A proposal that extends the enactive approach developed in cognitive science and philosophy of mind to issues in affective science.

In this paper we adopt Sterelny's framework of the scaffolded mind, and his related dimensional approach, to highlight the many ways in which human affectivity is environmentally supported. After discussing the relationship between the scaffolded-mind view and related frameworks, such as the extended-mind view, we illustrate the many ways in which our affective states are environmentally supported by items of material culture, other people, and their interplay. To do so, we draw on empirical evidence from various disciplines, and develop phenomenological (...) considerations to distinguish different ways in which we experience the world affectively. (shrink)

The idea for _Philosophy in a Time of Terror_ was born hours after the attacks on 9/11 and was realized just weeks later when Giovanna Borradori sat down with Jürgen Habermas and Jacques Derrida in New York City, in separate interviews, to evaluate the significance of the most destructive terrorist act ever perpetrated. This book marks an unprecedented encounter between two of the most influential thinkers of our age as here, for the first time, Habermas and Derrida overcome their (...) mutual antagonism and agree to appear side by side. As the two philosophers disassemble and reassemble what we think we know about terrorism, they break from the familiar social and political rhetoric increasingly polarized between good and evil. In this process, we watch two of the greatest intellects of the century at work. (shrink)

The thesis of the extended mind (ExM) holds that the material underpinnings of an individual’s mental states and processes need not be restricted to those contained within biological boundaries: when conditions are right, material artefacts can be incorporated by the thinking subject in such a way as to become a component of her extended mind. Up to this point, the focus of this approach has been on phenomena of a distinctively cognitive nature, such as states of dispositional belief, and processes (...) of planning and calculation. In this paper, we aim to expand the scope of ExM by considering the case for extended affectivity. We begin by clarifying the central commitments of ExM, before investigating its applicability to a range of affective phenomena, both dispositional and occurrent. We argue that proponents of ExM should also accept that the vehicles of emotions, moods, sentiments, temperaments, and character traits can extend beyond skull and skin. (shrink)

For many years emotion theory has been characterized by a dichotomy between the head and the body. In the golden years of cognitivism, during the nineteen-sixties and seventies, emotion theory focused on the cognitive antecedents of emotion, the so-called “appraisal processes.” Bodily events were seen largely as byproducts of cognition, and as too unspecific to contribute to the variety of emotion experience. Cognition was conceptualized as an abstract, intellectual, “heady” process separate from bodily events. Although current emotion theory has moved (...) beyond this disembodied stance by conceiving of emotions as involving both cognitive processes (perception, attention, and evaluation) and bodily events (arousal, behavior, and facial expressions), the legacy of cognitivism persists in the tendency to treat cognitive and bodily events as separate constituents of emotion. Thus the cognitive aspects of emotion are supposedly distinct and separate from the bodily ones. This separation indicates that cognitivism’s disembodied conception of cognition continues to shape the way emotion theorists conceptualize emotion. (shrink)

In this lively look at current debates in American philosophy, leading philosophers talk candidly about the changing character of their discipline. In the spirit of Emerson's The American Scholar , this book explores the identity of the American philosopher. Through informal conversations, the participants discuss the rise of post-analytic philosophy in America and its relations to European thought and to the American pragmatist tradition. They comment on their own intellectual development as well as each others' work, charting the course of (...) American philosophy over the past few decades. Giovanna Borradori, in her substantial introduction, explains the history of the analytic movement in America and the home-grown reaction against it. In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, American philosophy was a socially engaged interdisciplinary enterprise. In transcendentalism and pragmatism, then the dominant currents in American thought, philosophy was connected to history, psychology, and public issues. But in the 1930s, the imported European movement of logical positivism redefined philosophical discourse in terms of mathematical logic and theory of language. Under the influence of this analytic view, American philosophy became a professionalized discipline, divorced from public debate and intellectual history and antagonistic to the other, more humanistic tradition of continental thought. The American Philosopher explores the opposition between analytic and continental thought and shows how recent American work has begun to bridge the gap between the two traditions. Through a reexamination of pragmatism, and through an attempt to understand philosophy in a more hermeneutical way, the participants narrow the distance between America's distinctly scientific philosophy and Europe's more literary approach. Moving beyond classical analytic philosophy, the participants confront each other on a number of topics. The logico-linguistic orientations of Quine and Davidson come up against the more discursive, interdisciplinary agendas of Rorty, Putnam, and Cavell. Nozick's theory of pluralist anarchism goes face-to-face with the aesthetic neo-foundationalism of Danto. And Kuhn's hypothesis of paradigm shifts is measured against MacIntyre's ethics of "virtues." Borradori's conversations offer an unconventional portrait of the way philosophers think about their work scholars and students will not be its only beneficiaries, so will everyone who wonders about the current state of American philosophy. (shrink)

In this paper I advance an enactive view of affectivity that does not imply that affectivity must stop at the boundaries of the organism. I first review the enactive notion of “sense-making”, and argue that it entails that cognition is inherently affective. Then I review the proposal, advanced by Di Paolo, that the enactive approach allows living systems to “extend”. Drawing out the implications of this proposal, I argue that, if enactivism allows living systems to extend, then it must also (...) allow sense-making, and thus cognition as well as affectivity, to extend—in the specific sense of allowing the physical processes underpinning these phenomena to include, as constitutive parts, non-organic environmental processes. Finally I suggest that enactivism might also allow specific human affective states, such as moods, to extend. (shrink)

The theory of autopoiesis is central to the enactive approach. Recent works emphasize that the theory of autopoiesis is a theory of sense-making in living systems, i.e. of how living systems produce and consume meaning. In this chapter I first illustrate (some aspects of) these recent works, and interpret their notion of sense-making as a bodily cognitive- emotional form of understanding. Then I turn to modern emotion science, and I illustrate its tendency to over-intellectualize our capacity to evaluate and understand. (...) I show that this overintellectualization goes hand in hand with the rejection of the idea that the body is a vehicle of meaning. I explain why I think that this over-intellectualization is problematic, and try to reconceptualize the notion of evaluation in emotion theory in a way that is consistent and continuous with the autopoietic notion of sense-making. (shrink)

In this paper I argue that it is misleading to regard the brain as the physical basis or “core machinery” of moods. First, empirical evidence shows that brain activity not only influences, but is in turn influenced by, physical activity taking place in other parts of the organism. It is therefore not clear why the core machinery of moods ought to be restricted to the brain. I propose, instead, that moods should be conceived as embodied, i.e., their physical basis should (...) be enlarged so as to comprise not just brain but also bodily processes. Second, I emphasise that moods are also situated in the world. By this I do not simply mean that moods are influenced by the world, but that they are complexly interrelated with it, in at least three different ways: they are shaped by cultural values and norms; they are materially and intersubjectively “scaffolded”; and they can even “experientially incorporate” parts of the world, i.e., include the experience of parts of the world as part of oneself. (shrink)

‘Valence’ is used in many different ways in emotion theory. It generally refers to the ‘positive’ or ‘negative’ character of an emotion, as well as to the ‘positive’ or ‘negative’ character of some aspect of emotion. After reviewing these different uses, I point to the conceptual problems that come with them. In particular, I dis- tinguish: problems that arise from conflating the valence of an emotion with the valence of its aspects, and problems that arise from the very idea that (...) an emotion (and/or its aspects) can be divided into mutually exclusive opposites. The first group of problems does not question the classic dichotomous notion of valence, but the second does. In order to do justice to the richness of daily emotions, emo- tion science needs more complex conceptual tools. (shrink)

Family firms are ubiquitous and play a crucial role across all world economies, but how they differ in the disclosure of social and environmental actions from non-family firms has been largely overlooked in the literature. Advancing the discourse on corporate social responsibility reporting, we examine how family influence on a business organization affects CSR reporting. The arguments developed here draw on institutional theory, using a rich body of empirical evidence gathered through a content analysis of the CSR reports of 98 (...) large- and medium-sized Italian firms. The grounded theory analysis informs and contextualizes several differences in the type and content of corporate social responsibility reports of family and non-family firms. Our findings show that in comparison to non-family firms, family firms disseminate a greater variety of CSR reports, are less compliant with CSR standards and place emphasis on different CSR topics. We, thus, contribute to the family business and corporate social responsibility reporting literatures in several ways, offering implications for practice and outlining promising avenues for future research. (shrink)

How do we feel our body in emotion experience? In this paper I initially distinguish between foreground and background bodily feelings, and characterize them in some detail. Then I compare this distinction with the one between reflective and pre-reflective bodily self-awareness one finds in some recent philosophical phenomenological works, and conclude that both foreground and background bodily feelings can be understood as pre-reflective modes of bodily self-awareness that nevertheless differ in degree of self-presentation or self-intimation. Finally, I use the distinction (...) between foreground and background bodily feelings to characterize the experience of being absorbed in an activity, as opposed to accounts that imply that absorption involves bodily inconspicuousness. (shrink)

Emotion theorists tend to separate “arousal” and other bodily events such as “actions” from the evaluative component of emotion known as “appraisal.” This separation, I argue, implies phenomenologically implausible accounts of emotion elicitation and personhood. As an alternative, I attempt a reconceptualization of the notion of appraisal within the so-called “enactive approach.” I argue that appraisal is constituted by arousal and action, and I show how this view relates to an embodied and affective notion of personhood.

We call affective brainocentrism the tendency to privilege the brain over other parts of the organism when defining or explaining emotions. We distinguish two versions of this tendency. According to brain-sufficient, emotional states are entirely realized by brain processes. According to brain-master, emotional states are realized by both brain and bodily processes, but the latter are entirely driven by the brain: the brain is the master regulator of bodily processes. We argue that both these claims are problematic, and we draw (...) on physiological accounts of stress to make our main case. These accounts illustrate the existence of complex interactions between the brain and endocrine systems, the immune system, the enteric nervous system, and even gut microbiota. We argue that, because of these complex brain–body interactions, the brain cannot be isolated and identified as the basis of stress. We also mention recent evidence suggesting that complex brain–body interactions characterize the physiology of depression and anxiety. Finally, we call for an alternative dynamical, systemic, and embodied approach to the study of the physiology of emotions that does not privilege the brain, but rather aims at understanding how mutually regulating brain and bodily processes jointly realize a variety of emotional states. (shrink)

Recent analytic-philosophical works in the field of situated cognition have proposed to conceptualize the self as deeply entwined with the environment, and even as constituted by it. A common move has been to characterize the self in narrative terms, and then to argue that the narrative self is partly constituted by narratives about the past that are scaffolded (shaped and maintained) by, or distributed over, a variety of objects that can rekindle episodic memories. While we are sympathetic to these approaches, (...) here we propose a different strategy to situate the self—one which can be seen as complementing the narrative one, and which draws from concepts and ideas central to the phenomenological-existentialist tradition. We suggest, first, that the self has a sense of its past not just via narratives and episodic memories, but in virtue of being embodied and thus, importantly, _sedimented_ (in other words, it has, or rather is, a _body memory_). Embodiment and sedimentation, in turn, always necessarily imply an environment or a situation, entailing that the self is also _inherently situated_. Second, we discuss the future-oriented dimension of selfhood, and argue that we understand ourselves as _projected_ into the future, again not necessarily only narratively and reflectively, but also tacitly, in a bodily and inherently situated way. (shrink)

The experience of agency refers to the feeling that we control our own actions, and through them the outside world. In many contexts, sense of agency has strong implications for moral responsibility. For example, a sense of agency may allow people to choose between right and wrong actions, either immediately, or on subsequent occasions through learning about the moral consequences of their actions. In this study we investigate the relation between the experience of operant action, and responsibility for action outcomes (...) using the intentional binding effect as an implicit, quantitative measure related to sense of agency. We studied the time at which people perceived simple manual actions and their effects, when these actions were embedded in scenarios where their actions had unpredictable consequences that could be either moral or merely economic. We found an enhanced binding of effects back towards the actions that caused them, implying an enhanced sense of agency, in moral compared to non-moral contexts. We also found stronger binding for effects with severely negative, compared to moderately negative, values. A tight temporal association between action and effect may be a low-level phenomenal marker of the sense of responsibility. (shrink)

This paper distinguishes various ways in which language can act on our affect or emotion experience. From the commonsensical consideration that sometimes we use language merely to report or describe our feelings, I move on to discuss how language can constitute, clarify, and enhance them, as well as induce novel and oft surprising experiences. I also consider the social impact of putting feelings into words, including the reciprocal influences between emotion experience and the public dissemination of emotion labels and descriptions, (...) and how these influences depend on the power of labelling to make complex feelings visible and thus easily accessible. Finally, I address and reinterpret some psychological findings on the so-called “verbal overshadowing” effect. (shrink)

According to Discrete Emotion Theory, a number of emotions are distinguishable on the basis of neural, physiological, behavioral and expressive features. Critics of this view emphasize the variability and context-sensitivity of emotions. This paper discusses some of these criticisms, and argues that they do not undermine the claim that emotions are discrete. This paper also presents some works in dynamical affective science, and argues that to conceive of discrete emotions as self-organizing and softly assembled patterns of various processes accounts more (...) naturally than traditional Discrete Emotion Theory for the variability and context-sensitivity of emotions. (shrink)

This paper addresses the phenomenology of bodily feeling in depersonalization disorder. We argue that not all bodily feelings are intentional states that have the body or part of it as their object. We distinguish three broad categories of bodily feeling: noematic feeling, noetic feeling, and existential feeling. Then we show how an appreciation of the differences between them can contribute to an understanding of the depersonalization experience.

This commentary makes three points: (1) There may be no clear-cut distinction between emotion and appraisal “constituents” at neural and psychological levels. (2) The microdevelopment of an emotional interpretation contains a complex microdevelopment of affect. (3) Neurophenomenology is a promising research program for testing Lewis's hypotheses about the neurodynamics of emotion-appraisal amalgams.

Dummett's logic LC quantified, Q-LC, is shown to be characterized by the extended frame Q+, ,D, where Q+ is the set of non-negative rational numbers, is the numerical relation less or equal then and D is the domain function such that for all v, w Q+, Dv and if v w, then D v . D v D w . Moreover, simple completeness proofs of extensions of Q-LC are given.

The paper presents an epistemic logic with quantification over agents of knowledge and with a syntactical distinction between de re and de dicto occurrences of terms. Knowledge de dicto is characterized as ‘knowledge that’, and knowlegde de re as ‘knowledge of’. Transition semantics turns out to be an adequate tool to account for the distinctions introduced.

Humble leadership can be described as a positive psychological feature that allows leaders to admit their limitations, be open to new ideas, and give a voice to others while also recognizing their merits. The present study (n = 268 participants) explored the persuasive effects of a female politician communicating a humble stance by considering the role emotional displays at play (joy, calmness, sadness, and anger) when discussing a moral issue (hosting immigrants). The results revealed that the politician elicited positive emotions (...) and evaluations of her competence and benevolence, especially when exhibiting a sad facial display, by contributing to the intention to accept the moral gist of her persuasive message. Overall, these ‘gendered’ effects are discussed in relation to the ‘political authenticity’, which can be perceived as high especially when the humble message is connected with several social reasons, as is the case with gender or social status. (shrink)

Damasio's somatic marker hypothesis (SMH) is a prominent neuroscientific hypothesis about the mechanisms implementing decision-making. This paper argues that, since its inception, the SMH has not been clearly formulated. It is possible to identify at least two different hypotheses, which make different predictions: SMH-G, which claims that somatic states generally implement preferences and are needed to make a decision; and SMH-S, which specifically claims that somatic states assist decision-making by anticipating the long-term outcomes of available options. This paper also argues (...) that neither hypothesis is adequately supported empirically; the task originally proposed to test SMH is not a good test for SMH-S, and its results do not support SMH-G either. In addition, it is not clear how SMH-G could be empirically invalidated, given its general formulation. Suggestions are made that could help provide evidence for SMH-S, and make SMH-G more specific. 1 Introduction 2 Two Hypotheses: Somatic Markers as Embodied Preferences, and as a Source of Farsightedness 3 Lack of Evidence for Somatic Farsightedness 4 Does Making Decisions Require Somatic Markers, and can it be Shown in the Laboratory? 5 Conclusion CiteULike Connotea Del.icio.us What's this? (shrink)

Predicate extensions of the intermediate logic of the weak excluded middle and of the modal logic S4.2 are introduced and investigated. In particular it is shown that some of them are characterized by subclasses of the class of directed frames with either constant or nested domains.

A general strategy for proving completeness theorems for quantified modal logics is provided. Starting from free quantified modal logic K, with or without identity, extensions obtained either by adding the principle of universal instantiation or the converse of the Barcan formula or the Barcan formula are considered and proved complete in a uniform way. Completeness theorems are also shown for systems with the extended Barcan rule as well as for some quantified extensions of the modal logic B. The incompleteness of (...) Q°.B + BF is also proved. (shrink)

According to the "enactive" approach in philosophy of mind and cognitive science, mental states are neither identical with, nor reducible to, brain activity. Rather, the mind is enacted or brought forth by the whole situated living organism in virtue of its specific structure and organization. Although increasingly influential in cognitive science, the enactive approach has had little to do with psychopathology so far. This chapter first outlines this approach in some detail, and then illustrates its conceptual and methodological connections to (...) psychopathology. It also provides some indications on how to develop a more explicitly "enactive psychopathology.". (shrink)

This paper reconsiders the Idealistic aesthetics of tragedy from an unconventional point of view. It investigates the relationship between theory and dramatic canon by focusing on those works and authors that are excluded from the canon by the theoretical discourse. My aim is to show that Idealist philosophers and Romantic critics concur in constructing a unitary model of the tragic conflict that is partly defined through its contraposition to the ‘Senecan’ conception of tragedy as a representation of suffering and as (...) a dialectic of passions. Seneca here stands for an entire line of European dramaturgy, which involves Shakespeare and culminates in French Classicism. This contrast does not merely concern a literary model, but also, more generally, the conception of subjectivity underlying the dramaturgy of passions. This paper thus helps to shed light on the controversial relationship between the idealistic philosophy of the tragic with modern tragedy at large. -/- Keywords: Theory of Tragedy, Idealism, Seneca, Hegel, Pathos . (shrink)

The aim of this article is to clarify the critical role of Hegel's early logic, through an assessment of the dialectical process of sublation [Aufhebung] of the determinations of finite thinking at stake within its exposition. I want to show that the dialectical-critical work of logic has a speculative meaning for Hegel, thereby displaying the inward correspondence between critical and speculative aspects of philosophical activity. By pointing out the evidence from fragmentary texts on logic relating to Hegel's teaching activity in (...) 1801–1802, I will first put into question the idea of an introductory role of logic. In so doing I challenge a widespread reading which argues for the presence of a sharp separation between critical logic and speculative metaphysics. I will then focus on the texts on logic in the 1804–1805 Reinschrift, reading them as the worksite wherein the dawning form of a full-fledged dialectical logic is first prepared and elaborated. More generally, if this paves the way for establishing a continuity between Hegel's early and mature logic and his concept of dialectic, it is also paramount for understanding how the activity of systematic philosophy in the mature version of the system essentially constitutes an ongoing work on the forms of the finite. (shrink)

In this paper we first recall geometrical models of neurogeometical in Lie groups and we show that geometrical properties of horizontal cortical connectivity can be considered as a neural correlate of a geometry of the visual plane. Then we introduce a new model of non isotropic cortical connectivity modeled on statistics of images. In this way we are able to justify oblique phenomena comparable with experimental findings.

Two different copies of the influental Jewish philosophical and theological Maimonides’ Guide of the Perplexed, one in Hebrew and a second in Latin, are recorded in Pico’s library. A third copy, probably also belonged to him, is now the ms. Kassel, Universitätsbibliothek - Landesbibliothek und Murhardsche Bibliothek der Stadt, 2° theol. 67. The manuscript now in Kassel shows that Pico was not only a reader of Maimonides’ Guide but also a translator. Numerous passages have in fact been revised by Pico (...) in order to improve the latin translation evidently considered not particularly correct. (shrink)

Lorenzo Valla's rhetorical reform of logic resulted in important changes in sixteenth-century mathematical sciences, and not only in mathematical education and in the use of mathematics in other sciences, but also in mathematical theory itself. Logic came to be identified with dialectic, syllogisms with enthymemes and necessary truth with the limit case of probable truth. Two main ancient authorities mediated between logical and mathematical concerns: Cicero and Proclus. Cicero's 'common notions' were identified with Euclid's axioms, so that mathematics could be (...) viewed as core knowledge shared by all humankind. Proclus' interpretation of Euclid's axioms gave rise to the idea of a universal human natural light of reasoning and of a mathesis universalis as a basic mathematics common to both arithmetic and geometry and as an art of thinking interpretable as algebra. (shrink)

The main aim of this paper is to introduce the logic QE-LC whose language contains the existence predicate E and which is characterized by the class of connected (Kripke) E-models with nested domains.

The first commented edition of K.W.F. Solger's Vorlesungen über Ästhetik (1819), edited by Giovanna Pinna.

This book highlights the emergence of a new mathematical rationality and the beginning of the mathematisation of physics in Classical Islam. Exchanges between mathematics, physics, linguistics, arts and music were a factor of creativity and progress in the mathematical, the physical and the social sciences. Goods and ideas travelled on a world-scale, mainly through the trade routes connecting East and Southern Asia with the Near East, allowing the transmission of Greek-Arabic medicine to Yuan Muslim China. The development of science, first (...) centred in the Near East, would gradually move to the Western side of the Mediterranean, as a result of Europe's appropriation of the Arab and Hellenistic heritage. Contributors are Paul Buell, Anas Ghrab, Hossein Masoumi Hamedani, Zeinab Karimian, Giovanna Lelli, Marouane ben Miled, Patricia Radelet-de Grave, and Roshdi Rashed. (shrink)

The paper is an introduction to and an annotated translation of De quantitatibus, a mathematical manuscript by Johannes Kepler. Conceived as a philosophical treatise, the text collects, orders, and interprets the Aristotelian passages relevant to mathematics. Kepler thought of De quantitatibus as an introduction to Dasypodius's textbook, but by choosing the Aristotelian context, he distances himself from the tradition to which Dasypodius belonged. Dasypodius's works on mathematics, like Ramus's, were within the genre developed after the rediscovery of Proclus's commentary on (...) Euclid. Instead, Kepler took a position following the Aristotelian humanism of Schegk. While the dating of De quantitatibus is still uncertain, it is likely that Kepler wrote it not too long after his education in Tübingen, where he received instruction in natural philosophy under the influence of Schegk. In De quantitatibus, Kepler also exhibits some original views on mathematics within this humanist Aristotelian context. (shrink)

Although trust and reciprocity are ubiquitous in social exchange, their neurobiological substrate remains largely unknown. Here, we investigated the effect of damage to the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC)—a brain region critical for valuing social information—on individuals’ decisions in a trust game and in a risk game. In the trust game, one player, the investor, is endowed with a sum of money, which she can keep or invest. The amount she decides to invest is tripled and sent to the other player, (...) the trustee, who then decides what fraction to return to the investor. In separate runs, ten patients with focal bilateral damage to the vmPFC and control participants made decision while playing in the role of either investor or trustee with different anonymous counterparts in each run. A risk game was also included in which the investor faced exactly the same decisions as in the trust game, but a random device (i.e., a computer), not another player, determined the final payoffs. Results showed that vmPFC patients’ investments were not modulated by the type of opponent player (e.g., human vs. computer) present in the environment. Thus, vmPFC patients showed comparable risk-taking preferences both in social (trust game) and nonsocial (risk game) contexts. In stark contrast, control participants were less willing to take risk and invest when they believed that they were interacting with people than a computer. Furthermore, when acted as trustee, vmPFC patients made lower back transfers toward investors, thereby showing less reciprocity behavior. Taken together, these results indicate that social valuation and emotion subserved by vmPFC have a critical role in trusting and reciprocity decisions. The present findings support the hypothesis that vmPFC damage may impair affective systems specifically designed for mediating social transaction with other individuals. (shrink)