Research
Enculturated Imagination
I have recently been working alongside Sam Wilkinson investigating approaches to the imagination within the Predictive Processing or Active Inference frameworks. In a previously published article we argued that, despite initial appearances, the PP framework struggles to explain the distinctive capacity of imagining (albeit providing good explanations of closely related mental processes, such as mental imagery, dreaming, mind-wandering, and hallucination). We are now exploring a more positive account of how imagination should be explained within this framework, with an emphasis on imagination as an enculturated capacity. The working hypothesis is that imagination is not a precursor to external creative practices or the cause of individual acts of creativity. Instead, engaging in creative practices enables and shapes the capacity to imagine and acts of imagining are dependent on internalising creative practices, such as storytelling, pretence, and art. An upshot of this is that whether, what, and how one can imagine is likely to be strongly dependent on the cultural milieu in which one's imagination developed.
Counterfactual Thought and Metaphysical Modality
My recent and ongoing research, in collaboration with John Divers, investigates the relationship between our capacity for counterfactual thought and the notion of metaphysical modality. In recent years, this capacity has been extensively investigated by psychologists, who have uncovered many of the typical features of thinking about how things could have been different, as well as proposing models of how we achieve this capacity. Williamson, in The Philosophy of Philosophy, citing this research, has suggested that our commonplace practice of thinking about counterfactuals plays a significant role in our understanding of metaphysical modality. However, whether all such thinking really involves modality and, if so, whether it involves metaphysical modality can be questioned. As such, one aim of this project is to investigate if and when typical counterfactual thinking genuinely involves a metaphysical notion of modality (as opposed to, e.g., epistemic modality). One of the problems that arises when attempting to investigate the impact of psychological findings regarding the nature of counterfactual thought is that psychologists and philosophers tend to use the term "counterfactual" in different ways. As such, another aim of this project is to clearly delineate the various approaches to counterfactual thought in philosophy and psychology, so as to foster a more productive dialogue between the two fields.
Embodied Imagination and Modal Knowledge
Recently, there has been a resurgence of interest in the role of the imagination in providing justification for modal knowledge. Many have argued that, in order for imagination to play a justificatory role, it must be constrained by reality in some way. In some cases, we may be able to impose relevant constraints on our imaginative activity in order to make it suitable for yielding knowledge. However, not all constraints on the imagination are within our control. Embodied approaches to cognition suggest that our imagination is also constrained by the kinds of bodies that we have and the sensorimotor interactions that we are capable of. This project, in collaboration with Tom Schoonen, at the University of Amsterdam, aims to investigate the ways in which our embodiment constrains our imagination, as well as assessing both the benefits and costs of these constraints regarding our access to modal knowledge.
Perceiving Reality by Representing Possibilities
A central topic of debate in both philosophy of perception and cognitive science has been the issue of whether perception involves representation. In various different debates of this kind, it is widely assumed that, if perception involves representation, it involves representing the way that the world actually is. However, a range of recent developments in the cognitive sciences arguably call this assumption into question. Rather than perception functioning so as to model the actual state of the local environment, it can be understood as representing ways that the world possibly could be, including mere possibilities that may never come to pass. The aim of this project is to explore ways in which ecological, enactive, and predictive processing accounts of perception can be interpreted in terms of modal representations. Philosophical debates about mental representation, modal epistemology, and conscious experience are all founded on the assumption that perception only aims to represent actuality. As such, if perception represents possibilities this may have a profound impact on the terrain of these and other debates.
Painful Possibilities: An Embodied Predictive Processing Account of Pain Experience
Part of this wider project involves applying the general idea of perceptual representation of possibilities to the particular case study of pain experience. Alongside Abby Tabor, from the University of Bath's Centre for Pain Research, and Christopher Burr, from the University of Oxford's Oxford Internet Institute, we are developing a novel account of pain experience in terms of anticipation of possible harm as a result of one's own actions. The model that we are developing combines insights from embodied cognition, ecological psychology, and predictive processing. As well as having important implications for issues in the philosophy of cognitive science, the aim is to develop a model that can directly inform clinical practice, for example in the treatment of chronic pain.
I have recently been working alongside Sam Wilkinson investigating approaches to the imagination within the Predictive Processing or Active Inference frameworks. In a previously published article we argued that, despite initial appearances, the PP framework struggles to explain the distinctive capacity of imagining (albeit providing good explanations of closely related mental processes, such as mental imagery, dreaming, mind-wandering, and hallucination). We are now exploring a more positive account of how imagination should be explained within this framework, with an emphasis on imagination as an enculturated capacity. The working hypothesis is that imagination is not a precursor to external creative practices or the cause of individual acts of creativity. Instead, engaging in creative practices enables and shapes the capacity to imagine and acts of imagining are dependent on internalising creative practices, such as storytelling, pretence, and art. An upshot of this is that whether, what, and how one can imagine is likely to be strongly dependent on the cultural milieu in which one's imagination developed.
Counterfactual Thought and Metaphysical Modality
My recent and ongoing research, in collaboration with John Divers, investigates the relationship between our capacity for counterfactual thought and the notion of metaphysical modality. In recent years, this capacity has been extensively investigated by psychologists, who have uncovered many of the typical features of thinking about how things could have been different, as well as proposing models of how we achieve this capacity. Williamson, in The Philosophy of Philosophy, citing this research, has suggested that our commonplace practice of thinking about counterfactuals plays a significant role in our understanding of metaphysical modality. However, whether all such thinking really involves modality and, if so, whether it involves metaphysical modality can be questioned. As such, one aim of this project is to investigate if and when typical counterfactual thinking genuinely involves a metaphysical notion of modality (as opposed to, e.g., epistemic modality). One of the problems that arises when attempting to investigate the impact of psychological findings regarding the nature of counterfactual thought is that psychologists and philosophers tend to use the term "counterfactual" in different ways. As such, another aim of this project is to clearly delineate the various approaches to counterfactual thought in philosophy and psychology, so as to foster a more productive dialogue between the two fields.
Embodied Imagination and Modal Knowledge
Recently, there has been a resurgence of interest in the role of the imagination in providing justification for modal knowledge. Many have argued that, in order for imagination to play a justificatory role, it must be constrained by reality in some way. In some cases, we may be able to impose relevant constraints on our imaginative activity in order to make it suitable for yielding knowledge. However, not all constraints on the imagination are within our control. Embodied approaches to cognition suggest that our imagination is also constrained by the kinds of bodies that we have and the sensorimotor interactions that we are capable of. This project, in collaboration with Tom Schoonen, at the University of Amsterdam, aims to investigate the ways in which our embodiment constrains our imagination, as well as assessing both the benefits and costs of these constraints regarding our access to modal knowledge.
Perceiving Reality by Representing Possibilities
A central topic of debate in both philosophy of perception and cognitive science has been the issue of whether perception involves representation. In various different debates of this kind, it is widely assumed that, if perception involves representation, it involves representing the way that the world actually is. However, a range of recent developments in the cognitive sciences arguably call this assumption into question. Rather than perception functioning so as to model the actual state of the local environment, it can be understood as representing ways that the world possibly could be, including mere possibilities that may never come to pass. The aim of this project is to explore ways in which ecological, enactive, and predictive processing accounts of perception can be interpreted in terms of modal representations. Philosophical debates about mental representation, modal epistemology, and conscious experience are all founded on the assumption that perception only aims to represent actuality. As such, if perception represents possibilities this may have a profound impact on the terrain of these and other debates.
Painful Possibilities: An Embodied Predictive Processing Account of Pain Experience
Part of this wider project involves applying the general idea of perceptual representation of possibilities to the particular case study of pain experience. Alongside Abby Tabor, from the University of Bath's Centre for Pain Research, and Christopher Burr, from the University of Oxford's Oxford Internet Institute, we are developing a novel account of pain experience in terms of anticipation of possible harm as a result of one's own actions. The model that we are developing combines insights from embodied cognition, ecological psychology, and predictive processing. As well as having important implications for issues in the philosophy of cognitive science, the aim is to develop a model that can directly inform clinical practice, for example in the treatment of chronic pain.