PHIL 622 Ontology and Philosophy of Mind II

Lecturer: Majid D. Beni

Email: mbeni@metu.edu.tr

Course description:

The course explores metaphysical issues about consciousness, intentionality, and social cognition. It relates imporants issues in social epistemology to the ontology of mind or rather groups of mind that contribute to the formation of knowledge. In addition to it draws on state-of-the-art computational neuroscience and cognitive psychology in terms of the Fee Energy Principle and Predictive Coding as the basis of epistemological and metaphysical analysis.

Upon successful completion of the course, the students will acquire the requisite skills to understand some of the main discussions of the field and articulate arguments for and against different positions held in those discussions and examine them critically.

The course outcome:

To develop the skill to read and write about the course topic. To understand and critically discuss the main metaphysical and epistemological views on the nature of the consciousness and social cognition. To be able to see the relation between epistemological and metaphysical views on the one hand and some fundamental theories of the cognitive sciences and computer science on the other. To be able to reconstruct and critically evaluate the main replies to the questions about the nature of the consciousness, intentionality, and the self-other relationship.

Sources:

The mandatory text for each session is marked by “*”. The students need to read mandatory texts ahead of each session so as to be prepared for well-informed participation. There are also further readings.

Background reading

These are books for background reading:

Surfing Uncertainty, Andy Clark, 2016, OUP

Making up the Mind: How the Brain Creates Our Mental World, Chris Frith, Blackwell, 2007

Coursework and distribution of grades:

Attendance and Participation are very important for this course, as the course mainly runs in an interactive style. Participations, which are supposed to be well-informed and thoughtful, are highly valued in this course. They include 20% of the grade. Midterm paper: It is 3000-5000 words, and it should be submitted before the seventh session of the course. Students are advised to consult the instructor about their chosen topic. The midterm paper constitutes 30% of the student’s grade. Final paper: it is between 3000-7000 words, it should be submitted by the date of the final exam. It constitutes 50% of the grade.

Attendance policy:

Attendance is important. When unable to attend for an important reason such as illness or family emergency, the student may discuss the situation with me as soon as possible (preferably through email, before the session). Medical certificates and so on need to be sent to me through student affairs or registrar office.

Plagiarism and citations:

All cases of plagiarism will be punished severely. The students are free to choose any of the standard citation styles when needed, but they need to remain consistent with the style that they choose (see https://pitt.libguides.com/citationhelp for more information).

Auxiliary aids

Students who experience difficulties due to their disabilities and wish to obtain academic adjustments and/or auxiliary aids must contact ODTU Disability Support Office and/or course instructor and the advisor of students with disabilities at academic departments (for the list: ) as soon as possible. For detailed information, please visit the website of Disability Support Office: 

Changes to the program: The syllabus is provisional and it may be revised at any stage during the semester. It is the students’ responsibility to keep updated about the syllabus.

Week one: General introduction

PART I: Consciousness; philosophy and science

Week one: Explanatory Gap

Joseph Levine: Materialism and Qualia: The Explanatory Gap in Chalmers’s book

Week two: Illusionism about consciousness

Dennett, D. C. (2016). Illusionism as the obvious default theory of consciousness. Journal of Consciousness Studies, 23(11–12), 65–72.

Frankish, K. (2016). Illusionism as a theory of consciousness. Journal of Consciousness Studies, 23(11–12), 11–39.

Week three: Strong Intentionalism;

Crane, T. (2003). The intentional structure of consciousness. In A. Jokic & Q. Smith (Eds.), Consciousness: New Philosophical Perspectives.

Week four: Free Energy Principle and predictive coding  

Friston, K. J., & Stephan, K. E. (2007). Free-energy and the brain. Synthese, 159(3), 417–458.

Week five: Consciousness and self consciousness under FEP

 Friston, K. J. (2018). Am I self-conscious? Frontiers in Psychology,

Friston, K. J., Wiese, W., & Hobson, J. A. (2020). Sentience and the Origins of Consciousness: From Cartesian Duality to Markovian Monism.

Week six: Illusion and semi-illusionism under FEP

Clark, A., Friston, K. J., & Wilkinson, S. (2019). Bayesing Qualia: Consciousness as Inference, Not Raw Datum. Journal of Consciousness Studies

Do??ga, K., & Dewhurst, J. E. (2020). Fame in the predictive brain: a deflationary approach to explaining consciousness in the prediction error minimization framework. Synthese

Week seven: Consciousness and scientific models

Beni, Majid D., (2021), A Critical Analysis of Markovian Monism. Synthese

Week eight: Mid-term

PART II: Social cognition: Philosophy and science

Week nine: Social cognition and epistemic agency:

Palermos, O., & Pritchard, D. (2016). THE DISTRIBUTION OF EPISTEMIC AGENCY. In P. Reider (Ed.), Epistemology and Epistemic Agency:

Week ten: Social cognition and science:

 Giere, R. N. (2002b). Scientific Cognition as Distributed Cognition. In The Cognitive Basis of Science (pp. 285–299).

Niiniluoto, I. (2003). Science as Collective Knowledge. In Realism in Action (pp. 269–278)

Week eleven: Neurological basis of Social cognition

Friston, K. J., & Frith, C. (2015a). A Duet for one. Consciousness and Cognition, 36, 390–405.

Friston, K. J., & Frith, C. D. (2015b). Active Inference, Communication and Hermeneutics. Cortex, 68,

PART III: ontological issues

Week twlev: physicalism

Quine, W. V. O. (1948). On What There Is. The Review of Metaphysics, 2(5), 21–38.

Week thirteen: non-physiclaism

Ernest Mach, Analysis of Sensations

Rudolf Carnap, Aufbau, Parts I and II

Week fourteen: fictionalism and instrumentalism in modern science

(TBA)