Symposium in ISTP 2017

Next month, the 17th Biennial Conference of International Society for Theoretical Psychology will be held in Tokyo.

[The 17th Biennial Conference of The ISTP at Rikkyo University, Tokyo, August 21 - August 25, 2017]

Here I share the information on our symposium scheduled on August 24th, from 11:00 to 12:30.

[Symposium]
Quest for new methods in phenomenological psychology

[Speakers]
- Darren Langdridge (The Open University, United Kingdom)
- Tsuneo Watanabe (Toho University, Japan)
- Shogo Tanaka (Tokai University, Japan)

[Discussant]
- Masayoshi Morioka (Ritsumeikan University, Japan)

 

[Aim and Scope]
Phenomenological psychology is understood as a psychological project for investigating the structure and the meanings of lived experiences of people as they are given in the Lifeworld. As its general methods, the researcher interviews participants who have a particular experience, and then, analyzes participants’ descriptions to explicate the structure of the experience (descriptive method), or interprets the narrated stories to understand the meanings of the experience (interpretative method). Diverse topics have been investigated so far including the experiences of empathy, mourning, parenting, and physical diseases, among others. Though the details of research methods are different in diverse schools, priority is given to interview data narrated by participants, because the research is oriented to understanding lived experiences from the first-person perspective. This symposium addresses theoretical problems related to this primary topic and investigates new research methods in phenomenological psychology. There are certain related questions: How can the researcher understand the experience of a participant that has a different perspective? What can the researcher do when a participant does not seem to communicate the experience as it is given, because of the influence of particular beliefs and preconceptions? Is it allowed to posit that the interview is a collaborative experience of both the participant and the researcher because they create the data together through dialogue? Is it possible to design studies in phenomenological psychology that do not use interviews? The panelists will refer to these fundamental questions, by showing examples from their own research methods.

[Abstract 1] Darren Langdridge (The Open University, UK)
“Making space for suspicion: introducing a critical narrative methodology”
Phenomenological research methods have developed with a strong theoretical and practical opposition to psychoanalytically informed methodologies. One consequence of this opposition is that practitioners of these methods have sought to distance themselves from the hermeneutic of suspicion (Ricoeur, 1970). They have instead concentrated on a hermeneutic of meaning-recollection or empathy (Ricoeur, 1970), which prioritises the expressed experience of participants. This shift in focus has provided a valuable corrective to the worst excesses of the deterministic hermeneutic of suspicion, which subjugates the participant's experience to that of the researcher. However, one of the major problems in analysing a person's experience is that it is not just expressed in language but also shaped by it. Because of this, we cannot always take what people say at face value, as a direct and faithful account of their experience. I intend to explore the possibility of applying ideas from Paul Ricoeur to the research process and in the process demonstrate how it is possible to account for power and politics within a phenomenological research methodology. To this end, I introduce a relatively new method, Critical Narrative Analysis, which accounts for the effects of language and the lived experience of participants. I argue that this theoretical perspective, which employs imaginative rather than depth hermeneutics, grounded in critical social theory, provides a way forward for phenomenological theory and practice which recognises the need for political critique without imposing deterministic frameworks of meaning onto the data and thus stays true to the phenomenological project.

[Abstract 2] Tsuneo Watanabe (Toho University, Japan)
“Phenomenological elucidation of dreams based on Intentionalities: A new horizon for Husserlian analysis of dreams”
This is a study of dream analysis based on Husserlian intentionalities. This type of analysis, or phenomenological elucidation, is an attempt not only to describe experiences but also to answer the question “why….?” For example, “why is it possible to become someone else in dreams?” Phenomenological elucidation is, nevertheless, neither a scientific explanation nor a psychoanalytical interpretation, but a process of identifying phenomenological structures behind individual examples. In this dream analysis, by comparing each “dream text” with its corresponding “real text”, fundamental phenomenological structural differences were extracted as different kinds of intentionality, which result in answers to the question “why….?” For example, the real text, “I imagine “I am Harry Potter”” is transformed into a dream text “I am Harry Potter”, because “re-presentation (Vergegenwärtigung)” in the real world is transformed into “presentation (Gegenwärtigung)” in the dream world. The reason why “re-presentations” are transformed into “presentations” will be further elucidated based on Husserlian theories of imagination and intersubjectivity. I have used examples from my own “dream-diary” website. Using the investigators’ own reports on their personal websites is expected to facilitated anyone with the ability and motivation to describe their own experiences, as well as “professionals”, to participate in phenomenological investigations, not only as participants but also as investigators. The phenomenological difference between exclusively using descriptions of investigators’ own experiences and, as is used in many studies, relying on others’ experiences will be discussed in conclusion.

[Abstract 3] Shogo Tanaka (Tokai University, Japan)
“Psychological experiments as a sort of imaginative variation”
In this symposium, I would like to consider possible connections between phenomenology and psychological experiments. Major approaches in phenomenological psychology emphasize the importance of interviews in research practice because data collected through interviews are the primary descriptions of lived experiences. However, phenomenological research does not constitute only of descriptions but of exploring the invariable structure of lived experiences. Husserl himself emphasized the importance of using the method of imaginative variation in this step. In my opinion, diverse results of psychological experiments can be utilized to expand the possibilities of imaginative variation. For example, Merleau-Ponty described how the lived body extends its sensitivity by incorporating tools into it. According to his view, using tools through dynamic interactions with the environment, in other words, incorporating tools through bodily movements, is the essence of this phenomenon. However, experiments on the rubber hand illusion show that simultaneous input of visual and tactile stimuli is the primary condition for inducing extensions of sensitivity and that movement is unnecessary. Generally speaking, psychological experiments have the advantage of controlling diverse conditions inherent in experiences as independent variables in experimental settings. They do not serve to describe lived experiences themselves but serve to elucidate conditions of certain experiences. In this sense, psychological experiments can inform theoretical investigations in phenomenology, especially in the process of identifying structures of lived experiences through imaginative variation.

summary of an article on the sense of agency

Here I share the summary of the recent review article on the sense of agency, authored by Patrick Haggard.

• Haggard, P. (2017). Sense of agency in the human brain. Nature Reviews Neuroscience. doi: 10.1038/nm.2017.14

There are 8 sections in this article excluding introduction and conclusion.

1) Defining the sense of agency
In the first section, the author confirms the definition of the sense of agency. He writes, “the sense of agency is the feeling of making something happen.” And he also adds, “it is the experience of controlling one’s own motor acts and, through them, the course of external events.” According to the author, the sense of agency requires an action, and the subsequent outcome. Through overall article, he emphasizes that the association between a voluntary action and an outcome underlies the sense of agency.

2) Measuring the sense of agency
In the second section, the author explains that there are two different methods used to measure the sense of agency.

• One is the explicit method. In an experimental setting, the participant is shown a certain image of hand movement which could be one’s own movement or another person’s movement. After watching it, the participant is asked to attribute it to the self or the other.
• The other one is the implicit method, so-called “intentional binding.” The participant is asked to put the key voluntarily or involuntarily by TMS and listen to the sound after 250 mili-seconds. As a result, the participants report that the timespan between the putting action and the sound feels shorter, when they perform the action in a voluntary manner. So, the extent of binding can be considered as a quantitative marker for the sense of agency.

It is important to note that the author remarks that the sense of agency measured by an explicit manner and that measured by an implicit manner are different. (Though the former is social, the latter is intra-personal). And the relationship between them are to be explored further in the future investigations.

3) Cognitive processes that drive agency
In the third section, the author explains the cognitive processes that drive the sense of agency. In the first phase of agency, there are two important aspects; volition and action selection. As we know through intentional binding experiment, the voluntary action is needed to bring forth the agency. The second aspect is the selection of action. The author refers to the sensory attenuation in this regard. When the action is selected by oneself, the prediction of the outcome becomes redundant, and that makes the sensory feedback weaker (we can recall that the self-tickling is not ticklish).

   

4) The comparator model of agency
Then the author explains the comparator model. Traditionally, the sense of agency has been explained on the basis of this model.

According to the figure, when one plans to perform a certain action, the motor command makes a prediction based on the efference copy of it. And on the other hand, there is a sensory feedback route based on the perception of the outcome of the performed action. And we know the match or mismatch between the prediction and the sensory feedback. Basically, the sense of agency is considered to be generated through the match between them. However, this model includes one difficult issue, according to the author. If there is no prediction error, the perception of the outcome becomes weak, as it is known as the sensory attenuation. This is counter-intuitive, because the same situation means that one finds precisely the intended outcome in the situation. Thus, the author claims that the comparator model cannot be the only source for the sense of agency.

5) Prospective versus retrospective agency
This contradiction included in the comparator model leads the author to the next discussion. He emphasizes that not only the retrospective signals used in the comparator model, but also the prospective signals generated through volition and the selection of action are also important. There are empirical research that shows the importance of prospective signals. For example, in the experimental setting of the intentional binding, if the probability of the key sounds is controlled such as 75% or 50%, the binding becomes stronger when the probability is higher. This suggests that the participants experience the stronger sense of agency, when they anticipate the result in more intensive manner.

6) Brain mechanisms underlying agency
Traditionally, the parietal lobe, especially the angular gyrus has been said to play an important role in detecting non-agency condition, that is, the mismatched sensory feedback from the environment. Regarding the prospective signals, the frontal lobe and the pre-frontal cortex are the important areas. The author especially names pre-supplementary motor area, mentioning that the intentional bindings are reduced when the electric stimuli are added in this part. So, the pre-supplementary motor area seems to play an important role in generating the voluntary action or its planning. Within the frontal lobe, DLPFC is also considered to correspond with the selection of action. What the author emphasizes is the connectivity of the frontal lobe and the parietal lobe. This connectivity seems to correspond to the fact that the sense of agency has the prospective aspect and the retrospective aspect. There is no evidence so far that suggests a single unit in the bran that represents the comparator.

7) Pathological sense of agency
In this section, the author refers to the pathology of agency, especially focusing on the case of schizophrenia. What is well studied among the symptoms of schizophrenia in terms of agency is the "delusions of control". The patients subjectively feel that their actions or thoughts are inserted by an external force. And this is explained based on the comparator model, that the patients start performing in a voluntary manner but the prediction route is not functioning properly, so that the sensory feedback is not attributed to the self.

8) Society, agency and responsibility
In the last part, the author discusses the relationship between the sense of agency and the legal responsibility. Generally speaking, there must be an independent agent who is responsible for his/her action, in order that the society can punish or reward him/her. And that social agent must have a sense of agency to be fully responsible in these scenes. The author introduces one interesting experiment regarding this point; the participant is asked to give a painful shock to the partner participant, but by obeying the instruction of the experimenter. And comparing the condition with or without the coercion of the experimenter, the participant’s subjective time perception becomes different. With coercion, the participant’s time perception becomes longer, suggesting that the intentional binding reduces, and the sense of agency becomes weaker. Thus, this experiment suggests that the sense of agency actually becomes weaker, when one is forced to perform an action by someone else. This finding will stimulate a discussion in the field of ethics and law.

Intercorporeality and aida (Tanaka, 2017)

My new article was just published on Theory & Psychology.

Tanaka, S. (2017).
Intercorporeality and aida: Developing an interaction theory of social cognition.

It is still available online, but will appear in a printed issue in a few months. For those who are interested, here I include the abstract and keywords. As far as I know, this is the first paper that refers to Kimura's notion of aida in the field of social cognition. I tried to develop the so-called "interaction theory" by way of this notion.

Abstract:
The aim of this article is to develop an interaction theory (IT) of social cognition. The central issue in the field of social cognition has been theory of mind (ToM), and there has been debate regarding its nature as either theory-theory or as simulation theory. Insights from phenomenology have brought a second-person perspective based on embodied interactions into the debate, thereby forming a third position known as IT. In this article, I examine how IT can be further elaborated by drawing on two phenomenological notions—Merleau-Ponty’s intercorporeality and Kimura’s aida. Both of these notions emphasize the sensory-motor, perceptual, and non-conceptual aspects of social understanding and describe a process of interpersonal coordination in which embodied interaction gains autonomy as an emergent system. From this perspective, detailed and nuanced social understanding is made possible through the embodied skill of synchronizing with others.

Keywords:
social cognition, phenomenology, interaction theory, intercorporeality, aida

March 3-4, Civilization Dialogue in Denmark

We will have a two-day international symposium titled "Civilization Dialogue," in Vedbaek, Denmark. This is the second time for us to organize this event.

Now you can see the detailed program here at the website of Centre for Cultural Psychology (Aalborg University).

• 2nd Civilization Dialogue between Europe and Japan

In two days, we have two keynotes, two symposia, two lectures. We will also have a joint students seminar between Aalborg University and Tokai University, though it is not included in the official program.

 

This time, the event is realized by collaboration between the Centre for Cultural Psychology (Aalborg U) and the Institute of Civilization Research (Tokai U). So, this symposium means not only the dialogue between "Europe and Japan" but also the dialogue between "Culture and Civilization."

I look forward the keynote by Prof. Jaan Valsiner. It's titled, “The world is one: Through Einfühlung towards civility of human existence.” This title surely embraces "Europe and Japan" and "Culture and Civilization."

See you in Vedbaek.

the unrealized talk

I was going to attend and talk at this event last year, but I couldn't realize my visit for my own personal problem. This is one of the most unpleasant (and also unexpected) things that happened to me in 2016. Here I storage the abstract of my unrealized talk. I hope that I have another opportunity to realize this talk in the future.
　
--------------------
[Title] Reconnecting the self to the divine: The body’s role in religious experience

[Abstract]
In this presentation, I would like to explore spontaneous religious experiences. The term “spontaneous” is used to mean experiences that can happen without religious beliefs, outside religious institutions, or away from religious traditions, but still have a religious nature. They include among others, the feeling of unity with nature when watching a beautiful sunset, the experience of peak performance in sports as if someone else were perfectly controlling our bodily movements, and the sudden ecstatic sensation aroused by listening to a harmonious chorus. Such perceptual experiences are intense enough to awaken spiritual feelings, although they are not always recognized as “religious” for lack of proper context. Thus, experiences of this kind do not seem to have a religious nature in the ordinary sense, however, they do have a religious nature in an etymological sense: These experiences re- (again) -ligare (connect) the self and something beyond the self. What is experienced as “something beyond the self” in these cases might be the primordial source of divinity underlying all sorts of religious activities. My goal is to further explore the experience of divinity from the perspective of the embodied self, especially in terms of the sense of agency. As is well known, William James (1902) listed passivity as one of the four marks of mystical experiences. The person feels as if his/her actions are guided by an “Other,” while maintaining the sense of agency for actions. In my view, this alteration in the sense of agency originates in the function of body schema, which enables us to coordinate bodily actions toward the environment. In particular, when the body is thrown into an unfamiliar situation, body schema organizes new bodily actions beyond one’s intentions and expectations. During spontaneous religious experiences as well, the body operates beyond one’s intentions and expectations, as if following the Other’s will.

preparing for the event in March

We are going to have a two-day conference at the Tokai University European Center in Denmark, in March 3-4. As a part of the conference, I will organize a symposium on Cultural Psychology, titled "Individuality-Collectivity and Culture."

[Symposium: Individuality-Collectivity and Culture]
March 3, at TUEC
Individuality and collectivity are considered two fundamental modes of human experiences in social contexts. We feel that others cannot be held responsible for making serious choices in life, such as choosing a partner or switching careers, and therefore, we experience ourselves as individuals. In contrast, when we have a strong sense of belonging to a group, such as to our family, to the local community, or a religious organization, we tend to act as if we are conforming to the will of the group and we experience ourselves as a part of a collective. In the field of cross-cultural psychology, there is a widely held association of Western cultures with individualism and Eastern (or more generally, non-Western) cultures with collectivism. However, it is possible that humans are open to individualistic, as well as collectivistic experiences, regardless of their cultural background. In this symposium, we will combine diverse perspectives and attempt to explicate how human experiences of individuality and collectivity are related to culture.

  

Personally, I do not agree with the association of Western cultures with individualism and Eastern (or non-Western) cultures with collectivism. In the symposium, I would like to demonstrate that both individuality and collectivity are two compatible modes of human experiences from the perspective of phenomenology (especially that of embodiment). 

Prof. Luca Tateo (Aalborg University) and Prof. Gordana Jovanovic (University of Belgrade) are going to take part in the symposium. I look forward to sharing the discussion between Cultural Psychology and Phenomenology.

 

 

Workshop in Prague, November 22-23

This will be my first visit to Czech republic.

 

As you can see, the workshop title is enough provocative: "End of Phenomenology and Speculative Realism" This is surely named after Tom Sparrow's book "The End of Phenomenology: Metaphysics and the New Realism" and he is the main lecturer of the event. Though I am not committed to the "End of Phenomenology" claim, it would be a nice opportunity to consider the possibility that is still left for phenomenology as a contemporary thought. Now I'm preparing my comments on his new book "Plastic Bodies: Rebuilding Sensation After Phenomenology." The problem of sensation is really a topic worth reconsidering.

 

 

 

Galilei on mathematics

Looking at this picture Husserl would say,

"Galileo, the discoverer -- or, in order to do justice to his precursors, the consummating discoverer -- of physics, or physical nature, is at once a discovering and a concealing genius." (Husserl, Crisis, §9h)

　

Symposium in ICP 2016

On July 27, we will have a symposium on Self in the 31st International Congress of Psychology (ICP 2016 Yokohama).
http://www.icp2016.jp/

As you can see in the abstracts below, this symposium will be a rare opportunity to bridge phenomenologists (Dr. Applebaum, Dr. Ferrarello and me), experimental psychologists (Dr. Asai and Dr. Miyazaki), and researchers in neuro-cognitive science (Dr. Shimada and Mr. Ismail M Arif F B). The main focus is on the notion of minimal self and the experimental researches. I look forward to the discussion in the venue.

[Contributed Symposium]
In search of the self: Embodiment and interaction
Wednesday, July 27, 12:50 – 14:20 Conference Center 4F 413

[Organizer] Shogo Tanaka (Tokai University)
Since the publication of the classic work by William James, psychologists have investigated the concept of the self from diverse perspectives. Recent studies based on the neurocognitive approach have suggested that the minimal sense of self is embodied and experienced through both the sense of agency and the sense of ownership. Research has also indicated that psychopathologies such as schizophrenia can be explained as a disturbance of the minimal self. However, since the presence of another person is seemingly essential for the sense of the self, we plan to expand the discussion in this symposium from embodiment to embodied interactions. How do embodied interactions with others affect the sense of the self? Are such interactions necessary to foster the self in a developmental sense? Is the self and the other essentially interlaced? On this occasion, we plan to address these questions from neurocognitive, developmental, pathological and phenomenological perspectives.

Sotaro Shimada (Meiji University)
[Title] The senses of ownership and agency for a robot hand controlled under delayed visual feedback
[Abstract] The rubber hand illusion (RHI) is an illusion of the self-ownership of a rubber hand that is touched synchronously with one’s own hand. Here we investigated a similar self-ownership illusion of a robot hand that is moved synchronously with the subject’s hand movement, which is referred to as the ‘robot’ hand illusion (RoHI). We systematically introduced the delay in the robot hand movement and found that the participants felt significantly greater RoHI effects with temporal discrepancies of less than 200 ms compared with longer temporal discrepancies, both in terms of the senses of ownership and agency. Interestingly, participants still felt a significant, but weaker, sense of agency with temporal discrepancies of 300–500 ms, but not the sense of ownership. We discuss self-recognition models that can account for the relationship between the senses of ownership and agency based on our results.

Tomohisa Asai (NTT Communication Science Laboratories)
[Title] Between self and other in sensorimotor system
The sense of agency refers to the subjective experience of controlling one’s own action. This sense is sometimes regarded as a postdictive illusion of causality. However, agency has an important function in theory. When we move our own body, we implicitly attribute that movement to ourselves and utilize that sensory information in order to correct “our own” movement. The current study examined this intrinsic relationship between self-other sensory attribution and feedback control in motor control. The current study, where the participants were asked to trace a sine wave target using a pen tablet device, examined the effect of “self or other” visual feedback on the subjective agency rating as well as on the motor performance. The result indicates that the subjective ratings and motor performance highly depend on the self-other morphing ratio of the visual feedback, suggesting the sense of agency as the coordinator within the sensorimotor dynamics.

Michiko Miyazaki (Otsuma Women’s University)
[Title] The experience of controlling a virtual character affects choice of the character among 8-month-olds
[Abstract] When you control an on-screen character in a video game, you perceive yourself to be one with the character. The subjective experience of controlling external objects is called “extended self-agency,” and how this sense develops in infancy is especially important for elucidating the ontogenesis of self-consciousness. However, this evaluation is extremely difficult, because infants during their first year cannot explain their feelings or easily control objects with their hands. To overcome these problems, we developed gaze-contingent paradigms for estimating infants’ spontaneous object control (Miyazaki et al. 2014) and explored the related indices. We prepared two kinds of characters: one controllable by an infant’s gaze and one uncontrollable. We presented infants with both characters in turn and examined whether controlling the character affected the choice of that character among 5- and 8-month-olds. Results demonstrated that the 8-month-olds preferred the uncontrollable character, suggesting infants explicitly discriminate the controllable from the uncontrollable character.

Marc Applebaum (Saybrook University) and Susi Ferrarello (University of San Francisco)
[Title] The Constitution of Selfhood as Ethical: A Phenomenological Perspective
[Abstract] Edmund Husserl’s phenomenological philosophy offers a complex and useful account of the arising of consciousness and subjectivity, and insists upon the embeddedness of self-hood in embodied self-other relations. For Husserl, the self is not an object that can be considered in strict isolation; rather, what we call “self” can be regarded as the evidence of a dynamic and multilayered process in which an “I” emerges that, in grasping itself as an “I" in lived-contexts that are intrinsically intersubjective, is always already in dialogue with others, and finds itself through its embodied relations with alter egos. Not surprisingly, phenomenology's psychological implications have been a central focus of the tradition since its founding We will discuss the interplay of passive and active intentionality and self-other relations in the ongoing constitution of the ego, and its ethical dimension.

new article on Theory & Psychology

Finally, my new article on intercorporeality was published. It is an attempt to bridge Merleau-Ponty's notion of intercorporeality and the current theory of social cognition in psychology and cognitive science.

Tanaka, S. (2015). Intercorporeality as a theory of social cognition. Theory & Psychology, 25(4) 455-472.

International Symposium in Denmark

For all those who may be interested in, here is the detailed information of the symposium that we will organize in Denmark next month. If you have any further question, feel free to ask me by email (shg.tanaka <a> gmail.com)


International symposium: "Civilization Dialogue between Europe and Japan"

Venue:
Tokai University European Center
Vedbaek Strandvej 476, 2950 Vedbaek, Denmark
http://www.u-tokai.dk/

Program:
[November 13th, Friday] 
14:30-14:40 Welcome & Introduction
14:40-17:30 International Symposium: “Civilization Dialogue between Europe and Japan”
     Peter Grønnegård (Danish Ministry of Higher Education and Science)
     Yoichi Hirano (Tokai University)
        “A note on the possibility of a Civilization Dialogue: From a Trans-Disciplinary
          Humanities perspective”
     Nobutaka Kutsuzawa (Tokai University)
        “The Takenouchi mission and Western culture: The introduction of the telegraph”
     Peter Pantzer (University of Bonn)
        “European perceptions of Japan”
18:00-20:00 Dinner
[November 14th, Saturday] 
09:00-10:10 Keynote Lecture
     Luca Tateo (Aalborg University)
        “Some ideas on civilization from the cultural psychology’s viewpoint”
10:10-10:30 Coffee
10:30-12:30 Paper Session
     Nana Miyata (Austrian Academy of Sciences)
        “European views on Japan in the 17th century: The European perceptions of
          Toyotomi Hideyoshi in the writings of Erasmus Francisci (1627-1694) and
          Eberhard Werner Happel (1647-1690)”
     Toru Hattori (Tokai University)
        “An essay on the tourist gaze: Study on tourism from a trans-disciplinary viewpoint”
     Yuki Takatori (Tokai University)
        “Legitimacy of English domination and its relationship with linguistic and cultural diversity”
     Ayano Hidaka (Tokai University)
        “On Goethe’s criticism to Newton’s color theory”
     Chiaki Genji (Tokai University)
        “The influence of Nihon-Shikki (Japanese lacquer ware) imported to Europe”
12:30-13:30 Lunch
13:30-15:30 Workshop: “East-West Dialogue through the Body”
     Shogo Tanaka (Tokai University)
        “Reconsidering the self in Japanese culture from an embodied perspective”
     Denis Francesconi (University of Verona)
        “Embodiment in education: The case of meditative practices in Western society”
     Tomoko Nakamura (Tokai University)
        “The beauty of harmony: The case of Albrecht Dürer’s theory of human proportion”

Host:
Tokai University, Institute of Civilization Research
Tokai University European Center

International symposium in Denmark

Tokai University Institute of Civilization Research, where I am one of the members, is going to hold a two-day academic event in November 13-14. The venue is Tokai University European Center, in Vedbaek, Denmark (30kilometer north of Copenhagen).

http://www.u-tokai.dk/

As you can see in the proposal, this event has a very unique character that focuses on the difference of civilization between Europe and Japan (including cultural difference), and tries to promote dialogue. 

We have several slots available for individual papers on Saturday, 14th. If you are interested in presenting your idea, please send me an email (shg.tanaka [a] gmail.com) by September 15th. I will communicate the further details. 

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International symposium

Civilization Dialogue between Europe and Japan: 

--Responsibilities of academic research in an era of the ‘clash of civilizations’--

Currently, globalisation has been rapidly advancing worldwide. As many have noted, the 20th century was a ‘century of war’ as seen in the two World Wars and the Cold War. The world in the 21st century is concerned about the ‘clash of civilisations’, where the state of international order reflects a multi-polarization of world politics along with the progress of post-colonialization. Despite this tendency, it is impossible without cooperation among the international community to find solutions to issues such as climate change caused by global warming, which poses a threat even to human existence.

     The present world lies in between two conflicting forces. On the one hand, escaping the West-centred civilisation, lifestyles formed in diverse natural environments in different world regions have been increasingly reconstructed as have the individual civilisations based on them. On the other hand, cooperation beyond the nation and community has become crucial for the resolution of global environmental problems, which are the results of extensive exploitation of natural resources through science-based technologies developed in modern civilization. To pursue ‘sustainable development’, it might be essential not only to resolve actual policy challenges but also to pool accumulated knowledge from different civilisations of the world and to create a dialogue between them for mutual understanding and cooperation.

     Since its establishment in 1959, Tokai University Institute of Civilization Research has been promoting studies on various civilisations that humans have formed in different regions. The study of civilisation itself does not form a single discipline. Given that various human activities such as the modes of production, lifestyle, rituals and social practices, collectively form a civilisation, the overview of a specific civilisation cannot be obtained without an integration of findings from each field. The Institute of Civilization Research has been working on a comprehensive study of contemporary civilisations under a project called ‘Trans-Disciplinary Humanities’ as its key focus from this year.

     In light of the above, we have decided to host a conference on ‘Civilization Dialogue’ between Europe and Japan. The foundation of contemporary civilisation is arguably underpinned by values formed in modern Europe, which is especially symbolised by scientific knowledge and its application in industrial technology. Japanese society has proactively accepted not only science and technology but also the western social system and associated values since the beginning of modernisation in the Meiji era. However, modernisation of Japanese society is not necessarily equivalent to westernisation. Traditional values have remained in various aspects. This symposium aims to compare and re-examine views of people, society and nature underlying the civilisations of Europe and Japan. This is an attempt to find an academic response to two conflicting forces that the globalising society is dealing with currently.

     It is a great pleasure and of significance for Tokai University to host such an academic symposium in Denmark. Having witnessed the Danish national revival achieved through the education in the 19th and 20th centuries, the founder of Tokai University determined to establish a new educational institution in Japan. Tokai University was founded on the basis of the spirit and system of Danish education, which also led to Tokai University European Center being established in Denmark. Tokai University will celebrate the 75th anniversary of its foundation in 2017. The Institute of Civilization Research would like to take this research conference as the first step towards further development of civilisation studies and the 100th anniversary to come.

Yoichi Hirano (Vice-Chancellor, Tokai University)

Nobukata Kutsuzawa (Executive Director, Tokai University Institute of Civilization Research)

Shogo Tanaka (Tokai University Institute of Civilization Research)

Host:

Tokai University, Institute of Civilization Research

Tokai University, European Center

Venue:

Tokai University, European Center

Vedbaek Strandvej 476, 2950 Vedbaek, Denmark

Program:

<November 13th, Friday>

14:00-14:30   Welcome & Introduction

14:30-17:30   Symposium: “Civilization Dialogue between Europe and Japan” (TBA)

18:00-20:00   Dinner

<November 14th, Saturday>

09:30:10:30   Keynote Address (TBA)

10:30-12:00   Paper Session (1)

12:00-13:00   Lunch

13:00-14:30   Paper Session (2)

14:30-14:40   Closing

Kyoto Conference 2015

In a month, we will hold a conference on the notion of "Extended Mind" in Kyoto. Here you can find English version of the program following the link below:

Kyoto Conference 2015 "Beyond the Extended Mind: Different Bodies, Dolls, Female Soul and Eastern Spirit"

• Date: June 20-21, 2015
• Place: Kyoto Unviersity, Yoshida-South Campus, Academic Center Bldg.
• Keynote speaker: Tetsuya Kono, Shaun Gallagher

The main purpose of this conference is to put the notion of extended mind onto the context of postcolonial thought, and to present new concepts of mind and self. Post-colonialism has criticized colonialist, imperialist, ethnocentric, androcentric, misogynistic and even anthropocentric aspects of modern philosophy. The philosophy and the sciences of mind, which has kept a distance from post-colonialism, cannot be an exception any longer, since the modern notion of mind has implicitly modeled on the "mind" of Western, adult, male, middle class people. It is the time to deconstruct it.

We titled this conference as "Beyond the Extended Mind: Different Bodies, Dolls, Female Soul and Eastern Spiri." The papers collected for the conference will treat:
- bodies with "different abilities", not bodies with "disabilities",
- "dolls", not "robots" i.e. slave laborer machines,
- female "soul", not "mind",
- Eastern "spirit", but not separated from body.
All papers do not only criticize past conceptions, but also propose alternative models of mind and/or self.

See you in Kyoto.

A page on intercorporeality

A few days ago, I added an independent page on intercorporeality. It is a minimum summary of the notion, including a quote from Merleau-Pnty's text.

http://embodiedknowledge.blogspot.jp/p/intercorporeality.html

Yoshida's new HP

Yesterday, I received a new year's message from Akihiro Yoshida. He opened his own homepage, where you can read many of his papers in English. Yoshida is very well known as one of the pioneers in phenomenological psychology, in Japan. Now he is in his eighties but still active in research and publication. Rcent works include the Japanese translation of "The Descriptive Phenomenological Method in Psychology" by Amedeo Giorgi.

Here I forward his message partially -- "On the New Year’s Day, my HomePage is open. Would you please visit and enjoy the HomePage when you have time? The HomePage Address is:　 http://yoshidaakihiro.jimdo.com/ "

Enjoy his papers!