Organisers: Maria Sekatskaya, Corina Strößner
More information on this workshop will be added soon.
Speakers:
- Krzysztof Dołęga (CRN, Université Libre de Bruxelles): Looking Through Affectively-Tinted Glasses
- Maria Sekatskaya (Heinrich-Heine University Düsseldorf): Establishing dimensions of the free will concept: prototypes and similarty judgments
- Sebastian Scholz (Heinrich-Heine University Düsseldorf): Conceptual Spaces: Naturalness or Cognitive Sparseness?
- Corina Strößner (Ruhr Universität Bochum): Similarity in cognition and philosophy
- Thomas Wieder (Ruhr Universität Bochum): Words Can Only Say So Much
Schedule
| 15:30 – 16:10 | Sebastian Scholz; Conceptual Spaces: Naturalness or Cognitive Sparseness? |
| 16:15 – 16:55 | Corina Strößner: Similarity in Philosophy and Cognitive Science |
| 17:00 – 17:40 | Maria Sekatskaya and Corina Strößner: Establishing Dimensions of the Free Will Concept: Prototypes and Similarity Judgements |
| 18:00 – 18:40 | Krzysztof Dołęga: Looking Through Affectively-Tinted Glasses: The Philosophy and Cognitive Science Behind Perceptual Valence |
| 18:45 – 19:30 | Thomas Wieder: Words Can Only Say So Much: How the Study of Gestures Can Help Us Understand the Mind |
Abstracts
Sebastian Scholz: Conceptual Spaces: Naturalness or Cognitive Sparseness?
The conceptual spaces framework posits that conceptual content is structured geometrically, and is equipped with cognitive criteria of naturalness (namely, convexity and principles of cognitive economy). Its proponents suggest that cognitive naturalness is naturalness simpliciter, a novel move in a debate that is traditionally focused on how the world, and not the mind, is structured. We argue that “cognitive naturalness” is a misnomer and that the framework describes cognitive sparseness instead. To demonstrate this, we explore the approach’s shortcomings across various branches of the naturalness debate, most notably its failure to distinguish natural kinds from fictional kinds. Our diagnosis is that the evolutionary pragmatism employed by its proponents fails to establish a connection to the real world, thus failing to secure the ontological and epistemic objectivity required for a theory of naturalness. The structure of the real world, however, is what best explains the structure of our concepts. We advocate for a conception of naturalness that places interaction at center stage.
Maria Sekatskaya and Corina Strößner: Establishing Dimensions of the Free Will Concept: Prototypes and Similarity Judgements
Until the advent of experimental philosophy (ExPhi), free will was studied primarily through theoretical means. ExPhi employs psychological methods to explore the folk concept of free will, aiming to identify which philosophical theories best capture folk intuitions. In this talk, we will argue that while the ExPhi approach has advanced the debate, certain challenges remain. In particular, it is difficult to determine which theories are genuinely supported by folk intuitions, as these theories are often complex and presuppose significant metaphysical background. We will present a similarity-based approach to the folk concept of free will, grounded in conceptual dimensions. We will propose specific dimensions, derived from an analysis of existing discussions on free will, and outline a path for empirically testing these dimensions. This approach has the potential to reveal how much free will and moral responsibility laypeople attribute to agents in different scenarios, based on how similar the cases are to each other along these specific dimensions. It can also help identify prototypical cases, intermediary cases, and the boundaries of free will and moral responsibility.
Corina Strößner: Similarity in Philosophy and Cognitive Science
Philosophy in the empiricist tradition, up until Rudolf Carnap’s Aufbau, assumed a central role for similarity as the basis for kind concepts, beliefs, and theories. Following problems in Carnap’s work, Nelson Goodman formulated his general strictures against similarity as a philosophical concept. Around the same time, psychologists, such as Eleanor Rosch, based human categorization on similarity (rather than on definitions). However, similarity-based accounts of cognition are often still viewed with suspicion due to the apparent philosophical failures of similarity and its supposed eliminability in favor of more precise concepts.
This talk defends the idea that similarity is fundamental to cognition and might also be fundamental in metaphysical debates. How can this thesis be reconciled with the many objections to similarity, and how does it relate to the fact that there are multiple conceptions and representations of similarity?
Thomas Wieder: Words Can Only Say So Much: How the Study of Gestures Can Help Us Understand the Mind
In his book “Hand and Mind: What Gestures Reveal about Thought”, McNeill argues for three things: 1) language is more than just words, images and speech are equally important and simultaneously represent processes in the mind, 2) gestures are part of the discourse in which the speaker participates, and 3) gestures themselves have an impact on thought. The last point is the most interesting. He claims that gestures are an integral part of the speaker’s ongoing thought process, without which thought would be altered or incomplete. However, philosophers do not seem to focus so much on gestures when it comes to explaining mental processes. Therefore, along with insights from my research, I would like to argue for studying gestures as a pathway to understanding the mind.
Krzysztof Dołęga: Looking Through Affectively-Tinted Glasses: The Philosophy and Cognitive Science Behind Perceptual Valence
Valence, or the dimension of the pleasantness or unpleasantness of a conscious state, has been an area of interest for philosophers and scientists working on the nature of affective experiences, such as pains and emotions. However, a growing body of theoretical and empirical work also suggests that, at least sometimes, perceptual experiences can be valenced too. Most philosophers try to capture the phenomenology of perceptual valence in intentional terms, arguing that the valence of perceptual experiences depends on the contents of those experiences. However, some philosophers disagree with this position and defend the claim that valence depends not on the contents of these experiences, but on the attitudes directed at their contents. In this talk, I will look at recent empirical evidence and try to adjudicate between the competing positions. As I will argue, neither of these positions is entirely compatible with the empirical findings, thus motivating a need for a more complete philosophical account of perceptual valence.
SOPhiA 2026 