Publications
Selected presentations
Research groups
Publications
Selected presentations
Research groups
Roige, Aida (2023): The Kinda Hard Problem for animal consciousness research. Phenomenology and the Cognitive Sciences. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11097-023-09912-3
Which non-human animals are phenomenally conscious? In this paper I argue that the distribution of phenomenal consciousness in the animal world is an unsolvable issue, because of an underlying problem inherent in the field: what I call the Kinda Hard problem. The Kinda Hard problem arises because the grounds on which we base our consciousness attributions to humans third-personally are either unavailable or ambiguous once we move to the animal case. Its nature is that of an epistemic problem: we cannot collect enough evidential grounds to justify attributions of phenomenal consciousness (and attributions of its lack) to non-human animals. Thus, it is impossible to ground rational belief one way or another regarding animal consciousness. This paper presents the problem and explains how it differs from other problems of consciousness.
Roige, Aida, and Carruthers, Peter (2019): Cognitive instincts versus cognitive gadgets: A fallacy. Mind & Language. 34: 540– 550. https://doi.org/10.1111/mila.12251
The main thesis of Heyes' book is that all of the domain-specific learning mechanisms that make the human mind so different from the minds of other animals are culturally created and culturally acquired gadgets . The only innate differences are some motivational tweaks, enhanced capacities for associative learning, and enhanced executive function abilities. But Heyes' argument depends on contrasting cognitive gadgets with cognitive instincts , which are said to be innately specified. This ignores what has for some years been the mainstream nativist/anti‐empiricist view, which commits only to partially specified learning systems that become elaborated and built through domain‐specific learning.Jenkins, Carrie S.I., Heaton, Jasper; Roige, Aida (forthcoming). Art and emotions: romantic love. Chapter, in: Alex King (ed): Art & Philosophy: New Essays at the Intersection. Oxford University Press. Draft available.
We claim that popular music has a(n often harmful) role in the construction of romantic love.Roige, Aida (2015): Intelligence and IQ testing. Entry in the Encyclopedia of Eugenics of the Living Archives on Eugenics Project, funded by the Research Council of Canada. Open access.
Intelligence, genius and mental ability were a cluster of traits that received much attention in eugenics discourse. Intelligence was regarded as one of the good qualities superior individuals possessed, in turn beneficial for society as a whole. On the other hand, the socially problematic or unproductive were identified as being of inferior mental quality: “feeble-minded”. By and large, eugenicists thought that (1) intelligence was a unitary psychological trait that could be measured, being quantified as an intelligence quotient (IQ); (2) intelligence was paired with educational achievement, reputation, and economic success; (3) a certain degree of intelligence was necessary to act morally and to foresee the consequences of one’s actions. Despite the prominent role of intelligence in the history of eugenics, there is considerable lack of clarity in what this general mental ability was considered to be.A paper on representations and mechanisms
A paper on mental disorders
A paper on special science kinds
A paper on mechanisms in cognitive science
A paper on research misconduct
A paper on Marr's tri-level hypothesis and natural kinds in cognitive science
Forthcoming presentations:
(forthcoming, April 3rd 2025). Podem saber si els animals són conscients? XXII Seminari Anual de la Secció de Filosofia Analítica de la Societat Catalana de Filosofia, Barcelona.
(forthcoming, April 4th 2025) (with Marc Artiga). Elección de revistas. I jornada de iniciación a la investigación en filosofía. Universitat de València, VLC Philosophy Lab, Valencia.
(forthcoming, April 11th or April 14th 2025). Can AI solve science? Reflections from philosophy. Mindful science workshop, organized by the Signal and Image Processing Lab, Electronic Engineering Department at the Universitat Valencia.
(forthcoming, May 23rd 2025) TBA. Colloquium of the Valencia Philosophy Lab, Universistat de València.
**(forthcoming, July 20-24th 2025) “Special science kinds from a mechanistic standpoint. International Society for the History, Philosophy, and Social Studies of Biology. Porto, Portugal.
**(forthcoming, Oct. 2-3rd 2025) Creativity in AI and humans: lessons from the history of intelligence. Workshop The Composition of Creative Intelligence", UAB, Barcelona.
Some recent work:
I reviewed Daniel Quesada's book Saber, Opinión y Ciencia. You can read the review at Análisis. Revista de Investigación Filosófica. Link here.
Presentación del libro de Hugo Viciana, Antonio Gaitán y Fernando Aguiar, Experiments in moral and political philosophy (Routledge, 2024), December 2024, organized by SEFA, online.
Scientific Objectivity Workshop 2024, Barcelona, Spain, May 2024. Structural causes of research misconduct in contemporary science
XXI Inter-university workshop on Philosphy of Cognitive Science, Seville, Spain, April 2024. Commentary of Nick Byrd's "Socrates 2.0".
Invited talk at the Technical University Eindhoven, Netherlands, February 2024: Different accounts of mechanisms, or different sorts of mechanisms? Lessons from cognitive science.
Explaining Research Misconduct conference, Nancy, France, December 2023: A call for de-centralized decision-making in science.
International Society for the Philosophy of the Sciences of the Mind 2023 webconference, December 2023: Mental disorders as extreme reasons-irresponsiveness.
Ethics of Techonology ETEG workshop, Universität Wien, Vienna, July 2023: May we ever be in a position to know whether an AI is phenomenally conscious?
Buenos Aires Philosophical Perspectives on the Mind Sciences’ workshop, Argentina, May 2023: Mental disorders as extreme reasons-irresponsiveness.
Medical Grand Rounds, UM Capital Region Medical Center, August 2022: Patients' autonomy, surrogates, and advance directives.
Central APA, Chicago, February 2022: The Kinda Hard problem for animal consciousness research.
Eastern APA, Baltimore, January 2022: A mixed box: mechanisms in cognitive science.
Philosophy of Science Association (PSA) meeting. Seattle, USA, 2018: Strategies to attribute phenomenal consciousness to animals, and where they fail.
(for a full list of presentations, see CV)
I currently am a project member of the publicly financed research groups:
Reassessing Scientific Objectivity Research Group
Universitat de Barcelona. (2023- 2025) PIs: Carl Hoefer & Jose Díez
Autonomous University of Barcelona. (2023-2026) PI: Thomas Sturm
Until my move to Valencia, i was a senior member at LOGOS, a consolidated research group in analytic philosophy
Universitat de Barcelona. PI: Sven Rosenkranz
In the past, I had also been a project member of several others publicly financed research groups, including groups at UAB, UNED, Univ. of Alberta and Univ. of British Columbia, as well as a junior research fellow at the Philosophy institute of the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC).