Comparatively easy questions we might ask about creativity are distinguished from the hard question of explaining transformative creativity. Many have focused on the easy questions, offering no reason to think that the imagining relied upon in creative cognition cannot be reduced to more basic folk psychological states. The relevance of associative thought processes to songwriting is then explored as a means for understanding the nature of transformative creativity. Productive artificial neural networks—known as generative antagonistic networks (GANs)—are a recent example of (...) how a system’s ability to generate novel products can both be finely tuned by prior experience and grounded in strategies that cannot be articulated by the system itself. Further, the kinds of processes exploited by GANs need not be seen as incorporating something akin to sui generis imaginative states. The chapter concludes with reflection on the added relevance of personal character to explanations of creativity. [This is Chapter 12 of the book Explaining Imagination.]. (shrink)

Currie’s (2010) argument that “i-desires” must be posited to explain our responses to fiction is critically discussed. It is argued that beliefs and desires featuring ‘in the fiction’ operators—and not sui generis imaginings (or "i-beliefs" or "i-desires")—are the crucial states involved in generating fiction-directed affect. A defense of the “Operator Claim” is mounted, according to which ‘in the fiction’ operators would be also be required within fiction-directed sui generis imaginings (or "i-beliefs" and "i-desires"), were there such. Once we appreciate that (...) even fiction-directed sui generis imaginings would need to incorporate ‘in the fiction’ operators, the main appeal of the idea that sui generis imaginings (or "i-beliefs" or "i-desires") are at work in fiction-appreciation dissipates. [This is Chapter 10 of Explaining Imagination (OUP, 2020)]. (shrink)

Spatial models dominated memory research throughout much of the 20th century, but in recent decades, the concept of memory as a form of mental time travel (MTT) to the past has gained prominence. Initially introduced as a metaphor, the MTT perspective shifted the focus from internal memory processes to the subjective conscious experience of remembering. Despite its significant impact on empirical and theoretical memory research, there has been limited discussion regarding the meaning and adequacy of the MTT metaphor in accounting (...) for memory. While previous work has addressed the general limitations of the MTT metaphor in explaining memory (Trakas, 2022), the objective of this article is more focused and modest: to gain a better understanding of what constitutes MTT to the past. To achieve this objective, a detailed analysis of the characteristics of MTT to the past is presented through a comparison with time travel (TT) to the past. Although acknowledging that TT does not refer to an existing physical phenomenon, it is an older concept extensively discussed in the philosophical literature and provides commonly accepted grounds, particularly within orthodox theories of time, that can offer insights into the nature of MTT. Six specific characteristics serve as points of comparison: (1) a destination distinct from the present, (2) the distinction between subjective time and objective time, (3) the subjective experience of the time traveler, (4) their differentiation from the past self, (5) the existence of the past, and (6) its unchangeability. Through this research, a detailed exploration of the phenomenal and metaphysical aspects of MTT to the past is undertaken, shedding light on the distinct features that mental time travel to the past acquires when it occurs within the realm of the mind rather than as a physical phenomenon. By examining these characteristics, a deeper understanding of the nature of mental time travel is achieved, offering insights into how it operates in relation to memory and the past. (shrink)

​Imagination will remain a mystery—we will not be able to explain imagination—until we can break it into parts we already understand. Explaining Imagination is a guidebook for doing just that, where the parts are other ordinary mental states like beliefs, desires, judgments, and decisions. In different combinations and contexts, these states constitute cases of imagining. This reductive approach to imagination is at direct odds with the current orthodoxy, according to which imagination is a sui generis mental state or process—one with (...) its own inscrutable principles of operation. Explaining Imagination upends that view, showing how, on closer inspection, the imaginings at work in hypothetical reasoning, pretense, the enjoyment of fiction, and creativity are reducible to other familiar mental states—judgments, beliefs, desires, and decisions among them. Crisscrossing contemporary philosophy of mind, cognitive science, and aesthetics, Explaining Imagination argues that a clearer understanding of imagination is already well within reach. (shrink)

Mental Imagery, whereby we experience aspect of a perceptual scene or perceptual object in the absence of direct sensory stimulation is ubiquitous. Often the existence of mental imagery is demonstrated by asking one’s reader to volitionally generate a visual object, such as closing ones eyes and imagining an apple. However, mental imagery also arises in auditory, tactile, interoceptive, and olfactory cases. A number of influential philosophical theories have attempted to explain mental imagery in terms of belief-based forms of representation using (...) the Dependence Thesis, dependence upon means of access, such as enactivism, or in terms of the similarity of content with perceptual processing. The focus of this paper concerns the later approach and in particular assessing if Nanay’s promissory note that his theory is applicable to modalities other than vision, such as smell, seems likely to be of theoretical tender. The thesis argued for in this paper is that olfactory imagery exists and is best accounted for by considering it as a type of perceptual processing with a unique representational format relative to the olfactory perceptual modality. The paper concludes by summarizing the applicability of Nanay’s theory of mental imagery for olfaction and suggests some further issues that arise when transitioning to multi-modal mental imagery. (shrink)

Aphantasia is a recently discovered disorder characterised by the total incapacity to generate visual forms of mental imagery. This paper proposes that aphantasia raises important theoretical concerns for the ongoing debate in the philosophy and science of consciousness over the nature of dreams. Recent studies of aphantasia and its neurobehavioral correlates reveal that the majority of aphantasics, whilst unable to produce visual imagery while awake, nevertheless retain the capacity to experience rich visual dreams. This finding constitutes a novel explanandum for (...) theories of dreaming. Specifically, I argue that the recent dream reports of aphantasics constitute an empirical challenge to the emerging family of views which claim that dreams are essentially imaginative experiences, constitutively involving the kinds of mental imagery which aphantasics, ex-hypothesi, lack. After presenting this challenge in the context of Jonathan Ichikawa’s recent arguments for this view, I argue that this empirical challenge may be overcome if the imagination theorist abandons Ichikawa’s account of dreaming in favour of a modified version. This involves the claim that dreams are essentially inactive and constitutively involve non voluntary forms of imagination. I conclude with a suggestion for further research which can test the viability of this alternative hypothesis, and move the debate forward. (shrink)

As AI algorithms advance and produce surprising outputs, the question of imagination arises. Can we classify their output as imaginative? And what is their effect on human imagination? Apparently, algorithms follow Kant’s explanations on human imagination, thereby pushing us to update our understanding of imagination by taking into account the co-shaping between humans and their technologies. Such a new understating is offered in this article based on the theories of Don Ihde and Bernard Stiegler. With Ihde, imagination is conceived as (...) tightly linked to perception. Imagination evolves from the modernist task of seeking new points-of-view to a new mode in which technologies present imaginative layers of information on top of reality. With Stiegler, imagination is regarded as tightly linked to memory. He demonstrates how imagination complements memory, serves as a condition to memory/technology and at the same time how imagination itself is conditioned by memory/technology. In this article I develop a new synthesis: imagination as composed of perception and memory. This is the foundation of my layered model of digital imagination. In this model, the task of AI algorithms is the filling in of the layers with data. By producing endless possibilities, these technologies “automate” the Kantian “free play” of imagination, allowing us to examine more options and focus on the best of them. The model reserves the production of meaning to humans. Our role as humans is to generate meaning to the link between layers and establish new layers. (shrink)

According to the so-called ‘artifactual theory’ of fiction, fictional objects are to be considered as abstract artifacts. Within this framework, fictional objects are defined on the basis of their complex dependence on literary works, authors, and readership. This theory is explicitly distinguished from other approaches to fictions, notably from the imaginary-object theory. In this article, I argue that the two approaches are not mutually exclusive but can and should be integrated. In particular, the ontology of fiction can be fruitfully supplemented (...) by a phenomenological analysis, which allows us to clarify the defining modes of givenness of fictional objects. Likewise, based on the results of the artifactual theory, some assumptions in the imaginary-object theory, which are liable to be interpreted as laying the ground to phenomenalism, can be corrected. (shrink)

A number of studies have investigated how immersion in a virtual reality environment can affect participants’ implicit biases. These studies presume associationism about implicit bias. Recently philosophers have argued that associationism is inadequate and have made a case for understanding implicit biases propositionally. However, no propositionalist has considered the empirical work on virtual reality and how to integrate it into their theories. I examine this work against a propositionalist background, in particular, looking at the belief and patchy endorsement models. I (...) argue that the results therein can only be accommodated by a model which recognizes structural heterogeneity, that is, one which allows for implicit biases being both associatively and non-associatively structured. My preferred view – that implicit biases are constituted by unconscious imaginings – allows for this, as well as for heterogeneity at the level of content (propositional and imagistic), a feature which also earn its explanatory keep in this context. I conclude that empirical work on virtual reality and implicit bias gives us a reason to prefer a pluralist model of bias, and that my unconscious imagination model, in its recognizing wide-ranging heterogeneity, is uniquely placed to accommodate the results of work on virtual reality and bias mitigation. (shrink)

I propose a new model of implicit bias, according to which implicit biases are constituted by unconscious imaginings. I begin by endorsing a principle of parsimony when confronted with unfamiliar phenomena. I introduce implicit bias in terms congenial to what most philosophers and psychologists have said about their nature in the literature so far, before moving to a discussion of the doxastic model of implicit bias and objections to it. I then introduce unconscious imagination and argue that appeal to it (...) does not represent a departure from a standard view of imagination, before outlining my model and showing how it accommodates characteristic features of implicit bias. I argue for its advantages over the doxastic model: it does not violate the parsimony principle, it does not face any of the objections so far raised to doxasticism, and it can accommodate the heterogeneity in the category of implicit bias. Finally, I address whether my view limits our ability to hold people accountable for their biases (it does not), and whether it is consistent with what we know about intervention strategies (it is). I conclude that implicit biases are constituted by unconscious imaginings. (shrink)

The intuitive view that memories are characterized by a feeling of pastness, perceptions by a feeling of presence, while imagination lacks either faces challenges from two sides. Some researchers complain that the “feeling of pastness” is either unclear, irrelevant or isn’t a real feature. Others point out that there are cases of memory without the feeling of pastness, perception without presence, and other cross-cutting cases. Here we argue that the feeling of pastness is indeed a real, useful feature, and although (...) this feeling does not define memory ontologically, it is a characteristic marker which helps us easily categorise a mental state first-personally. We outline several cognitive features that underlie this experience, including the feeling of past accessibility, ergonomic significance, immersion, objectivity and mental strength. Our account is distinctly phenomenal, rather than doxastic, although our web of beliefs may contribute to this experience. (shrink)

Our eyes, bodies, and perspectives are constantly shifting as we observe the world. Despite this, we are very good at distinguishing between self-caused visual changes and changes in the environment: the world appears mostly stable despite our visual field moving around. This, it seems, also occurs when we are dreaming. As we visually investigate the dream environment, we track moving objects with our dream eyes, examine objects, and shift focus. These movements, research suggests, are reflected in the rapid movements or (...) saccades of our sleeping eyes. Do we really see the dream world in the same way that we see the real world? If we do, how could dreaming, usually assumed to be mind-generated hallucinations, replicate such an experience? This problem would be deflated if dreams are not hallucinations at all, but rather imagination, illusion or simply unrealistic. I argue that imagination and illusion views do not satisfactorily explain away the problem of vision and action in sleep. The imagination model is not a complete description of dreaming that is consistent with empirical research, and it is unlikely that the visual dream world is an illusion. Given that the dreaming visual experience is most likely active, hallucinatory, and at times a realistic world simulation, there are important implications for our understanding of visual perception and its relationship to movement. Evidence suggests that our dream eyes investigate the dream world as our waking eyes investigate the waking world. If changes to the unconsciously generated dream environment are perceived as external and unintentional while dream body movements are perceived as self-generated and intentional, current theory of visual perception may have to be expanded to account for how the dreaming mind generates a stable world in which we track and visually explore mind-generated objects. (shrink)

In opposition to the natural view that observer perspective memory is bound to be inauthentic, McCarroll argues for the surprising conclusion that memories in which the subject sees himself in the remembered scene are, in many cases, true to the subject’s original experience of the scene. By means of a careful reconstruction of his argument, this paper shows that McCarroll does not succeed in establishing his conclusion. It shows, in fact, that we ought to come to the opposed conclusion that, (...) while it may be possible in principle for observer perspective memory to be authentic, this is unlikely ever to happen in practice. The natural view, in short, is more or less right. (shrink)

In this paper, I defend a tripartite metaphysics of intentional mental states, according to which mental states are divided into subject, content, and attitude, against recent attempts at eliminating the attitude component (e.g., Montague, Oxford studies in philosophy of mind, 2022, 2, Oxford University Press). I suggest that a metaphysics composed of only subject and content cannot account for (a) multisensory perceptual experiences and (b) phenomenological differences between episodes of perception and imagination. Finally, I suggest that some of the motivations (...) behind the rejection of the attitude component can be accommodated within the tripartite framework. (shrink)

This paper argues that we should distinguish two different kinds of imaginative vividness: vividness of mental images and vividness of imaginative experiences. Philosophy has focussed on mental images, but distinguishing more complex vivid imaginative experiences from vivid mental images can help us understand our intuitions concerning the notion as well as the explanatory power of vividness. In particular, it can help us understand the epistemic role imagination can play on the one hand and our emotional engagement with literary fiction on (...) the other hand. (shrink)

(Open Access article, freely available to download from publisher's site.) Our visual experiences of objects as located in external space, and as having definite three-dimensional shapes, are closely linked to our implicit expectations about what things will look like from alternative viewpoints. What sorts of contents do these expectations involve? One standard answer is that they relate to what things will look like to us upon changing our positions. And what sorts of mental representations do the expectations call upon? A (...) standard answer is that they involve our powers of visual imagery; this answer requires us to allow for the possibility of unconscious visual imagery, however. The current paper presents an alternative model of the contents of our implicit visual expectations, one that regards them as wholly nonreflexive. It also argues that, once we ascribe the relevant contents to the expectations, there is no longer any reason for holding that they involve our powers of visual imagery. (shrink)

Here is a crucial question in the contemporary philosophy of perception: how can we be aware of action properties? According to the perceptual view, we consciously see them: they are present in our visual phenomenology. However, this view faces some problems. First, I review these problems. Then, I propose an alternative view, according to which we are aware of action properties because we imagine them through a special form of imagery, which I call visuomotor imagery. My account is to be (...) preferred as it offers an explanation of our awareness of action properties without generating all the problems that the perceptual view faces. (shrink)

Philosophy, scientific psychology, and common sense all distinguish perception from cognition. While there is little agreement about how the perception–cognition boundary ought to be drawn, one prominent idea is that perceptual states are dependent on a stimulus, or stimulus-dependent, in a way that cognitive states are not. This paper seeks to develop this idea in a way that can accommodate two apparent counterexamples: hallucinations, which are prima facie perceptual yet stimulus-independent; and demonstrative thoughts, which are prima facie cognitive yet stimulus-dependent. (...) The payoff is not only a specific proposal for marking the perception–cognition boundary, but also a deeper understanding of the natures of hallucination and demonstrative thought. (shrink)

What’s presented in our normal waking perceptual visual experiences feels present to us, while what we “see” in pictures and imagine does not. What about dreams? Does what we “see” in a dream feel present? Jennifer Windt has argued for an affirmative answer, for all dreams. But the dreams which flow from the brain’s registration of myoclonic twitches present a challenge to this answer. During these dreams motion-guiding vision is shut off, and, as Mohan Matthen has argued, motion-guiding vision seems (...) to be a key mechanism underlying the feeling of presence. I propose that the feeling of presence in fact involves two components: the feeling of immersion, and the feeling of availability for action. I suggest that only the feeling of availability for action derives from motion-guiding vision, and, hence, hypothesize that body-driven dreams lack this component to the feeling of presence. Finally, the distinction between these two varieties of presence has implications for measures of presence in virtual environments, as these measures can diverge over which of the two varieties they track. (shrink)

To imagine is to form a mental representation that does not aim at things as they actually, presently, and subjectively are. One can use imagination to represent possibilities other than the actual, to represent times other than the present, and to represent perspectives other than one’s own. Unlike perceiving and believing, imagining something does not require one to consider that something to be the case. Unlike desiring or anticipating, imagining something does not require one to wish or expect that something (...) to be the case. // -/- Imagination is involved in a wide variety of human activities, and has been explored from a wide range of philosophical perspectives. Philosophers of mind have examined imagination’s role in mindreading and in pretense. Philosophical aestheticians have examined imagination’s role in creating and in engaging with different types of artworks. Epistemologists have examined imagination’s role in theoretical thought experiments and in practical decision-making. Philosophers of language have examined imagination’s role in irony and metaphor. // -/- Because of the breadth of the topic, this entry focuses exclusively on contemporary discussions of imagination in the Anglo-American philosophical tradition. (shrink)

Similarity and difference, patterns of variation, consistency and coherence: these are the reference points of the philosopher. Understanding experience, exploring ideas through particular instantiations, novel and innovative thinking: these are the reference points of the artist. However, at certain points in the proceedings of our Symposium titled, Next to Nothing: Art as Performance, this characterisation of philosopher and artist respectively might have been construed the other way around. The commentator/philosophers referenced their philosophical interests through the particular examples/instantiations created by the (...) artist and in virtue of which they were then able to engage with novel and innovative thinking. From the artists’ presentations, on the other hand, emerged a series of contrasts within which philosophical and artistic ideas resonated. This interface of philosopher-artist bore witness to the fact that just as art approaches philosophy in providing its own analysis, philosophy approaches art in being a co-creator of art’s meaning. In what follows, we discuss the conception of philosophy-art that emerged from the Symposium, and the methodological minimalism which we employed in order to achieve it. We conclude by drawing out an implication of the Symposium’s achievement which is that a counterpoint to Institutional theories of art may well be the point from which future directions will take hold, if philosophy-art gains traction. (shrink)

The main purpose of this dissertation is to examine critically and discuss the role of imagination in science and religion, with particular emphasis on its possible epistemic, creative, and meaning-making functions. In order to answer my research questions, I apply theories and concepts from contemporary philosophy of mind on scientific and religious practices. This framework allows me to explore the mental state of imagination, not as an isolated phenomenon but, rather, as one of many mental states that co-exist and interplay (...) in our cogntive architecture. Based on the philosophical discourse of philosophy of mind, four types of imagination are indentified and conceptualized: sensory, propositional, experiential, and creative imagination. These categories are then employed on five phenomena that can be found in scientific and religious environments: metaphors, models, thought experiments, aspect perception, and - in the religious case - rituals. In relation to the concept of religious "seeing" I consider how imaginings may influence visionary experiences and visualization, and compare these phenomena with cases of scientific visualization and eureka experiences. In regard to scientific and religious models, a distinction is made between, on the one hand, two notions of truth and, on the other hand, truth-independent meaning-making. In light of these categories, I differentiate between, and critically discuss, the use of imagination in doxastic, non-doxastic and fictionalist accounts. In light of this investigation, I formulate and defend the position of interactivism, which acknowledges a constant interplay between different attitudes and mental states. In my examination of rituals and scientific and religious thought experiments, special attention is given to the mental capacity to recreate the experiences that are entailed in an imagined scenario. At the end of the investigation, I consider the possible impact that my study might have on how we view science and religion as well as the dialogue bewteen these two fields. (shrink)