Timetable
| Mon | Tue | Wed | Thu | Fri | |
| 8-10 | |||||
| 10-12 | 30097 Thinking and Reasoning – Conceptual, Behavioral, and Neuro-Cognitive Perspectives (Unterhuber) | 30082 Computer Simulations in Science (Fait) | |||
| 30101 Agency in philosophy and the science: From plants to humans (Baedke/Fábregas-Tejeda) | |||||
| 30089 Theory of Mind – Understanding the Mental States of Others (Wolf) | |||||
| 12-14 | 00000 Compositional semantics (Wimmer) | 30035 Philosophical Concepts and Puzzles in Physics (Rebol) | 30088 Philosophy of Artificial Intelligence (Venter) | 30006 Proper Names (Rami) | |
| 30005 Introduction into Cognitive Science (Schlicht/Newen) | |||||
| 14-16 | 30099 Mind is always und everywhere – Ancient and Modern Forms of Panpsychism (Sattler & Göcke) | 30094 Work in progress seminar in logic (Wansing/Omori) | 30091 What is information? (Liefke) | ||
| 30106 The Philosophy of Memory: Historical, Phenomenological and Analytical Perspectives (Werning) | 30081 Action and Interaction (Dings) | ||||
| 16-18 | 30104 Being a Person and Understanding Other persons (Newen, Crone) | 30095 Intuitionistic Modal Logic (Omori) | |||
| 30102 Machine Consciousness (Wiese) | |||||
| 18-20 | 00000 Jenifer Robinson: Deeper than Reason: Emotion and Its Role in Literature, Music, and Art (Olbrisch) | ||||
| Blockseminar 31.01.-04.02.2022: Non-classical logic (Wansing/Omori) | |||||
Please note:
- Since this is the first term of the program, we offer only modules required for the first year.
- The courses are color coded: WM IIIa 1 (Epistemology, Action, and Methods in Philosophy and Science), WM IIIa 2 (Logic, Language, and Metaphysics), WM IIIa 3 (Mind and Cognition)
- The seminar “Non-classical logic” by Profs. Wansing and Omori will be taught as a compact course between the 31 Jan and 4 Feb.
Course descriptions
WM IIIa 1
Action and Interaction
Dings, R.
In this seminar we will perform a close reading of Shaun Gallagher’s recent book Action and Interaction (2020, OUP). The book consists of three parts, where the first part deals with demarcating ‘actions’, clarifying the temporal structure of actions, the meaning of actions and different senses of agency. The second part turns to ‘interaction’. In this part Gallagher outlines his ‘interaction theory’ of social cognition, and defends it from other mindreading approaches to social cognition. Finally, in part three, Gallagher explores the implications of the first two parts for thinking about how we as agents are shaped by our social practices and institutions. The ultimate goal of the book is to have a clearer understanding of autonomous agency and morally responsible action.
The book contains a treasure trove of interesting ideas, and Gallagher substantiates his analyses by drawing on diverse fields such as philosophy of action, embodied and enactive cognitive science, hermeneutic phenomenology and critical social theory. No substantial background knowledge in these fields is required. Where necessary the lecturer will provide background information.
After an introductory session, each subsequent session will be devoted to discussing a chapter of the book. Ideally, towards the end of the semester Prof. Gallagher will be invited for an online session so that the students may interact directly with the author of this book.
Shaun Gallagher (2020). Action and Interaction. Oxford University Press. I recommend the students to obtain this book before or immediately after starting the seminar (please take into account possible delays of delivery)
Some additional reading material may be made available via Moodle.
Agency in philosophy and the sciences: From plants to humans
Baedke, J. & Fábregas-Tejeda, A.
The concept of ‘agency’ has played a fundamental role in the history of philosophy and the sciences since antiquity. For instance, it has ignited debates about the ontological status of organisms and the activities they undertake in the world. Moreover, it has been tied up with the notions of action and intention, and with ramifications in long-standing philosophical debates on determinism and free will, personhood, moral responsibility, or the nature of causation. This seminar offers an introduction to the historical and contemporary uses and configurations of the concept of agency in diverse contexts. From a philosophical perspective, it will trace the early usages of the concept, its uptake in the natural and human sciences, and the current strands of theorization. Furthermore, the course will navigate cognate concepts such as goals, goal-directedness, normativity, agent, teleology, and purposiveness.
Three thematic axes articulate the seminar: (1) the debate concerning agency as a purported feature of organisms (from bacteria to plants and humans) in the history of philosophy, history and philosophy of biology, and philosophical anthropology; (2) the characteristics of human agency as seen through discussions in the philosophy of action and ‘agent causation’ (e.g., the distinctive deliberative, social and practical capacities of human beings); and (3) the roles the concept of agency plays in a subset of the natural and human sciences (e.g., cognitive sciences, anthropology, and robotics), and how the concept has been mobilized to understand knowledge production within manifold scientific practices.
In sum, through the analysis of classic and contemporary texts from philosophy, biology and other sciences, this seminar scrutinizes agency as an important concept for contemporary reflection. In that sense, the seminar will provide a comprehensive introduction to central questions and problems in today’s philosophy of agency (broadly construed). To pass the course, students must participate in the first meeting, actively partake in the discussions, and conduct a presentation (or take other course activities).
Schlosser, Markus (2019): Agency. In: Zalta, Edward N. (eds.): The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Winter 2019 Edition). [Available online] [suggested preparation literature]
Davidson, Donald (1980): Essays on Actions and Events. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
Mayr, Erasmus (2011): Understanding Human Agency. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Paul, Sarah (2021): Philosophy of Action: A Contemporary Introduction. New York and London: Routledge.
Computer simulations in science
Fait, B.
For more than half a century, the digital computer has become more and more a tool of scientific research, and now some sciences perform a large part of their experiments ‘in silico’. Not only are the phenomena that this method aims to better understand complex, but the tool itself, i.e. computer simulations of these phenomena, has become so complex that we observe a trade-off between traditional explanation and ‘understanding’ on the one hand, and other epistemic goals – especially prediction – on the other. Climate models are characterized by what Eric Winsberg calls “distributed epistemic agency”, with the effect that although these models can no longer be truly ‘understood’ by any single person, they perform remarkably well in prediction. While there seems to be no alternative to the use of computer simulations in climate science, the extent to which simulations can be used in other sciences such as the social sciences or medicine is still controversial and unclear. To better understand all this, in the seminar we will read and discuss texts that address the following questions: How can computer simulations improve science and scientific understanding? Do computer simulations change the focus of scientific research and the goals of science? What are the epistemic opportunities, as well as the epistemic risks, associated with the use of computer simulations? What can sciences such as the social sciences learn from the highly successful use of computer simulations, e.g., in climate science?
The literature will be provided via Moodle. A preliminary discussion will take place at the first meeting. ECTS can be achieved by essays, talks/presentations, seminar papers and oral examinations. Appointments for oral examinations can be made during the semester break, and written papers must be submitted no later than March 31, 2022.
Literature (recommended for introduction):
Winsberg, Eric, “Computer Simulations in Science”, The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Winter 2019 Edition), Edward N. Zalta (ed.), URL = <https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/win2019/entries/simulations-science/>.
“Non-classical logic”
Wansing, H. & Omori, H.
In this seminar, we intend to study (substantial parts of) the book “Core Logic” by Neil Tennant, OUP, 2017. This book can be seen as Tennant’s opus magnum. It deals with a system of intuitionistic relevant logic Tennant refers to as “core logic”. According to the book cover, “Core Logic is the first system that ensures both relevance and adequacy for the formalization of all scientific and constructive mathematical reasoning. It is an elegant kernel lying deep within Classical Logic, a cannon for constructive and relevant deduction furnishing faithful formalizations of informal constructive mathematical proofs. It provides transitivity of deduction with potential epistemic gain. Classical Core Logic does the same for informal non-constructive mathematical proofs.” We shall scrutinize these bold claims. Participants are required to have some knowledge of classical and ideally intuitionistic logic and of natural deduction.
Philosophical Concepts and Puzzles in Physics
Rebol, N.
The aim of this course is to specify and address philosophical issues in two of the main “pillars” of modern physics: Spacetime physics (e.g. General and Special Relativity) and Quantum physics. While there are general issues in the philosophy of science that also apply to the domain of physics (such as realism, demarcation, reduction, explanation, etc), the aim of this course is to address the philosophical puzzles that come up specifically in physics. In particular, we will focus on these questions:
– What are space and time?
– How is time different from space?
– Is the world deterministic or not?
– What does it mean for a physical theory to be probabilistic?
The course will be structured such that a relevant background for each of the physical theories discussed will be given before diving into the philosophical aspects of that theory. It is neither required, nor would it be superfluous, to have a background in physics. The readings will be available on Moodle.
Albert, D. Z. (1992). Quantum mechanics and experience. Harvard University Press.
Sklar, L. (1992). Philosophy of physics. CRC Press.
WM IIIa 2
Compositional semantics
Wimmer, S.
What determines the meaning of a sentence? According to compositional semantics. that work is done by the meanings of its constituent words and the way in which these words are combined. This seminar offers an introduction to the basic ideas, insights, and techniques of compositional semantics. We will start by considering word meaning and use and highlight the role played by structure in the meanings of larger expressions, such as phrases and clauses. We will introduce the notions of extension and intension and learn how to apply them, alongside tools from logic, in analyzing the meaning of complex linguistic expressions. With the basic tools of compositional semantics on hand, we will consider a particularly vexing question for semanticists: how exactly do ascriptions of propositional attitudes, for instance “Heimson believes that he’s Hume”, work?
The first part of the course will be based on the following textbook:
Zimmermann, Thomas Ede, and Wolfgang Sternefeld. Introduction to Semantics: An Essential Guide to the Composition of Meaning. De Gruyter Mouton Textbook. Berlin: De Gruyter Mouton, 2013.
This textbook is available as an e-book via the library; a link will be provided on moodle. The second part of the course will be based on articles that will be accessible via moodle.
Intuitionistic Modal Logic
Omori, H.
The characteristic property of intuitionistic logic is the failure of the principle of bivalence, the principle of classical logic that every proposition is either true or false. This is reflected in the failure of Av¬A to be a theorem. The notion of truth motivating intuitionistic logic is one that is epistemically constrained. Truth is explained in terms of or even equated to proof or verification. According to intuitionists, a proposition is true only if it has been proved (in mathematics) or otherwise verified (in other areas of enquiry). Intuitionistic logic is thus of relevance to many questions central to epistemology. It also has metaphysical motivations. Truth is the link between language or thought and reality. Propositions for which bivalence fails, those for which we neither possess a verification nor a falsification, leave reality open in certain respects. Intuitionistic logic has been proposed as a logic for the open future or vagueness and other areas of discourse where there is ‘no fact of the matter’ whether certain propositions are true or false. If there is as yet no sign of an impending sea battle or conditions that would prevent one from taking place, then ‘There will be a sea battle’ is neither provable norrefutable: the future is genuinely open in that respect.
The first sessions of this seminar consist of an introduction to intuitionistic logic, its philosophical motivations and formal characteristics. There will be an overview over its formalisations in axiomatic, natural deduction and sequent calculus style and the different proof systems will be explained. These sessions provide the basis on which we will study various systems of intuitionistic modal logic, of which a great number have been proposed. A core question will be which notions of necessity and possibility are suitable to the intuitionist background. One such options is to take validity as a notion of necessity. We will take a close look at a few prominent versions of intuitionistic modal logic, in particular intuitionistic versions of S4 and S5. Due to the characteristics of intuitionistic negation, the interdefinability of necessity and possibility familiar from classical logic — p is necessary if and only if not p is not possible, p is possible if and only if not p is not necessary — is no longer available. It is due to the fact that both notions must be treated as primitives that a wide plethora of systems is available. It is not always evident which systems are equivalent. We will spend some time looking into these questions, which presents an opportunity to revise and apply basic formal techniques and will deepen our understanding of the workings of modal operators within intuitionistic logic.
Mind is always und everywhere – Ancient and Modern Forms of Panpsychism
Sattler, B. & Göcke, B.
Panpsychism is the idea that the world as a whole cannot simply be understood in material terms, but has to be seen as essentially (also) mental; mind is not restricted to human beings or animals but a fundamental feature of the universe. In the history of philosophy, this idea is often closely connected to the idea that the world is divine or God. We find first suggestions of such a view in the Presocratics, and the first full-blown account in Plato’s Timaeus. We will start the course with discussing these ancient beginning and the ancient reasons for such as assumption – for example, for Plato, the world can only be the best possible one if it is itself intelligent and that means possessing a soul – as well as Aristotle’s strong criticism of it. We will then look at some variations of these accounts in early modern times, for example, in Spinoza, and in German idealism. While such a view may seem fairly strange prima facie, it is a view that gets increasing support also in contemporary metaphysics and philosophy of religions, and it is with this modern accounts and their reasons for assuming panpsychism that we will finish off the course. Together with Prof. B. P. Göcke from the Katholisch-Theologischen Fakultät
Literature
– Plato, Timaeus 34b-37c
– P. Goff, “Panpsychism”, in: The Blackwell Companion to Consciousness
Proper Names
Rami, D.
Since the pioneering work of Mill, Frege and Russell, proper names are a central topic of (analytic) philosophy. These expressions seem to be, on the one hand, the paradigm example of a singular referring term and they, therefore, represent an important aspect of language-world connections. On the other hand, these expressions are relative to their paradigm use apparently semantically simple, but they have a large number of non-paradigm and puzzling uses. In this lecture, I will provide a mixture of a historical and systematic overview of (a) the most important challenges with respect to the semantics, pragmatics and metaphysics of names and (b) the most important views on proper names in the philosophy of language and linguistics.
S. A. Kripke: Naming & Necessity, Blackwell 1980.
F. Recanati: Direct Reference, Blackwell 1993.
M. Sainsbury: Reference without Referents, Oxford, 2005.
D. Rami: Names & Context, Bloomsbury 2021. (in print)
What is information?
Liefke, K.
Information takes a central role in our social and scientific lives. As a result, it is perhaps surprising that the concept of information has only recently started to receive broader attention in philosophy. This seminar gives an introduction to this emerging topic, focusing on semantic information. The latter is information about the world that can be true or false and that can constitute knowledge. We will start the semester by distinguishing information from some of its cognate concepts (incl. data, meaning, representation), by asking how data can turn into information, and by delineating different kinds of information (esp. semantic vs. ecological/natural information). In the second half of the semester, we will discuss different approaches to semantic information that identify information with representational content, and we will ask how this kind of content can acquire a truth-value. Finally, we will discuss the question whether misinformation is a kind of information and whether all semantic information is (or needs to be) propositional.
Readings: A selection of texts will be made available through Moodle before the start of the semester. This selection will include (a.o.) the following texts:
Dretske, F. I. (1983). Précis of Knowledge and the Flow of Information. Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 6(1), 55-90.
Floridi, L. (2008). Trends in the philosophy of information. In P. Adriaans & J. v. Benthem (eds.) Philosophy of Information (pp.113-132). Amsterdam: Elsevier.
Floridi, L. (2016). Semantic information. In L. Floridi (ed.) The Routledge Handbook of Philosophy of Information (pp.44-49). Routledge.
Grice, H. P. (1957). Meaning. The Philosophical Review, 66(3), 377-388.
Work in progress seminar in logic
Omori, H. & Wansing, H.
In this seminar students are given the opportunity to present on a regular basis progress they are making in logic related projects they are currently working on, and to discuss their research problems, methods, and ideas. The intervals for reporting on own writings or presenting and discussing relevant papers and the length of the reports and presentations may vary and will depend on the needs of the participants.
WM IIIa 3
Being a person and understanding persons
Crone, K. & Newen, A.
In this seminar, we will explore the relation between personhood and the ability to understand other persons.
In the first part of the course, we will turn to the concept of a person. What is constitutive for persons, and what distinguishes a person from a non-person? We will take a closer look at some central characteristics such as self-awareness, (moral) agency, and the ability to entertain a self-narrative and to have a self-concept. Also, we will discuss the role social groups and society in general play in establishing beings as persons.
In the second part of the seminar, we will focus on the question of what it means to recognize and to understand other persons in the light of some of the previously explored person-making characteristics. We start with an overview of the classical positions of Theory-Theory and Simulation Theory. We then turn to more recent approaches such as the Interaction Theory and the Person Model Theory. In addition to theoretical overview articles we will also select some articles discussing psychological evidence about understanding others including low-level perceptual information as well as high-level linguistic information from others. The aim of the seminar is to combine the question of personhood with the question of social cognition such that we are able to outline a unified perspective of both phenomena.
Depending on the pandemic situation, the course will be organized as a hybrid course. Participation can also be realized completely online. But we plan a meeting in person every two weeks. We change the place of the seminar meeting each time and will let the participants know when it is in Bochum and when in Dortmund. Both universities can be reached by public transport within 40 minutes (from mid campus to mid campus).
– Baker, Lynne R. (2007) “Persons and Other Things”, Journal of Consciousness Studies 14, 17-36.
– Dennett, Daniel (1976) “Conditions of Personhood”, in: A.O. Rorty (ed.) Identity of Persons, Berkeley/Los Angeles: University of California Press, 175-196.
– Goldman, Alvin I. (2006) Simulating Minds. The Philosophy, Psychology, and Neuroscience of Mindreading, Oxford University Press.
– Spaulding, Shannon (2020) How We Understand Others, Routledge.
Introduction into Cognitive Science
Newen, A. & Schlicht, T.
The lecture introduces the interdisciplinary field of cognitive science in combining philosophy, psychology, computational modeling and neurosciences. The lecture has the aim to deliver important basic knowledge from empirical sciences in the framework of theory formation. For philosophy student the credit points are delivered on the basis of a written examination or on the basis of an oral exam. For cognitive science students the credit point can only be acquired on the basis of the written examination and it presupposes in addition some active work in the obligatory additional seminar.
The structure of the lecture:
Introduction: History of Cognitive Science
Basic Concepts in Cognitive Science.
Cognitive Neuroscience of Perception
Modeling Vision
Philosophy of Perception
Development of Vision
Enacted and Embodied Cognition
Models of Motor Control
Theories of Emotion
Cognitive Neuroscience of Emotion
Psychology of Learning
Cognitive Neuroscience of Memory
Models of Learning and Memory
Social Cognition: Evolution, Development, Pathology
Jenefer Robinson: Deeper than Reason: Emotion and Its Role in Literature, Music, and Art
Olbrisch, N.
In her monography Deeper than Reason: Emotion and Its Role in Literature, Music, and Art, Jenefer Robinson explores the connection between emotion and the arts, with a special focus on literature and music. She first sets out to answer the question what emotions (like fear, love, anger, shame) are and how they operate, suggesting that emotions should be viewed as processes which involve both affective and cognitive evaluations. Robinson‘s perspective is enriched by insights from psychological research and might help to shed light on some highly disputed questions of aesthetics, for example:
How can literature generate pleasure from painful material? Are our emotional responses to art necessary for our understanding of it? How can content-less instrumental music express or arouse emotions?
The default language for our discussions is English. But you are very welcome if you think your English might not be sufficiently fluent. We will support each other with our English.
Jenefer Robinson (2005): Deeper than Reason: Emotion and Its Role in Literature, Music, and Art. Oxford: Clarendon Press. (Available as an e-book via the library)
Machine Consciousness
Wiese, W.
Can machines be conscious and how could we find out? Understanding consciousness in human and non-human animals is hard, but understanding machine consciousness seems even harder. At the same time, rapid advances in AI and growing ethical concerns about the creation of machine consciousness demand an answer to the question under what conditions consciousness should be ascribed to artificial entities.
The seminar has a systematic focus on contemporary philosophy of consciousness and machine ethics. We will first discuss theories and general problems of consciousness. We will then apply these to the question under what conditions machines can be conscious. Finally, we will discuss ethical questions of machine consciousness: Would conscious machines be able to suffer, perhaps in ways we cannot even imagine? Is the attempt to create conscious machines unethical, or do the potential benefits outweigh the risks? What moral rights should conscious machines have? Could machines be moral agents and have moral responsibility?
Dehaene, S., Lau, H., & Kouider, S. (2017). What is consciousness, and could machines have it? Science, 358, 486–492.
Metzinger, T. (2021). Artificial Suffering: An Argument for a Global Moratorium on Synthetic Phenomenology. Journal of Artificial Intelligence and Consciousness, 1–24. https://doi.org/10.1142/S270507852150003X
Reggia, J. A. (2013). The rise of machine consciousness: Studying consciousness with computational models. Neural Netw, 44, 112–131. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neunet.2013.03.011
Schneider, S. (2019). Artificial You: AI and the future of your mind. Princeton University Press.
Wallach, W., & Allen, C. (2009). Moral Machines. Oxford University Press.
Philosophy of Artificial Intelligence
Venter, E.
The application of artificial intelligence (AI) is all around us and raises many interesting questions. In this seminar, we will concern ourselves with the concept of ‘mind’ – its nature, implementation, and application. What requirements must a ‘mind’ fulfil in order to be considered a mind? We will discuss the historical roots of this question and look at some major types of AI such as GOFAI (Good Old-Fashioned AI), artificial neural networks, and dynamical systems. We will concern ourselves with the philosophical implications of AI by engaging with a series of articles and book chapters from philosophers and cognitive scientists including Joel Walmsley, Daniel Dennett, and Margaret Boden.
Course material will be made available on Moodle throughout the semester. In addition to academic papers, chapters will be selected from the following books:
Boden, M.A., 2016. AI: Its Nature and Future. Oxford University Press.
Walmsley, J., 2012. Mind and Machine. Palgrave Macmillan.
Theory of Mind – Understanding the Mental States of Others
Wolf, J.
How do we come to understand others as beings with thoughts and beliefs which shape their behaviour? This is the central question addressed by research on ‘Theory of Mind’. One much debated issue by both psychologists and philosophers is the question of when and how children develop the ability to attribute false beliefs to others, which is thought to be one of the core ‘Theory of Mind’ abilities. In this seminar we will focus especially on the evidence from the false belief task, the main tool used to study children’s developing ability to attribute beliefs to others, and the philosophical and psychological implications of this research. Key issues focused on in the seminar will be the puzzles in understanding the development of children’s belief understanding that arise out of the evidence, as well as assessing the importance of belief attribution within social cognition.
Reading lists and literature will be provided via Moodle.
The Philosophy of Memory: Historical, Phenomenological and Analytical Perspectives
Werning, M.
Memory has been a topic of philosophy since antiquity and as has regained attention in both phenomenological as well as analytical branches of modern philosophy. This seminar aims at a synopsis of historical, phenomenological, and analytic approaches in the philosophy of memory. Accordingly, the seminar will be divided into three parts. In the first part, we will review historical approaches such as Plato’s, Augustine’s, Locke’s and Reid’s. The second part will focus on the 19th & 20th century phenomenological tradition. Here the question came up whether memory is just a kind of archive, from which stored information can be retrieved, or whether aspects of a particular form of consciousness in remembering, such as the experience of temporality and corporeality, are equally important. Phenomenologists have provided analyses starting from questions like: Do attention and habit influence the content of our memories? Does only temporal proximity make some memories more vivid than others? What is the role of consciousness in remembering? This part of the seminar will be devoted to phenomenologists like Bergson, Husserl, Merleau-Ponty, Proust, and Ricoeur. In the third part of the seminar, we will turn to accounts of memory from within analytical philosophy such as Martin & Deutscher and Bernecker. The seminar will conclude with a discussion contemporary position regarding the unity and taxonomy of memory, the question whether certain forms of memory are a natural kind and how memory relates to mental time travel.
Students will have the opportunity to link up with our DFG research group “Constructing Scenarios of the Past”, the Bochum-Grenoble Memory Colloquium and our DFG Research Training Group “Situated Cognition”. Aside from active participation, participants will be expected to give a presentation in English. Assistance regarding the English language will be provided upon request.
Bergson, H. (1991) Matter and Memory, trans. N. M. Paul and W. S. Palmer. New York: Zone.
Bernecker, S. (2010). Memory : a philosophical study. Oxford University Press.
Bernecker, S., & Michaelian, K. (Eds.). (2017). The Routledge Handbook of Philosophy of Memory. Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315687315
Cheng, S., & Werning, M. (2016). “What is Episodic Memory if it is a Natural Kind?” Synthese, 193, 1345–1385. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-014-0628-6
Fuchs, T. (2005). “Implicit and explicit temporality”, Philosophy, Psychiatry & Psychology, 12, 195–198.
Husserl, E. (1991). “On the phenomenology of the consciousness of internal time (1893–1917)”. In Collected works of Edmund Husserl (Vol. 4). Trans. J. B. Brough. Dordrecht: Springer
Husserl, E. (2001). Analyses concerning passive and active synthesis: Lectures on Transcendental Logic, Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers.
Krell, D. F. (1982). “Phenomenology of Memory from Husserl to Merleau-Ponty”, Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, Vol. 42, No. 4, pp. 492-505.
Merleau-Ponty, M. (2012). Phenomenology of perception. Trans. D. E. Landes. New York: Routledge.
Proust, M. (1971). “Contre Sainte-Beuve” (CSB), précédé de Pastiches et mélanges et suivi de Essais et articles, Paris: Gallimard.
Ricoeur, P. (2003). “Narrative Identity”, in Wood, D. (eds.), On Paul Ricoeur. Narrative and Interpretation, London and New York: Routledge.
Thinking and Reasoning – Conceptual, Behavioral, and Neuro-Cognitive Perspectives
Unterhuber, M.
The study of reasoning and thinking– which is closely related to thinking and problem solving – is an integral part of the neuro- and cognitive sciences. This seminar focuses on central paradigms in this area (e.g., the Wason selection task and the conditional inference task) and discusses recent approaches to these phenomena in the light of behavioral data and neuro-cognitive markers of neural-cognitive processes as well as their conceptual underpinnings. The discussion is interdisciplinary in nature and takes into account perspectives from philosophy, linguistics, psychology, and the neuro- and cognitive sciences.