CFP: The Body Represented/Embodied Representation

The Body Represented/Embodied Representation

Review of Philosophy and Psychology 3(1), 2012

Adrian J.T. Smith & Frédérique de Vignemont (eds.)

Submission deadline: 15 August 2011

Cognition is embodied. The body is represented. Is there genuinely a convergence of ideas here? Does the claim that representations of the body support cognitive processes amount to the claim that the latter are embodied? What are the important open questions emerging
from sensorimotor and embodied accounts of cognition? What are the advances that have been made? This issue will explore the landscape beyond the
ideological differences in which embodied and sensorimotor approaches to cognitive science first emerged. It aims to discern avenues of concrete
progress with contributions from fields including comparative, developmental, and perceptual psychology, cognitive neuroscience, and philosophy.
Contributions will serve to clarify the concept of embodiment, its productive value and contemporary worth in the study of mind, and its relation to the
emerging focus on body representation in contemporary cognitive neuroscience. The focus will be upon general agreement and the prospects of achieving
it. To this end we invite contributions specifically anchored in discussion of one of the particular issues highlighted below. Each contribution ought
to be made with a view to encompassing more than one disciplinary domain. We are not looking for revised manifestos, but for genuinely novel
contributions to an advancement of the field.

Themes and questions to be addressed include but are not limited to the following:

• How embodied is a mind that represents its body?

Despite its radical anti-representational roots, embodied cognitive science is often presented as entirely compatible with a representational theory
of mind. But does positing representations of the body complement or challenge an understanding of the mind as embodied rather than merely
embrained?

• Higher cognition and sensorimotor loops: Is there a difference that makes a difference?

The coordination of sensory and motor functions is a capacity shared between the most basic and the most advanced cognitive systems. Is the claim
that human cognition is unique in genuine conflict with its putative sensorimotor origins?

• To what extent are cognitive capacities learnt through action?

A variety of factors have been hypothesised as playing a role in the acquisition of cognitive capacities, such as innate core modules, linguistic
bootstrapping, and sensorimotor engagement. Does sensorimotor learning have a special role in bootstrapping higher cognitive capacities? What is the
balance between these factors? Does their contribution vary from one domain to another (e.g. from spatial cognition to mathematics)?

Guest authors

The issue will include invited articles authored by:

• Salvatore Aglioti, University of Rome, Matteo Candidi, University of Rome, & Patrick Haggard, University
  College London
• Ned Block, New York University & J. Kevin O'Regan, Paris Descartes University
• Shaun Gallagher, University of Memphis & Daniel Povinelli, University of Louisiana Lafayette
• Alvin Goldman, Rutgers University

Order of authorship is alphabetical.

Important dates

• Submission deadline: 15 August 2011
• Target publication date: 15 March 2012

How to submit

Prospective authors should register at: www.editorialmanager.com/ropp to obtain a login and
select The Body Represented/Embodied Representation as an article type. Manuscripts should be approximately 8,000 words.
Submissions should follow the author guidelines available on the journal's website.

About the journal

The Review of Philosophy and Psychology (ISSN: 1878-5158; eISSN: 1878-5166) is a peer-reviewed journal published quarterly by Springer and focusing on philosophical and foundational issues in cognitive science. The aim of the journal is to provide a forum for discussion on topics of mutual interest to philosophers and psychologists and to foster interdisciplinary research at the crossroads of philosophy and the sciences of the mind, including the neural, behavioural and social sciences.

The journal publishes theoretical works grounded in empirical research as well as empirical articles on issues of philosophical relevance. It includes thematic issues featuring invited contributions from leading authors together with articles answering a call for paper.

Contact

Any questions? Please email the guest editors:
adrianjtsmith@gmail.com - frederique.de.vignemont@ens.fr

Pete Mandik, Slow Earth and the Slow-switching Slowdown Showdown | PhilPapers

Pete Mandik, Slow Earth and the Slow-switching Slowdown Showdown | PhilPapers

The present paper has three aims. The first and foremost aim is to introduce into philosophy of mind and related areas (philosophy of language, etc) a discussion of Slow Earth, an analogue to the classic Twin Earth scenario that features a difference from aboriginal Earth that hinges on time instead of the distribution of natural kinds. The second aim is to use Slow Earth to call into question the central lessons often alleged to flow from consideration of Twin Earth, lessons having to do with relations of minds to spatially definable boundaries of bodies such as skin or skull. The third aim is to suggest a puzzle for adherents of cognitive content externalism having to do with the metaphysical requirements on slow-switching, a hypothetical process whereby changes in the relations between subjects and their environments are followed by gradual changes in cognitive contents.

Eric Dietrich, There Is No Progress in Philosophy | PhilPapers

Eric Dietrich, There Is No Progress in Philosophy | PhilPapers

Eric Dietrich (2011). There Is No Progress in Philosophy. Essays in Philosophy 12 (2).
ABSTRACT:

Except for a patina of twenty-first century modernity, in the form of logic and language, philosophy is exactly the same now as it ever was; it has made no progress whatsoever. We philosophers wrestle with the exact same problems the Pre-Socratics wrestled with. Even more outrageous than this claim, though, is the blatant denial of its obvious truth by many practicing philosophers. The No-Progress view is explored and argued for here. Its denial is diagnosed as a form of anosognosia, a mental condition where the affected person denies there is any problem. The theories of two eminent philosophers supporting the No-Progress view are also examined. The final section offers an explanation for philosophy's inability to solve any philosophical problem, ever. The paper closes with some reflections on philosophy's future.

Tracking down the Russell joke about solipsism

"As against solipsism it is to be said, in the first place, that it is psychologically impossible to believe, and is rejected in fact even by those who mean to accept it. I once received a letter from an eminent logician, Mrs. Christine Ladd-Franklin, saying that she was a solipsist, and was surprised that there were no others. Coming from a logician and a solipsist, her surprise surprised me." (Russell, p. 180). Russell, Bertrand., Human Knowledge: Its Scope and Limits,London: George Allen & Unwin, 1948.

Bat-winged Skull Chickens drawing by Pete Mandik

Bat-winged Skull Chickens, pen and ink, scanned and colored in Photoshop, 2008.

At Brains: Was Psychosemantics a Failure?

Brains: Was Psychosemantics a Failure?

Career Advice: Getting a Job in Philosophy - Inside Higher Ed

Career Advice: Getting a Job in Philosophy - Inside Higher Ed:

Getting a Job in Philosophy

June 20, 2011

By Brian L. Keeley

These suggestions are based on my personal experiences as a graduate student at the University of California at San Diego, as a postdoc at Washington University in St. Louis, and as an assistant professor at the University of Northern Iowa. While my experiences are in philosophy, much of this advice would apply to other humanities fields as well.

There are different things that can be done at different points in your graduate career. This series of recommendations will be broken down by year. I will take as my ideal a person who goes on the market for the first time in the fall of his or her fifth year. Obviously, if you go out sooner or later, the time frame will shrink or expand accordingly. (However, the longer you wait, the more urgency there will be that you get a job immediately.) Also, the order is more or less arbitrary.

Jackson's Mary thought experiment as a rap video

"Trumpalump" by Dels. All the monochrome stuff is done with paint.

Posted via email from petemandik's posterous

Bach, Toccata and Fugue in D minor, organ

On Malinowski's Music Animation Machine:

Posted via email from petemandik's posterous

New Books in Philosophy Podcast

Here's announcement of a new cool thing I just got from Rob Talisse:

I write to announce a new podcast, New Books in Philosophy. Carrie Figdor (U of Iowa) and I co-host the podcast, and each episode features an in-depth interview with an author of a newly-published philosophy book. Interviews will be posted on the 1st and 15th of each month. The inaugural interview, posted today, is with Eric Schwitzgebel (UC Riverside), author of Perplexities of Consciousness (MIT Press). An interview with Jerry Gaus (Arizona), author of The Order of Public Reason (Cambridge University Press), will be posted on July 1st. Upcoming podcasts include interviews with Robert Pasnau, Sandy Goldberg, Carolyn Korsmeyer, Fabienne Peter, Allen Buchanan, and others. Please click over to the NBiP site, and check out what we’re doing.

Here’s a link to the interview with Eric Schwitzgebel:

http://newbooksinphilosophy.com/2011/06/15/eric-schwitzgebel-perplexities-of-consciousness-mit-press-2011/