Arnon Cahen

Abstract The aim of this paper is twofold. First, we clarify the notion of immunity to error through misidentification with respect to the first-person pronoun (IEM). In particular, we set out to dispel the view that for a judgment to be IEM it must contain a token of a certain class of predicates. Rather, the importance of the IEM status of certain judgments is that it teaches us about privileged ways of coming to know about ourselves. We then turn to examine how perception, as a state with nonconceptual content, can give rise to judgments that are IEM. On one view, the ‘inheritance model’ of immunity, perception gives rise to such judgments because perception itself is IEM. We argue that this model is misguided, and, instead, suggest and elucidate an alternative view: perception gives rise to judgments that are IEM by virtue of containing implicitly self-related or self-concerning information.

Hoerl & McCormack argue that comparative and developmental psychology teaches us that “neither animals nor infants can think and reason about time.” We argue that the authors neglect to take into account pivotal evidence from ethology that suggests that non-human animals do possess a capacity to represent and reason about time, namely, work done on Sumatran orangutans’ long travel calls.

Peter Menzies has developed a novel version of the exclusion principle that he claims to be compatible with the possibility of mental causation. Menzies proposes to frame the exclusion principle in terms of a difference-making account of causation, understood in counterfactual terms. His new exclusion principle appears in two formulations: upwards exclusion — which is the familiar case in which a realizing event causally excludes the event that it realizes — and, more interestingly, downward exclusion, in which an event causally excludes its realizer. This paper shows that one consequence of Menzies’s proposed solution to the problem of mental causation is a ubiquitous violation of the principle of closure — a fact that forces him into a trilemma to which we see no satisfactory response.

This paper assesses Fodor’s well-known argument from multiple realizability to nonreductive physicalism. Recent work has brought out that the empirical case for cross-species multiple realizability is weak at best and so we consider whether the argument can be rebooted using a “thin” notion of intra-species multiple realizability, taking individual neural firing patterns to be the realizers of mental events. We agree that there are no prospects for reducing mental events to individual neural firing patterns. But there are more plausible candidates for the neural realizers of mental events out there, namely, global neural properties such as the average firing rates of neural populations, or the local field potential. The problem for Fodor’s argument is that those global neural properties point towards reductive versions of physicalism.

This paper assesses Fodor’s well-known argument from multiple realizability to nonreductive physicalism. Recent work has brought out that the empirical case for cross-species multiple realizability is weak at best and so we consider whether the argument can be rebooted using a “thin” notion of intra-species multiple realizability, taking individual neural firing patterns to be the realizers of mental events. We agree that there are no prospects for reducing mental events to individual neural firing patterns. But there are more plausible candidates for the neural realizers of mental events out there, namely, global neural properties such as the average firing rates of neural populations, or the local field potential. The problem for Fodor’s argument is that those global neural properties point towards reductive versions of physicalism.

ABSTRACT This paper assesses Fodor's well-known argument from multiple realizability to nonreductive physicalism. Recent work has brought out that the empirical case for cross-species multiple realizability is weak at best and so we consider whether the argument can be rebooted using a "thin" notion of intra-species multiple realizability, taking individual neural firing patterns to be the realizers of mental events. We agree that there are no prospects for reducing mental events to individual neural firing patterns. But there are more plausible candidates for the neural realizers of mental events out there, namely, global neural properties such as the average firing rates of neural populations, or the local field potential. The problem for Fodor's argument is that those global neural properties point towards reductive versions of physicalism.

How are conscious mental events integrated into the causal fabric of the world? Many philosophers thinking about the metaphysics of consciousness have been attracted to some version of non-reductive physicalism, holding that while conscious mental events are token-identical to physical events there are no type-identities holding between the conscious mind and the physical world. As is well-known, non-reductive physicalism is in danger of making conscious mental events epiphenomenal, if certain initially plausible assumptions about causation in the physical world are accepted. These assumptions include the causal closure of the physical. Since the causal efficacy of conscious mental events seems undeniable, some philosophers committed to non-reductive physicalism have rejected the causal closure of the physical. In a series of papers Peter Menzies and Christian List have tried to motivate such a rejection through a counterfactual theory of causation. Distinguishing causation proper from causal sufficiency they argue that, in suitable circumstances, mental causes can exclude physical ones, thus preserving mental causation. Their argument rests crucially on claims about counterfactual dependence relations between mental causes and physical realizers (List and Menzies 2009, Menzies and List 2010, Menzies 2013, 2015). In this paper, we argue that these claims rest upon a mistaken view of realization in the brain. The Menzies/List argument (together with many other arguments in the metaphysics of the conscious mind) assumes that conscious mental events are directly realized by specific firing patterns of neurons, which stand in different patterns of counterfactual dependence to actions than conscious mental events. We show how their argument from counterfactual dependence fails because the most plausible neural realizers for conscious mental events are not specific firing patterns, but rather higher-level properties of populations of neurons that are themselves instantiated in specific firing patterns. Those higher-level properties stand in relations of counterfactual dependence to actions that typically mirror those of conscious mental events. These parallel relations of counterfactual dependence provide, we claim, the basis for a new argument for a version of the type-identity theory.

I argue that the debate about the reason-giving character of perception, and, derivatively, the contemporary debate about the nature of the (non)conceptual content of perception, is best viewed as a confrontation with refined versions of the following three independently plausible, yet mutually inconsistent, propositions:
Perceptual apprehension – Some perceptions provide reasons directly
Exclusivity – Only beliefs provide reasons directly
Bifurcation – No perception is a belief
I begin with an evaluation and refinement of each proposition so as to crystallize the source of the difficulties that dominate our thinking about the reason-giving character of perception. I argue that the contemporary literature is broadly split between those denying Bifurcation and those denying Perceptual apprehension. Though Exclusivity, too, has been target to criticism, its grip on our thinking has all too often been underestimated. As a result, a proper denial or modification of Exclusivity is yet wanting. Overcoming Exclusivity involves a considerable challenge that has not been adequately acknowledged or met – to develop a substantive account of nonconceptual apprehension. Getting a clearer understanding of the nature, the source, and possible resolution of this challenge is the primary aim of this paper.

Peter Menzies has developed a novel version of the exclusion principle that he claims to be compatible with the possibility of mental causation. Menzies proposes to frame the exclusion principle in terms of an interventionist or difference-making account of causation, understood in counterfactual terms. His new exclusion principle appears in two formulations: upwards exclusion – which is the familiar case in which a realizing event causally excludes the event that it realizes – and, more interestingly, downward exclusion, in which an event causally excludes its realizer. This paper explores shows that one consequence of Menzies’s proposed solution to the problem of mental causation is a ubiquitous violation of the principle of closure – a fact that forces him into a trilemma to which we see no satisfactory response.

Biographies Itzhak Aharon (Gingi) is a lecturer at the Interdisciplinary Center in Herzliya, Israel, and a visiting fellow of the Center for Rationality and Interactive Decision Making in Jerusalem. After receiving his PhD in computational neuroscience from the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, he worked for several years in the high-tech industry, before returning to academia as a member of the Martinos Center for Biomedical Imaging in Boston. His research centers on the neurobiology of motivation and decision making (neuroeconomics).

As our primary mode of contact with the world, perception is the causal and informational foundation for our higher cogni-tive functions—it guides our thinking about and acting upon the world. It is therefore unsurprising that so much empirical and theoretical research is devoted to the study of the complex interrelations between perception and cognition. Nor is it surpris-ing that such research spans traditional disciplinary boundaries and attracts the interest and efforts of researchers from the full spectrum of the cognitive sciences, psychology, neuroscience, phi-losophy, and others. This Research Topic aims to contribute to this expansive research project—the exploration of the percep-tion/cognition interface—while respecting its essentially interdis-ciplinary character. Given that perception is the input to cognition, the two systems must be able to “talk ” to each other; at the very least, information

My dissertation articulates and resolves a problem at the heart of debates about how perception guides our actions and deliberations. The problem arises from the independent plausibility but mutual inconsistency of the following theses: Some perceptions provide us reasons Only belief-like states provide us reasons No perception is belief-like I argue that this problem is deeper than has been acknowledged. Simply rejecting any one thesis leads to serious challenges. Nonetheless, I argue that we can unravel the link between having reasons and having belief-like states in a way that explains the initial plausibility of the first thesis. I provide a formulation of what being a reason-giving state amounts to, which does not require it to be belief-like. I then offer a substantive account of perceptual content that both respects its non-belief-like (nonconceptual) character and explains its ability to provide us reasons. ii

... An example of the first sort of dependency is given by the phenomenon of color constancy. ... According to Tye, perception involves Russellian nonconceptual content. ... The argument from the finer-grained content of colour experiences: A redefinition of its role within the debate ...

How can two peoples, engaged in a decades-long bloody conflict, break the cycle of violence, reconcile their divergent interests, and construct a reality devoid of the deep seated hatred permeating their respective communities? A novel initiative called ‘The Minds of Peace Experiment’ (MOPE) attempts to tackle this vexed question by bringing together regular Israelis and Palestinians to simulate the process of peace negotiations. Sitting before an audience and assisted by moderators, two mock delegations discuss the conflict and the steps they consider necessary if it is to come to a close. This article discusses the general nature of the MOPE, its stated goals, and procedure. It focuses on several significant themes that emerged from one particular instalment of the experiment. The aim is to evaluate the utility of the MOPE along two dimensions. First, in terms of its capacity to affect the dynamics of the conflict. Second, in terms of its adequacy as a model of a genuine major Palestinian–Israeli public assembly. It is argued that the MOPE is an important addition to various strategies for conflict resolution, though its effectiveness is hampered by several factors that demand attention.