In everyday moral experience, we judge ourselves for our emotional responses. Most of the philosophical literature on recalcitrant emotions focuses on (a) whether and how they are possible or (b) whether and how they are irrational. My interest here is in the ways we blame ourselves for recalcitrant emotions. I aim to show that it is harder than it looks to explain self-blame for recalcitrant emotions. I argue recalcitrance alone does not give us a reason to feel any particular (...) way about our emotions and it is not sufficient grounds for self-blame. (shrink)

Do animals other than humans feel pain? How do we know? Well, how do we know if anyone, human or nonhuman, feels pain? We know that we ourselves can feel pain. We know this from the direct experience of pain that we have when, for instance, somebody presses a lighted cigarette against the back of our hand. But how do we know that anyone else feels pain? We cannot directly experience anyone else's pain, whether that "anyone" is our (...) best friend or a stray dog. Pain is a state of consciousness, a "mental event", and as such it can never be observed. Behavior like writhing, screaming, or drawing one's hand away from the lighted cigarette is not pain itself; nor are the recordings a neurologist might make of activity within the brain observations of pain itself. Pain is something that we feel, and we can only infer that others are feeling it from various external indications. (shrink)

“Don’t be jealous of your sister.” “Don’t be angry with your father.” “You should be more forgiving.” “You ought to feel terrible for what you’ve done.” “You ought to feel ashamed of yourself!” It is common practice within our society to morally reprimand people for their emotions, thereby expressing a kind of moralism: the idea that there are morally right and morally wrong ways to feel. Drawing on an alternative way of engaging with emotions derived from my (...) experience working clinically with people with personality disorders, I argue against the value of this common practice and the moralization of emotions that underpins it. Stop telling people what to feel! (shrink)

It is commonly presupposed that there are no decisive differences between empathy with fictional characters on one hand and empathy with real persons on the other. I distinguish two types of processes of affect recognition "Perceptual Affect Recognition" and "Affective Affect Recognition". The consensus view about empathy with fictional characters has to be challenged if "empathy" refers to the former or the latter process because of the significant differences between the fictional and the non-fictional scenario: firstly, readers as "empathizers" cannot (...) perceive the fictional target person directly but only the literary text. This is especially problematic for Affective State Recognition. Secondly, fictional characters do not exist, at least not in the sense that they are real people or entities with mental states which leads to relevant differences of the accuracy conditions of Affective Affect Recognition in the fictional and the nonfictional scenario. (shrink)

David Chalmers appears to assume that we can meaningfully discuss what goes on in human heads without paying any attention to the words in which we couch our statements. This paper challenges this assumption and argues that the initial problem is that of metalanguage: if we want to say something clear and valid about us humans, we must think about ourselves outside conceptual English created by one particular history and culture and try to think from a global, panhuman point of (...) view. This means that instead of relying on untranslatable English words such as 'consciousness' and 'experience' we must try to rely on panhuman concepts expressed in cross-translatable words such as THINK, KNOW, and FEEL (Wierzbicka, 2018). The paper argues that after 'a hundred years of consciousness studies' it is time to try to say something about us (humans), about how we think and how we differ from cats and bats, in words that are clear, stable, and human rather than parochially English. (shrink)

This paper on the phenomenology of joint agency proposes a foray into a little explored territory at the intersection of two very active domains of research: joint action and sense of agency. I explore two ways in which our experience of joint agency may differ from our experience of individual agency. First, the mechanisms of action specification and control involved in joint action are typically more complex than those present in individual actions, since it is crucial for joint action that (...) people coordinate their plans and actions. I discuss the implications that these coordination requirements might have for the strength of the sense of agency an agent may experience for a joint action. Second, engagement in joint action may involve a transformation of agentive identity and a partial or complete shift from a sense of self-agency to a sense of we-agency. I discuss several factors that may contribute to shaping our sense of agentive identity in joint action. (shrink)

In a recent article in this journal, Calum Miller skillfully and creatively argues for the counterintuitive view that there aren’t any good reasons to believe that non-human animals feel pain in a morally relevant sense. By Miller’s lights, such reasons are either weak in their own right or they also favor the view that non-human animals don’t feel morally relevant pain. In this paper, I explain why Miller’s view is mistaken. In particular, I sketch a very reasonable abductive (...) argument for the conclusion that non-human animals feel morally relevant pain. This argument shows that, even in the face of Miller’s moderate skepticism about whether non-human animals feel pain in a morally relevant sense, it’s still more epistemically reasonable to believe that non-human animals feel pain in a morally relevant sense than not. In which case, I conclude that Miller has failed to show that there aren’t any good reasons to believe that non-human animals don’t feel pain in a morally relevant sense that don’t also count in favor of the view that non-human animals don’t feel morally relevant pain. (shrink)

We argue for an imaginative analog of desire from premises about imaginative engagement with fiction. There's a bit about the paradox of fiction, too.

Here I explore a new line of evidence for belief–credence dualism, the thesis that beliefs and credences are distinct and equally fundamental types of mental states. Despite considerable recent disagreement over this thesis, little attention has been paid in philosophy to differences in how our mindreading systems represent the beliefs and credences of others. Fascinatingly, the systems we rely on to accurately and efficiently track others’ mental states appear to function like belief–credence dualists: Credence is tracked like an emotional state, (...) composed of both representational and affective content, whereas belief is tracked like a bare representational state with no affective component. I argue on a preliminary basis that, in this particular case, the mechanics of mentalizing likely pick out a genuine affective dimension to credence that is absent for belief, further strengthening the converging case for belief–credence dualism. (shrink)

ABSTRACTThis paper seeks to problematise and complexify scholarly accounts of contemporary emotional repression in Western contexts by presenting counterevidence in the form of two examples of post-secular collective affectivity and their ritual expressions. It argues that both narratives of emotional repression and expression fail to capture the non-linear complexity of processes of cultural transformation, which have resulted in the simultaneous expression and repression of ritualistic affects that are products of our evolutionary embodied history. Drawing on insights from affect theory, this (...) paper seeks to illustrate how contingent yet nonetheless residual ritualistic affects have become repressed in the nominally secular public sphere in modernity. This has presented certain obstacles to the open communal display of religious ritual, and, as a corollary, the expression of certain religious affects, which have subsequently re-emerged in post-secular ritual spaces that are both publically private and pr... (shrink)

The catastrophe of the eye -- A new view of seeing -- Applying the new view of seeing -- The illusion of seeing everything -- Some contentious points -- Towards consciousness -- Types of consciousness -- Phenomenal consciousness, raw feel, and why they're hard -- Squeeze a sponge, drive a porsche : a sensorimotor account of feel -- Consciously experiencing a feel -- The sensorimotor approach to color -- Sensory substitution -- The localization of touch -- The (...) phenomenality plot -- Consciousness. (shrink)

In 2006 Jamie Tworkowski wrote a story called "To Write Love on Her Arms" about helping a friend through her struggle with drug addiction, depression, and self-injury. The piece was so hauntingly beautiful that it quickly went viral, giving birth to a non-profit organization of the same name. Nine years later, To Write Love on Her Arms (TWLOHA) is an internationally-recognized leader in suicide prevention and a source of hope, encouragement, and resources for people worldwide. Jamie's words have been shared (...) hundreds of thousands of times online. They've shown up on T-shirts and posters and even tattoos. Now, for the first time, Jamie's writing is available in the form of a book. If You Feel Too Much is a celebration of hope, wonder, and what it means to be human. From personal stories of struggling on days most people celebrate to offering words of strength and encouragement in moments of loss, the essays in this book invite readers to believe that it's okay to admit to pain and it's okay to ask for help. If You Feel Too Much is an important book from one of this generation's most important voices. (shrink)

Discourse containing the verb ‘feel’, almost without exception, purports to describe inner experience. Though this much is evident, the question remains what exactly is conveyed when we talk about what and how we feel? Does discourse containing the word ‘feel’ actually succeed in describing the content and phenomenology of inner experience? If so, how does it reflect the phenomenology and content of the experience it describes? Here I offer a linguistic analysis of ‘feels’ reports and argue that (...) a subset of ‘feels’ reports, when accurate, reflect the representational content of emotions, tactile experiences and bodily sensations. Because ‘feels’ reports may reflect the representational content of bodily experience, these types of report may be able to give us some insight into the structure of bodily experience. I argue that our descriptions of bodily experience, on the assumption that they are sometimes accurate, indicate that emotions and tactile experiences are experiences of bodily reactions to objects, whereas bodily sensations are partial descriptions of emotions and tactile experiences or other events of the body. At the end I address the concern that an adequate account of inner experience cannot be given in terms of an analysis of ordinary language. (shrink)

This article explores the affective dimension of resilient epistemological systems. Specifically, I argue that responsible epistemic practice requires affective engagement with nondominant experiences. To begin, I outline Kristie Dotson's account of epistemological resilience whereby an epistemological system remains stable despite counterevidence or attempts to alter it. Then, I develop an account of affective numbness. As I argue, affective numbness can promote epistemological resilience in at least two ways. First, it can reinforce harmful stereotypes even after these stereotypes have been rationally (...) demystified. To illustrate, I examine the stereotype of Black criminality as it relates to false confessions. Second, it can encourage “epistemic appropriation”, which I demonstrate by examining the appropriation of “intersectionality” and #MeToo by white culture. Finally, I conclude that resisting harmful resilience requires affective resistance, or efforts that target numbness via different kinds of affective engagement. I consider Kantian “disinterestedness” as a candidate. (shrink)

Interactions between humans and machines that include artificial intelligence are increasingly common in nearly all areas of life. Meanwhile, AI-products are increasingly endowed with emotional characteristics. That is, they are designed and trained to elicit emotions in humans, to recognize human emotions and, sometimes, to simulate emotions. The introduction of such systems in our lives is met with some criticism. There is a rather strong intuition that there is something wrong about getting attached to a machine, about having certain emotions (...) towards it, and about getting involved in a kind of affective relationship with it. In this paper, I want to tackle these worries by focusing on the last aspect: in what sense could it be problematic or even wrong to establish an emotional relationship with EAI-systems? I want to show that the justifications for the widespread intuition concerning the problems are not as strong as they seem at first sight. To do so, I discuss three arguments: the argument from self-deception, the argument from lack of mutuality, and the argument from moral negligence. (shrink)

For a long time, emotions have been ignored in the attempt to model intelligent behavior. However, within the last years, evidence has come from neuroscience that emotions are an important facet of intelligent behavior being involved into cognitive problem solving, decision making, the establishment of social behavior, and even conscious experience. Also in research communities like software agents and robotics, an increasing number of researchers start to believe that computational models of emotions will be needed to design intelligent systems. Nevertheless, (...) modeling emotions in technical terms poses many difficulties and has often been accounted as just not feasible. In this article, there are identified the main problems, which occur when attempting to implement emotions into machines. By pointing out these problems, it is aimed to avoid repeating mistakes committed when modeling computational models of emotions in order to speed up future development in this area. The identified issues are not derived from abstract reflections about this topic but from the actual attempt to implement emotions into a technical system based on neuroscientific research findings. It is argued that besides focusing on the cognitive aspects of emotions, a consideration of the bodily aspects of emotions—their grounding into a visceral body—is of crucial importance, especially when a system shall be able to learn correlations between environmental objects and events and their “emotional meaning”. (shrink)

This paper examines the implications of the context-sensitivity of counterfactuals for the correctness of emotions and attitudes towards death. I argue that the correctness of an attitude such as fear must be explained by appeal to its causal relations to certain preferences.

It is not necessarily the case that we ever have experiences of self, but human beings do regularly report instances for which self is experienced as absent. That is there are times when body parts, mental states, or actions are felt to be alien. Here I sketch an explanatory framework for explaining these alienation experiences, a framework that also attempts to explain the “mental glue” whereby self is bound to body, mind, or action. The framework is a multi-dimensional model that (...) integrates personal and sub-personal components, psychological and neural processes. I then proceed to show how this model can be applied to explain the action-related passivity experiences of persons suffering from schizophrenia. I argue that a distinctive phenomenological mark of these experiences is that they are vividly felt, unlike ordinary actions (those taken to belong to self), and I seek to explain these heightened sensory experiences from within the proposed framework. I also propose hypotheses concerning such phenomena as thought insertion and anarchic hand syndrome that are motivated by this framework. Finally, I argue that the proposed model and view of self-experiences is consistent with several aspects of and theories of consciousness, especially theories which indicate that consciousness is more likely to be engaged when we are dealing with novelty or error—e.g. when self seems to have gone missing. I conclude by recommending that if we wish to learn about self, we would be well advised to attend closely to those times when it seems absent. (shrink)

The most cursory examination of the history of artificial intelligence highlights numerous egregious claims of its researchers, especially in relation to a populist form of ‘strong’ computationalism which holds that any suitably programmed computer instantiates genuine conscious mental states purely in virtue of carrying out a specific series of computations. The argument presented herein is a simple development of that originally presented in Putnam’s (Representation & Reality, Bradford Books, Cambridge in 1988 ) monograph, “Representation & Reality”, which if correct, has (...) important implications for turing machine functionalism and the prospect of ‘conscious’ machines. In the paper, instead of seeking to develop Putnam’s claim that, “everything implements every finite state automata”, I will try to establish the weaker result that, “everything implements the specific machine Q on a particular input set ( x )”. Then, equating Q ( x ) to any putative AI program, I will show that conceding the ‘strong AI’ thesis for Q (crediting it with mental states and consciousness) opens the door to a vicious form of panpsychism whereby all open systems, (e.g. grass, rocks etc.), must instantiate conscious experience and hence that disembodied minds lurk everywhere. (shrink)

Contemporary accounts on fictional emotions, i.e., emotions experienced towards objects we know to be fictional, are mainly concerned with explaining their rationality or lack thereof. In this context dominated by an interest in the role of belief, questions regarding their phenomenal quality have received far less attention: it is often assumed that they feel “similar” to emotions that target real objects. Against this background, this paper focuses on the possible specificities of fictional emotions’ qualitative feel. It starts by (...) presenting what I call the “phenomenological question” about the qualitative feel of fictional emotions (section 1) and by showing that this is irreducible to questions about their cognitive, intentional, evaluative, and embodied nature (section 2). Drawing on some insights from early phenomenologists, the next two sections elaborate criteria to distinguish between real and sham emotions on the one side (section 3) and between genuine and non-genuine emotions on the other (section 4). Finally, I apply this orthogonal distinction to the particular case of fictional emotions (section 5). The paper argues that fictional emotions are neither sham emotions nor quasi-emotions, but full-fledged emotional experiences, despite them displaying the distinctive phenomenology of emotions experienced as non-genuine. In the particular case of fictional emotions, they are non-genuine because our psychology is in fact in a state dominated by aesthetic enjoyment. (shrink)

People have little difficulty distinguishing effects they cause and those they do not. An important question is what underlies this sense of agency. A prevailing idea is that the sense of agency arises from a comparison between a predictive representation of the effect and the actual effect that occurs, with a clear match between the two producing a strong sense of agency. Although there is general agreement on this comparison process, one important theoretical issue that has yet to be fully (...) determined is whether these computations are consciously performed. Here, we studied this issue by requiring participants to perform a simple judgment of agency task under conditions of different concurrent working memory load. Working memory operations are known to tax conscious cognitive resources. We found that agency judgments were moderated by working memory load, with lower agency ratings being observed in the high load condition, suggesting that the sense of agency is dependent on the availability of conscious cognitive resources. An examination of the time-course of this load effect suggests that it is the construction of the mental representation of the predicted effect which is particularly dependent on said resources. (shrink)

In many jurisdictions, an offender’s remorse is considered to be a relevant factor to take into account in mitigation at sentencing. The growing philosophical interest in the use of neurointerventions in criminal justice raises an important question about such remorse-based mitigation: to what extent should technologically facilitated remorse be honoured such that it is permitted the same penal significance as standard instances of remorse? To motivate this question, we begin by sketching a tripartite account of remorse that distinguishes cognitive, affective (...) and motivational elements of remorse. We then describe a number of neurointerventions that might plausibly be used to enhance abilities that are relevant to these different elements of remorse. Having described what we term the ‘moral value’ view of the justification of remorse-based mitigation, we then consider whether using neurointerventions to facilitate remorse would undermine its moral value, and thus make it inappropriate to honour such remorse in the criminal justice system. We respond to this question by claiming that the form of moral understanding that is incorporated into a genuinely remorseful response grounds remorse’s moral value. In view of this claim, we conclude by arguing that neurointerventions need not undermine remorse’s moral value on this approach, and that the remorse that such interventions might facilitate could also be authentic to the recipient of the neurointerventions that we discuss. (shrink)

Unresponsive wakefulness syndrome is a disorder of consciousness wherein a patient is awake, but completely non-responsive at the bedside. However, research has shown that a minority of these patients remain aware, and can demonstrate their awareness via functional neuroimaging; these patients are referred to as having ‘cognitive motor dissociation’. Unfortunately, we have little insight into the subjective experiences of these patients, making it difficult to determine how best to promote their well-being. In this paper, I argue that the capacity to (...) experience pain or pleasure is a key component of well-being for these patients. While patients with unresponsive wakefulness syndrome are believed to be incapable of experiencing pain or pleasure, I argue that there is evidence to support the notion that CMD patients likely can experience pain and pleasure. I analyze current neuroscientific research into the mechanisms of pain experience in patients with disorders of consciousness, and provide an explanation for why CMD patients likely can experience physical pain. I then do the same for physical pleasure. I conclude that providing these patients with pleasurable experiences, and avoiding subjecting them to pain, are viable means of promoting their well-being. (shrink)

Many people are attracted to the idea that plants experience phenomenal conscious states like pain, sensory awareness, or emotions like fear. If true, this would have wide-ranging moral implications for human behavior, including land development, farming, vegetarianism, and more. Determining whether plants have minds relies on the work of both empirical disciplines and philosophy. Epistemology should settle the standards for evidence of other minds, and science should inform our judgment about whether any plants meet those standards. We argue that evidence (...) for other minds comes either from testimony, behavior, anatomy/physiology, or phylogeny. However, none of these provide evidence that plants have conscious mental states. Therefore, we conclude that there is no evidence that plants have minds in the sense relevant for morality. (shrink)

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)

Conversations about the past can involve voicing and silencing; processes of validation and invalidation that shape recall. In this experiment we examined the products and processes of remembering a significant autobiographical event in conversation with others. Following the death of Australian celebrity Steve Irwin, in an adapted version of the collaborative recall paradigm, 69 participants described and rated their memories for hearing of his death. Participants then completed a free recall phase where they either discussed the event in groups of (...) three or wrote about the event on their own. Finally, participants completed the original questionnaire again, both 1 week and 1 month after the free recall phase. Discussion influenced later memories for hearing of Irwin’s death, particularly memories for emotion and shock. Qualitative analysis of the free recall phase suggested that during conversation a shared understanding of the event developed, but that emotional reactions to the event were silenced in ways that minimised the event’s impact. These findings are discussed in terms of the processes and consequences of sharing public and personal memories in conversation. (shrink)

The most cursory examination of the history of artificial intelligence highlights numerous egregious claims of its researchers, especially in relation to a populist form of ‘strong’ computationalism which holds that any suitably programmed computer instantiates genuine conscious mental states purely in virtue of carrying out a specific series of computations. The argument presented herein is a simple development of that originally presented in Putnam’s (Representation & Reality, Bradford Books, Cambridge in 1988) monograph, “Representation & Reality”, which if correct, has important (...) implications for turing machine functionalism and the prospect of ‘conscious’ machines. In the paper, instead of seeking to develop Putnam’s claim that, “everything implements every finite state automata”, I will try to establish the weaker result that, “everything implements the specific machine Q on a particular input set (x)”. Then, equating Q (x) to any putative AI program, I will show that conceding the ‘strong AI’ thesis for Q (crediting it with mental states and consciousness) opens the door to a vicious form of panpsychism whereby all open systems, (e.g. grass, rocks etc.), must instantiate conscious experience and hence that disembodied minds lurk everywhere. (shrink)

We suggest a new answer to this intriguing question and argue that the answer may have implications for the solutions to the measurement problem. The main basis of our analysis is the doctrine of psychophysical supervenience. First of all, based on this doctrine, we argue that an observer in a quantum superposition or a quantum observer has a definite conscious experience, which is neither disjunctive nor illusive. The inconsistency of this result with the bare theory is further analyzed, and it (...) is shown that an appropriate use of the strategy of analyzing the disposition of an observer to answer a particular question also leads to the same result. Next, we argue that this new result seems to disfavor Everett's and Bohm's approaches to quantum mechanics when considering the doctrine of psychophysical supervenience. This suggests that dynamical collapse theories are in the right direction to solve the measurement problem. Thirdly, we analyze the concrete content of the conscious experience of a quantum observer. It is argued that the mental content of a quantum observer is related to both the amplitude and relative phase of each branch of the superposition she is physically in, and it is composed of the mental content corresponding to every branch of the superposition. In addition, we argue that when assuming the modulus squared of the amplitude of each branch determines the vividness of the mental content corresponding to the branch, the structured tails problem of dynamical collapse theories can be solved. (shrink)

Life in Groups: How We Think, Feel, and Act Together comprises thirteen essays by the author relating to human life in groups, together with a substantial introduction and concluding discussion. The essays continue the development and application of the author’s perspective on collective beliefs, emotions, and actions, arguing that these and other central social phenomena are grounded in a joint commitment of the parties. This commitment unifies them, guides their actions going forward, and determines their relations to one another (...) in important ways. In particular, it grounds in each of the parties a set of rights and obligations of a particular kind. The introduction serves both to introduce joint commitment to those unfamiliar with it and to advance discussion in light of questions that have been raised. Several of the essays respond to comments on particular aspects of the author’s work. These include an essay that addresses some central questions about a joint commitment approach to the problem of political obligation. (shrink)

The most cursory examination of the history of artificial intelligence highlights numerous egregious claims of its researchers, especially in relation to a populist form of ‘strong’ computationalism which holds that any suitably programmed computer instantiates genuine conscious mental states purely in virtue of carrying out a specific series of computations. The argument presented herein is a simple development of that originally presented in Putnam’s monograph, “Representation & Reality”, which if correct, has important implications for turing machine functionalism and the prospect (...) of ‘conscious’ machines. In the paper, instead of seeking to develop Putnam’s claim that, “everything implements every finite state automata”, I will try to establish the weaker result that, “everything implements the specific machine Q on a particular input set ”. Then, equating Q to any putative AI program, I will show that conceding the ‘strong AI’ thesis for Q opens the door to a vicious form of panpsychism whereby all open systems,, must instantiate conscious experience and hence that disembodied minds lurk everywhere. (shrink)

The most well-known and controversial solution to the paradox of fiction is Kendall Walton’s, according to whom pity of (say) Anna Karenina is not genuine pity. Walton’s opponents argue that we can resolve the paradox of fiction while preserving the intuition that our response to Anna is ordinary, run-of-the-mill pity; and they claim that retaining this intuition explains more than Walton’s approach. In my view, the arguments of Walton’s opponents depend on idiosyncratic features of examples involving purely fictional characters like (...) Anna Karenina. What is really at issue is the fact that we respond emotionally to fiction in ways that are not explained by our beliefs, but instead by what we imagine. That this is the crux of the paradox of fiction becomes clear only when we consider fictions about real persons and events. And I contend that once we turn our attention to these cases, Walton’s theory proves significantly more explanatory than the opposition. (shrink)

According to some, there is a problem concerning the emotions we feel toward fictional entities such as Anna Karenina, Werther and the like. We feel pity, fear, and sadness toward them, but how is that possible? “We are saddened, but how can we be? What are we sad about? How can we feel genuinely and involuntarily sad, and weep, as we do know that no one has suffered or died?” (Radford, in: Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, 1975). (...) This is the paradox of fiction which is based on the assumption that emotions, to be genuine and rational, should be directed toward existent beings. But if beliefs about existence are necessary for us to be rationally moved by something, and such beliefs are lacking when we are moved by fiction (because we do not believe fictional characters and events to be real), then our capacity for an emotional response to fiction is irrational. Consequently, our emotional attitude toward future generations should be considered as irrational as well. But is this really the case? Are there good arguments to consider future and fictional entities as similar from this point of view? Or would it be better to distinguish the two? Is there such a thing as a paradox of the future? If so, how does it relate to the more famous paradox of fiction? (shrink)

Discussion of J. Kevin O’Regan’s “Why Red Doesn’t Sound Like a Bell: Understanding the Feel of Consciousness” Content Type Journal Article Pages 1-20 DOI 10.1007/s13164-012-0090-7 Authors J. Kevin O’Regan, Laboratoire Psychologie de la Perception, CNRS - Université Paris Descartes, Centre Biomédical des Saints Pères, 45 rue des Sts Pères, 75270 Paris cedex 06, France Ned Block, Departments of Philosophy, Psychology and Center for Neural Science, New York University, 5 Washington Place, New York, NY 10003, USA Journal Review of Philosophy (...) and Psychology Online ISSN 1878-5166 Print ISSN 1878-5158. (shrink)

To gain a deeper understanding of consumers' brain responses during a real-time in-store exploration could help retailers to get much closer to costumers' experience. To our knowledge, this is the first time the specific role of touch has been investigated by means of a neuroscientific approach during consumer in-store experience within the field of sensory marketing. This study explores the presence of distinct cortical brain oscillations in consumers' brain while navigating a store that provides a high level of sensory arousal (...) and being allowed or not to touch products. A 16-channel wireless electroencephalogram was applied to 23 healthy participants, with interest in cosmetics but naive about the store explored. Subjects were assigned to two experimental conditions based on the chance of touching or not touching the products. Cortical oscillations were explored by means of power spectral analysis of the following frequency bands: delta, theta, alpha, and beta. Results highlighted the presence of delta, theta, and beta bands within the frontal brain regions during both sensory conditions. The absence of touch was experienced as a lack of perception that needs cognitive control, as reflected by Delta and Theta band left activation, whereas a right increase of Beta band for touch condition was associated with sustained awareness on the sensory experience. Overall, EEG cortical oscillations' functional meaning could help highlight the neurophysiological implicit responses to tactile conditions and the importance of touch integration in consumers' experience. (shrink)