Sara Dellantonio

Corso Bettini, 31 - 38068 Rovereto
tel. 0464 808627
sara.dellantonio[at]unitn [dot] it
Education

2005 PhD in Philosophy University of Bremen, Germany. Title of dissertation: “Die interne Dimension der Bedeutung. Internalismus, Externalismus und semantische Kompetenz“ [“The Internal Dimension of Meaning. Externalism, Internalism and Semantic Competence”]. Grade: Summa cum laude.

1997 Master Degree in Philosophy (“Laurea”). State University of Milan, Italy. Title of Dissertation: “Relativismo, commensurabilità e interpretazione” [“Relativism, Commensurability and Interpretation”]. Grade: 110/110 cum laude.

Academic career and teaching activities

Academic positions

 

November, 1st 2020

Associate Professor, Department of Psychology and Cognitive Sciences, University of Trento, Italy.

2017 - 2020

Ricarcatore TD tipo B/ Faculty Member Researcher (3-years tenure track) Department of Psychology and Cognitive Sciences, University of Trento, Italy.

2012 - 2017

Ricarcatore TD tipo A/ Faculty Member Researcher, Department of Psychology and Cognitive Sciences, University of Trento, Italy.

2009 – 2012

Research Fellow (post-doc): Responsible for a research project supported by public funds on “Concepts and Meanings. An Hypothesis on Linguistic Determinism from a Cognitive Point of View” [bando post-doc PAT 2007], Department of Psychology and Cognitive Sciences, University of Trento, Italy.

2008

Research Fellow (“Assegnista di Ricerca”), University of Bari, Italy.

2004 – 2007

Research Fellow (“Assegnista di Ricerca”), University of Trento, Italy.

2003

Research Fellow: Centre for Cognitive Sciences (Zentrum für Kognitionswissenschaften) of the University of Bremen, Germany – Financed by the University of Bari, Italy.

2000–2001– 2002

Ph.D. Student (with 3-year scholarship), University of Bremen, Germany.

Overseas Experiences

October 2009 – February 2010

Visiting Fellow at the Centre for Critical and Cultural Theory, University of Cardiff UK.

June 2008 – January 2009

Visiting Fellow at the Institut für Philosophie, University of Bremen financed by funds from the VIGONI project (MIUR - DAAD).

June – August 2007

Visiting Fellow at the Institut für Philosophie, University of Bremen financed by funds from the VIGONI project (MIUR - DAAD).

2003

Visiting Scholar at the Centre of Cognitive Sciences (Zentrum für Kognitionswissenschaften) at the University of Bremen, Germany.

Fall 2001 – Spring 2002

Visiting Scholar at the Department of Philosophy of the Columbia University, New York, USA.

1998 – 2002

Specialization and Ph.D. at the Zentrum Philosophischer Grundlagen der Wissenschaften [Centre for the Philosophical Foundations of Sciences] and at the Institut für Philosophie, University of Bremen, Germany.

Fall Semester 1996 –1997

Visiting Undergraduate Student at the Zentrum Philosophischer Grundlagen der Wissenschaften [Centre for the Philosophical Foundations of Sciences], University of Bremen, Germany.

Journal Editorship

Present - 2019

Review Editor for Frontiers in Psychology, section "Theoretical and Philosophical Psychology" (as a Review Editor I am a member of the Editorial Board and act as a regular reviewer for the journal “Frontiers in Psychology”)

2010 - present

Co-founding Editor, Rivista Internazionale di Filosofia e Psicologia [RiFP - International Journal for Philosophy and Psychology], MIMESIS, Milan, Italy [A journal for philosophy in Italy; included in Web of Science and Scopus]

www.rifp.it

2010 - present

Member of the Editorial Board, Direito & Práxis [Universidade do Estado do Rio de Janeiro] http://www.e-publicacoes.uerj.br/index.php/revistaceaju/about

2003 - 2009

Member of the Scientific Committee, Il Giornale della Filosofia [Philosophy Magazine], Copernico, Roma – Latina).

Editorial Activities

Occasional

2020

Reviewer for Frontiers in Psychology

Ad hoc reviewer for the Journal “Philosophies”

2019

Reviewer for Frontiers in Psychology

Ad hoc reviewer for the Journal “Synthese”.

Ad hoc reviewer for the Journal “Language and Cognition”.

Ad hoc reviewer for the 41st Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society [CogSci 2019].

Reviewer for the XVI AISC Annual Conference 2019

2018

Ad hoc review for the Journal “Philosophical inquiries” [philinq]

Ad hoc reviewer for the Journal “Etica & Politica / Ethics & Politics”

Ad hoc reviewer for MBR18_SPAIN: Model-Based Reasoning in Science and Technology: Inferential Models for Logic, Language, Cognition and Computation. 20 Anniversary)

Ad hoc reviewer for the 40th Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society [CogSci 2018], July 25th – 28th, 2018, Madison, Wisconsin.

2017

Ad hoc reviewer for the Giornale italiano di psicologia (GIP)

Ad hoc reviewer for the 39th Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society [CogSci 2017], July 26th–29th, 2017, London, UK

Ad hoc reviewer for the 14th Annual Conference of the Italian Association for Cognitive Sciences (Associazione Italiana di Scienze Cognitive - AISC), AISC 2017, December 14-16, 2017, Bologna.

2016

Ad hoc reviewer for Behavioural and Brain Research

Ad hoc reviewer for Philosophical Psychology

Ad hoc reviewer for the 38th Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society [CogSci 2016], Aug 10-13, 2016, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

Ad hoc reviewer for MBR015 (International Conference Model-Based Reasoning in Science and Technology)

2015

Ad hoc reviewer for MBR014 (International Conference Model-Based Reasoning in Science and Technology)

2014

Ad hoc reviewer for the Giornale italiano di psicologia (GIP)

2013

Ad hoc reviewer for the ICIC 2013 (International Conference on Intelligent Computing)

2011

Ad hoc reviewer for the Proceedings of PCS2011 (Third International Conference on Philosophy and Cognitive Science), Guangzhou, China, May 26th-27th, 2011

2006

Reviewer of the XXVIII Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society [CogSci 2006], 26th-29th July, 2006, Vancouver, Canada

2005

Reviewer of the XXVII Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society [CogSci 2005], 21st-23rd July 2005, Stresa, Italia

______________________________________________________________________­­­­­____________

Coordination activities and internationalization projects

2019 - present

Member of the Joint Committee called “Commissione Paritetica Docenti-Studenti” which is aimed at monitoring and improving the teaching activities and the quality of the teaching of the bachelor course in Cognitive Psychology [corso di laurea in Scienze e tecniche di psicologia cognitiva] of the Department of Psychology and Cognitive Science, University of Trento.

2019 - present

Person in charge for the Erasmus Project of the Department of Psychology and Cognitive Science of the University of Trento for the following destinations: Freie Universität Berlin (Germany) and l’Universidade de Lisboa (Portogallo).

2019 - present

Responsible for the tutoring activities [Responsabile del tutorato] of the Department of Psychology and Cognitive Sciences of the University of Trento.

2017-present

University curriculum counsellor for high school students [Delegata all’Orientamento] for the Department of Psychology and Cognitive Sciences of the University of Trento in collaboration with Professor Valeria Sovrano.

2015-present

Member of the Executive committee of the PhD. Program in “Cognitive Science” of the Department of Psychology and Cognitive Sciences, University of Trento, Italy (Until 2016 the Ph.D. program name was “Psychological and Education Sciences”). [Membro della Giunta del Dottorato in Scienze cognitive]

2015-2019

Assistant coordinator of the Erasmus Project for the Department of Psychology and Cognitive Science of the University of Trento, Italy.

2013-present

Member of the board of the PhD. Program in “Cognitive Science” of the Department of Psychology and Cognitive Sciences, University of Trento, Italy [Until 2016 the Ph.D. program name was “Psychological and Education Sciences”], University of Trento, Italy.

2012-present

Person in charge for the Erasmus Project of the Department of Psychology and Cognitive Science of the University of Trento for the following destinations: Humboldt-Universitaet zu Berlin and Universitaet Osnabrueck (Germany).

2009

Planning of the ICI Education Cooperation Programme – Cooperation in Higher Education and Training, University of Trento, Italy (collaboration).

2007

Planning of the Erasmus Mundus project between the University of Trento, Italy, the University of Osnabrück, Germany, the University of Nijmegen, Holland and the Budapest University of Technology and Economics, Hungary (collaboration).

Planning, distribution and correction of the admission tests for the IULM University of Venice (collaboration).

2006

Planning of the Erasmus Mundus project between the University of Trento, Italy, the University of Osnabrück, Germany, and the University of Nijmegen, Holland (collaboration).

Creation of posters about “Art, philosophy and Cognitive Science” for the Exhibition “AttrattivaMente” [about Art and mind] organized by the University of Trento (April 28 – June 10, 2006, city of Rovereto).

Member of the Organizational Committee of the “Congresso Nazionale di Psicologia Sperimentale (AIP)” [National Congress of Experimental Psychology] held in Rovereto (13–15 September, 2006)

Planning of an orientation project designed to facilitate entry into cognitive science (collaboration) and lecture on “Cognitive science and philosophical matters”.

2005

Planning of the Agreement for the International Cooperation in the Research between the University of Bari, Italy, and the University of Bremen, Germany (collaboration).

Planning of the joint degree programme between the Faculty of Cognitive Science of the University of Trento, Italy, and the Institute of Cognitive Science of the University of Osnabrück, Germany (collaboration).

Teaching Experience

Doctoral School, Master’s Program and post-graduate classes

2018-present

Spring semester

Design epistemology and ethics (14 classes, 28 hours; taught in English) Master’s course in Human-Computer Interaction, Department of Psychology and Cognitive Sciences, University of Trento, Italy.

2013-present

Spring semester

Fondamenti epistemologici delle scienze cognitive [Philosophy and Cognitive Sciences] (four classes, 12 hours) Doctoral School in Psychological Sciences and Education, Department of Psychology and Cognitive Sciences, University of Trento, Italy

2015-2016 Spring semester

Organizer and coordinator of the lecture series “Emozioni: un possibile percorso dalla filosofia, alla clinica, alle neuroscienze, alla letteratura” [“Emotions: a possible path from philosophy, to clinics, neurosciences and literature”] (5 meetings of 4 hours each):

1. “La questione delle emozioni nel pensiero filosofico” [“The issue of emotions in the history of philosophy”] by Paola Giacomoni;

2. “Teorie contemporanee delle emozioni: un percorso interdisciplinare fra filosofia e psicologia” [“Contemporary theories of emotions: an interdisciplinary perspective relating philosophy and psychology”] by Sara Dellantonio;

3. “L’analisi del vissuto emozionale nella pratica clinica” [The analysis of experienced emotions the in the clinical practice] by Gianluca Esposito;

4. “Emozioni e neuroscienze: dal laboratorio alle tecniche di regolazione emozionale” [Emotions and neurosciences: from the lab to the emotional regulatio] by Alessandro Grecucci;

5. “Letteratura e emozioni: leggere e narrare per comprendere la complessità” [“Literature and emotions: reading and story-telling as means to understand complexity”] by Maria Micaela Coppola.

Program for Continuing Education. Lectures addressed to high school teachers. Organized by the Department of Psychology and Cognitive Sciences, University of Trento, Italy.

2014-2015 Spring Semester

Critical thinking. Argomentazione comunicazione, ragionamento [Critical thinking. Argumentation, communication, reasoning] (12 hours-course). Program for Continuing Education. Lectures addressed to high school teachers. Organized by the Department of Psychology and Cognitive Sciences, University of Trento, Italy.

2014-2015      Fall Semester

Critical thinking. Argomentazione comunicazione, ragionamento [Critical thinking. Argumentation, communication, reasoning] (5 hours, October 10th, 2014) II Level University Master Course (Postgraduate specialization for teachers) on Pianificazione e gestione dei processi inclusivi nella scuola [Planning and development of inclusive processes at school] Organized by the Dept. of Psychology and Cognitive Science of the University of Trento.

2013-2014 Spring Semester

La filosofia e sue applicazioni psicologiche: teorie filosofiche classiche sulla morale e sulla mente che sono ancora vive nella contemporaneità [Philosophy and its psychological applications: classical theories on morality and mind that are still present in the contemporary debate] (12 hours-course, March 2014). Program for Continuing Education. Lectures addressed to high school teachers. Organized by the Department of Psychology and Cognitive Sciences, University of Trento, Italy.

2012-2013 Spring semester

Mentalismo e psicologia come scienza [Mentalism and Psychology as a Science] (9 hours-course, May 2013) Doctoral School in Psychological Sciences and Education, Department of Psychology and Cognitive Sciences, University of Trento.

Percorsi dell'insegnamento filosofico tra scienza e vita quotidiana (12 hours-course, March 2013). First two classes on Duhem e il problema del controllo di ipotesi scientifiche [Duhem and the problem of how to test scientific hypotheses]; third class on Locke e l’identità personale [Locke and the issue of personal identity] Program for Continuing Education. Lectures addressed to high school teachers. Organized by the Department of Psychology and Cognitive Sciences, University of Trento, Italy.

2011-2012

Spring Semester

Qualia and the Problem of Consciousness (two classes, 4 hours, 26 and 29 March 2012) taught in English at the University of Trento, Doctoral School in Psychological Sciences and Education, Department of Cognition Science and Education, Department of Psychology and Cognitive Sciences, University of Trento, Italy.

Soggetti psichici o oggetti psicologici? Problemi cartesiani e scienza della mente [Psychological Subjects or Objects of Psychological Investigation? Cartesian Problems and the Science of Mind] (8 hours course, March 2012). Program for Continuing Education. Lectures addressed to high school teachers. Organized by the Department of Psychology and Cognitive Sciences, University of Trento, Italy.

2007-2009 Spring Semester

Filosofia e scienze cognitive [Philosophy and cognitive science] 4 credits/ 32 hours at the University of Trento, Master’s Program and Doctoral School in Cognitive Science.

2007-2008

Fall Semester

Didattica della filosofia [Methods for Teaching Philosophy], 24 hours at the “Scuola di Specializzazione all’Insegnamento Secondario” (SSIS), [School for Philosophy Master Students aspiring to become philosophy teachers], University of Trento, Italy.

2006-2007 Spring Semester

Filosofia e scienze cognitive [Philosophy and cognitive science] with Prof. Pim Haselager, Radboud University Nijmegen, 4 credits/ 32 hours, Master’s Program and Doctoral School in Cognitive and Brain Science, University of Trento, Italy.

2006-2007     Fall semester

Didattica della filosofia [Methods for Teaching Philosophy], 24 hours at the “Scuola di Specializzazione all’Insegnamento Secondario” (SSIS) [School for Philosophy Masters Students aspiring to become philosophy teachers], University of Trento, Italy.

2005-2006 Spring semester

Filosofia e scienze cognitive [Philosophy and cognitive science] 4 credits/ 32 hours, Master’s Program and Doctoral School in Cognitive and Brain Science, University of Trento, Italy.

2002-2003 Spring Semester

Begriffe: Die Debatte zwischen dem klassischen Rationalismus und Empirismus [Concepts: the debate between classical rationalism and empiricism] 26 hours, taught in German, Department of Philosophy, University of Bremen, Germany.

2002-2003    Fall Semester

Rationalität und Irrationalität. Inwiefern kann man die Menschen als grundsätzlich rational betrachten [Rationality. Can we consider humans as essentially rational?] 26 hours, taught in German, Department of Philosophy, University of Bremen, Germany.

2001-2002 Spring semester

Sprache und Geist in der heutigen analytischen Debatte: ein Überblick [Language and Mind in the Contemporary Analytic Debate: an Overview] 26 hours, taught in German, Department of Philosophy, University of Bremen, Germany.

__________________________________________________________________________________

Bachelor

 

2015-present Spring Semester

Il metodo scientifico. Origini storiche e fondamenti. [The scientific method. Historical origins and basic principles] one class offered in the course of “Metodi della ricerca in psicologia” coordinated by Maria Paola Paladino, Bachelor Program in Psychology, University of Trento, Italy.

2015-present Spring Semester

Filosofia della scienza [Philosophy of science] 9 credits/ 63 hours (mandatory class – more than 200 students enrolled each year) at the University of Trento, Bachelor in Cognitive Science (mandatory class – more than 200 students enrolled each year).

2012-2015 Spring Semester

Filosofia della scienza [Philosophy of science] 6 credits/ 42 hours (mandatory class – more than 200 students enrolled each year) at the University of Trento, Bachelor in Cognitive Science.

2009- 2012 Spring Semester

Filosofia della scienza [Philosophy of science] 8 credits/ 64 hours (mandatory class – more than 200 students enrolled each year) at the University of Trento, Bachelor in Cognitive Science.

2008-2009, Spring Semester

Filosofia della scienza [Philosophy of science] with Prof. Lilliana Albertazzi, University of Trento, 8 credits/ 64 hours at the University of Trento, Bachelor in Cognitive Science (mandatory class – more than 200 students enrolled each year).

2007-2008, Fall Semester

Filosofia della scienza [Philosophy of science] 8 credits/ 64 hours (mandatory class – more than 200 students enrolled each year) at the University of Trento, Bachelor in Cognitive Science.

__________________________________________________________________________________

Research interests

•    Philosophy of Science, Philosophy of Cognitive Science and Philosophy of Psychology 
•    Epistemology
•    Philosophy of Mind and Language
•    Applied Philosophy of Science, Experimental Philosophy

Research work

PHILOSOPHY OF PSYCHOLOGY AND EPISTEMOLOGY OF THE COGNITIVE SCIENCES – Sara Dellantonio

Overview

Long before the investigation of mind and behavior became the focus of experimental psychology, it was the prerogative of philosophy. The birth of scientific psychology lead to the separation of these disciplines and the development of two different traditions of research on mind that often do not communicate: an essentially theoretical philosophical tradition, and a largely empirical psychological one. The emergence of the “cognitive sciences” has offered to reconcile philosophy and psychology, by reuniting them in an interdisciplinary research project, whose aim is to arrive at an empirically based understanding of mental phenomena in all their complexity. 

The terms “Philosophy of psychology” and “Epistemology of the cognitive sciences” describe the philosophical traditions that have taken hold within the ambit of the cognitive project. They include a large variety of issues that range:

  • from the analysis of the methods, instruments and models adopted in psychology and other cognitive disciplines
  • to the development, in collaboration with these other disciplines, of specific psychological explanations
  • to the study of the (epistemological, social, ethical and other) consequences of the theories put forward by cognitive researchers.

A more specific description of each of the topics I address in this field is given below.

 

Representations, concepts, meanings

Concepts are essential constituents of thought: they are the instruments we use to categorize our experience, i.e. to classify things and group them together in homogeneous sets. In the field of cognitive research, concepts are characterized as the internal mental information (representations) that allow us, among other things, to master the words of natural language. By analyzing the way in which individuals master word meanings, I explore a number of hypotheses regarding the nature of concepts, the composition of representations and the relationship between language and thought, tackling issues such as:

  • What is the relationship between the perceptual and the cognitive system, i.e. between perceptual and conceptual information?
  • How are conceptual representations originally constituted?
  • What does the specific semantic mastery exhibited by people tell us about the nature of our concepts?
  • Does language learning influence the way in which we categorize the world?

I am not only interested in investigating the relationship between external perception and conceptualization. In fact, external perception is not the only source of information available to living creatures. They also have internal sensations that may help explain where at least some of their conceptual representations originate.

In order to explore the contribution of this latter information, I am especially interested in investigating specific word classes such as terms denoting bodily experiences (e.g. ‘pain’, ‘hunger’, ‘itch’ etc.); as well as terms denoting emotions and abstract words. Given their complexity and their links to other topics, emotions and abstract terms deserve a more detailed explanation.

 

Emotions

The field of cognitive research is characterized by two large families of theories on emotions: the so-called cognitive and the perceptual theories of emotion. According to cognitive theories, we identify our emotions on the basis of the thoughts that correspond to them. In contrast, perceptual theories of emotion – whose basic ideas date back to William James and Carl Lange at the end of the 19th-century – suggest that we recognize our emotions on the basis of the bodily changes and sensations we experience when an emotion occurs. In my studies, I argue for a perceptual theory of emotions. I suggest that there is a continuity between bodily experiences and emotions and that internal perceptual information is essential for the recognition and categorization of our emotions.

 

Abstract terms

The ‘standard picture of meaning’ suggests that natural languages are composed of concrete words whose meanings rely on observable properties of external objects as well as on abstract words which are essentially linguistic constructs. These two kinds of words do not belong to different conceptual classes; they rather form a continuum. In line with this view, it is usually assumed that concepts – as mental representations that support our semantic competence with these words – are also positioned along a continuum which is characterized, at the one pole, by concepts that are more directly based on perceptual information and, at the other, by concepts that rely chiefly on linguistic information.

However, recent studies, largely carried out in the field of so-called embodied cognition, challenge this view and suggest that abstract words are not just linguistic constructs, and that at least some of them rely on sensory information that is not driven by external perception, but instead relates to internal states of the body. In fact, many non-concrete words are based – at least in part – on bodily information and on emotions: think, for example, of ‘balance’, ‘force’, ‘friendship’, ‘familiarity’, ‘respect’, etc. On the other hand, there are abstract words that are defined within the scope of a particular theory and appear to be more deeply definitional: think, for example, of ‘axiom’, ‘legislation’, ‘fallacy’, ‘hypothesis’ etc.

I suggest that concrete and abstract do in fact constitute a continuum, but that this continuum is not simply defined by two poles (external perception and definitions), but by three: external perception, internal perception and definitions. In line with this scheme, the construction of abstract concepts might originate from and rely on either form of concreteness, that is, either external or internal perceptual experience.

 

Nativism vs. empiricism

Nativists believe that the mind comes equipped with many innate structures which are essential for explaining the various capacities humans exhibit. Nativists are opposed by empiricists. Their view has often been described as postulating that the mind is not equipped with any innate structure, but is rather a ‘blank slate’ on which experience impresses its traces. This is a mistaken picture of the contraposition between nativism and empiricism which is instead concerned with the quantity and kinds of innate structures the mind may be equipped with. As stated by Simpson et al. (2005) in the introduction of the first volume of their ambitious trilogy of volumes ‘The innate mind’: “Nativists are inclined to see the mind as the product of a relatively large number of innately specified, relatively complex, domain-specific structures and processes. Their empiricist counterparts incline toward the view that much less of the content of the mind exists prior to worldly experience, and that the processes that operate upon this experience are of a much more domain-general nature.” (Simpson et al. 2005, p. 5)

I endorse an empiricist view of the mind: in particular, I suggest that empiricist explanations should be pursued as far as possible. From an epistemological point of view, nativist explanations are based on the idea that the existence of inborn structures is the only possible way to account for the capacity exhibited by individuals. However, if one could show that this capacity can be explained using other, non-innate cognitive resources, a nativist explanation would become unnecessary and could be superseded. Indeed, the hypothesis of the research I propose is that – if we can explain the origin of a certain capacity within an empiricist framework – this explanation will ipso facto (by a principle corollary to Ockham’s razor) supplant the nativist position.

 

Categories

Studies of categorization in psychology and the cognitive sciences have made use of the notions of ‘category’ and ‘concept’ without precisely defining what is meant by either; in fact, often these terms have been used as synonyms, making it difficult to address specific issues related to conceptual development. Categories are defined as the means thorough which experience is originally (pre-linguistically) organized in a passive and fully unconscious manner on the basis of universal structuring principles. Conceptualization is then explained as a later process in which the earlier categorical macro-classes are further subdivided into more specific and detailed sets; this later process also relies on linguistic learning and exposure to culture.

The hypothesis that our experience is categorically organized opens up many avenues for cognitive research. One of them is whether categories must be considered inborn or whether they can be explained, at least in part, as beginning from some more general capacities.

One specific categorical partition I have worked on is the dichotomy animate/inanimate. The specific issue addressed with reference to this dichotomy, is whether the capacity to distinguish animate from inanimate entities is innate or develops on the basis of information and organizational structure already available at a very early developmental stage.

In line with an empiricist research project on mind, I tried to show how this capacity can be explained by starting with bodily information and then applying an analogizing mechanism. The bodily information is driven by self-monitoring mechanisms that inform the first-person about his/her internal states and movements and thus, implicitly, also inform her/him that s/he is alive. Furthermore, the analogizing mechanism is capable of recognizing all the forms of movement that are analogous to those detected by the self-monitoring mechanism (biological, intentional and self-propelled movement) in the external world. In this way, the subject will be able to distinguish between entities that move like her/him (which are therefore animate) and entities that do not move like her/him (which are therefore inanimate).

 

Modularity

Nativism is one of the defining traits of the cognitive approach to mind since its beginnings. The version of nativism that characterizes this approach can be traced back to Fodor’s modularity thesis. Fodor relies on the classical metaphor of the mind as a computer and distinguishes between two kinds of system: the input systems and the central system. Input systems provide the central system with information on the external world, while the central system codifies this information in a unique format and uses it for any kind of thought. The modularity thesis in Fodor’s version concerns the input system only: input systems are modular in the sense that they are highly specialized, domain specific and informationally encapsulated computational mechanisms whose operations are mandatory, fast, and operate below awareness.

Fodor’s interpretation of modularity is considered to be modest because it is limited to the input systems. However, another important tradition of research supports a view called massive modularity according to which the central system is also organized into separate modules. Massive modularity gives rise to a model of mind described as a ‘Swiss army knife’, i.e. an assembly of genetically determined tools (modules) which are specialized for some particular purpose and autonomous from each other. This version of the modularity theory leads to a revision of the very notion of module and has relevant consequences for many research fields, including psychological research on morality. In our studies, we argue against the massive modularity thesis. Furthermore, we suggest that its use in explaining our ‘moral competence’ in the field of morality is questionable.

 

Philosophical Psychology and Experimental Philosophy

The boundaries between the psychological and philosophical research on mind are getting progressively blurrier and difficult to define. As e.g. Mason, Sripada and Stich maintain: “in the last quarter of the century, the distinction between psychology and the philosophy of psychology began to dissolve as philosophers played an increasingly active role in articulating and testing empirical theories about the mind and psychologists became increasingly interested in the philosophical underpinnings and implications of their work.” (Mason, K. Sripada, C.S., Stich, S. (2008). Philosophy of Psychology, p. 583; in: D. Moran (ed.) Routledge Companion to Twentieth-Century Philosophy).

The mind is a unitary research object and there are not two ways – a philosophical and a psychological one – to account for it. The differences are rather due to the fact that these disciplines pursue, in part, different interests and approaches. The interests of psychology are chiefly empirical and related to the possibility of developing very specific hypotheses that can be entirely controlled by experimentation. Philosophy is primarily interested in developing theories that are as wide, coherent and inclusive as possible and that allow us, among other things, to address classical issues on the nature and structure of human knowledge. Thus, ‘philosophical psychology’ is a way of doing psychology that emphasizes the need for wide-ranging theories that also deal with fundamental issues concerning e.g. the structures that allow us to acquire knowledge, whether they are innate or learned, the implication that these have for the kind of knowledge we can develop and so on. My research is oriented towards a form of philosophical psychology understood in this sense.

Typically, philosophy does not do experiments, but it uses a critical-comparative approach that ultimately relies on empirical evidence obtained from other disciplines. However, recently in the field of philosophy a movement called ‘experimental philosophy’ (X-Phil) has taken hold whose aim is to address philosophical questions also by doing experiments. In the light of the idea that the mind is a unitary research object, this perspective turns out to be attractive and promising. However, I believe that philosophy cannot begin to build its own experimental research tradition, distinct from that of the empirical sciences. In the spirit of the unity of scientific research, philosophy should rather seek an alliance with the empirical disciplines. Consistent with this perspective, my research activity relies on cooperation with researchers in empirical psychology. This collaboration is not meant to be a passive one, in which psychology offers its services to philosophy and performs experiments to test the hypotheses put forward by philosophy. This is rather a common, critical and integrated enterprise in which philosophy collaborates with psychology including with respect to methodological issues (contributing e.g. to the development of new instruments: new scales, questionnaires, etc.) and in which psychology is also called on to make its contribution to theoretical issues (e.g. by offering philosophy constructs and operationalizations that are evidence-based and make the theories on mental phenomena easier to control from an empirical point of view).

Memberships in societies and scientific committees

Professional Membership

SILFS – Società Italiana di Logica e Filosofia delle Scienze [Italian Society for Logic and Philosophy of Sciences]

AISC – Associazione Italiana di Scienze Cognitive [Italian Association for Cognitive Sciences]

GAP (2000-2019) – Gesellschaft für Analytische Philosophie [German Society for Analytical Philosophy]

SINe – Società Italiana di Neuroetica e Filosofia delle neuroscienze [Italian Society for Neuroethics and Philosophy of Neurosciences]

Conferences and lectures

Invited lectures

May 29th, 2018

Internal Perception. How Bodily Feelings and Emotions influence the formation and transformation of Concepts – class offered at the undergraduate and graduate students of the School of Psychology at Aristotle University of Thessaloniki (Greece).

October 13th, 2017

Discussant at the conference Uno, nessuno, centomila modi di essere. Argomenti di metafisica, realismo e ontologia. Speakers: Francesco Berto, University of Amsterdam “C’è un ‘è’ in c’è” [There is an “is” in ‘there is’]; Franca D’Agostini, Università Statale di Milano “La verità non è importante: è inevitabile [Truth is not Important: it is Inevitable”; Achille Varzi, Columbia University “Né in cielo, né in terra” [Neither Heaven nor Earth]. Conference organized by Faculty of Law and by the Department of Philosophy of the University of Trento, Italy.

May 15th, 2015

Pensare gli artefatti. Percorsi ‘naturali’ e ‘culturali’ della categorizzazione. [How do we think of artifacts. ‘Natural’ and ‘cultural’ paths of categorization] one class offered in the course of Philosophy of Language held by Massimiliano Carrara, Master in philosophical Sciences and PhD school in Philosophy, University of Padua, Italy.

September 24th- 25th, 2014

Modularità. Da Fodor alla modularità massiva [Modularity. From Fodor to Massive Modularity] two classes offered in the course of Cognitive Neurosciences held by Fancesco Pavani, Master in Psychology (Neuroscience Program), University of Trento, Italy.

September 25th- 26th, 2013

Modularità. Da Fodor alla modularità massiva [Modularity. From Fodor to Massive Modularity] two classes offered in the course of Cognitive Neurosciences held by Fancesco Pavani, Master in Psychology (Neuroscience Program), University of Trento, Italy.

April 21st and 22nd, 2009

Breve introduzione all’etica e ai problemi filosofici della neuroetica [Short Introduction to ethics and to the philosophical problems of neuroethics] two classes offered in the course of Neuroethics held by Claudia Bonfiglioli, Master in Psychology (Neuroscience Program), University of Trento, Italy.

March 31st – April 4th, 2003

La teoria della mente di Donald Davidson [Donald Davidson’s Theory of Mind] 4-day intensive seminar at the University of Siena, Italy, sponsored by the University of Bremen through the Socrates-Erasmus exchange programme.

Conferences Convened

December 15th, 2015

Innatismo ed empirismo in chiave cognitiva. Il dibattito sulla modularità in filosofia [Nativism and empiricism. The debate on modularity in philosophy], one-hour presentation in the workshop on [Nativism and empiricism. The debate on modularity in philosophy and in cognitive neurosciences]. The presentation was followed by a discussion with Francesco Pavani on the interdisciplinary character of this debate. Department of Cognitive Science and Education, University of Trento, Italy. Workshop in collaboration with SIFA (Italian Society of Analytic Philosophy) and Art-Science, Firenze. The workshop was recorded and is available on-line:

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLsBUh_gUwMHa63oPqEdL3rHCmJ__vEUv0

February 8th, 2012

’Libertà’ e determinismo linguistico. Cognizione, cultura, ideologia [Freedom and linguistic determinism. Cognition, culture, ideology] with Luigi Pastore, one-hour presentation in the workshop Concetti e significati. Il determinismo linguistic in chiave cognitive [Concepts and Meanings. An Hypothesis on Linguistic Determinism from a Cognitive Point of View], Department of Cognitive Science and Education, University of Trento, Italy.

December 7th, 2007

Mindreading: razionalità o simulazione? [Mindreading: rationality or simulation?] three-hour lecture in the series of seminars Fondamenti delle scienze cognitive [The fundamentals of Cognitive Science] for the Doctoral School in Cognitive and Brain Science of the University of Trento.

January 31th, 2007

Teorie dei concetti e modelli etici [Theories of Concepts and Ethical Models] Conference, University of Trento, Italy.

November 22th, 2005

Violazioni semantiche e teoria dei concetti [Semantic Violation and Theory of Concepts] Conference, University of Trento, Italy.

November 3th, 2004

Significato e competenza semantica [Meaning and Semantic Competence] Conference, University of Trento, Italy.

October 9th, 2003

Semantica e cognizione [Semantics and Cognition] International Conference Mind and Nature, October 8-11, 2003, University of Bari, Italy.

__________________________________________________________________________

Invited Plenary Presentations

December 5th, 2019

Resilience and emotions. Alexithymia as a key to understanding human emotion experience. I-CORE final international conference “Complexity, Inter-Connectivity and Resilience”, Bologna 5-6 December 2019.

October 30th, 2019

Aims and scopes of “Philosophy of psychology”. The theory of emotion as an example. Philosophy of Mind Seminar. Istituto Universitario di Studi Superiori (IUSS) di Pavia, Pavia, Italy.

June 13th, 2019

Ragioni ed emozioni [Reasons and emotions], Contribution to the Symposium “Onus probandi. La formazione della prova tra ragioni ed emozioni” [“Onus probandi. The formation of the proof between reasons and emotions”], Faculty of Law, University of Trento, Italy.

November, 22th, 2018

Epistemic Feelings & Reasoning: Cognitive Insights, One-class Seminar in the course of “Logic, Argumentation and the Law” held by the Faculty of Law of the University of Trento, Italy.

November 20th, 2018

Filosofia cognitiva: come lo studio della patologia ci aiuta a sviluppare teorie sul funzionamento cognitivo. Un esempio tratto dalla teoria delle emozioni [Cognitive philosophy. How the Study of Pathology help us to develop cognitive theories. An example from the theory of emotions], Dipartimento di Filosofia e Comunicazione, Università degli Studi di Bologna, Italia.

October, 19th, 2018

Filosofia della psicologia [Philosophy of Psychology]. Conference “La filosofia della scienza in Italia, oggi”[Philosophy of science in Italy, today]. October 19-20, 2018, Associazione “Nuova Civiltà delle Macchine”, Forlì. Italy.

May 30th, 2018

Alexithymia and Agnosia. Parallels in Emotion and Visual Perception. School of Psychology, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki (Greece).

February 10th, 2017

Naturalisierte Epistemologie angewandt: Der Gegensatz zwischen konkret und abstrakt [Epistemology Naturalized in Practice: The Opposition between Concrete and Abstract] Fest-Kolloquium „Naturalismus“ [Conference on „Naturalism“] Bremen, Germany.

October 18th, 2016

Il naturalismo cognitivo e il futuro della filosofia [Cognitive Naturalism and the Future of Philosophy] Workshop “Dalla filosofia dell’azione alla filosofia della mente” [“From philosophy of action to philosophy of mind”], Dipartimento di Scienze Sociali, Politiche e Cognitive (DISPOC), Università di Siena, Italy.

June 30th, 2014

The Architecture of Categorization. Artifacts and Other Kinds of Things. Workshop “Artifacts and Artifacts Talk: Cognitive and Semantic Aspects”, (FISPPA) Graduate School in Philosophy, Department of Philosophy, Sociology, Education and Applied Psychology, University of Padua, Italy.

November 7th, 2013

On the Nature and Composition of Abstract Concepts [with Remo Job] PCS2013: IV International Conference on Philosophy and Cognitive Science Sun Yat-Sen University, Guangzhou, China, November 7-8, 2013

May 27th, 2011

Moral intuitions vs. moral reasoning. Are people victims of culture or are they capable of thinking? [with Remo Job] PCS2011 – Third International Conference on Philosophy and Cognitive Science, May 26-27, 2011 Guangzhou, China.

December 9th, 2008

Vorstellbarkeit als Denkbarkeit [Representability as Thinkability] [with Luigi Pastore] Workshop Gli oggetti e la loro costituzione [Objects and Object Constitution] December 09-10, 2008, University of Bari, Italy.

October 30th, 2008

Kognitive Module und moralische Kompetenz [Cognitive Modules and Moral Competence] Workshop on Genetic Screening, October 29-30, 2008, Universität Salzburg, Austria.

March 9th, 2007

Die universale Dimension des Denkens und die kulturelle Bestimmung der Sprache: auf der Suche nach einer Erläuterung ihrer Beziehung [The Universal Dimension of Thought and the Cultural Determination of Language: in Search of an Explanation for their Relation] Kolloquium [Reaserach Seminar], University of Bremen, Germany.

June 22th, 2006

Il naturalismo semantico. Presupposti epistemologici e implicazioni per una teoria dei concetti [Semantic Naturalism. Epistemological Presuppositions and Implications for a Theory of Concepts] Research Seminar, University of Bari, Italy.

December 3th, 2005

Significato, concetto, cognizione [Meaning, Concept, Cognition] Workshop Psycholinguistics and Cognition, University of Padua, Italy.

January 29th, 2001

Das Problem der Bedeutung von einem externalistischen Standpunkt [The Problem of Meaning from an Externalist Point of View] Research Seminar, Freie Universität Berlin, Berlin, Germany.

June 8th, 2000

Erfahrung und Erkenntnis: die Frage nach dem empirischen Fundament [Experience and Knowledge: The Question of Empirical Foundations] Research Seminar, University of Bremen, Germany.

___________________________________________________________________________

Refereed Conferences

December 12th, 2019

Positive and negative emotions. Valence, emotion recognition and emotion regulation [with Luigi Pastore], AISC 2019 Annual Meeting of the Italian Association of Cognitive Sciences, December 11-13, 2019, Università di Roma Tre, Italy.

December 18th, 2018

Paranormal beliefs? A matter of core knowledge confusion (that can be simulated by a computational model) [with Luigi Pastore and Claudio Mulatti], AISC 2018 Annual Meeting of the Italian Association of Cognitive Sciences, December 17-19, 2018, IUSS Pavia, Italy.

25th October, 2018

Seed of Certainty: Epistemic Feelings as a Monitoring System for Cognitive Contents [with Luigi Pastore], Model-Based Reasoning in Science and Technology. Inferential Models for Logic, Language, Cognition and Computation, October 24th-26th, 2018, University of Seville (Spain).

December 15th, 2017

The perceptual identification and conceptualization of emotions. Evidence from alexithymia [with Luigi Pastore], 14th Annual Conference of the Italian Association for Cognitive Sciences (AISC), University of Bologna, Bologna, Italy.

September 21st, 2017

Le due dimensioni del concreto e l’erosione dell’astratto [The two Dimensions of the Concrete and the Wear of Abstraction; with Remo Job]. Contribution to the Symposium “Concetti astratti: diversi tipi, molteplici rappresentazioni” [“Abstract Concepts: different types, multiple representations”], XXIII Congresso Nazionale della Sezione Sperimentale della Associazione Italiana di Psicologia (AIP) [National Congress of the Italian Association of Experimental Psychology], 20-22 Settembre 2017Università di Bari, Italy.

May 24th, 2016

Strong Emergentism and Its Implications for Cognitive Neuroscience. [with Diego Azevedo Leite], 11th Annual International Conference on Philosophy, 23-26 May 2016, Athens Institute for Education and Research Athens, Philosophy Research Unit of ATINER, Athens, Greece.

September 17th, 2015

Abstractness reconsidered. The internal grounding of the human conceptual system. [with Luigi Pastore] GAP 9. German Society of Analytic Philosophy, September 14th-17th, 2015, Philosophy between Armchair and Lab, hosted by the University of Osnabrueck, Germany.

June 26th, 2015

Modelling scientific certainty. Argumentation strategies vs. linguistic markers analysis. [with Luigi Pastore] Model-Based Reasoning in Science and Technology. Models and Inferences: Logical, Epistemological, and Cognitive Issues. Sestri Levante, Italy, June 25-27th, 2015.

December 5th, 2013

Empirical and experimental philosophy as a new frontier for the philosophy of science in the 21th century: The case of folkbiological classifications of living and animate beings [with Luigi Pastore]. International Conference "Philosophy of Science in the 21st century - Challenges and Tasks", 4-6 December 2013, Faculty of Science of the University of Lisbon, Lisbon, Portugal. [Abstract accepted for presentation and published in the book of abstract - presentation was cancelled at the last minute for reasons of health].

June 21st, 2012

Freedom to kill. Cognitive Models, Categorization and Moral Judgment Model-Based Reasoning in Science and Technology 2012. Theoretical and Cognitive Issues, 21-23 June 2012, Sestri Levante, Italy.

June 28th, 2011

The understanding of word meanings. The role of qualitative information in referential competence [with Luigi Pastore] 14th Biennial Conference of the International Society for Theoretical Psychology, 27 June – 1 July 2011, Thessaloniki, Greece.

December 18th, 2009

Models for Moral Behaviour: Rawlsian, Quasi-Rationalistic or Human? [with Remo Job] Model-Based Reasoning in Science and Technology, December 17-19, 2009, State University of Campinas, SP, Brazil.

August 9th, 2006

Concepts, Prototypes, Person. Does Cognitive Science Solve Cultural Problems or Does it Merely Dissolve Their Specificity? [with Luigi Pastore] Austrian Ludwig Wittgenstein Society, 29th International Wittgenstein Symposium, August 6 – 12, 2006, Kirchberg am Wechsel, Austria.

June 2th, 2006

What do concepts consist of? The role of geometric and proprioceptive information in categorization [with Luigi Pastore] International Conference on Philosophy, June 1-4, 2006 Athens, Greece.

September 23th, 2003

Mentalismus und Externalismus. Bedeutung von einem kognitiven Standpunkt [Mentalism and Externalism: Meaning from a Cognitive Point of View] Gesellschaft für Analytische Philosophie (GAP), V Congresso Internazionale, September 22-26, 2003.

October 4th, 2002

Esternismo, internismo e atteggiamenti proposizionali. La duplicazione del contenuto [Externalism, Internalism and Propositional Attitudes. The Duplication of Content] Società Italiana di Filosofia Analitica, V Congresso Nazionale, 3 - 5 October 2002, Bergamo, Italy.

August 12th, 2002

Social Externalism and Psychological Explanations. The Problem of the Semantic Features of Contents Austrian Ludwig Wittgenstein Society, 25th International Wittgenstein Symposium, August 11 – 17, 2002, Kirchberg am Wechsel, Austria.

October 7th, 2000

Competenze linguistiche e comunicazione [Linguistic Competencies and Communication] Società Italiana di Filosofia Analitica, IV Congresso Nazionale, October 5-7, 2000, Università degli Studi di Siena, Italy.

September 27th, 2000

Sinneswahrnehmung und Überzeugungen [Perception and Beliefs] Gesellschaft für Analytische Philosophie (GAP), IV International Conference, 26-29 September, 2000, University of Bielefeld, Germany

Other work

Journal Editorships

2010 - present

Co-founding Editor, Rivista Internazionale di Filosofia e Psicologia [RiFP - International Journal for Philosophy and Psychology], MIMESIS, Milan, Italy.

www.rifp.it

2010 - present

Notes

Please, visit also

https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Sara_Dellantonio

Attachments