This is the first modern edition of the works of Lady Mary Shepherd, one of the most important women philosophers of the early modern period. Shepherd has been widely neglected in the history of philosophy, but her work engaged with the dominant philosophers of the time - among them Hume, Berkeley, and Reid. In particular, her 1827 volume Essays on the Perception of an External Universe outlines a theory of causation, perception, and knowledge which Shepherd presents as (...) an alternative to what she sees as the mistaken views of Berkeley and Hume. What she ultimately presents is an original and systematic metaphysics and epistemology. Shepherd's Essays consists of two parts. The first is a theory of perception and knowledge of the external world, which is designed to rebut idealism and skepticism about the external world and show that our ordinary beliefs are based on reason. The second is a collection of essays on topics in metaphysics and epistemology, including the immateriality and eternity of the mind, the relationship between mind and body, the possibility of miracles, the association of ideas, the relationship between physical and mathematical reasoning, and the epistemology of testimony. Antonia LoLordo's edition of Shepherd's Essays includes scholarly notes throughout the text that provide historical and philosophical context and expand on the major concepts of Shepherd's system. Her extensive introduction to Shepherd's life and works surveys some of the major points of Shepherd's system, points out directions for future research, and offers guidance for readers planning to teach her work in their courses. This volume is an invaluable primary resource for scholars, graduate students, and undergraduates interested in metaphysics, epistemology, and early modern philosophy. (shrink)

The Shape of Agency offers interlinked explanations of the basic building blocks of agency, as well as its exemplary instances. The first part offers accounts of a collection of related phenomena that have long troubled philosophers of action: control over behaviour, non-deviant causation, and intentional action. These accounts build on earlier work in the causalist tradition, and undermine the claims made by many that causalism cannot offer a satisfying account of non-deviant causation, and therefore fails as an account of intentional (...) action. The second part turns to modes of agentive excellence—ways that agents display quality of form—providing a novel account of skill, including an account of the ways that agents display more or less skill. Shepherd discusses the role of knowledge in skill, and concludes that while knowledge is often important, it is inessential. This leads to a discussion of the way that knowledge of action and knowledge of how to act informs action execution. Knowledgeable action includes a unique epistemic underpinning: in knowledgeable action, the agent has authoritative knowledge of what she is doing and how she is doing it when and because she is poised to control her action by way of practical reasoning. (shrink)

It seems obvious that phenomenally conscious experience is something of great value, and that this value maps onto a range of important ethical issues. For example, claims about the value of life for those in a permanent vegetative state, debates about treatment and study of disorders of consciousness, controversies about end-of-life care for those with advanced dementia, and arguments about the moral status of embryos, fetuses, and non-human animals arguably turn on the moral significance of various facts about consciousness. However, (...) though work has been done on the moral significance of elements of consciousness, such as pain and pleasure, little explicit attention has been devoted to the ethical significance of consciousness. In this book Joshua Shepherd presents a systematic account of the value present within conscious experience. This account emphasizes not only the nature of consciousness, but the importance of items within experience such as affect, valence, and the complex overall shape of particular valuable experiences. Shepherd also relates this account to difficult cases involving non-humans and those with disorders of consciousness, arguing that the value of consciousness influences and partially explains the degree of moral status a being possesses, without fully determining it. The upshot is a deeper understanding of both the moral importance of phenomenal consciousness and its relations to moral status. This book will be of great interest to philosophers and students of ethics, bioethics, philosophy of psychology, philosophy of mind and cognitive science. (shrink)

Mary Shepherd's An Essay upon the Relation of Cause and Effect, first published in 1824, was a pioneering work in metaphysics and epistemology. Together with her 1827 Essays on the Perception of an External Universe, they make her one of the most important philosophers of her era. Although widely neglected by the history of philosophy in the decades after her death, her works have recently begun to attract the attention and sustained study they deserve. In the course of her (...) writings, Shepherd offers trenchant and detailed rebuttals of the arguments and conclusions of many prominent predecessors-including George Berkeley, Thomas Reid, Dugald Stewart, Thomas Brown, William Lawrence, and especially David Hume-but she is no merely negative thinker. On the contrary, her critiques are always in the service of her own distinctive and highly original doctrines, which are of striking contemporary interest. Appearing two hundred years after its original publication, this is the first full modern edition of her first book, which presents and defends the theory of causation and scientific knowledge that constitutes the cornerstone of her entire philosophy. The edition includes an extensive introduction and scholarly notes throughout that provide historical and philosophical context while explaining the central ideas of the work. It also includes Shepherd's two essays published in 1828 and all of her known letters-all but one of them published here for the first time-which shed significant additional light on her philosophical ideas. (shrink)

I seek an explanation for the etiology and the function of mind wandering episodes. My proposal – which I call the cognitive control proposal – is that mind wandering is a form of non-conscious guidance due to cognitive control. When the agent’s current goal is deemed insufficiently rewarding, the cognitive control system initiates a search for a new, more rewarding goal. This search is the process of unintentional mind wandering. After developing the proposal, and relating it to literature on mind (...) wandering and on cognitive control, I discuss explanations the proposal affords, testable predictions the proposal makes, and philosophical implications the proposal has. (shrink)

Consciousness-based approaches to non-human moral status maintain that consciousness is necessary for (some degree or level of) moral status. While these approaches are intuitive to many, in this paper I argue that the judgment that consciousness is necessary for moral status is not secure enough to guide policy regarding non-humans, that policies responsive to the moral status of non-humans should take seriously the possibility that psychological features independent of consciousness are sufficient for moral status. Further, I illustrate some practical consequences (...) of calling consciousness-based views into question. (shrink)

Necessarily, if S lacks the ability to exercise control, S is not an agent. If S is not an agent, S cannot act intentionally, responsibly, or rationally, nor can S possess or exercise free will. In spite of the obvious importance of control, however, no general account of control exists. In this paper I reflect on the nature of control itself. I develop accounts of control ’s exercise and control ’s possession that illuminate what it is for degrees of control (...) —that is, the degree of control an agent possesses or exercises in a given circumstance—to vary. Finally, I demonstrate the usefulness of the account on offer by showing how it generates a solution to a long-standing problem for causalist theories of action, namely, the problem of deviant causation. (shrink)

We argue that any strong version of a knowledge condition on intentional action, the practical knowledge principle, on which knowledge of what I am doing (under some description: call it A-ing) is necessary for that A-ing to qualify as an intentional action, is false. Our argument involves a new kind of case, one that centers the agent’s control appropriately and thus improves upon Davidson’s well-known carbon copier case. After discussing this case, offering an initial argument against the knowledge condition, and (...) discussing recent treatments that cover nearby ground, we consider several objections. One we consider at some length maintains that although contemplative knowledge may be disconnected from intentional action, specifically practical knowledge of the sort Anscombe elucidated escapes our argument. We demonstrate that this is not so. Our argument illuminates an important truth, often overlooked in discussions of the knowledge-intentional action relationship: intentional action and knowledge have different levels of permissiveness regarding failure in similar circumstances. (shrink)

In 1886, as Nietzsche's thought becomes more explicitly oriented toward the project of a revaluation of all values, he reframes BT and three middle period books with prefaces. Four out of the five prefaces show Nietzsche noticeably occupied with the theme of health, which serves in each of those four as a lens orienting the reader toward his earlier work. In his "Attempt at Self-Criticism," for instance, Nietzsche suggests that the principal contribution of BT lies in the idea of the (...) Dionysian, which carries the promise that there might exist "neuroses of health".1 The preface to GS finds Nietzsche looking for a "philosophical physician" who might "pursue the problem of the total... (shrink)

The rise of experimental philosophy has placed metaphilosophical questions, particularly those concerning concepts, at the center of philosophical attention. X-phi offers empirically rigorous methods for identifying conceptual content, but what exactly it contributes towards evaluating conceptual content remains unclear. We show how x-phi complements Rudolf Carnap’s underappreciated methodology for concept determination, explication. This clarifies and extends x-phi’s positive philosophical import, and also exhibits explication’s broad appeal. But there is a potential problem: Carnap’s account of explication was limited to empirical and (...) logical concepts, but many concepts of interest to philosophers are essentially normative. With formal epistemology as a case study, we show how x-phi assisted explication can apply to normative domains. (shrink)

What are the folk-conceptual connections between free will and consciousness? In this paper I present results which indicate that consciousness plays central roles in folk conceptions of free will. When conscious states cause behavior, people tend to judge that the agent acted freely. And when unconscious states cause behavior, people tend to judge that the agent did not act freely. Further, these studies contribute to recent experimental work on folk philosophical affiliation, which analyzes folk responses to determine whether folk views (...) are consistent with the view that free will and determinism are incompatible (incompatibilism) or with the opposite view (compatibilism). Conscious causation of behavior tends to elicit pro-free will judgments, even when the causation takes place deterministically. Thus, when controlling for consciousness, many folk seem to be compatibilists. However, participants who disagree with the deterministic or cognitive scientific descriptions given of human behavior tend to give incompatibilist responses. (shrink)

Recent work in cognitive science suggests that conscious thought plays a much less central role in the production of human behavior than most think. Partially on the basis of this work, Peter Carruthers has advanced the claim that humans never consciously decide to act. This claim is of independent interest for action theory, and its potential truth poses a problem for theories of free will and autonomy, which often take our capacity to consciously decide to be of central importance. In (...) this article, I examine the nature of conscious deciding and I argue that Carruthers fails to establish the claim that humans never consciously decide to act. (shrink)

The concept of revelation is a pivotal one, both in the study of religion in general, and with regard to Christianity in particular. Yet it is a fluid concept that has undergone notable transformations down the ages as succeeding generations have re-interpreted it in the light of fresh presuppositions which they have come to share. My purpose here is to offer a re-interpretation in the light of some contemporary presuppositions which, though not universal, are, I shall argue, sufficiently widely held, (...) sufficiently basic, and sufficiently secure, to warrant accommodation. I shall be concerned primarily, though not in principle exclusively, with the concept of revelation in a Christian context. (shrink)

In his powerful anti-Christian polemic, The Misery of Christianity , J. Kahl charges Christianity with suffering from a rock-bottom lack of identity. ‘Theologians…have been looking for a continuous thread which will lead them out of the maze of contradictory forms of Christianity…into the open. They would like to be able to say with binding force what Christianity really is.’ 1 But, he urges, they cannot. P. van Buren agrees, but sees in this no cause for concern. ‘Christianity has been changing (...) since its beginning, the religion of the past constantly being adapted to the conditions of each new present. Once we see this character of Christianity, we are released from the misconceived task of trying to identify its unchanging essence.’ 2 Again more recently J. Hick has urged, in effect half agreeing with van Buren, that although there is an unchanging element in Christianity, it is restricted to ‘the originating events from which the moving stream of christian history has flowed’. ‘Christianity is an ongoing movement of life and thought, defined by its origin in the Christ-event and by its consciousness of that origin. It cannot be defined in terms of adherence to any doctrinal standard, for its doctrines are historically and culturally conditioned and have changed as the church has entered new historical and cultural situations.’ 3. (shrink)

It is well known that the nature of consciousness is elusive, and that attempts to understand it generate problems in metaphysics, philosophy of mind, psychology, and neuroscience. Less appreciated are the important – even if still elusive – connections between consciousness and issues in ethics. In this chapter we consider three such connections. First, we consider the relevance of consciousness for questions surrounding an entity’s moral status. Second, we consider the relevance of consciousness for questions surrounding moral responsibility for action. (...) Third, we consider the relevance of consciousness for the acquisition of moral knowledge. (shrink)

The extensive involvement of nonconscious processes in human behaviour has led some to suggest that consciousness is much less important for the control of action than we might think. In this article I push against this trend, developing an understanding of conscious control that is sensitive to our best models of overt action control. Further, I assess the cogency of various zombie challenges—challenges that seek to demote the importance of conscious control for human agency. I argue that though nonconscious contributions (...) to action control are evidently robust, these challenges are overblown. (shrink)

My topic is the intelligent guidance of action. In this paper I offer an empirically grounded case for four ideas: that [a] cognitive processes of practical reasoning play a key role in the intelligent guidance of action, [b] these processes could not do so without significant enabling work done by both perception and the motor system, [c] the work done by perceptual and motor systems can be characterized as the generation of information specialized for action guidance, which in turn suggests (...) that [d] the cognitive processes of practical reasoning that play a key role in the guidance of intelligent action are not the abstract, syllogistic ones philosophers often treat as the paradigm of practical reasoning. Rather, these cognitive processes are constrained by, and work well with, the specialized concepts outputted by perception and the feedback outputted by sensorimotor processes. (shrink)

One necessary condition on any adequate account of perception is clarity regarding whether unconscious perception exists. The issue is complicated, and the debate is growing in both philosophy and science. In this paper we consider the case for unconscious perception, offering three primary achievements. First, we offer a discussion of the underspecified notion of central coordinating agency, a notion that is critical for arguments that purportedly perceptual states are not attributable to the individual, and thus not genuinely perceptual. We develop (...) an explication of what it is for a representational state to be available to central coordinating agency for guidance of behavior. Second, drawing on this explication, we place a more careful understanding of the attributability of a state to the individual in the context of a range of empirical work on vision-for-action, saccades, and skilled typing. The results place pressure on the skeptic about unconscious perception. Third, reflecting upon broader philosophical themes running through debates about unconscious perception, we highlight how our discussion places pressure on the view that perception is a manifest kind, rather than a natural kind. In doing so, we resist the tempting complaint that the debate about unconscious perception is merely verbal. (shrink)

It is natural to think that at root, agents are beings that act. Agents do more than this, however – agents omit to act. Sometimes agents do so intentionally. How should we understand intentional omission? Recent accounts of intentional omission have given causation a central theoretical role. The move is well-motivated. If some form of causalism about intentional omission can successfully exploit similarities between action and omission, it might inherit the broad support causalism about intentional action enjoys. In this paper (...) I consider the prospects for causalism about intentional omission. I examine two recent proposals: one Carolina Sartorio (2009) defends, and one Randolph Clarke (2010a) defends. I argue these versions fail, and for a similar reason. Reflection on the function of intention for agency brings this reason to light, and motivates a novel causalism about intentional omission. On the account I go on to defend necessarily, an agent J intentionally omits to A only if an intention of J’s with relevant content (or the intention’s acquisition) causes in J a disposition not to A. Though the causal work done by intentions to omit differs in some cases from the causal work done by intentions to act, it turns out that causalism about intentional behavior (i.e., about action and omission) is viable. (shrink)

In this paper, I examine the claim that self-consciousness is highly morally significant, such that the fact that an entity is self-conscious generates strong moral reasons against harming or killing that entity. This claim is apparently very intuitive, but I argue it is false. I consider two ways to defend this claim: one indirect, the other direct. The best-known arguments relevant to self-consciousness's significance take the indirect route. I examine them and argue that in various ways they depend on unwarranted (...) assumptions about self-consciousness's functional significance, and once these assumptions are undermined, motivation for these arguments dissipates. I then consider the direct route to self-consciousness's significance, which depends on claims that self-consciousness has intrinsic value or final value. I argue what intrinsic or final value self-consciousness possesses is not enough to generate strong moral reasons against harming or killing. (shrink)

In this paper, I offer evidence that folk views of free will and moral responsibility accord a central place to consciousness. In sections 2 and 3, I contrast action production via conscious states and processes with action in concordance with an agent's long-standing and endorsed motivations, values, and character traits. Results indicate that conscious action production is considered much more important for free will than is concordance with motivations, values, and character traits. In section 4, I contrast the absence of (...) consciousness with the presence of consciousness in behaviorally identical agents. Most participants attribute free will to conscious agents, but not to nonconscious agents. Focusing in particular on two leading views of free will and moral responsibility, namely, Deep Self and Reasons-Responsive Views, I argue that these results present philosophers of mind and action with the following explanatory burden: develop a substantive theory of the connection between consciousness on the on.. (shrink)

: Interesting work has been done on the striking similarities between the key arguments of the late Jacques Derrida and Daoism. While named otherwise, such Derridean signposts as the metaphysics of presence, the duality of language, and logocentrism are found in Daoist views of the relationship between reality, speech, writing, and knowledge. However, where the limits of language lead Derrida is different from where they take the authors of the Zhuangzi and the Daodejing, in particular regarding the question of action (...) for and responsibility toward others. (shrink)

In this interesting paper, Lavazza and Massimini draw attention to a subset of the ethical issues surrounding the development and potential uses of cerebral organoids. This subset concerns the possibility that cerebral organoids may one day develop phenomenal consciousness, and thereby qualify as conscious subjects—that there may one day be something it is like to be an advanced cerebral organoid. This possibility may feel outlandish. But as Lavazza and Massimini demonstrate, the science of organoids is moving fast, and I agree (...) that the ethical issues now deserve careful scrutiny. The ethical issues are not entirely separate from epistemological issues concerning how certain we could ever be that an organoid is conscious or that regarding any conscious state or process, an organoid is capable of tokening that state or undergoing that process. Lavazza and Massimini’s approach is theory-based—they claim that ‘we need a general theory of consciousness that attempts to explain what experience is and what type of physical systems can have it’. I am not convinced, however, that a theory of consciousness is what we need. Nor am I convinced that detecting the presence of consciousness is the most important moral issue. Let me say a word regarding theories of consciousness first. In general, to the extent that pervasive disagreement characterises expert discussion of some phenomenon P, one should modify one’s credence downward regarding any theory of the nature of P. In my view, this is the case regarding expert discussion of consciousness. Although most philosophers are confident that consciousness is an entirely physical phenomenon, a …. (shrink)

In this paper I explore the relationship between skill and sensitivity to reasons for action. I want to know to what degree we can explain the fact that the skilled agent is very good at performing a cluster of actions within some domain in terms of the fact that the skilled agent has a refined sensitivity to the reasons for action common to the cluster. The picture is a little bit complex. While skill can be partially explained by sensitivity to (...) reasons – a sensitivity often produced by rational practice – the skilled human agent, because imperfect, must navigate a trade-off between full sensitivity and a capacity to succeed. (shrink)

Many think that a specific aspect of phenomenal consciousness – valenced or affective experience – is essential to consciousness’s moral significance (valence sentientism). They hold that valenced experience is necessary for well-being, or moral status, or psychological intrinsic value (or all three). Some think that phenomenal consciousness generally is necessary for non-derivative moral significance (broad sentientism). Few think that consciousness is unnecessary for moral significance (non-necessitarianism). In this paper I consider the prospects for these views. I first consider the prospects (...) for valence sentientism in light of Vulcans, beings who are conscious but without affect or valence of any sort. I think Vulcans pressure us to accept broad sentientism. But I argue that a consideration of explanations for broad sentientism opens up possible explanations for non-necessitarianism about the moral significance of consciousness. That is, once one leans away from valence sentientism because of Vulcans, one should feel pressure to accept a view on which consciousness is not necessary for well-being, moral status, or psychological intrinsic value. (shrink)

The chief themes of this discussion are as follows. First, we need a theory of the grounds of moral status that could guide practical considerations regarding how to treat the wide range of potentially conscious entities with which we are acquainted – injured humans, cerebral organoids, chimeras, artificially intelligent machines, and non-human animals. I offer an account of phenomenal value that focuses on the structure and sophistication of phenomenally conscious states at a time and over time in the mental lives (...) of conscious subjects. Second, we need to map a theory of moral status onto practical considerations. I prefer the precautionary framework proposed by many, and fruitfully precisified recently by Birch. I have suggested that in addition to further discussion surrounding the evidential bar for attributing consciousness to different types of entities, more discussion is needed regarding how value and moral status may vary across different entity-types, and regarding the sources of value in an entity’s mental life. (shrink)

The flow construct has been influential within positive psychology, sport psychology, the science of consciousness, the philosophy of agency, and popular culture. In spite of its longstanding influence, it remains unclear [a] how the constituents of the flow state ‘hang together’—how they relate to each other causally and functionally—[b] in what sense flow is an ‘optimal experience,’ and [c] how best to describe the unique phenomenology of the flow state. As a result, difficulties persist for a clear understanding of the (...) flow state’s structure and function. After explicating the standard view of the flow construct, I articulate several basic questions regarding its nature and functional roles, and I argue that these questions are best answered by integrating flow within broader streams of research on the dynamics of thought, on cognitive control resource allocation, and on creative thought. (shrink)

A majority of people regard the harmful side-effects of an agent’s behavior as much more intentional than an agent’s helpful side-effects. In this paper, I present evidence for a related asymmetry. When a side- effect action is an instance of harming, folk ascriptions are significantly impacted by the relative badness of either an agent’s main goal or her side- effect action, but not her attitude. Yet when a side- effect action is an instance of helping, folk ascriptions are sensitive to (...) an agent’s expressed attitude, but not to the relative goodness of her main goal or side- effect. It seems that the connection between harmful side-effects and intentionality is, for many, uniquely impervious to the expressed attitude of the agent in question. (shrink)

I offer an account of the experience of acting that demonstrates how agentive aspects of experience associated with the execution of intentions are richly integrated with perceptual aspects associated with parts of action taking place in the publicly observable world. On the view I elucidate, the experience of acting is often both an engagement with the world and a type of intimate acquaintance with it. In conscious action the agent consciously intervenes in the world and consciously experiences the world she (...) is changing. In section one, I discuss extant accounts of the experience of acting, noting deficiencies. In sections two and three, I develop my own account, drawing on Casey O’Callaghan’s work on multi-modal perception. In the conclusion, I discuss ramifications for psychology and philosophy. (shrink)

: I focus on Uriah Kriegel’s account of conative phenomenology. I agree with Kriegel’s argument that some conative phenomenology is primitive in that some conative phenomenal properties cannot be reduced to another kind of property. I disagree, however, with Kriegel’s specific characterization of the properties in question. Kriegel argues that the experience of deciding-and-then-trying is the core of conative phenomenology. I argue, however, that the experiences of trying and acting better occupy this place. Further, I suggest that the attitudinal component (...) of the experiences of trying and acting is not, as Kriegel suggests, best characterized in terms of commitment to the rightness or goodness of the objects of experience. Rather, I argue that the attitudinal component is best characterized in imperatival terms. Keywords : Agentive Phenomenology; Deciding; Trying; Imperatives Kriegel e la fenomenologia dell’azione Riassunto : In questo testo mi concentrerò sulla descrizione della fenomenologia conativa di Kriegel. Mentre condivido la tesi di Kriegel, secondo cui parte della fenomenologia conativa è primitiva, nel senso che parte delle proprietà fenomeniche conative non possono essere ridotte ad altri tipi di proprietà, debbo tuttavia dissentire riguardo la specifica caratterizzazione data da Kriegel delle proprietà in questione. Kriegel ritiene che l’esperienza del decidere-e-poi-sforzarsi sia il nucleo della fenomenologia conativa. Io direi tuttavia che le esperienze dello sforzo e dell’azione occupano meglio questa posizione. Inoltre, suggerirei che la componente relativa all’atteggiamento delle esperienze dello sforzo e dell’azione non sia descrivibile al meglio, come suggerisce Kriegel, in termini di impegno legato all’adeguatezza o all’integrità dell’oggetto d’esperienza. Direi piuttosto che la componente dell’atteggiamento sia meglio descrivibile in termini imperativi.. Parole chiave : Fenomenologia dell’agentività; Atto della decisione; Atto dello sforzo; Imperativi. (shrink)

Ned Block has recently pressed a new criticism of the higher-order thought (HOT) theory of consciousness. HOT proponents have responded in turn. The exchange affords a chance to find some clarity concerning the essential commitments of HOT, as well as a chance to find clarity on the issues that divide Block and HOT proponents. In this paper I discuss the recent exchange, and I draw some lessons. First, I side with HOT proponents in arguing that new criticism presents no new (...) problem for HOT. Second, I argue that the issues separating Block and HOT proponents suggest that two separate debates are being conflated, and I suggest that keeping them distinct will yield progress for consciousness studies. (shrink)

I argue that moral skill is limited and precarious. It is limited because global moral skill—the capacity for morally excellent behaviour within an über action domain, such as the domain of living, or of all-things-considered decisions, or the same kind of capacity applied across a superset of more specific action domains—is not to be found in humans. It is precarious because relatively local moral skill, while possible, is prone to misfire. My arguments depend upon the diversity of practical structures confronting (...) human agents, the limitations of human skill learning and reason-sensitivity, and the failure of moral considerations to respect the social and institutional boundaries we develop to structure our practical lives. (shrink)

This chapter revolves around the problem of the disappearing agent. Shepherd suggests that as typically formulated, the problem relies on an improper focus upon the causation of action, and an inadequate characterization of agency. One result is that a key function of mental action for human agents tends to be misconstrued. Furthermore, Shepherd argues that an adequate characterization of agency illuminates why agents may seem (misleadingly) to disappear in some cases of action, and illuminates as well a key (...) function of mental action for human (and similar) agents. According to the sketch offered in this chapter, mental action enables human agents to rationally glue themselves together. (shrink)

In this book Shepherd and Wicke make a bold and original contribution to the understanding of music as a form of human expression. They argue that music is fundamental to social life. Music is not merely a form of leisure or entertainment: it is central to the very formation and reproduction of human societies. The authors pursue this argument through a wide-ranging assessment of some of the major cultural theoretical contributions to understanding music. Theories of culture, linguistic theories, structuralist (...) and post-structuralist theories and psychoanalytic theories of music are carefully explained and critically examined. The authors then develop their own account of music as a non-referential yet material form of human expression which embodies and conveys principles of symbolic structuring. They emphasize the human body as a principal site for the musical mediation of social and symbolic processes. Music and Cultural Theory establishes new links between musicology and cultural studies, showing how each discipline can inform and enrich the other. It will be recommended reading for students and professionals in musicology, media and communication studies, cultural studies and the sociology of culture. (shrink)

Society is failing in its moral obligation to improve the standard of healthcare provided to vulnerable populations, such as people who lack decision making capacity, by a misguided paternalism that seeks to protect them by excluding them from medical research. Uncertainties surround the basis on which decisions about research participation is made under dual regulatory regimes, which adds further complexity. Vulnerable individuals’ exclusion from research as a result of such regulation risks condemning such populations to poor quality care as a (...) result of ‘evidence biased’ medicine. This paper explores the research regulation provisions for proxy decision making for those unable to provide informed consent for themselves, and the subsequent legal and practical difficulties for decision-makers. There are two separate regulatory regimes governing research involving adults who lack capacity to consent in England and Wales. The Mental Capacity Act 2005 governs how incapacitated adults can be involved in research, however clinical trials of medicinal products are separately regulated by the Medicines for Human Use Regulations 2004. There are significant differences under these dual regimes in the provisions for those lacking capacity to participate in medical research. The level of risk permitted differs, with a greater requirement for justification for participation in a clinical trial than other types of research. Who acts as proxy decision maker, how much information is provided to the person lacking capacity, and whether they retain the power of veto also significantly differs. The development of two separate regulatory regimes has resulted in significant differences between the provisions for clinical trials and other forms of research, and from usual medical practice. The resulting uncertainty has reinforced the tendency of those approving and conducting research to exclude adults lacking capacity to avoid difficult decisions about seeking consent for their participation. Future developments, such as the incoming EU Regulations, may address some of these differences, however the justification and level of risk permitted requires review to ensure that requirements are appropriate and proportionate to the burdens and risks for the individual, and also to the benefits for the wider population represented. (shrink)

First, what are the psychological roots of our concept of free will? Second, how might progress on the first question contribute to progress regarding normative debates about the proper concept of free will? In sections two and three I address the first question. Section two discusses recent work in the experimental philosophy of free will, and motivates the study I report in section three. Section four reflects on the second question in light of the reported results. To preview, the results (...) suggest that the psychological structure of our concept of free will is sensitive to three independent features: Liberty, Ensurance, and Consciousness. I argue this supports the view that our concept is incompatibilist more than the view that our concept is compatibilist, and I discuss two proposals regarding the normative upshot. On one proposal, these results might be taken to offer some support to incompatibilism about the proper concept. A second proposal, however, makes room for a much different upshot. (shrink)

One of the central insights of the embodied cognition (EC) movement is that cognition is closely tied to action. In this paper, I formulate an EC-inspired hypothesis concerning social cognition. In this domain, most think that our capacity to understand and interact with one another is best explained by appeal to some form of mindreading. I argue that prominent accounts of mindreading likely contain a significant lacuna. Evidence indicates that what I call an agent’s actional processes and states—her goals, needs, (...) intentions, desires, and so on—likely play important roles in and for mindreading processes. If so, a full understanding of mindreading processes and their role in cognition more broadly will require an understanding of how actional mental processes interact with, influence, or take part in mindreading processes. (shrink)

I argue that the neural realizers of experiences of trying are not distinct from the neural realizers of actual trying . I then ask how experiences of trying might relate to the perceptual experiences one has while acting. First, I assess recent zombie action arguments regarding conscious visual experience, and I argue that contrary to what some have claimed, conscious visual experience plays a causal role for action control in some circumstances. Second, I propose a multimodal account of the experience (...) of acting. According to this account, the experience of acting is a temporally extended, co-conscious collection of agentive and perceptual experiences, functionally integrated and structured both by multimodal perceptual processing as well as by what an agent is, at the time, trying to do. (shrink)

In this paper I consider an argument for the possibility of intending at will, and its relationship to an argument about the possibility of believing at will. I argue that although we have good reason to think we sometimes intend at will, we lack good reason to think this in the case of believing. Instead of believing at will, agents like us often suppose at will.

The article focuses on the work of Ian Wallace, Jeff Wall and Rodney Graham, in particular, a notion of the studio that provides both an anchor and departure for the work of all three. This genealogy turns primarily on Wallace’s photo-conceptual work from the 1970s, which establishes the space of the studio as an allegory of painting or the modernist tradition, and as the topological equivalent of the museum and street. Using Wallace’s model of post-studio practice as an analytic, the (...) article unpacks the tensions of Wall’s notion of cinematography, highlighting his mounting hesitations with photography understood on the model of the studio system, as an inside/outside relationship and as the mimesis of painting. Finally, the article puts the notions of studio as genealogy and dispositif to work in order to understand the logic of Graham’s emphasis on the durational art of film. (shrink)

Some of the things we do intentionally we do halfheartedly. I develop and defend an account of halfheartedness with respect to action on which one is halfhearted with respect to an action A if one’s overall motivation to A is weak. This requires getting clear on what it is to have some level of overall motivation with respect to an action, and on what it means to say one’s overall motivation is weak or strong. After developing this account, I defend (...) the claim that one key functional expression of halfhearted action is the possession of impaired control over the action in question. Finally, I elucidate a puzzle that sometimes arises with respect to halfhearted action. The puzzle arises when an agent’s commitment in acting conflicts with an agent’s acceptance of poor performance. (shrink)

To a first approximation, ‘bodily skill’ refers to the capacity to successfully utilize the body in the world to achieve goals. But the body is complex, and bodily skill manifests in many different ways. Further, work on bodily skill spans the philosophy of mind, action, and cognitive science, as well as the sciences of motor control and perception. This chapter aims to provide an overview of recent themes and key ideas. First, we review work on the nature of skill as (...) such. Second, we discuss ways theorists have discussed the implementation of skill in the human body, and a theoretical difficulty associated with explanations of implementation. Third, we discuss the importance of the idea of a hierarchical representational architecture for understanding skill’s implementation, and various ways this architecture can be made more sophisticated. Fourth, we discuss work that attempts to understand skill execution on-the-fly, and in particular, work that attempts to understand the connection between intentions and motor representations, and the connection between implicit sensorimotor adaptation and explicit planning and executive control. Fifth, we discuss work on the models that assist fine-grained skill execution, as well as the idea that even at rapid, fine-grained motoric levels, one finds intelligent systems and mechanisms supporting skill. Finally, we consider the place of bodily awareness in an account of bodily skill. (shrink)

Common-sense folk psychology and mainstream philosophy of action agree about decisions: these are under an agent's direct control, and are thus intentional actions for which agents can be held responsible. I begin this paper by presenting a problem for this view. In short, since the content of the motivational attitudes that drive deliberation and decision remains open-ended until the moment of decision, it is unclear how agents can be thought to exercise control over what they decide at the moment of (...) deciding. I note that this problem might motivate a non-actional view of deciding?a view that decisions are not actions, but are instead passive events of intention acquisition. For without an understanding of how an agent might exercise control over what is decided at the moment of deciding, we lack a good reason for maintaining commitment to an actional view of deciding. However, I then offer the required account of how agents exercise control over decisions at the moment of deciding. Crucial to this account is an understanding of the relation of practical deliberation to deciding, an understanding of skilled deliberative activity, and the role of attention in the mental action of deciding. (shrink)