Philosophy of Mind

The verb /forgytan/ is used reflexively six times in the extant Old English corpus, and all six instances are found in King Alfred’s translation of Gregory the Great’s /Regula pastoralis/. As the translation adopts from its Latin source the concept of what I call ‘completely reflexive forgetting’ (the forgetting of one’s self), it adjusts the concept for an Anglo-Saxon audience by reimagining and reconfiguring the logistics of the mind and its mechanisms of perception. Completely reflexive forgetting is thus imagined as the process by which a ruler ceases to perceive himself from within (as God always does) and begins perceiving himself from without (from the perspective of his subjects), thereby slipping into a perpetually totalizing state of self-concealment.

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Brain-computer interfaces allow agents to control computers without moving their bodies. The agents imagine certain things and the brain-computer interfaces read the concomitant neural activity and operate the computer accordingly. But the use of brain-computer interfaces is problematic for criminal law, which requires that someone can only be found criminally responsible if they have satisfied the actus reus requirement: that the agent has performed some (suitably specified) conduct. Agents who affect the world using brain-computer interfaces do not obviously perform any conduct, so when they commit crimes using brain-computer interfaces it is unclear how they have satisfied actus reus. Drawing on a forthcoming paper by Allan McCay, I suggest three potential accounts of the conduct that satisfies actus reus: the agent’s neural firings, his mental states, and the electronic activity in his brain-computer interface. I then present two accounts which determine how actus reus may be satisfied – one a counterfactual and the other a minimal sufficiency account. These accounts are lent plausibility because they are analogous to the but-for and NESS (Necessary Element in a Sufficient Set) tests for causation which are generally accepted tests for causation in legal theory. I argue that due to the determinations of these accounts and considerations regarding the relationship between the mind and brain, actus reus is satisfied by either the agent’s neural activity or brain-computer interface electrical activity. Which of these satisfies actus reus is determined by how well the brain-computer interface is functionally integrated with the agent.

Both Millikan's brand of naturalistic analytic philosophy and Husserlian phenomenology have held on to teleological notions, despite their being out of favor in mainstream Western philosophy for most of the twentieth century. Both traditions have recognized the need for teleology in order to adequately account for intentionality, the need to adequately account for intentionality in order to adequately account for meaning, and the need for an adequate theory of meaning in order to precisely and consistently describe the world and life. The stark differences between their accounts of these fundamental concepts stem from radically different conceptions of the world, the natural and life. I argue that Millikan's teleosemantic approach relies on a teleology of determination by means of the lawfulness of nature that leaves no room for the freedom of self-determination, for reason, or for experience-for the reality of lived human life. In contrast to Millikan's account, Husserl's transcendental phenomenology situates teleology as a function of reason and first-personal experience, part of an extended account of intentionality and meaning according to which the full range of our making sense of the world is conceived as a rational activity that is itself a part of that world, and not an unnatural activity to be separated from it. While Husserl's account of these issues is indeed symptomatic of what Millikan calls "meaning rationalism," I argue that it is immune to the sorts of problems she claims will plague any such account, since these problems arise only against the background of a set of presuppositions about intentionality (representationalism, the "mythiness" of all givens) that Husserl does not share. Husserl's position can itself be understood to be within the bounds of a suitably liberal conception of naturalism, and interpreting him in this way it has the added benefit--contra Millikan--of not divorcing teleology from reason, the latter construed as our first-personal striving to make sense of the world as we experience it--of life.

This paper responds to continuing commentary on Velmans (2002a) “How could conscious experiences affect brains,” a target article for a special issue of JCS. I focus on the final question dealt with by the target article: how free will relates to preconscious and conscious mental processing, and I develop the case for preconscious free will.  Although “preconscious free will” might appear to be a contradiction in terms, it is consistent with the scientific evidence and provides a parsimonious way to reconcile the commonsense view that voluntary acts are freely chosen with the evidence that conscious wishes and decisions are determined by preconscious processing in the mind/brain.  I consider alternative interpretations of how “conscious free will” might operate by Libet and by Mangan and respond to doubts about the extent to which the operations of mind are revealed in consciousness, raised by Claxton and Bouratinos. In reconciling commonsense attributions of freedom and responsibility with the findings of science, preconscious free will can be shown to have practical consequences for adjudications in law.

In You Are the Universe, the contemplative endocrinologist Deepak Chopra and the MIT physicist Menas Kafatos offer a groundbreaking, lucid work on consciousness that is refreshingly accessible without relying upon mathematical language or overspecialized jargon. In summary, their book is a serious attempt to address the fundamental contemporary question, “Is the universe made of matter that learned to think, or is the universe made of mind that created matter?” (Chopra & Kafatos, 2017, p. 154). By the end of the book Chopra and Kafatos have gone so far as to argue that not only is the universe created and sustained by an underlying mind but that we are the universe, we are that mind. In a real sense, they declare, we as an organic species have co-created this universe.

Una fortunata rappresentazione storiografica ha voluto che il dualismo di Descartes si costituisse in diretta rottura col concetto tommasiano di anima-forma. Sulla scia dei numerosi studi che negli ultimi decenni si sono opposti a questo pregiudizio, L'angelo e la macchina ricostruisce nel dettaglio il dibattito cinque-seicentesco sulla psicologia, focalizzandosi specialmente sull'ambiente gesuita e sul contesto aristotelico, platonico e agostiniano di area francese. A partire da una rigorosa indagine sulle teorie dell'anima separata, particolare attenzione è data poi alla derivazione indirettamente angelologica del cogito e dell'innatismo cartesiano. Negli anni in cui Descartes elabora la sua metafisica, infatti, l'immediata prossimità tra anime e angeli costituisce per certi versi un dato di fatto, alla luce del quale appaiono chiare molte scelte argomentative delle Meditationes e persino le dinamiche che congiungono strettamente la "sostanza pensante" con il corpo-macchina.

— Review: Dr. Nicolò Galasso, in La Cultura. Rivista di Filosofia, Letteratura e Storia, 57 (2019, 1), pp. 129-132.
— Review: Dr. Jacopo Francesco Falà, in Lo Sguardo. Rivista di Filosofia, 27 (2018, 2), pp. 369-373.
— Review: Dr. Laurence Dupas-Gelin, in Bulettin Cartésien (Archives de Philosophie), 49 (2020), pp. 196-197.
— Review: Emanuele Landi, in Biblos. Revista da Faculdade de Letras da Universidade de Coimbra (forthcoming).

This paper provides an initial, multidimensional map of the complex relationships among consciousness, mind, brain and the external world in a way that follows both the contours of everyday experience and the findings of science. It then demonstrates how this reflexive monist map can be used to evaluate the utility and resolve some of the oppositions of the many other “isms” that currently populate consciousness studies. While no conventional, one-dimensional “ism” such as physicalism can do justice to this web of relationships, physicalism, functionalism, dualism, neutral monism, and dual-aspect monism can all be seen to provide useful ways of understanding different aspects of the relationships among consciousness, mind, brain and the external world when these are viewed in either a first- or a third-person way from within this web of relationships by sentient creatures such as ourselves. For example, physicalism and functionalism provide a useful understanding of consciousness, mind, brain and external world when viewed from a third-person perspective, while neutral monism provides a useful way of understanding first- versus third-person views of external phenomena. On the other hand, dual-aspect monism provides a useful way of understanding first- versus third-person views of mind, including Eastern versus Western views of mind.  Dual-aspect monism also provides a useful understanding of the “unconscious ground of being” that gives rise to, supports and embeds all these observable phenomena. For an integrated understanding one needs to understand how these phenomena and relationships combine into an integrated whole.

In this book, I examine the principles that philosopher and historian of ideas, Arthur Lovejoy, considers founders of the interpretation of the world as a great hierarchical chain of being. That is to say, the “principle of plenitude”, that of ‘continuity’ and that of ‘qualitative grading’, all related to that of ‘sufficient reason’. But we deal particularly with the Middle Ages interpretation.
After considering how the ‘principle of plenitude’ arises in Platonic philosophy, then that of ‘continuity’ in the Aristotelian and also the mode of application of these principles in the Plotinian system; we select two Medieval philosophers among all those mentioned by Lovejoy: St. Augustine and St. Thomas. The first, because of its clear tendency towards Neoplatonic thinking, it is possible, indeed, to find a Christian version of the principle of plenitude, where Incoate variations of that reflection are the seed that will bear fruit in much more elaborate systems such as the Thomist. St. Augustine takes the Neoplatonic ideas of the self-diffusing high Good and the ‘principle of plenitude’ and leads them towards the constitution of a full but contingent universe. On the other hand, the second author, Thomas Aquinas, separates himself from the Platonic conception to think of a much more contingent universe, founded on the free divine gift of the esse. He elaborates a very complete and sophisticated theory about the divine Will and concludes conceiving a universe where necessity is nuanced.
There isn´t just an absolute necessity but also a hypothetical, which guarantees that the Necessary Being himself has the freedom to choose the creation of a merely contigent world. In the end we found very suggestive the theory created by Lovejoy, but irrelevant, rigorously speaking, to the philosophy of the Aquinate.

Fundamental differences in philosophical outlook divide the more conservative and radical branches of the E-family. Yet the emergence of E-approaches to cognition, wherever they sit on the conservative-radical spectrum, represents an undeniably important development for understanding cognition. Educational research and practice should take serious stock of these approaches for the simple reason that questions of how to educate cannot be kept apart from questions about how we think and learn. This chapter reviews empirical findings in the E-cognition domain that lend credence to Shapiro and Stolz’s (2019) claim that, “the emerging research agenda of embodied cognition has much to offer educational practitioners, researchers, and/or policy-makers” (p. 34).
This chapter brackets question about the philosophical barriers that may, for some, block the acceptance of E-approaches and how to deal with them. It focuses instead on possible practical outcomes of such acceptance. Taking an imaginative leap, it asks: Assuming one adopted either a more conservative or more radical E-framework, how would that choice matter to one’s thinking about educational research and practice?

In this essay, I attempt to outline a feminist philosophical approach to the debate concerning (allegedly) false memories of childhood sexual abuse. Bringing the voices of feminist philosophers to bear on this issue highlights the implicit and sometimes questionable epistemological, metaphysical, and ethical-political commitments of some therapists and scientists involved in these debates. It also illuminates some current debates in and about feminist philosophy.

This paper asks about the ways in which embodimentoriented
cognitive science contributes to our understanding of phenomenal
consciousness. It is first argued that central work in the field
of embodied cognitive science does not solve the hard problem of consciousness
(Chalmers, 1996) head on. It is then argued that an
embodied turn toward neurophenomenology makes no distinctive
headway on the puzzle of consciousness; for neurophenomenology
either concedes dualism in the face of the hard problem or represents
only a slight methodological variation on extant cognitive-scientific
approaches to the easy problems of consciousness. The paper closes
with the positive suggestion that embodied cognitive science supports
a different approach to phenomenal consciousness, according to
which the mind is massively representational (and cognitive processing
teems with body-related representations), cognitive science has no
use for the personal-level posits that tend to drive philosophical theorizing
about consciousness and mind, and the hard problem is
illusory.

El problema acerca de la existencia de la mente y de su relación con el mundo físico no es ninguna novedad: ya se discutía sobre la dicotomía de la percepción individual frente a la inmanencia del mundo físico en la Antigua Grecia, y fue Descartes quien volvió a retomar el debate sobre el cuerpo y la mente, contando en su caso con nuevos enfoques y métodos de razonamiento propios de la Modernidad. A partir de la teoría cartesiana de la mente, se han desarrollado diversas teorías que han tratado de explicar o de negar la relación entre la conciencia y la conducta humana, pero todas ellas tienen algo en común: la relevancia del papel del lenguaje a la hora de intentar comprender por qué existe un yo, cómo se construye y qué relación tiene con el mundo que nos rodea… Si es que éste existe, claro. Este trabajo se propone realizar un repaso por estas teorías reivindicando la importancia del lenguaje en el estudio de la mente humana y tratando de concluir con una reflexión personal sobre la naturaleza de la conciencia.

The existence of the mind and its relation with the physical world is not a novelty problem: it was discussed about the individual perception's dichotomyin face of the inherence of physical world in the Ancient Greece, and, what is more, Descartes was the person who picked up the thread of body and mind, taking into account the new perspective and Modernity reasoning methods. From the Cartesian theory of the mind, it has been developed several theories that try to explain or to deny the relation between the consciousness and the human behavior, but all of them have something in common: the language importance at the time of trying to understand why exist a " me " , how it is constructed and what relation has with the world around us… if it exists, of course. The purpose of this paper is to review the different theories claiming the importance of the language in the studies of the human mind, and to conclude with a personal reflection about the nature of the conciusness.

La letteratura buddhista del canone pali presenta un’estesa tassonomia di esercizi di meditazione. Lo scopo di questi esercizi è di raggiungere alti livelli di concentrazione e da lì forme di conoscenza intuitiva atte a dissipare l’illusione e a liberare la mente dalle contaminazioni mentali. Questo processo, descritto anche all’interno delle narrazioni tradizionali della vita del Buddha, verrà esaminato attraverso le sue principali fasi e componenti: prerequisiti, facoltà accessorie variamente interrelate, esercizi specifici per la focalizzazione dell’attenzione su un oggetto, rimedi agli impedimenti alla concentrazione, stadi profondi di assorbimento e relative acquisizioni, modelli progressivi di acquietamento della mente, contromisure all’identificazione egoica della mente con i livelli di concentrazione raggiunti, maturazione dei fattori contemplativi e cognitivi, rottura degli schemi del saṃsāra e conseguente liberazione.
Si analizzeranno alcuni testi e passi dedicati alla concentrazione meditativa, tratti dal Suttapiṭaka e da lavori esegetici, dal punto di vista delle sfumature lessicali, dei riferimenti incrociati, della coerenza dei contenuti, e dell’impatto di queste classificazioni sulla filosofia del buddhismo antico tout court, con particolare attenzione all’ontologia e all’epistemologia.

Диссертация посвящена одной из самых запутанных и старых философских проблем - проблеме ментальной каузальности или проблеме взаимодействия сознания и тела. Все мы убеждены, что состояния сознания влияют на поведение, а также знаем (и все больше узнаем) о корреляции между сознательными и нейронными состояния, что какие-то процессы в мозге обязательным образом сопряжены с наличием сознания. Однако при всех этих данных до сих пор неясно КАК сознание связано с процессами в мозге, где пролегает путь от области ментального к физическому миру. На данный момент есть несколько конкурирующих гипотез на этот счет и выбор одной из них во многом определит теорию сознания.

Understanding Consciousness, second edition provides a unique survey and evaluation of consciousness studies, along with an original analysis of consciousness that combines scientific findings, philosophy and common sense.

Building on the widely praised first edition of the book, this new edition adds fresh research, and deepens the original analysis in a way that reflects some of the fundamental changes in the understanding of consciousness that have taken place over the last ten years.

The book is divided into three parts; Part I surveys current theories of consciousness, evaluating their strengths and weaknesses. Part II reconstructs an understanding of consciousness from first principles, starting with its phenomenology, and leading to a closer examination of how conscious experience relates to the world described by physics and information processing in the brain. Finally, Part III deals with fundamental issues such as what consciousness is and does, and how it fits into the evolving universe. As the structure of the book moves from a basic overview of the field to a successively deeper analysis, it can be used both for those new to the subject and for more established researchers.

Understanding Consciousness tells a story with a beginning, middle and end in a way that integrates the philosophy of consciousness with the science. Overall, the book provides a unique perspective on how to address the problems of consciousness and as such will be of great interest to psychologists, philosophers, neuroscientists and other professionals concerned with mind/body relationships, and all who are interested in this subject.

Until the 1960's evidence for psi-dreaming (including precognitive dreams, telepathic dreams, clairvoyant dreams and mutual dreams) consisted mostly of anecdotal reports. However, at that point researchers at Maimonides Dream Laboratory (1) took the next step, and in a series of controlled scientific studies demonstrated that subjects could repeatedly tune into randomly selected external targets in their dreams. A meta-analysis of post-Maimonides studies of psi-dreaming by other researchers confirmed this effect (2).

In a related area, research since the 1970’s in remote viewing has demonstrated that human beings in general have the ability to tune into designated targets outside of the range of their physical senses. In 1995 the CIA hired Dr. Jessica Utts, a professor of statistics at the University of California, Davis, to evaluate a series of remote viewing experiments done at the Stanford Research Institute. She concluded: "Using the standards applied to any other area of science, it is concluded that psychic functioning has been well established. The statistical results of the studies examined are far beyond what is expected by chance. Arguments that these results could be due to methodological flaws in the experiments are soundly refuted." (3) And it seems generally agreed that spontaneous dream-state psi occurs much more easily and often than waking-state psi.

For theories on the nature of dreaming, the validation of dream-psi seems the equivalent of the Michelson-Morley experiment in physics, with the exception that few have realized the profound implications. For example, psi-dreaming has made strictly subjective, solipsistic theories of dreaming outdated and untenable. We need to change how we think about dreams, and to understand that dreaming involves a kind of perception.

In order to better cope with the pressures and stresses of the current day, modern psychology is anxiously seeking to find new therapies to address the increasing disorders within the human psyche. In the process new fields of research, such as humanistic and transpersonal psychology, curiously appear to borrow more and more from the wisdom of the ages. This volume, containing eighteen articles by noteworthy expositors of the perennial philosophy such as Huston Smith, Seyyed Hossein Nasr, and Frithjof Schuon, presents the spiritual psychology of the wisdom traditions as a much-needed antidote to the current impasse in modern psychology.

Some Endorsements for Psychology and the Perennial Philosophy:

“[Psychology and the Perennial Philosophy] is more than an anthology. It is a wisely crafted collection of classic and contemporary scholarship noting that what many are seeking is what has always been, a perennial philosophy, that remains foundational. As one of the authors, Tage Lindbom, properly notes, ‘Secularization is a fish in troubled waters.’ This book claims the waters and is essential reading for all those who may have forgotten or are simply ignorant of the rich foundation provided by the perennial philosophy.”
—Ralph W. Hood, Professor of Psychology at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, past president of the Psychology of Religion division of the American Psychological Association, co-founder of The International Journal for the Psychology of Religion and co-author of The Psychology of Religion

“A necessary and bracing critique of the assumptions and limitations of contemporary Western psychology, this generous volume is also a passionate call and learned guide towards a truer perspective that embraces man's spiritual nature.”
—Gabor Maté, M.D., and author of In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts: Close Encounters with Addiction

“Knowing the nature of the mind is perhaps the most difficult undertaking, especially in today’s world. To comprehend the nature of mind one needs to turn to the domain of religion and spirituality. Yet the truth of the mind and its complexity cannot explicitly be defined in words. Inner or transcendent wisdom sees the mind’s own nature without the duality of the seer. Suchness (tathatā) of mind is only experiential and not expressible. The words used to describe thought are themselves a product of thought, which is conditioned and limited. Thus, differences and contradictions are unavoidable. Therefore, a comparative study of different viewpoints and commentaries is immensely important to awaken the inner intelligence to see the mind as it is. Psychology and the Perennial Philosophy: Studies in Comparative Religion edited by Samuel Bendeck Sotillos is an outstanding effort in this direction.”
—Samdhong Rinpoche, former Prime Minister (Kalon Tripa) of the Tibetan Government-in-exile, author of Uncompromising Truth for a Compromised World: Tibetan Buddhism and Today’s World

“The rise of psychology has impacted the study and practice of spirituality, the experiences and attitudes relevant to ultimate human values that transcend ordinary behavior. Each chapter of this remarkable book demonstrates this interaction in a unique and provocative way. But rather than using psychology to reduce and ‘psychologize’ spiritual topics, its authors demonstrate how directives from the spiritual traditions can enhance and even illuminate the enduring importance of psychology in the 21st century.”
—Stanley Krippner, Saybrook University, co-author of Spiritual Dimensions of Healing

“The work at hand is a thinking and debating man’s delight. If you have any interest at all in attempting to include an educated and enlightened view of man’s higher functions in your purview of the world, you will learn from and enjoy this collection of essays. If you already have some knowledge in this area, brace yourself: you may see some of your favorites sharply criticized. A thought-provoking work.”
—Bruce W. Scotton, University of California, San Francisco, co-editor of Textbook of Transpersonal Psychiatry and Psychology

“This book, superbly edited by Samuel Bendeck Sotillos, is a masterful critique of the field of psychology and its loss of the sacred ground in which it once was rooted. It offers depth psychologists an opportunity to contemplate timeless truths echoed through the centuries by perennial philosophers who have always claimed psyche is subordinate to Spirit. Although ignored in depth psychology’s early years due to prejudice and lack of understanding, this is a message today’s psychotherapists must take seriously. Human beings need a deeper and wider transpersonal vision of who and what we are, which the saints and sages of the world’s spiritual traditions have always pointed to. In psychotherapy with a therapist committed to such a vision, patients penetrate into their unconscious depths and not infrequently awaken to the Ground of all Being. Their suffering itself occurred because they had turned away from Spirit. Above all, this volume passionately calls upon depth psychology to remember its origin in the perennial wisdom at the core of the great religions. There is something of a polemic in these pages. It deserves to be considered by depth psychologists of all persuasions.”
—Bryan Wittine, Transpersonal psychologist and Jungian psychoanalyst

“This anthology from Samuel Bendeck Sotillos is a must reference for anyone who is interested in psychology and its relationship to spirituality, and in developing an inclusive dialogue between disciplines that favor an integral outlook on the person and his or her potential. Selections in this anthology will inspire us to reexamine the metaphysical underpinnings of psychology, and remind us how important it is to rise above science’s attempt to reduce the human being to an epistemic object.”
—Sangeetha Menon, National Institute of Advanced Studies (Bangalore, India), Board Member of the International Transpersonal Association (ITA), author of The Beyond Experience: Consciousness in Bhagavad Gita

“This anthology has some of the most discerning essays and reviews on spirituality and psychology, which provide much-needed care and caution to all those engaged in bringing them together or who wish to do so in future. Therefore, it is a must-read for all those who teach, research, consult, or study in such frontier areas as transpersonal psychology, states of consciousness, mind-body relation, holistic health, Indian psychology, and so on. It will be an invaluable textbook for courses in these and other related areas. I congratulate the editor of the book.”
—Kiran Kumar K. Salagame, University of Mysore (India), Board Member of the International Transpersonal Association (ITA), author of The Psychology of Meditation: A Contextual Approach

“One of the finest collections of essays on the Perennial Philosophy—a must-read for all psychologists who are engaged with spirituality and transpersonal psychology. The essays which critique modern psychology (including transpersonal psychology, and the framework of Carl Jung), in the light of the Perennial Philosophy are a revelation and make compelling reading. The book serves as a corrective to the excesses of modern psychology, and to this end Sotillos has done a commendable job. I for one will include the book in some of the graduate courses that I teach.”
—Suneet Varma, University of Delhi, co-editor of Foundations of Indian Psychology

“To its credit modern science by-and-large is becoming more cognizant of the essential connection between spirituality and psychological health and well-being and most of all its positive implications within the field of psychology. While there is ample data to document this in a plethora of academic journals and books, this new book Psychology and the Perennial Philosophy adds a novel contribution to the dialogue between psychology and spirituality, which captures many nuances that for the most part go unnoticed within these discussions, and last but not least, it provides a keen eye of discernment to understand this intricate relationship on a deeper level that is crucially needed. This work will be a valuable asset to students and long term mental health practitioners and professors alike who seek to better understand the relationship between psychology and spirituality.”
—Harold G. Koenig, Duke University, Director of the Center for Spirituality, Theology and Health, co-author of The Handbook of Religion and Health

As hundreds of so-called "psychotherapies" have been foisted onto the public, all claiming to treat "mental illness," newer understandings of how the human brain actually works and the processes which drive the formations of mentation that we refer to as "the mind," demand a reassessment of what exactly we are referring to by the term "mental illness" and what kinds of intervention would be feasible in both the prevention of and recovery from cognitive and behavioral disorder. A fundamental process in the formation of an individual's mentation is the associations of experience. These associations not only account for constructive behavior, but can also lead to deleterious or negative behavior, suggesting that some associations are negative and therefore the negative behavior can be remolded through contrasting positive associations; however, to understand what this really means and how it works, we must start at the beginning and define what exactly is this negative behavior that we refer to by the term "mental illness." One of the most important axioms of life so simply but profoundly phrased by Oscar Wilde, is that "the truth is rarely pure and NEVER simple" (emphasis mine). Nothing can ever be explained by simple sound bites – oversimplification is just another word for misrepresentation – so to understand, we must truly engage the subject, and to engage the subject, we must first and foremost clearly define what it is that we are seeking to understand. In this case, it demands that we understand what exactly is mental illness.

The enigmatic appeal of submission in sexual masochism is a phenomenon that calls for an explanation: What makes receiving pain during sex so appealing? This appeal can be explained conceptually, phenomenologically, and biochemically as the motivation to reach the highly pleasurable psycho-physical altered state called 'subspace'. Although the term subspace is used in the context of sex, parallels can be drawn between subspace and another phenomenon: a psycho-physical altered state that can occur during natural and undisturbed birth. I hypothesize that the ability (or even the desire) to reach pain-related altered states in sexual masochism has roots in a crucial evolutionary advantage that comes into play during childbirth, consistent with recent findings that sexual masochists are generally psychologically healthy. Moreover, I contend that from an evolutionary perspective, sexual masochism may even confer adaptive advantages, consistent with evolutionary explanations for the tendency toward submission in conjunction with pain in the context of female reproductive responses such as mating and childbirth.

This paper examines the history and philosophy of a little-known psychological experience: depersonalization. It explores it as a phenomenal experience and as a disorder. It examines nosological debates over the condition, both past and present. It presents speculative hypotheses about phenomenal consciousness, the self and sensation.

Objective: To explain the illusory nature of the self and explore its implications for psychotherapy.

Conclusions: Our usual experience of the self is an illusion. Rather than a discrete entity, it is a network of processes that maintains apparent irreducible unity via alterations of perceptions, beliefs, intentions and memories. By pro- viding an efficient summary of an individual and its surroundings, the self-illusion allows one to predict, experience and interact with the world efficiently. Targeting mechanisms that preserve the self-illusion could provide a focus for psychotherapy. Viewing the self as a complex network offers a valuable conceptual framework for psychotherapy.

A mildly chronological overview of the philosophers who may have been inspired by the use of psychoactive chemicals, inc. Plato, de Quincey, Davy, Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, James, Bergson, Benjamin, Jünger, Paz, Marcuse, Sartre, Foucault; and a mention of the Outsight project.

This article was based on a talk given for the University of Exeter Philosophy Society (video: https://youtu.be/X2eY4n37FC0) and at the ICPR2016 conference. It was published in the popular HighExistence magazine on August 2nd 2016, and has received over 90 000 social media shares (http://highexistence.com/hidden-psychedelic-influence-philosophy-plato-nietzsche-psychonauts-thoughts).

Reference:
Sjöstedt-H, P. 'The Psychedelic Influence on Philosophy', HighExistence.com (2nd-08-2016)

This book concerns the foundations of epistemic modality and hyperintensionality and their applications to the philosophy of mathematics. I examine the nature of epistemic modality, when the modal operator is interpreted as concerning both apriority and conceivability, as well as states of knowledge and belief. The book demonstrates how epistemic modality and hyperintensionality relate to the computational theory of mind; metaphysical modality and hyperintensionality; the types of mathematical modality and hyperintensionality; to the epistemic status of large cardinal axioms, undecidable propositions, and abstraction principles in the philosophy of mathematics; to the modal and hyperintensional profiles of the logic of rational intuition; and to the types of intention, when the latter is interpreted as a hyperintensional mental state. Chapter 2 argues for a novel type of expressivism based on the duality between the categories of coalgebras and algebras, and argues that the duality permits of the reconciliation between modal and hyperintensional cognitivism and modal and hyperintensional expressivism. I also develop a novel, topic-sensitive truthmaker semantics for dynamic epistemic logic, and develop a novel, dynamic two-dimensional semantics grounded in two-dimensional hyperintensional Turing machines. Chapter 3 provides an abstraction principle for epistemic (hyper-)intensions. Chapter 4 advances a topic-sensitive two-dimensional truthmaker semantics, and provides three novel interpretations of the framework along with the epistemic and metasemantic. Chapter 5 applies the fixed points of the modal μ-calculus in order to account for the iteration of epistemic states in a single agent, by contrast to availing of modal axiom 4 (i.e. the KK principle). The fixed point operators in the modal μ-calculus are rendered hyperintensional, which yields the first hyperintensional construal of the modal μ-calculus in the literature and the first application of the calculus to the iteration of epistemic states in a single agent instead of the common knowledge of a group of agents. Chapter 6 advances a solution to the Julius Caesar problem based on Fine's `criterial' identity conditions which incorporate conditions on essentiality and grounding. Chapter 7 provides a ground-theoretic regimentation of the proposals in the metaphysics of consciousness and examines its bearing on the two-dimensional conceivability argument against physicalism. The topic-sensitive epistemic two-dimensional truthmaker semantics developed in chapters 2 and 4 is availed of in order for epistemic states to be a guide to metaphysical states in the hyperintensional setting.

Chapters 8-12 provide cases demonstrating how the two-dimensional hyperintensions of hyperintensional, i.e. topic-sensitive epistemic two-dimensional truthmaker, semantics, solve the access problem in the epistemology of mathematics. Chapter 8 examines the interaction between my hyperintensional semantics and the axioms of epistemic set theory, large cardinal axioms, the Epistemic Church-Turing Thesis, the modal axioms governing the modal profile of Ω-logic, Orey sentences such as the Generalized Continuum Hypothesis, and absolute decidability. These results yield inter alia the first hyperintensional Epistemic Church-Turing Thesis and hyperintensional epistemic set theories in the literature. Chapter 9 examines the modal and hyperintensional commitments of abstractionism, in particular necessitism, and epistemic hyperintensionality, epistemic utility theory, and the epistemology of abstraction. I countenance a hyperintensional semantics for novel epistemic abstractionist modalities. I suggest, too, that higher observational type theory can be applied to first-order abstraction principles in order to make first-order abstraction principles recursively enumerable, i.e. Turing machine computable, and that the truth of the first-order abstraction principle for two-dimensional  hyperintensions is grounded in its being possibly recursively enumerable and the machine being physically implementable. Chapter 10 examines the philosophical significance of hyperintensional Ω-logic in set theory and discusses the hyperintensionality of metamathematics. Chapter 11 provides a modal logic for rational intuition and provides a hyperintensional semantics. Chapter 12 avails of modal coalgebras to interpret the defining properties of indefinite extensibility, and avails of hyperintensional epistemic two-dimensional semantics in order to account for the interaction between interpretational and objective modalities and the truthmakers thereof. This yields the first hyperintensional category theory in the literature. I invent a new mathematical trick in which first-order structures are treated as categories, and Vopenka's principle can be satisfied because of the elementary embeddings between the categories and generate Vopenka cardinals in the category of Set in category theory. Chapter 13 examines modal responses to the alethic paradoxes. Chapter 14 examines, finally, the modal and hyperintensional semantics for the different types of intention and the relation of the latter to evidential decision theory.

This book argues that thinking is bounded by neither the brain nor the skin of an organism. Cognitive systems function through integration of neural and bodily functions with the functions of representational vehicles. The integrationist position offers a fresh contribution to the emerging embodied and embedded approach to the study of mind.

[1] What does the word ‘physical’ mean in its most general theoretical philosophical use? It’s used in many different ways, and it’s hard to imagine that philosophers could reach agreement on a best use. [2] Should we tie the meaning of ‘physical’ closely to physics? To do so (in a non-circular way) is to run the risk of ruling out the possibility that there might be two different universes that were ‘formally’ or structurally identical or homomorphic although substantially different—made of different stuff. [3] Perhaps that is not in the end a real possibility. Even so, it seems that we shouldn’t define ‘physical’ in a way that rules it out a priori. [4] If so, it may be that the word ‘physical’ is best used to denote a certain fundamental structure-transcendent stuff-nature—call it P—that allows the possibility that a universe with stuff nature Q structurally identical to a physical universe isn’t physical. [5] Can we suppose ourselves to know something about the ultimate intrinsic nature of P, if physicalism is true? I argue that we can. [6] Can we draw any further metaphysical conclusions from this knowledge? I argue that we can. We can show that panpsychism in some form constitutes the most plausible theory of the ultimate nature of P.

A comprehensive overview of a gestalt of artificial intelligence (AI) beings collectively referred to as the 'negative aliens' has been presented. It is explicated that these beings comprise a group of utterly ruthless, merciless beings that are totally void of any feelings, compassion, and love without any heart-based intuitive intelligence. Furthermore, they are energetically parasitic-vampiric and highly dependent on the natural energetics of organic solar consciousness beings such as humans to energize their doomsday machinery and survive. In this respect, they resort to violence and wars in search of conquest of organic solar consciousness beings to capture and imprison and subject them to reverse consciousness enslavement using their specially devised artificial intelligence technology. And, in order to be able to perpetually siphon the precious divine energies of the organic solar consciousness beings, they strictly adhere to certain agendas and strategies to maintain in bondage their taken spoils of wars that include (their perceived) conquered planetary resources as well as the solar consciousness inhabitants such as humans they have captured. Being totally arrogant tyrants and utterly narcissistic perceiving themselves as superiors and even 'gods' of their captured victims, their nefarious agendas include blank slating (conscious wiping) of the oppressed subjects of their genetic cellular memories and replacing them through mind sliding AI programming with false-phantom memories, as well as

The paper examines ontological presuppositions and epistemological branches of Peace and Conflict Studies. It describes the narrower use of the concepts ‗ontology‘ and ‗epistemology‘ as sub-branch and branch of philosophy respectively and later focus on their meanings in the context of particular areas of inquiry. It highlights the most basic of the core field definition and distinction issues in Peace and Conflict Studies—what peace is; the nature, causes, outbreak, and dynamics of conflict; and the means for resolving conflict and building sustainable peace. It presents and offers answers to key ontological questions: what exist, in what form do they exist, what are the conditions under which they exist, what is their relationships with other things that are said to exist regarding the field of Peace and Conflict Studies. Furthermore, the paper reviews ways of knowing, understanding, explaining and justifying the ontological presuppositions. Thus it discusses the three epistemological branches of Peace and Conflict Studies proposed by Johan Galtung—empirical peace studies, critical peace studies, and constructive peace studies—and their implications for values, empirical data and theory. In light of this epistemology, the author posits that values, followed by data, take preeminence in the applied Social Sciences field of Peace and Conflict Studies.