Clotilde Calabi

Amodal completion typically occurs when we look at an object that is partially behind another object. Theorists often say that in such cases we are aware not only of the visible parts, but also, in some sense, of the occluded parts, because otherwise we could not have a perceptual experience of the object as continuing behind its occluder. Since no sense modality carries information about the occluded parts, this information is provided by other means. Amodal completion raises two questions. First, what is the mechanism involved? Second, what kind of experience do we have of the occluded parts? According to Nanay, the so-called Imagery Theory answers both questions. For this theory, information about the occluded parts is the product of a low level, vision specific, neural mechanism that takes place in the early vision processing areas of the brain. This mechanism provides a representation of the occluded parts and, as a result, the observer enjoys a quasi-sensory or quasi-perceptual conscious experience that is phenomenally similar to seeing those parts (as purportedly Perky has proved). In this paper I criticize Nanay’s answer to the second question.

It is natural to describe many pictures as of movement. We might for example say that a painting is of a horse rearing up, or a dog scurry along the pavement. The topic of this paper is how this “of” should be understood. Can a static picture depict movement, or is movement merely represented by, or suggested by, pictures, in some non-pictorial way? We argue that movement can be depicted and not merely represented. We examine three different views put forward by Le Poidevin, and use his third as a basis for our own view of movement depiction, which is a version of Hopkins’s experienced resemblance theory of depiction.

From November 5 to November 22, 2019, the University of Milan hosts an exhibition in which philosophy and its problems are staged in playful and interactive forms. Like any catalog, this volume also intends to document the objects and themes proposed to the visitor. But it also has a more ambitious goal: to imagine and design the spaces of that Museum of Philosophy which, we are sure, will be created here in Milan, starting from the experience of this exhibition--Translated, via Google, from page 2 of cover.

What do we see in a mirror? There is an ongoing debate whether mirrors present us with images of objects or whether we see, through the mirror, the objects themselves. Roberto Casati has recently argued that there is a categorical difference between images and mirror-reflections. His argument depends on the observation that mirrors, but not paintings, are sensitive to changes in the observer’s prospective. In our paper we scrutinize Casati’s argument and present a modal argument that shows that it cannot establish this conclusion. We suggest that Casati’s line of reasoning suffers from the fact that he does not take dynamic images, i.e., images that change over time, into account.

In the last twenty years, beginning with a seminal paper by Dagfinn Follesdal published in 1969,1 analytic philosophy has shown a renewed and increasing interest in Husserl's phenomenology. 2 In Husserl and Inten- tionality, David Woodruff Smith and Ronald Mclntyre give an important contribution to this line of research. The book is written in the analytic tradition, and represents in part an attempt at making phenomenology palatable to those who look suspiciously at 'continental philosophy'. Thus it provides a double service: it introduces phenomenology to an analytic public, and it shows to those raised in the opposite tradition what kind of reception their tradition has overseas.

Reasons motivate our intentions and thus our actions, justify our beliefs, ground our hopes and connect our feelings of shame and pride to our thoughts. Given that intentions, beliefs and emotions are intentional states, intentionality is strongly connected with normativity. Yet what is more precisely their relationship? Some philosophers, notably Brandom and McDowell, contend at places that intentionality is intrinsically normative. In this paper, we discuss Brandom and McDowell’s thesis and the arguments they provide for its defence. In contrast to what they hold, we argue that neither reference intentionality nor content intentionality are intrinsically normative, although at least content intentionality has normative implications. More precisely, we argue that neither species of intentionality are normative from a semantical viewpoint, because being in an intentional state is not being in a state that is semantically correct or incorrect. Nevertheless, being in a state endowed with content may be a reason for believing or acting. Thus, we argue that content intentionality has normative implications. More precisely, we argue that any content is such that, if it is the content of a state that is sensitive to reasons - as judging paradigmatically is – then it entitles the subject of that state to have further states or to act in certain ways.

Tip-of-the-tongue experiences have an intriguing and insidious character. Some philosophers have tried to reduce them to more common states, with some considering these experiences to be beliefs about one’s state of knowledge, and still others considering them feelings about one’s state of knowledge. These two latter views are not mutually exclusive; indeed, one might hold a mixed theory, according to which the TOT is a feeling that depends constitutively on a belief. In the paper I first argue against the idea that beliefs are a constitutive feature of TOTs and hence against both the pure and the mixed belief theories; next I address the feeling theory; finally, I defend a pluralist theory.