Research Group
in Analytic Philosophy

Abstract

Chris Peacocke, "Analog Representation and the Conceptual/Nonconceptual Distinction"

We can deploy the resources of a good account of analog representation to characterize a highly distinctive kind of explanation by mental representation. Appeal to this distinctive kind of explanation undercuts, and allows us to replace, the widely held distinction between conceptual and nonconceptual content in perception and in other mental states. I discuss where this argument leaves the issues involved in that distinction, and I relate the resulting position to the well-known discussions of Burge, McDowell, and others.

Frédérique de Vignemont, "A feeling of here-ness?"

The distinction between ‘here’ and ‘there’ can be found almost in all languages[1] and constitutes the most universal example of spatial deixis (Levinson, 2004). In a nutshell, ‘here’ is a marker of proximity, which normally refers to a region that includes the speaker (where I am). [2] On the other hand, ‘there’ refers to what is farther away, a distal region more remote from the speaker (where I am not). This distinction is not only at the linguistic level but also at the cognitive level. Perry, for instance, suggests that we have a specific mental file that encodes information about what is conceived as here, which is tightly connected to action: “Let’s call a notion a “here-notion” if it is associated with a self-notion and the idea of being-in.” (Perry, 1990). However, one can propose that animals that do not have a self-notion can still have at least a primitive version of the here-notion. Instead of self-location, it is sufficient for this primitive here-ness to be based on body location. Here-ness then refers to where the body is. My proposal is two-fold. First, embodied here-ness is restricted to visual experiences of one’s immediate surrounding, also known as peripersonal space. Secondly, there is a distinctive phenomenology of here-ness, which corresponds to a specific type of feeling of presence.