In the last decade the international situation has been marked on the one hand by refugee crisis, and on the other by right-wing populist reaction to it. This constellation forces a new playground for the traditional philosophical cosmopolitan–nationalist debate. The moral and political issues raised in this new context concern duties to “strangers at our doors”, and these duties and the awareness of them are the first step in a cosmopolitan but realistic direction. Cosmopolitanism now has to start as “samaritan” cosmopolitanism, openness to and engagement for the close and present strangers. Once the present urgent problems are on the way to be solved, we should turn our attention to deeper causes of the crisis. These causes are the evils traditionally discussed by cosmopolitan authors, from dramatic North-South inequalities, to exploitation and warmongering done by the richest countries. The initial samaritan motivation naturally leads to attention to deeper issues, and toward a more ideal cosmopolitan theory. The resulting Samaritan-to-deeper-measures model fits well with Ypi’s engagement with the principle/activism divide, and offers a way of understanding, and hopefully, overcoming it. At the meta-level it connects the appeal to empathy as the relevant moral sentiment and the more rationalist, contractualist justification of global justice.

Criticisms and rejections of representationalism are increasingly popular in 4E cognitive science, and especially in radical enactivism. But by overfocusing our attention on the debate between radical enactivism and classical representationalism, we might miss the woods for the trees, in at least two respects: first, by neglecting the relevance of other theoretical alternatives about representationalism in cognitive science; and second by not seeing how much REC and classical representationalism are in agreement concerning basic and problematic issues dealing with mental content and intentionality. In order to expand and exemplify these ideas, this paper presents two heterodox positions on intentionality and on the relations between content and representation. Special attention is paid to the way REC is rejecting these positions: I argue that this rejection reveals common assumptions with classical representationalism, but also undermines the coherence of REC’s conception of intentionality.

In this article I propose a way of thinking about aesthetic and artistic verdicts that would keep them distinct from one another. The former are reflections of the kinds of things we prefer and take pleasure in; the latter are reflections of other judgments we make about the kinds of achievements that are made in works of art. In part to support this view of verdicts, I also propose a way of keeping distinct the description, the interpretation, and the evaluation of works of art. (And along the way, I worry about whether we offer the same kinds of interpretations of the objects of our aesthetic pleasures, properly considered, that we clearly do offer with respect to works of art.) The thesis I propose—the achievement model—is not original with me. What is original, perhaps, is that it is posed as an alternative to two other views of artistic evaluation, namely the appeal to “ideal critics” and the appeal to one way of understanding our preferences with regard to works of art. I do not attempt to show that each of these alternatives meets with insuperable problems; but I do indicate what I take to be the substantive content of those problems. In the end, in order to flesh out the thesis I propose, I borrow some material from the literature on human well-being concerning how we determine what an achievement is.

The aims of this paper are twofold: first, to identify a sense of ‘popular art’ in which the question, ‘can there be popular art?’ is interesting and the answer to this question is not obvious; second, to propose and defend a challenging but attractive answer to this question: challenging in that it draws some distinctions we might not initially be inclined to draw, and attractive in offering a productive way of thinking about the ontology, epistemology, and axiology of the kinds of artifacts proposed as examples of ‘popular art’. I take the ‘interesting’ question to be whether, given a way of distinguishing artworks from other kinds of artifacts, there can be artworks that meet the conditions set out by Noel Carroll for what he terms ‘mass art’. I sketch a way of thinking about the distinction between artworks and other artifacts—what I term the neo-Goodmanian approach—and then explore the implications of the neo-Goodmanian approach for the existence of ‘popular art’, and vice versa. In so doing, I subsume these issues under a more general problem for the neo-Goodmanian—what I term the problem of ‘fast art’. I argue that, while the neo-Goodmanian can embrace artworks that are ‘popular’ in the sense of being targeted at a wide audience, she should insist that there cannot be artworks that meet all of Carroll’s requirements for being ‘mass art’.

Contrary to the skepticism of some authors about the artistic potential or even the possibility of films being improvised artworks, I argue that not only is it conceptually possible for many elements of the filmmaking process to be performed in an improvisatory manner, but that a number of existing films and filmmaking practices provide examples of the realization of such possibilities. Further, I argue that these examples show that improvisation by filmmakers can enhance the aesthetic or artistic value of a film. As well as its artistic potential, I consider some social and ethical implications of improvisatory approaches to filmmaking, and by extension to art in general.

This paper aims to demonstrate that art history’s need for theory remains relevant as the process of research advances. The paper rests on a case study from 1950s Hungary. Lajos Fülep composed an interesting opponent’s review on the 1955 doctoral thesis of Hungarian Renaissance scholar, Jolán Balogh. Fülep disapproves not of the lack of theory in Balogh’s scholarly work, but of her theoretical encroachments without an awareness of a basic need for theorizing. Behind Fülep’s critical review there apparently stands the instinctive idea of a Lakatosian scientific research programme. If a historian of art does not pursue a research programme, her work could easily lose its coherence and resonance. Without a research programme, there is no room left either for internal, or for external histories. One also has to consider, whether in the case of art, internal-normative history is governed by the problem of aesthetic value and whether the external-empirical history could be only formulated in these terms. If so, then a theory-unaware history of art would fail to reconstruct how different art-making individuals conceived of aesthetic properties. In line with this idea, the second part of this paper reflects on the status of research programmes in art historical practice.

This essay explores claims made frequently by artists, critics, and philosophers that artworks bear personifying traits. Rejecting the notion that artists possess the Pygmalion-like power to bring works of art to life, the article looks seriously at how parallels may exist between the ontological structures of the artwork and human personhood. The discussion focuses on Arthur Danto’s claim that the “artworld” itself manifests properties that are an imprint of the historical representation of the “world.” These “world” representations are implicitly embodied in the artist’s style. The “world” that is stamped on the people of a historical period entails a point of view that influences how they might act, something like the logic that guides a conversation. This “conversational” logic is also extant in the artworks that artists of a given period create. This analysis of Danto’s account of how people are connected to their world clarifies Danto’s assertions that a parallel structure of personification in the artwork and the human exists. It also explains his claims that artworks themselves appear to be in a kind of dialogue.

Many philosophers have claimed that reading literary fiction makes people more virtuous. This essay begins by defending the view that this claim is empirical. It goes on to review the empirical literature and finds that this literature supports the claim philosophers have made. Three mechanisms are identified whereby reading literary fiction makes people more virtuous: empathy is increased when readers enter imaginatively into the lives of fictional characters; reading literary fiction promotes self-reflection; and readers mimic the prosocial behaviour of fictional characters. The paper concludes with a caution: there is a danger that readers could mimic antisocial behaviour displayed in literary fiction. If they do, reading some literary fiction could make readers less virtuous.

The paper provides a philosophical analysis of the role of food and eating in Hannibal. In the classical epistemological paradigm of detective fiction knowledge is linked with the sense of sight. This means that knowledge required for solving a detective mystery is objective and intersubjective in its nature. I argue that in order to understand Dr. Lecter’s motives, it is necessary to adopt the different epistemological model whereby valuable information is acquired through the senses of taste and smell. The protagonist displays mastery of the two senses through the use of his culinary skills. This fact explains how Lecter can control over the whole intrigue through the series.

In this paper I address Jerome Stolnitz’s famous article “On the cognitive triviality of art,” with the aim of defending aesthetic and literary cognitivism against the charges Stolnitz issues at it therein. My defence of literary cognitivism is grounded in contemporary epistemology, which, I argue, is more embracive of cognitive values of literature traditionally invoked by literary cognitivists. My discussion is structured against Stolnitz’s individual arguments, dedicated in particular to the problem of literary truth. After exploring what such notion might amount to, I move on to address the problems of applicability and triviality of literary truths, and I end by defending literature as a cognitively valuable social practice.

A Cinematic Humanist approach to film is committed inter alia to the following tenet: Some fiction films illuminate the human condition thereby enriching our understanding of ourselves, each other and our world. As such, Cinematic Humanism might reasonably be regarded as an example of what one might call ‘Cinematic Cognitivism’. This assumption would, however, be mistaken. For Cinematic Humanism is an alternative, indeed a corrective, to Cinematic Cognitivism. Motivating the need for such a corrective is a genuine scepticism about the very notion of the cognitive. Using historical reconstruction, I reveal how ‘cognitive’ has become a multiply ambiguous, theory-laden term in the wake of, indeed as a consequence of, Noam Chomsky’s original stipulative definition. This generates a constitutive problem for cognitivism as both a research programme and a set of claims, and as such poses a trilemma for philosophers of film, art and beyond. I propose a Cinematic Humanist solution to the problematic commitments of cognitive film theorising and, in so doing, gesture towards a methodology I am calling ‘philosophy of film without theory’.

In Overlooking Conventions Michael Devitt argues in defence of the traditional approach to semantics. Devitt’s main line of argument is an inference to the best explanation: nearly all cases that linguistic pragmatists discuss in order to challenge the traditional approach to semantics are better explained by adding conventions into language, in the form of expanding the range of polysemy or the range of indexicality (in the broad sense of linguistically governed context sensitivity). In this paper, we discuss three aspects of a draft of Devitt’s Overlooking Conventions, which was discussed at a conference in Dubrovnik in September 2018. First, we try to show that his rejection of Bach’s distinction between convention and standardization overlooks important features of standardization. Second, we elaborate on Devitt’s argument against linguistic pragmatism based on the normative aspect of meaning and show that a similar argument can be mounted against semantic minimalism. While Devitt and minimalists have a common enemy, they are not allies either. Third, we address a methodological difficulty in Devitt’s view concerning a threat of over-generation and propose a solution to it. Although this paper is the result of collaboration the authors have written different parts. Carlo Penco has written part 1, Massimiliano Vignolo has written part 2 and part 3.

In his forthcoming book, Overlooking Conventions: The Trouble with Linguistic Pragmatism, Michael Devitt raises, once again, the debate between minimalism and pragmatism to defend the former. He claims that, by taking some overlooked conventions into account, a semantic notion of what is said is possible. In this paper, we claim that a semantic notion of what is said is not possible, especially if some overlooked compositional conventions are considered. If, as Devitt defends, verbal activity is more linguistically constrained, compositional linguistic rules should be included in his catalogue of overlooked conventions and this entails an important challenge to the minimalist claim that the semantic view of what is said can handle all context relative phenomena. In this paper, we argue that, when conventions concerning compositionality are not overlooked, modulation should be added to the two qualifications (disambiguation and saturation) accepted by Devitt in the constitution of what is said. Thus, what is said is not always literally said and the traditional semantic view of what is said cannot be saved.

In this paper, I focus on the alleged distinction between speaker’s reference and semantic reference. I begin by discussing Saul Kripke’s notion of speaker’s reference and the theoretical roles it is supposed to play, arguing that they do not justify the claim that reference comes in two different sorts and highlighting that Kripke’s own definition makes the notion incompatible with the nowadays widely endorsed Gricean project, which aims at explaining semantic reference in terms of speaker’s reference. I then examine an alternative account of speaker’s reference offered by Michael Devitt within his causal theory and express some doubts about its suitability for explaining proper name semantic reference. From all this, I conclude that there is at least some tension between Kripke’s chain of communication picture and the attempt to explain (Griceanly, so to say) semantic properties in terms of speakers’ mental states.

One basic idea of the causal theory of reference is reference grounding. The name is introduced ostensively at a formal or informal dubbing. The question is: By virtue of what is the grounding term grounded in the object qua-horse and not in the other natural kind whose member it is? In virtue of what does it refer to all horses and only horses? The problem is usually called the qua problem. What the qua problem suggests is that the causal historical theory in the final analysis depends on some kind of unexplained intentionality. This is a great problem since the whole project is an attempt to explain intentionality naturalistically. In this paper, I have two aims: (i) to discuss the most important attempts at solving the qua problem; and (ii) to evaluate the solutions. (i) I focus on the following attempts for the solution of the qua problem: Sterelny (1983), Richard Miller’s (1992), mentioning briefly more recent attempts by Ori Simchen (2012) and Paul Douglas (2018). I also concentrate on the attempts in mind and brain sciences as presented by Penelope Maddy (1983) and more recently by Dan Ryder (2004). (ii) In evaluating the solutions, I argue that when a metaphysical question “what is to name” is replaced/or identified with the question about the mechanism of reference, namely “in virtues of what does a word attach to a particular object”, then the final answer will/should be given by neurosemantics. The most promising attempt is Neander’s (2017), based on the teleological causal explanation of preconceptual content to which the conceptual can be developed, as Devitt and Sterelny suggested in their work (1999).

The discussion that follows rehearses some familiar arguments and replies from the Kripke/Putnam/Burge critique of the traditional Frege/Russell/Wittgenstein views on names and predicates. Its main contributions are, first, to introduce a novel way of individuating tokens of the same expression, (what we call “articulations”) second, to then revise standard views on deference, (as this notion is understood to pertain to securing access to meaning for potentially ignorant, and confused agents in the externalist tradition going back to Putnam and Burge) and lastly, to emphasize the often conflated distinction between disambiguation and meaning fixing. Our line on deference is that it is not, and should not be conceived as, an intentional mental act, but rather indicates an historical chain of antecedent tokenings of the same expression.

In recent work Sperber and Wilson expand on ideas initially presented in Relevance (1986) and flesh out continuua between showing and meaning, and determinate and indeterminate content. Drawing on Sperber and Wilson’s work, and at points defending it from what I see as potential objections, I present a Schema of Communicative Acts (SCA) that includes an additional third continuum between linguistic and non-linguistic content. The SCA clears the way for consideration of what exactly is meant by showing, the motivations of speakers, how affect impacts expression, and metaphor. The SCA allows us to consider not only how but why we engage in certain forms of communicative behavior, and captures the incredible nuance of human interactions: said and meant, linguistic and non-linguistic, determinate and indeterminate.

The topic of this paper is the question of in virtue of what first-person thoughts are about what they are about. I focus on a dilemma arising from this question. On the one hand, approaches to answering this question that promise to be satisfying seem doomed to be inconsistent with the seeming truism that first-person thought is always about the thinker of the thought. But on the other hand, ensuring consistency with that truism seems doomed to make any answer to the question unsatisfying. Contrary to a careful and enticing recent effort to both sharpen and escape this dilemma by Daniel Morgan, I will argue that the dilemma remains pressing both for broadly epistemic and broadly causal-acquaintance-based accounts of the aboutness of first-person thought.

In this paper, I would like to present Aristotle’s attitude to sense-perception. I will refer to this attitude as “perceptual optimism”. Perceptual optimism is, very briefly, the position that the senses give us full access to reality as it is. Perceptual optimism entails perceptual realism, the view that there is a reality out there which is accessible to our senses in some way or other, and the belief that our senses are veridical at least to some extent, but it is more comprehensive than that. For instance, a perceptual optimist does not admit such things as qualities which are perceptible in principle but not by us or bodies too small to be perceptible. In this paper I argue that Aristotle is a perceptual optimist, since he believes that reality, at least in the sublunary sphere, is indeed fully accessible to our senses. In the first and largest part of this paper, I will show, in seven distinct theses, what Aristotle’s perceptual optimism entails. In the second and shorter part, I will put Aristotle’s position in a wider context of his epistemology and show why it was important for him to be a perceptual optimist.