Recent literature emphasizes an altered perception of the body in subjects practicing sport to pursue an ideal body image. Sometimes such bodily misperception is associated with the inability to re...

In this timely and highly original merging of theory and practice, conflict photographer and critical theorist Rita Leistner applies Marshall McLuhan's semiotic theories of language, media, and technology to iPhone photographs taken during a military embed in Afghanistan. In a series of what Leistner calls iProbes—a portmanteau of iPhone and probe—Leistner reveals the face of war through the extensions of man. As digital photography becomes more ubiquitous, and as the phones we carry with us become more advanced, the process (...) of capturing images becomes more democratic and more spontaneous. Leistner's photos result from both access and impulse. Looking for Marshall McLuhan in Afghanistan will appeal anyone with an interest in the conflicts in the Middle East, the seminal communications theorist, or iPhone apps and photography. (shrink)

Hittite Diplomatics: Studies in Ancient Document Format and Record Management. By WillemiJn J. I. Waal. Studien zu den Boğazköy-Texten, vol. 57. Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag, 2015. Pp. xxi + 620, illus. €98.

This book provides an introduction to the study of words, their main properties and how we use them to create meaning. It offers a detailed description of the organizational principles of the lexicon, and of the categories used to classify various lexical phenomena, including polysemy, meaning variation, behaviour in composition, and the interface with pragmatics. Elisabetta Ježek uses empirical data from digitalized corpora and speakers' judgements, combined with the formalisms developed in the field of general and theoretical linguistics, to (...) propose representations for each of these phenomena. The book's clear structure and accessible approach make it an ideal textbook for all students of linguistics and a valuable resource for scholars and students of language in the fields of cognitive science and philosophy. (shrink)

The purpose of this study was to illuminate the ethically difficult situations experienced by care providers working in a nursing home. Individual interviews using a narrative approach were conducted. A phenomenological-hermeneutic method developed for researching life experience was applied in the analysis. The findings showed that care providers experience ethical challenges in their everyday work. The informants in this study found the balance between the ideal, autonomy and dignity to be a daily problem. They defined the culture they work in (...) as not supportive. They also thought they were not being seen and heard in situations where they disagree with the basic values of the organization. The results are discussed in terms of Habermas’s understanding of modern society. Care settings for elderly people obviously present ethical challenges, particularly in the case of those suffering from dementia. The care provider participants in this study expressed frustration and feelings of powerlessness. It is possible to understand their experiences in terms of Habermas’s theory of modern society and the concept of the system’s colonization of the life world. (shrink)

This book provides an introduction to the study of words, and how we use words to create meaning. It offers an accessible description of the main properties of words and the organizational principles of the lexicon, based on theoretical accounts and extensive empirical data.

There is a lot of conceptual engineering going on in medical research. I substantiate this claim with two examples, the medical debate about cancer classification and about obesity as a disease I also argue that the proper target of conceptual engineering in medical research are experts’ conceptions. These are explicitly written down in documents and guidelines, and they bear on research and policies. In the second part of the chapter, I propose an externalist framework in which conceptions have both the (...) explanatory power of psychological concepts and that of semantic concepts. It is likely, however, that human activities and practices distinct from medical research, and regulated by different practices and epistemic rules, call for different targets for conceptual engineering. I conclude with indicating an open agenda of problems for philosophers of medicine interested in conceptual engineering. (shrink)

In this paper, the role played in learning to argue by an essential and yet under-researched epistemic and argumentative norm is discussed, namely, the consistency requirement. An argumentative intervention is presented, that is designed to enhance the understanding of this norm among high school students, to enable them to recognize contradictions in the process of argumentation and to familiarize them with the argumentative strategies related to the reductio ad absurdum. There follows a description of how the designed intervention was implemented (...) in two Italian high schools, which served as an exploratory case study, and the results obtained are discussed. (shrink)

Baccarini and Malatesti (2017) defend the idea that we must use coercively biomedical means to enhance the morality of a specific group of individuals: psychopaths, diagnosed through the Psychopathy Checklist-Revised (PCL-R) standards (Hare, 2003). Their argument is theoretical, thus it goes independently from the actual effectiveness of existent treatments, and it is based on a logical reasoning. Moral bioenhancement (MB) means include psychotropic drugs, brain stimulations, neurosurgeries, genetic editing, etc. -/- In short, the authors apply Gerald Gaus' account of open (...) justification (Gaus, 1996, 2011), according to which “a prescription addressed to an agent is a reasoning that includes premises that consider the system of reasons (such as beliefs, preferences, etc.) of that agent” (Baccarini and Malatesti, 2017, p. 1). In their view, coercive MB of psychopaths is morally sound and deducible by reasons within the psychopath's cognitive-affective system—even if the psychopath needs not to be able to consciously or sincerely endorse them. We believe that this argument is flawed. In sum, we argue that the psychopath's cognitive-affective system would consistently justify reasons against mandatory MB to herself, even if she wishes differently for others, and that the prescription cannot be extended. (shrink)

Advanced medical imaging, such as CT, fMRI and PET, has undergone enormous progress in recent years, both in accuracy and utilization. Such techniques often bring with them an illusion of immediacy, the idea that the body and its diseases can be directly inspected. In this paper we target this illusion and address the issue of the reliability of advanced imaging tests as knowledge procedures, taking positron emission tomography in oncology as paradigmatic case study. After individuating a suitable notion of reliability, (...) we argue that PET is a highly theory-laden and non-immediate knowledge procedure, in spite of the photographic-like quality of the images it delivers; the diagnostic conclusions based on the interpretation of PET images are population-dependent; PET images require interpretation, which is inherently observer-dependent and therefore variable. We conclude with a three-step methodological proposal for enhancing the reliability of advanced medical imaging. (shrink)

A Kuhnian reformulation of the recent debate in psychiatric nosography suggested that the current psychiatric classification system (the DSM) is in crisis and that a sort of paradigm shift is awaited (Aragona, 2009). Among possible revolutionary alternatives, the proposed fi ve-axes etiopathogenetic taxonomy (Charney et al., 2002) emphasizes the primacy of the genotype over the phenomenological level as the relevant basis for psychiatric nosography. Such a position is along the lines of the micro-reductionist perspective of E. Kandel (1998, 1999), which (...) sees mental disorders reducible to explanations at a fundamental epistemic level of genes and neurotransmitters. This form of micro-reductionism has been criticized as a form of genetic-molecular fundamentalism (e.g. Murphy, 2006) and a multi-level approach, in the form of the burgeoning Cognitive Neuropsychiatry, was proposed. This article focuses on multi-level mechanistic explanations, coming from Cognitive Science, as a possible alternative etiopathogenetic basis for psychiatric classification. The idea of a mechanistic approach to psychiatric taxonomy is here defended on the basis of a better conception of levels and causality. Nevertheless some critical remarks of Mechanism as a psychiatric general view are also offered. (shrink)

Mentalization is a useful ability for social functioning and a crucial aspect of mentalizing is emotion regulation. Literature suggests programmes for children and adults to increase mentalizing abilities useful both for emotional and social competences. For this reason, the issue of how to prompt children’s mentalization has started to attract researchers’ attention, supporting the importance of the interpersonal dimension for the individual differences in the developmental of mentalization. The TiM (Thoughts in Mind) Project, a training programme based on the explanation (...) of mentalization mechanisms and designed for adults, deals with emotion regulation. Starting from the TiM Project, this study tests the effects of the TiM Child (TiM-C) training programme, over a control training programme, a conversational training designed for the school context, in children attending Year 2 of primary school. We designed a training based on narratives, followed by multiple-choice questions and conversations about mental states. Our results revealed significant improvements over the training period only in the TiM-C Project group for Metacognition, Emotion Regulation Strategies and a Theory of Mind task. As far as the educational implications, our findings suggest that it is possible to enhance mentalization through activities at school by promoting not only the understanding of the relations between mind and emotion, but also metacognitive skills. (shrink)

Italy is in the forefront of forensic neuroscience practice among European nations. In recent years, the country presented two major criminal cases, the Trieste Case in 2009 and the Como Case in 2011, which were the first cases employing neurogenetic and functional neuroimaging methods in European courts. In this paper we will discuss the consequences that an understanding of the neural and genetic determinants of human (mis)behavior will have on law, especially on the Italian legal context. Some claim that such (...) consequences will actually be revolutionary, while others argue that legal doctrine assumptions won’t be undermined by neuroscientific findings. In the first section of the paper, we introduce the general debate and follow with a section devoted to the two Italian cases. In the third and final section, we discuss epistemological and ethical issues regarding Italian neurolaw. We defend a position which diverges from those prevailing in the debate. While negative outcomes and concerns were usually evidenced, we focus on positive changes coming with the new paradigm of interaction between neuroscience and the law. Our view is that these cases are clearly pioneering ones, anticipating what will happen in the courtrooms of the European Union in the whole, in the near future. (shrink)

Despite the belief that autism is an empathy disorder, autistics declare their ability to empathize. To explore this experiential vision, we present the alternative explanation for social impairments in autism offered by the Intense World Theory (IWT) and substantiate it through the phenomenological analysis of empathy as an experienced phenomenon. According to IWT, autistics are characterized by hyper-emotionality and therefore their detachment is not the sign of a disrupted empathy, but a strategy to face a world of overwhelming stimuli. Taking (...) the phenomenological account of empathy as a tendency to minimize the emotional and conceptual space dividing embodied and conscious subjects, our purpose is to explain that although autistics seem to expand this space, they may still be considered empathetic. (shrink)

Musical Perceptions is a much-needed text that introduces students of both music and psychology to the study of music perception and cognition. Because the book aims to foster a closer interaction between research in the science and the art of music, both psychologists and musicians contribute chapters on a wide range of topics, including the philosophy of music; research in musical performance; perception of melody, tonality, and rhythm; pedagogical issues; language and music; and neural networks. With their unique ability to (...) introduce musical and psychological concepts to first-time students in the area, Rita Aiello and John Sloboda have edited a volume that will be popular with undergraduate and graduate students taking courses in the perception, psychology, and aesthetics of music. They have prefaced each chapter with an introduction to the chapter's research. This book will also be useful to cognitive and physiological psychologists and music theorists interested in music perception. (shrink)

This is the first book to explore the epistemology and ethics of advanced imaging tests, in order to improve the critical understanding of the nature of knowledge they provide and the practical consequences of their utilization in healthcare. Advanced medical imaging tests, such as PET and MRI, have gained center stage in medical research and in patients’ care. They also increasingly raise questions that pertain to philosophy: What is required to be an expert in reading images? How are standards for (...) interpretation to be fixed? Is there a problem of overutilization of such tests? How should uncertainty be communicated to patients? How to cope with incidental findings? This book is of interest and importance to scholars of philosophy of medicine at all levels, from undergraduates to researchers, to medical researchers and practitioners (radiologists and nuclear physicians) interested in a critical appraisal of the methodology of their discipline and in the ethical principles and consequences of their work. -/- . (shrink)

In this paper I focus on the emergence of the concept of the “historical a priori” at the origin of Foucault’s archeology. I emphasize the methodological function of this concept within Foucault’s archaeology, and I maintain that despite the different thesis it entails as compared to its philosophical sources, it pertains to one of the main issues of phenomenology, that is, the problematization of the relation between reality as it appears in its historicity, and transcendentality. I start from the interest (...) of the young Foucault in existential psychiatry, and I focus on the French philosophical context in which Foucault’s Introduction to Ludwig Binswanger’s “Dream and Existence” (1954) was conceived. My aim is to show that the first “phenomenological” phase of Foucault’s work is coherent, from a methodological point of view, with the development of archaeology intended as “historical epistemology.” I conclude by arguing that Foucault’s archaeology is methodologically linked to Canguilhem’s epistemology, in that the latter presents itself as an important attempt at linking together historicity and transcendentality. (shrink)

È possibile perseguire intenzionalmente la speranza o si tratta di una postura interiore che sfugge alla volontà? E se scaturisce da una ricerca, può essere trasmessa, sollecitata?Declinata in una pratica da perseguire nella relazione di aiuto? È realistico considerare la capacità di schiudere nuove possibilità per abitare con senso la vita, una competenza professionale del lavoro di cura? Nell’intento di dare risposta a questi interrogativi la riflessione attraversa il pensiero di alcuni tra i maggiori filosofi del Novecento, secondo un orientamento (...) fenomenologico che prende le mosse dall’esperienza vissuta.Is it possible to “intentionally” pursue the hope or is it an inner attitude beyond anyone’s will? And if it derives from a research, can it be transmitted, aroused? Can it be declined as a practice to be followed in a helping relationship? Is it realistic to consider the capacity of disclosing new possibilities of living a meaningful as a professional skill in care job?The intention of giving an answer to these questions crosses the beliefs of some of the greatest philosophers of the twentieth century, in compliance with a phenomenological orientation taking its moves from lived experience. (shrink)

The mathematical scenario in Italy during the Late Middle Ages and the Renaissance is mainly dominated by the treatises on the abacus, which developed together with the abacus schools. In that context, between approximately the last thirty years of the fourteenth century and the first twenty years of the sixteenth century, the manuscript and printed tradition tell us of queries and challenges, barely known or totally unknown, in which the protagonists were abacus masters. We report in this work on the (...) most significant examples and draw out interesting cues for thoughts and remarks of a scientific, historical and biographical nature. Five treatises, written in the fifteenth and sixteenth century, have been the main source of inspiration for this article: the Trattato di praticha d’arismetricha and the Tractato di praticha di geometria included in the codices Palat. 573 and Palat. 577 (c. 1460) kept in the Biblioteca Nazionale of Florence and written by an anonymous Florentine disciple of the abacist Domenico di Agostino Vaiaio; another Trattato di praticha d’arismetrica written by Benedetto di Antonio da Firenze in 1463 and included in the codex L.IV.21 kept in the Biblioteca Comunale of Siena; the Tractatus mathematicus ad discipulos perusinos written by Luca Pacioli between 1477 and 1480, manuscript Vat. Lat. 3129 of the Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana; and Francesco Galigai’s Summa de arithmetica, published in Florence in 1521. (shrink)

The distinction between concept and conception has been widely debated in political philosophy, whereas in the philosophy of psychology is frequently used, but rarely focused on. This paper aims at filling in this lacuna. I claim that far from being explanatorily idle, the distinction makes it possible to provide an adequate description of phenomena such as genuine disagreement, and concept contestation, which would otherwise remain implausibly puzzling. I illustrate and assess three accounts of the concept-conception distinction. Finally I propose a (...) social externalist account, which relies on deference to experts, and builds on Tyler Burge’s ideas of many decades ago. The debate on concepts and conceptions thus shows a connection with the increasing research work on experts and expertise in psychology and social epistemology. (shrink)

Trolley-like dilemmas are other cases of what Bermúdez refers to as (conscious) quasi-cyclical preferences. In these dilemmas, identical outcomes are obtained through morally non-identical actions. I will argue that morality is the context where descriptive invariance and ecological relevance may be crucially distinguished. Logically irrational moral choices in the short term may promote greater social benefits in the longer term.

In this paper, we describe a framework for studying social agents’ individual decision making, that takes account of the environment and social dynamics. We describe a study in which we explored the efficiency of foraging strategies within a group of individuals faced with a resource-limited environment. We investigated to what extent cooperative and non-cooperative behaviors impacted on the survival rates of a population of individuals. In the experiment presented here, we considered two different types of individuals: selfish individuals who gather (...) energy for their own use, and cooperative individuals who share the energy they gather with others, thus reducing their own individual chances of survival. In order to study the trade-off between non-cooperative and cooperative behaviors in a pseudo-realistic two-dimensional environment, we introduced an agent-based modeling and simulation tool called ACACIA-ES, which simulated local interactions and spatial behavior for large numbers of individuals in complex environments. The main result from our simulation was that a group of cooperative individuals displayed better survival strategies than groups of selfish individuals when faced with a variety of environmental pressures; however, it was very unlikely that such cooperative strategies could resist competition from selfish individuals, if the outcome of past social interactions was memorized, even when a very small group of selfish individuals was introduced. (shrink)

This commentary focuses on Machery's eliminativist claim, that ought to be eliminated from the theoretical vocabulary of psychology because it fails to denote a natural kind. I argue for the more traditional view that concepts are a functional kind, which provides the simplest account of the empirical evidence discussed by Machery.