In part three of Self and Other, which carries the title The Interpersonal Self, I return to the earlier established contrast between the experiential self and the normatively enriched and narratively extended self. We are here dealing with two notions placed at each end of a scale. On the one …
Today I will continue my discussion of Self and Other, and move on to the second part of the book which carries the title Empathic Understanding. My defence of a minimalist conception of experiential selfhood doesn’t merely target no-self accounts, but also the kind of social constructivism according to which …
Self and Other is divided into what at first might look like three distinct parts. There are, however, a number of interlocking themes that run through the book and makes it into one interconnected whole. Let me today present some themes from the first part of the book that is …
Thanks to John Schwenkler for offering me this opportunity to share some thoughts regarding my new book Self and Other: Exploring Subjectivity, Empathy, and Shame (OUP 2014). Before going into some details about the book, let me just say a few introductory words about my own background. I have been …
In my final post here, I would like to present some material from the final chapter of The First Sense on pleasant touch. Perceptual experience is often more than merely descriptive or informational; it is also often evaluative and motivational. Offering an account of this component is critical to our understanding …
Touch seems like a paradigm contact sense. In order to experience things through touch it seems necessary that we be in direct contact with them. I argue that this is false. We can and often do experience things not in direct (or even apparent) contact with our bodies. We do …
Active or haptic touch typically involves externally directed experiences of things in the world. We experience through touch tables, chairs, breezes, cups, dogs, microwaves, even other people. Such experiences are directed at ordinary material objects and their properties, just like vision is typically directed at external objects and their features …
