Simulation and the We-Mode. A Cognitive Account of Plural First Persons

Abstract

In this article, I argue that a capacity for mindreading conceived along the line of simulation theory provides the cognitive basis for forming we-centric representations of actions and goals. This explains the plural first personal stance displayed by we-intentions in terms of the underlying cognitive processes performed by individual minds, while preserving the idea that they cannot be analyzed in terms of individual intentional states. The implication for social ontology is that this makes sense of the plural subjectivity of joint actions without making group agents require either a corporate body or the unity of consciousness.

Explaining Ideology: Mechanisms and Metaphysics

“…Epstein’s reading of Searle preserves the latter but not the former—because anchoring relations are not relations of constitution. Also, the claim that collective intentionality cannot be analyzed in terms of individual intentionality does not entail that it cannot be explained in terms of cognitive processes performed by individual minds (Tomasello 2008, 68ff., see also Bianchin 2015).…”

Introduction: Empathy, Shared Emotions, and Social Identity

“…DeJaegher et al (2010), Fuchs and De Jaegher (2009), Gallagher (2008a,Gallagher and Varga (2014),Krueger (2011Krueger ( , 2012,Schilbach et al (2013),Satne and Roepstorff (2015),Chemero (2016), see, critically; Herschbach (2012),,Overgaard and Michael (2015). 5 E.g.,Pacherie and Dokic (2006),Hobson and Hobson (2007), Gallotti and Frith (2013),Tomasello (2014),Abramova and Slors (2015),Bianchin (2015),León (2016),Martens and Schlicht (2018).6 Incidentally, early phenomenologists such asGurwitsch (1931) have already pursued very similar lines of interactionist argument regarding empathy, seeJardine and Szanto (2017), and more below.…”

Introduction: Empathy and Collective Intentionality—The Social Philosophy of Edith Stein

“…The first such trend of relating the second-person singular and the first-person plural perspective, can be seen in the so-called 'interactive turn' in social cognition research (De Jaegher and Di Paolo 2007;De Jaegher et al 2010;Fuchs and De Jaegher 2009;Gallagher 2008a, b;Gallagher and Varga 2013;Schilbach et al 2013;Satne and Roepstorff 2015;see, critically, Herschbach 2012;Michael et al 2014;Overgaard and Michael 2015), and the related, rapidly increasing, but still rather narrow body of work exploring links between social cognition, joint attention and joint agency (Pacherie and Dokic 2006;Hobson and Hobson 2007;Butterfill 2013;Gallotti and Frith 2013;Tomasello 2014;Zahavi 2014Zahavi , 2015aAbramova and Slors 2015;León, forthcoming;see Szanto and Moran, forthcoming;Bianchin 2015). For instance, it has been argued that collaborating agents are better mindreaders, since they can draw on a number of situational cues afforded by the very interaction, which might otherwise be unavailable (Butterfill 2013); or that complex forms of we-intentionality and group agency conceptually require more basic face-to-face interaction and dyadic forms of empathy (Zahavi 2015a, b).…”