•  7
    Be Right Back and Rejecting Tragedy
    In David Kyle Johnson (ed.), Black Mirror and Philosophy, Wiley. 2019.
    In Be Right Back Martha's partner Ash is snatched away from her by an automobile accident. When, desperate and alone, she discovers that she is pregnant with Ash's child, she utilizes an emerging technology to bring him, or something like him, back. Would you replace your partner with a robotic likeness, maybe even make a few improvements? Should you?
  •  6
    What is it like to be a host?
    In James South & Kimberly Engels (eds.), Westworld and Philosophy, Wiley-blackwell. pp. 79-89. 2018.
    The consciousness of the hosts is a major theme in Westworld, and for good reason. Hosts are not philosophical zombies. The hosts act like they have feelings, like they suffer and fear, like they enjoy the yellow, pink, and blue tones of a beautiful sunset. This chapter examines the analogs of memory, perception, and emotion in hosts. Hosts have a very troubling relationship to memory. Although using a different visual style would denote unique host experience, using the same visual style to dep…Read more
  •  19
    Seeing and attending wholes and parts: A reply to Prettyman
    Thought: A Journal of Philosophy 10 (3): 226-236. 2021.
    Thought: A Journal of Philosophy, EarlyView.
  •  34
    Forests, Trees, and Aesthetic Attention: A Reply to Nanay
    Journal of Consciousness Studies 27 (11-12): 81-98. 2020.
    Nanay (2015; 2016) revives manner or attitude accounts of aesthetic experience. While manner-based accounts are promising, Nanay's claim that certain kinds of aesthetic experiences require attention to be focused on one object, but distributed across many properties of that object, that 'aesthetic attention' is necessary for 'Proustian experience', is false. Attention to objects of aesthetic experience frequently involves attention to intra-objects, objects that are proper perceptual parts of th…Read more
  •  1201
    Horgan and Tienson on phenomenology and intentionality
    with Andrew Bailey
    Philosophical Studies 167 (2): 313-326. 2014.
    Terence Horgan, George Graham and John Tienson argue that some intentional content is constitutively determined by phenomenology alone. We argue that this would require a certain kind of covariation of phenomenal states and intentional states that is not established by Horgan, Tienson and Graham’s arguments. We make the case that there is inadequate reason to think phenomenology determines perceptual belief, and that there is reason to doubt that phenomenology determines any species of non-perce…Read more
  • Living in the Dreamworld
    In Tracy Lyn Bealer, Rachel Luria & Wayne Yuen (eds.), Neil Gaiman and Philosophy: Gods Gone Wild!, Open Court. 2012.
  •  46
    Attention and seeing objects: The identity-crowding debate
    Philosophical Psychology 29 (5): 743-758. 2016.
    Can unattended objects by seen? Ned Block has claimed they can on the basis of “identity-crowding.” This paper summarizes the ensuing debate with particular emphasis on the role of unconscious perception. Although unconscious perception plays an important role, it cannot support conscious object-seeing in identity-crowding. Nevertheless, unconscious perception assists in making successful judgments about unseen objects. Further, compelling conceptual evidence against seeing unattended objects pl…Read more
  •  147
    Sexual Desire and the Phenomenology of Attraction
    Dialogue 54 (2): 263-283. 2015.
    Poursuivant une idée discutée part Thomas Nagel, Rockney Jacobsen soutient que les désirs sexuels ont pour objets des activités que l’on croit affecter les états d’excitation sexuelle de certaines façons. Je soutiens que certains désirs sexuels ont plutôt pour objets des activités que l’on croit affecter les états d’attraction phénoménale. Contrairement à l’excitation sexuelle, l’attraction phénoménale ne peut être apaisée; il n’existe donc aucune activité qui puisse satisfaire les désirs sexuel…Read more
  •  65
    Advancing the overflow debate
    Journal of Consciousness Studies 22 (7-8): 124-144. 2015.
    Introspective subjective reports cannot provide direct evidence that phenomenal experience overflows cognitive access. This problem for the overflow view is underappreciated in several ways: first, it places the onus on the overflow theorist to explain how sub-jective reports can be used to provide evidence for overflow. Second, it implies that there must be a true non-overflow account of subjective reports of overflow, even if there is overflow. Thus, attempting to dis-prove all anti- overflow …Read more
  •  51
    Nanay has recently argued, on the basis of the cognitive penetrability of experience, that the attribution of aesthetically relevant properties supervenes on perceptual experience. I argue that this claim is false as stated and cannot be salvaged. I provide a series of thought experiments as counterexamples, showing that the title of an artwork can influence its ARPs, its meaning or value, and the accurate attributions of ARPs while the character of the perceptual experience of the piece remains…Read more
  •  727
    Identity-Crowding and Object-Seeing: A Reply to Block
    Thought: A Journal of Philosophy 2 (1): 9-19. 2013.
    Contrary to Block's assertion, “identity-crowding” does not provide an interesting instance of object-seeing without object-attention. The successful judgments and unusual phenomenology of identity-crowding are better explained by unconscious perception and non-perceptual phenomenology associated with cognitive states. In identity-crowding, as in other cases of crowding, subjects see jumbled textures and cannot individuate the items contributing to those textures in the absence of attention. Blo…Read more