Argumenta – Journal of Analytic Philosophy

The Phenomenological Turn in Analytic Philosophy of Mind

 

Guest editors:

Michele Di Francesco (IUSS Pavia)

Marco Facchin (IUSS Pavia)

Giulia Piredda (IUSS Pavia)

Giacomo Zanotti (IUSS Pavia)

 

Invited Contributors:

Jérôme Dokic (Institut Jean Nicod)

Anna Giustina (University of Liège)

Angela Mendelovici (University of Western Ontario)

Elisabetta Sacchi (San Raffaele Vita-Salute University, Milan)

Alfredo Tomasetta (IUSS Pavia)

Alberto Voltolini (University of Turin)

 

Important dates

Deadline for submission: January 22, 2023

Notification of acceptance: February 28, 2023

 

For any query, use please the following addresses: marco.facchin@iusspavia.it or giulia.piredda@iusspavia.it

 

Description: Two assumptions have long prevailed in the analytic tradition. First, intentionality has to be conceived as some sort of naturalistic relation holding between a subject’s mental states and the objects these states represent. Second, phenomenology pertains only to sensory states. Recently, however, a number of philosophers have broken free of this tradition. While these new proposals are fairly heterogeneous, they revolve around two major theses. First, the claim that the intentionality of mental states is best understood in terms of a subject’s phenomenal experience, and that indeed all forms of intentionality are rooted in phenomenology (cf. Kriegel 2014; Mendelovici 2018). Secondly, the claim that phenomenology extends beyond the sensory domain and covers a subject’s thought and propositional attitudes (cf. Pitt 2004; Horgan 2011). This diversion is rapidly gaining momentum, so much so that we are witnessing a phenomenological turn taking place in analytic philosophy of mind, challenging more traditional approaches.

 

We invite submission of original papers addressing issues that are relevant for the debate on analytic phenomenology. Question tackled in this Special Issue include, but are not limited to, the following:

 

  • Does a state’s phenomenology determine the state’s content? And if so, how is intentional content determined by the phenomenal properties of a mental state?
  • How does this novel approach impact traditional philosophical issues concerning content, such as content internalism/externalism, conceptualism/non-conceptualism, propositional attitudes, and the metaphysics of mental content more generally?
  • Is an account of intentionality based on phenomenal properties necessarily non-naturalistic or non-reductive? How could phenomenology-based and “classical” (reductive and naturalistic) approaches to intentionality interact?
  • Are phenomenology-based accounts of intentionality related to first-person cognitive science and the field of consciousness studies more generally? And if so, how should this relation be spelled out? Can phenomenology-based accounts of intentionality be falsified or supported by empirical means?
  • Assuming that phenomenology goes beyond the sensory sphere, what kinds of non-sensory phenomenologies are there (e.g. agency, freedom, for-me-ness, cognitive phenomenology, etc)? And what is their nature?
  • Should proponents of phenomenal intentionality also accept the existence of non-sensory kinds of phenomenologies (e.g. for-me-ness, cognitive phenomenology)?
  • In the analytic phenomenology perspective, how are conscious and unconscious mental states related?
  • Methodological issues in analytic phenomenology

 

References:

Bourget, D., & Mendelovici, A. (2019). Phenomenal Intentionality. In E. Zalta, The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Fall 2019 Edition), https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2019/entries/phenomenal-intentionality

Dokic, J. (2012). “Seeds of Knowledge: Noetic Feelings and Metacognition”. In M. Beran, J. L. Brandl, J. Perner & J. Proust, (eds.). Foundations of Metacognition, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 302-320.

Dokic, J. & Lemaire, S. (2013). Are Emotions Perceptions of Value? Canadian Journal of Philosophy, 43(2), 227-247

Dokic, J. (2016). Toward a Unified Account of Hallucinations. Journal of Consciousness Studies, 23(7-8), 82-99.

Giustina, A. (2017). Conscious unity from the top-down. A Brentanian Approach. The Monist, 100(1), 15-36.

Giustina, A. (2021). Introspective acquaintance: an integration account. European Journal of Philosophy, https://doi.org/10.1111/ejop.12690

Giustina, A. (2021). Introspection without judgment. Erkenntnis, 86, 407-427.

Horgan, T. (2011). “From agentive phenomenology to Cognitive Phenomenology: A guide for the perplexed”. In Bayne, T. and Montague, M. (Eds.), Cognitive Phenomenology. New York: Oxford University Press.

Kriegel, U. (2014). The Sources of Intentionality. New York: Oxford University Press.

Mendelovici, A., & Bourget, D. (2014). Naturalizing Intentionality: tracking theories versus phenomenal intentionality theories. Philosophy Compass, 9(5), 325-337.

Mendelovici, A. (2018). The Phenomenal Basis of Intentionality. New York: Oxford University Press.

Pitt, D. (2004). “The Phenomenology of Cognition, or What it is Like to Think That P?”. Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, 69(1), 1-36.

Sacchi, E. (2007). “Thought and Thinking: the Ontological Ground of Intentionality”. In M. Beaney et al. (eds.), Explaining the Mental. Naturalist and Non-Naturalist Approaches to Mental Acts and Processes, Cambridge: Cambridge Scholar Press, 135-152.

Sacchi, E. (2020) Aspettualità dell’intenzionalità e prospetticità del mentale: in difesa di un resoconto pluralista, Rivista di Filosofia, 2, 179-214, DOI: 10.1413/97570

Sacchi, E. (2021), Is so-called Phenomenal Intentionality Real Intentionality? Axiomathes, https://doi.org/10.1007/s10516-021-09549-4

Tomasetta, A. (2015), Persone umane. Teorie contemporanee in metafisica analitica, Carocci: Roma.

Tomasetta, A. (2015). Physicalist naturalism in the philosophy of mind. Discipline Filosofiche, 25, 89-111.

Tomasetta, A. (2016), Knowledge by Experience. Or Why Physicalism Should not be Our Default Position in Consciousness Studies Rivista Internazionale di Filosofia e Psicologia, 7(1), 2016,  37-47.

Voltolini, A. (2020), Why the Mark of the Dispositional Is Not the Mark of the Intentional, The Journal for the Philosophy of Language, Mind, and the Arts, 1, 19-32.

Voltolini, A. (2021), Intentionality in the Tractatus, Disputatio, 10, 133-144.

Voltolini, A. (2021), Troubles with Phenomenal Intentionality, Erkenntnis, https://doi.org/10.1007/s10670-019-00193-4.

 

Instructions for authors: articles should be written in English and prepared for blind review. Articles should not exceed 8000 words, and submissions should include an abstract of no more than 250 words and five keywords for indexing purposes. For further instruction, please refer to the section Information for Authors. The editors kindly ask authors to notify the intent to submit beforehand. If possible, a title and a brief summary of the contribution’s content should be included. This will be of great assistance in the coordination and planning of the special issue.