The metaphysics of gender and race is a growing area of concern in contemporary analytic metaphysics, with many different views about the nature of gender and race being submitted and discussed. But what are these debates about? What questions are these accounts trying to answer? And is there real disagreement between advocates of differ- ent views about race or gender? If so, what are they really disagreeing about? In this paper I want to develop a view about what the debates (...) in the metaphysics of gender and race are about, namely, a version of metaphysical deflationism, according to which these debates are about how we actually use or should use the terms ‘gender’ and ‘race’ (and other related terms), where moral and political considerations play a central role. I will also argue that my version of the view can overcome some recent and powerful objections to metaphysical deflationism of- fered by Elizabeth Barnes (2014, 2017). (shrink)

We formulate and explore two basic axiomatic systems of type-free subjective probability. One of them explicates a notion of finitely additive probability. The other explicates a concept of infinitely additive probability. It is argued that the first of these systems is a suitable background theory for formally investigating controversial principles about type-free subjective probability.

This article investigates the relationship between emotional sharing and the extended mind thesis. We argue that shared emotions are socially extended emotions that involve a specific type of constitutive integration between the participating individuals’ emotional experiences. We start by distinguishing two claims, the Environmentally Extended Emotion Thesis and the Socially Extended Emotion Thesis. We then critically discuss some recent influential proposals about the nature of shared emotions. Finally, in Sect. 3, we motivate two conditions that an account of shared emotions (...) ought to accommodate: Reciprocal Other-awareness and Integration. Consideration of and discussion of relational accounts of joint attention lead us to the proposal that a construal of socially extended emotions in terms of a constitutive integration of the participating individuals’ experiences is more promising than proposals that simply appeal to various forms of social situatedness, embeddedness, or scaffolding. (shrink)

On a widely held characterization, triadic joint attention is the capacity to perceptually attend to an object or event together with another subject. In the last four decades, research in developmental psychology has provided increasing evidence of the crucial role that this capacity plays in socio-cognitive development, early language acquisition, and the development of perspective-taking. Yet, there is a striking discrepancy between the general agreement that joint attention is critical in various domains, and the lack of theoretical consensus on how (...) to account for it. This paper pursues three interrelated aims: (i) it examines the contrast between reductive and non-reductive views of (triadic) joint attention, by bringing into focus the notion of recursive mindreading; (ii) it assembles, advances, and discusses a number of arguments against reductive views; (iii) finally, in dialogue with some prominent non-reductive views, it outlines the case for a non-reductive view that gives pride of place to the idea that co-attenders relate to one another as a ‘you’. (shrink)

Como reacción a la recuperación académica de un Marx completamente desvinculado de la tradición marxista-leninista realizada a finales del siglo xx, las dos últimas décadas han presenciado un nuevo intento, propiamente filosófico, de rescatar partes del pensamiento de Lenin, si bien se han llevado a cabo desde posiciones epistemológicas, y con objetivos políticos, altamente divergentes. El presente artículo analiza y compara las que consideramos que son las dos líneas principales de esta recuperación: La liderada por Slavoj Žižek desde posiciones sociosimbólicas (...) post-althusserianas, y la desarrollada por Antonio Negri y Michael Hardt a partir de la ontología deleuzoguattariana y el post-operaísmo. (shrink)

One way to theorize about we-identities—the identities that individual subjects have as ‘one of us’—is in terms of the uniformity, interchangeability, and prototypicality of group members. The social-psychological theory of self-categorization epitomizes this approach, which has strongly influenced contemporary phenomenological research on the we. This paper argues that this approach has one important and largely overlooked limitation: the we-identities tied to close personal relationships—exemplified by long-term friendships and romantic partnerships—are based on patterns of interpersonal interaction and integration through which individuals (...) tend to grasp their non-substitutability and complementarity. This limitation suggests that another approach is needed to tackle the we-identities characteristic of close personal relationships. I outline such an approach, by combining resources from classical phenomenology and ongoing research on the socially extended mind. (shrink)

This article is concerned with reflection principles in the context of Cantor’s conception of the set-theoretic universe. We argue that within such a conception reflection principles can be formulated that confer intrinsic plausibility to strong axioms of infinity.

This article engages critically with Margaret Gilbert’s proposal that joint commitments are necessary for collective emotions. After introducing Gilbert’s concept of joint commitment (Section 2), and the joint commitment account of collective emotions (Section 3), we argue in Section 4 that research from developmental psychology challenges the necessity of joint commitments for collective emotions. In that section, we also raise a more principled objection to Gilbert’s account, independently of developmental considerations. Section 5 develops a complementary line of argument, focused on (...) the notion of mutual recognition. While we agree with Gilbert that mutual recognition has an important role to play in an account of collective emotions, we take issue with her attempt to analyse face-to-face based mutual recognition in terms of the concept of joint commitment. We conclude by sketching an alternative analysis of collective emotions that highlights the role of interpersonal identification and socially mediated self-consciousness. (shrink)

This article investigates the relationship between for-me-ness and sociality. I start by pointing out some ambiguities in claims pursued by critics that have recently pressed on the relationship between the two notions. I next articulate a question concerning for-me-ness and sociality that builds on the idea that, occasionally at least, there is something it is like ‘for us’ to have an experience. This idea has been explored in recent literature on shared experiences and collective intentionality, and it gestures towards the (...) question of the extent to which some social interactions make a difference in the phenomenal character of their participants’ experiences. Finally, I present a construal of for-us-ness that complements the received understanding of for-me-ness, by drawing on Alfred Schutz’ concept of the we-relationship, and on the idea of second-personal awareness, i.e. awareness of a ‘you’. The current proposal provides a suitable account of some basic forms of phenomenally manifest social connectedness, in a way that is cognitively undemanding and without incurring the costs of a sui generis plural pre-reflective self-awareness. (shrink)

The relationship between aesthetic value and other moral and cognitive values has been a key theme within contemporary aesthetic discussion. In this article, I explore once again the implications of this relationship, but from what I think might be a different angle. With few exceptions, notably Dominic Lopes, most of the contributions to this issue have dealt with the impact that moral or cognitive values could possibly have on the overall aesthetic value of a work of art. In this article, (...) I explore instead how aesthetic properties or merits could play a role in explaining moral and cognitive properties. To do so, I first offer some examples that I think may reasonably exemplify the phenomenon we are considering. Second, I argue that a proper account of interactionism should meet at least two constraints: the relevance constraint and the autonomy constraint. Finally, I try to clarify how it is possible that aesthetic properties substantially contribute to other values by appealing to the notions of expression and the affective character of aesthetic properties. (shrink)

Recent AI progress led to a boost in beneficial applications from multiple research areas including VR. Simultaneously, in this newly unfolding deepfake era, ethically and security-relevant disagreements arose in the scientific community regarding the epistemic capabilities of present-day AI. However, given what is at stake, one can postulate that for a responsible approach, prior to engaging in a rigorous epistemic assessment of AI, humans may profit from a self-questioning strategy, an examination and calibration of the experience of their own epistemic (...) agency – especially to counteract both intentional misdirection by unethical actors and unintentional epistemic self-sabotage. In this paper, we expound on a new avenue of utilizing AIVR tools to advance an AI-related misdirection awareness of humans in the deepfake era. Firstly, we harness scientific knowledge from the psychology and neuroscience of magic where the study of misdirection techniques is center stage. Secondly, we connect the latter to creativity research linking human creative potential to inspiration from the seemingly impossible. Overall, AIVR could become an empowering experiential testbed for human epistemic agency enabling a better rational evaluation of AI capabilities. However, a misuse of the same type of tools could yield AIVR safety risks if not counteracted preemptively. (shrink)

Para explorar las diferencias significativas entre estos dos pensadores, la primera parte de este articulo considerará sus ideas ontológicas. Comenzando con su preocupación común por la multiplicidad, exploraremos el movimiento fundacional de Deleuze hacia diferentes tipos de multiplicidad. La crítica de Badiou a este enfoque estará relacionada con su defensa de los recursos abstractos de la teoría de conjuntos en oposición a las síntesis concretas con las que Deleuze busca comenzar. La segunda parte de este documento explorará las consecuencias de (...) los compromisos ontológicos de Deleuze cuando se trata de la ética del acontecimiento exigido por Badiou. El compromiso de Deleuze con el estoicismo proporcionará el escenario para su explicación de cómo ocurren los acontecimientos y representa una fuente de pensamiento y actividad. En la tercera y última parte se buscará evaluar la explicación de Deleuze sobre el papel de los acontecimientos en situaciones particulares y en las actividades de los sujetos que responden a estos. Esto nos permitirá sacar conclusiones sobre la crítica de Badiou a Deleuze y la capacidad de Deleuze para resistir estas críticas. Argumentaré que Deleuze comparte con Badiou la preocupación de mantener una visión clara del tema como una figura comprometida en la búsqueda de proyectos nuevos e inauditos que responden al llamado de los acontecimientos. (shrink)

There are two perspectives from which formal theories can be viewed. On the one hand, one can take a theory to be about some privileged models. On the other hand, one can take all models of a theory to be on a par. In contrast with what is usually done in philosophical debates, we adopt the latter viewpoint. Suppose that from this perspective we want to add an adequate truth predicate to a background theory. Then on the one hand the (...) truth theory ought to be semantically conservative over the background theory. At the same time, it is generally recognised that the central function of a truth predicate is an expressive one. A truth predicate ought to allow us to express propositions that we could not express before. In this article we argue that there are indeed natural truth theories which satisfy both the demand of semantical conservativeness and the demand of adequately extending the expressive power of our language. (shrink)

The confinement that COVID-19 has brought about has had a negative influence on people’s psychological health. However, this impact is not widespread throughout the population, and men and women may be affected differently and it is not known what protective factors may exist. In this sense, physical activity has classically been shown to be a habit associated with psychological health. The study aimed to analyze the impact of confinement on psychological health, taking into account gender, and perceived changes in physical (...) activity. After the project was approved by the University’s Ethics Commission, the participants, after signing the informed consent, completed the online questionnaires during the days from 6 to 20 April, the time when, in Spain, confinement was in place and the highest peak of deaths and infections from COVID-19 occurred. A total of 457 Spanish participants were evaluated in psychological well-being, in its adaptation to Spanish, in coping, with the Spanish adaptation of the COPE Inventory, in daily habits and difficulties and the level of physical activity they had was recorded. Besides, the perceived change in physical activity due to confinement was recorded. The results showed that perceived emotions, difficulties for certain routines, psychological well-being, and coping differed according to sex. On the other hand, depending on the change in physical activity habits, it was observed that participants who increased their physical activity responded differently in the perception of emotions, and difficulties for routines and in psychological well-being. Finally, differences were also observed in most variables between sedentary, active, and federated participants. Results are discussed highlighting the importance of physical activity as a moderating factor of the impact of confinement. (shrink)

In this article, we offer a rebuttal to a key thesis in Chapter 5 of Engelhardt’s After God: namely, that there exists an “unbridgeable gap” between the dominant secular culture and traditional religious believers. Contra Engelhardt, we argue that it is possible to bridge the gap by employing a strategy that includes, but is not limited to, methods for cultivating understanding and respect and a sense of solidarity. Our argument proceeds in three steps. First, we elucidate Engelhardt’s thesis in light (...) of some of the key concepts he discusses elsewhere in After God. Second, in the hope of developing understanding and respect, we elucidate the history and teachings that form the consciences of traditional Christian medical professionals concerning abortion, euthanasia, and disfiguring surgeries. Third, in the hope of developing a sense of solidarity, we explain the broad scope of the dominant secular culture’s attempt to limit people’s freedom of conscience rights, showing that it includes not only traditional Christians but also members of other traditional religions, members of mainline religious groups, people with alternative conceptions of secularity, and even faithful members of the dominant secular culture. (shrink)

Every word signifies multiple senses. Many studies using comprehension-based measures suggest that polysemes’ senses share lexical representations, whereas homophones’ meanings correspond to distinct lexical representations. Less is known about the lexical representations of polysemes compared to homophones in language production. In this study, speakers named pictures after reading sentence fragments that primed polysemes and homophones either as direct competitors to pictures, or as indirect-competitors to pictures. Polysemes elicited equal numbers of intrusions to picture names compared to in control conditions whether (...) primed as direct competitors or as indirect-competitors. This contrasted with the finding that homophones elicited more intrusions to picture names compared to in control conditions when primed as direct competitors than when primed as indirect-competitors. These results suggest that polysemes, unlike homophones, are stored and retrieved as unified lexical representations. (shrink)

Book reviewed in this article: Toward a More Natural Science: Biology and Human Affairs. By Leon R. Kass.

En este artículo analizaremos los posibles criterios epistemológicos que, en el contexto de la filosofía hegeliana de la historia mundial, circunscriben el largo proceso revolucionario haitiano en un no-lugar narrativo. Contrario al imaginario político, económico y cultural europeo de fines del siglo XVIII y comienzos del siglo XIX, que vio en la Revolución haitiana un acontecimiento que directa o indirectamente repercute en las transformación geopolítica global, en los discursos abolicionistas y en la flujos comerciales a través del Atlántico, Hegel parece (...) en principio desatender la especificidad del proceso, aunque, como sostenemos en este contexto, es posible rastrear los motivos de una exclusión deliberada que responder a una ideas precisas de libertad y terror que anteceden, y por tanto determinan, el lugar de la Revolución haitiana en la historia mundial. (shrink)