) A plausible notion of self-consciousness is, I think, simply having any degree of higher-order or meta-psychological thought. I argue that the connection between conscious states and self-consciousness is representational but also critically evaluate several different options. I then critique the alternative “acquaintance” theory of self-awareness and address a couple of recent criticisms of HOT theory. There is the potential danger of misrepresentation between self-awareness and conscious states which I also briefly address. (shrink)