On 6th and 7th November, Ema Sullivan Bissett organised a conference on Belief, Imagination, and Delusion at the University of Birmingham. The PERFECT team attended the event and this report is the result of their collective effort! Anna Ichino on imagination Paul Noordhof on aim of belief Sophie Archer (Cardiff University) started the conference with a discussion of delusion and belief, inviting us to learn some lessons from the implicit bias literature. When the avowed anti-racist says all races are equal but does not behave in ways consistent to this belief, then we assume that there is an additional mental state (not open to consciousness) that is responsible for those behaviours. Is this additional mental state a belief? Archer argues that it is not. On the background, there is a thesis about belief. Even if a mental state responds directly to epistemic reasons, this is necessary but not sufficient for the mental state to be a belief (Epistemic Reasons). If the me
A blog at the intersection of philosophy, psychology, and mental health