Consciousness in Action

CenSes Research Seminar

David Papineau (KCL) and Hong Yu Wong (Birkbeck)

The seminar will cover topics concerning the role of consciousness in the control of action. The first half of the seminar will look at various dissociations between 'perception' and 'action' in vision and somatosensation. The second half of the seminar will look at challenges to our commonsensical understanding of agency raised by experiments in psychology and neuroscience. The overarching aim of the seminar is to articulate the challenges to our understanding of agency raised by recent scientific work into stimulus-driven action and endogenous action, and to re-evaluate our philosophical picture of agency in the light of this.

New!

Video of Marcel vs. Haggard on the sense of agency:

Seminar 3 on the sense of agency, featuring guest speakers Tony Marcel (Herts) and Patrick Haggard (ICN, UCL), was videotaped by the School of Advanced Study audiovisual crew.

• Click here to watch a video of seminar 3

The speakers' powerpoint slides can be accessed here:

Tony Marcel's slides introducing his paper

Patrick Haggard's commentary on Marcel

Summer Term 2010

Tuesdays, 4.30-6.30 pm

Seminar location:

ST275, 4 May

ST275, 11 May

G34, 18 May

G34, 25 May

G34, 1 June

ST275, 8 June

STB9, 15 June

(The rooms starting with ST are in Stewart House: ST275 is on the 2nd floor of Stewart House and STB9 is in the basement of Stewart House.

G34 is on the ground floor of Senate House South Block.)

Syllabus and reading list in PDF here.

Supplementary materials about forward models and computational aspects of motor control here.

Week 1: Control in Exogenous and Endogenous Action

4 May, ST 275

• Handout for week 1

Bargh, J. A., and Chartrand, T. L. (1999) “The unbearable automaticity of being”, American Psychologist, 54: 462 - 479.

O’Shaughnessy, B. (1992) “The Diversity and Unity of Action and Perception”, in T. Crane (ed.) The Contents of Experience (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), pp. 216-266.

Week 2: Bodily Awareness and Action I

11 May, ST275

• Handout for week 2

*O’Shaughnessy, B. (1995) “Proprioception and the Body Image”, in J. Bermúdez, A. Marcel, and N. Eilan (eds.) (1995) The Body and The Self (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press), pp. 175-203.

*Marcel, A. (2003) “The Sense of Agency: Awareness and Ownership of Action”, in J. Roessler and N. Eilan (eds.) Agency and Self-Awareness (Oxford: Oxford University Press), pp. 48-93.

*Wong, H. Y. (2010) “Bodily Awareness and Bodily Agency”, in T. O’Connor and C. Sandis (eds.) A Companion to the Philosophy of Action (Blackwell).

[This provides an overview of the area.]

O’Shaughnessy, B. (2008), “The Immediate Object of the Will”, The Will: A Dual Aspect Theory, vol. 1, 2nd ed. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), part II.

Peacocke, C. A. B. (2003) “Action: Awareness, Ownership, and Knowledge”, in J. Roessler and N. Eilan (eds.) Agency and Self-Awareness (Oxford: Oxford University Press), pp. 94-110.

Week 3: Bodily Awareness and Action II [EARLIER TIME on this date: 4-6 pm Note LOCATION: G34 Senate House South Block]

18 May, G34

• • Guest speakers: AJ Marcel (Hertfordshire/MRC) and Patrick Haggard (ICN, UCL)

  • Video recording of this session

  • Tony Marcel's slides introducing his paper

  • Patrick Haggard's commentary on Marcel

The seminar will focus on Marcel's paper:

*Marcel, A. (2003) “The Sense of Agency: Awareness and Ownership of Action”, in J. Roessler and N. Eilan (eds.) Agency and Self-Awareness (Oxford: Oxford University Press), pp. 48-93.

Tony Marcel will introduce the discussion and Patrick Haggard will reply.

Peacocke, C. A. B. (2003) “Action: Awareness, Ownership, and Knowledge”, in J. Roessler and N. Eilan (eds.) Agency and Self-Awareness (Oxford: Oxford University Press), pp. 94-110. [ Commentary on the Marcel paper.]

Eilan, N. (2010) "Explanatory Role of Consciousness", in T. O’Connor and C. Sandis (eds.) A Companion to the Philosophy of Action (Blackwell).

[An overview of questions about role of consciousness in action control and action explanation.]

Kammers, M., de Vignemont, F., Verhagen, L., Dijkerman, H.C. (2009) “The Rubber Hand in action”, Neuropsychologia 47: 204-211.

de Vignemont, F. (2010) “The body schema and the body image—Pros and cons”, Neuropsychologia, doi:10.1016/j.neuropsychologia.2009.09.022.

Dijkerman, H. C., and De Haan, E. H. F. (2007) “Somatosensory processes subserving perception and action”, Behavioral and Brain Sciences 30: 189-201.

- Supplementary materials about forward models and computational aspects of motor control here.

Week 4: Vision and Action

25 May, G34

*Clark, A. (2009) “Perception, action, and experience: Unraveling the golden braid”, Neuropsychologia 47: 1460-1468.

*Milner, A. D., and Goodale, M. A. (2008) “Two visual systems re-viewed”, Neuropsychologia 46: 774-785.

*Campbell, J. (2003) “The Role of Demonstratives in Action-Explanation”, in J. Roessler and N. Eilan (eds.) Agency and Self-Awareness (Oxford: Oxford University Press), pp. 150-164.

Eilan, N. (2010) "Explanatory Role of Consciousness", in T. O’Connor and C. Sandis (eds.) A Companion to the Philosophy of Action (Blackwell).

Clark, A. (2001) “Visual Experience and Motor Action: are the Bonds too Tight?” Philosophical Review 110: 495-519. [Available on JSTOR]

Jeannerod, M. (2003) “Consciousness of Action and Self-Consciousness: A Cognitive Neuroscience Approach”, in J. Roessler and N. Eilan (eds.) Agency and Self-Awareness (Oxford: Oxford University Press), pp. 128-149.

- Supplementary materials about forward models and computational aspects of motor control here.

Week 5: The Phenomenology of Agency

1 June, G34

On the phenomenology of agency:

*O’Shaughnessy, B. (2008) “Observation and the Will”, in The Will: A Dual Aspect Theory, vol. II, 2nd ed. (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), chapter 9.

[Alternately read: O'Shaughnessy, B. (1963) "Observation and the Will", The Journal of Philosophy 60: 367-392. AVAILABLE ON JSTOR.]

*Marcel, A. (2003) “The Sense of Agency: Awareness and Ownership of Action”, in J. Roessler and N. Eilan (eds.) Agency and Self-Awareness (Oxford: Oxford University Press), pp. 48-93.

On sub-personal mechanisms underlying awareness of action:

*Blakemore S-J, Frith, CD. (2003) "Self-awareness and action", Current Opinion in Neurobiology 13(2): 219-224.

*Blakemore, S-J, Wolpert, DM, Frith, CD. (2002) "Abnormalities in the awareness of action", TRENDS in Cognitive Science 6(6): 237-242.

Eilan, N., and Roessler, J. (2003) "Agency and Self-Awareness: Mechanisms and Epistemology", in J. Roessler and N. Eilan (eds.) Agency and Self-Awareness (Oxford: Oxford University Press).

See also essays by Dokic, O'Brien, Peacocke, Proust, and Roessler in Roessler and Eilan (2003).

Eilan, N. (2010) "Explanatory Role of Consciousness", in T. O’Connor and C. Sandis (eds.) A Companion to the Philosophy of Action (Blackwell).

Bayne, T. (2009) "The Sense of Agency", in F. Macpherson (ed.) The Senses (Oxford: Oxford University Press).

Bayne, T. (2008) "The Phenomenology of Agency", Philosophy Compass, 3: 1-21.

Week 6: Agency and Confabulation

8 June, ST275

*Wegner, D. M. (2004) "Precis of The Illusion of Conscious Will", Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 27, 649-692.

Bayne, T. (2006) "Phenomenology and the Feeling of Doing: Wegner on the Conscious Will", in S. Pockett, W. P. Banks and S. Gallagher (eds.) Does Consciousness Cause Behavior? (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press), pp. 169-186.

Wegner, D. M. (2002) The Illusion of Conscious Will (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press).

Mele, A. (2009) Effective Intentions: The Power of Conscious Will (Oxford: Oxford University Press).

[Available on Oxford Scholarship Online]

Week 7: Awareness of agency and the timing of intention

[Note EARLIER TIME on this date 4-6 pm and CHANGE OF ROOM]

15 June, STB9 (Stewart House, basement)

• • Guest speaker: Patrick Haggard (ICN, UCL)

*Haggard (2005) “Conscious Intention and Motor Cognition”, TRENDS in Cognitive Science 9: 290-295.

*Haggard, P. (2003) “Conscious Awareness of Intention and of Action”, in J. Roessler and N. Eilan (eds.) Agency and Self-Awareness (Oxford: Oxford University Press), pp. 111-127.

Lau, H. (2009) "Volition and the functions of consciousness", in M. Gazzaniga (ed.) The Cognitive Neurosciences, 4th Edition (MIT Press).

Libet, B., Gleason, C. A., Wright, E. W., Pearl, D. K. (1983) “Time of conscious intention to act in relation to cerebral activities (readiness potential): the unconscious initiation of freely voluntary act”, Brain 106: 623-642.

Libet, B. (1985) “Unconscious cerebral initiative and the role of conscious will in voluntary action”, Behavioural and Brain Sciences 8: 529-566.

Mele, A. (2009) Effective Intentions: The Power of Conscious Will (Oxford: Oxford University Press).

[Available on Oxford Scholarship Online]

Volumes of General Relevance

Jeannerod, M. (1997) The Cognitive Neuroscience of Action (Oxford: Blackwell).

Jeannerod, M. (2006) Motor Cognition: What Actions Tell the Self (Oxford: Oxford University Press).

Jacob, P. and Jeannerod, M. (2003) Ways of seeing: The scope and limits of visual cognition (Oxford: Oxford University Press).

Milner, A. D., and M. A. Goodale (2006) The Visual Brain in Action, 2nd ed. (Oxford: Oxford University press).

Pockett, S., Banks, W. P., and Gallagher, S. (2006) Does Consciousness Cause Behavior? (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press).

Roessler, J., and Eilan, N. (2003) Agency and Self-Awareness (Oxford: Oxford University Press).