Experimental Turn in Philosophy

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New Turn

The paths of philosophy have never been straight and smooth, but the last two centuries have been full of many new forks and unexpected turns. There were linguistic, cognitive, pragmatic, practical, metaphysical, and speculative, social turns, and a turn to things themselves. One cannot mention them all. Furthermore, now there is a relatively new, experimental turn. What is its essence? What will be its consequences? Will it become just another homage to fashion, or will it determine the vector of development of world philosophy for the near future? The answers to these questions should partly be provided by the articles of the special issue of the RUDN Journal of Philosophy devoted to experimental philosophy. In this introductory article, we will substantiate our vision of experimental philosophy as a result, first of all, of a radical turn in the field of research methodology, as well as demonstrate the fundamental role of the phenomenological approach in interdisciplinary experimental-philosophical research.

Much has been written about experimental philosophy in recent years in many ways. The authors of [1], having analyzed a corpus of 1,248 books and articles in this field published over the last two decades, note a tendency of increasing publications, characterizing the last five years as a plateau of about one hundred publications per year. Conventionally, this multitude of texts can be divided into two streams – works that discuss the specificity and essence of experimental philosophy as a relatively young philosophical direction and direct research articles carried out within the framework of experimental philosophy. For obvious reasons, in this article, we will be more interested in the first group of publications.

It could be more precise to describe profoundly the problematics of experimental philosophy in this article. It is broad and covers various topics, from conceptual analysis and thought experiments to the Hopi language and human cognitive functions. As it will become apparent from the further presentation, from our standpoint, the specificity of experimental philosophy is determined not by the set of topics but by the approach to their study. We will point to the article by Knobe and Nichols [2] as a convenient information resource so as to keep the introductory article manageable with literature references. There traditionally, for the Stanford Encyclopedia, there are many references for finding the most significant publications in the field and a description of the main approaches to the interpretation and definition of experimental philosophy.

Virtually all authors who set themselves the task of briefly characterizing experimental philosophy first note that there is no single definition and, secondly, offer their interpretation of this philosophical trend. The recent history of experimental philosophy is usually counted from several works of the beginning of the 21^st century (ref. [3–5]) and the critical book [6], published in 2008, which contains a kind of manifesto of experimental philosophy and outlines the tendencies of its development. However, many authors agree that research, later united under the umbrella term of experimental philosophy, has been present in the traditional philosophical space since the times of Aristotle. Among the predecessors of experimental philosophy are also T. Hobbes, F. Bacon, R. Descartes, I. Kant, J. Locke, W. James, and, of course, D. Hume. It is to Hume that we owe the term experimental philosophy (in Russian translation – a philosophy based on experience), which appears in the Introduction to A Treatise on Human Nature [7. P. 57].

Surprisingly, Hume’s reasoning is relevant and consonant with our understanding of experimental philosophy today, so let us cite it with a few minor footnotes. “Here then is the only expedient, from which we can hope for success in our philosophical researches, to leave the tedious lingring method, which we have hitherto followed, and instead of taking now and then a castle or village on the frontier, to march up directly to the capital or center of these sciences, to human nature itself; which being once masters of, we may every where else hope for an easy victory. From this station we may extend our conquests over all those sciences, which more intimately concern human life” [7. P. 56]. Further: “And as the science of man is the only solid foundation for the other sciences, so the only solid foundation we can give to this science itself must be laid on experience and observation.” [7. P. 57]. Elsewhere in the Treatise, he characterizes experimental philosophy as the most natural and simple.

This kind of philosophy, based on experience and observation, is what Hume called experimental. This key characteristic is also true for contemporary experimental philosophy as a philosophical study that uses the methods of cognitive sciences to pose and consider philosophical questions. It is critical to note, however, that from our point of view, the study of human nature, consciousness, thinking, and other cognitive functions occupies a preeminent position among these questions. As experimental philosophers, we seek to investigate human beings and the world as given, relying on direct description and observation of what and how is represented in experience. This approach requires an interdisciplinary effort, a close interaction between philosopher and scientist aimed at realizing a common goal.

There is no master and slave in this tandem. Experimental philosophy is not just a philosophical theorization of post facto experimental scientific experience. However, experimental science also turns to philosophy not only for the sake of theoretical comprehension of already obtained data, raising a wave of philosophical reflections and interpretations, as it happened, for example, in the case of B. Libet’s famous experiments (ref., e.g., [8]), which sparked a wide philosophical discussion about free will, which continues.

There is another, in our opinion, more promising format of interaction between philosophy and experimental science – a joint experimental work of philosopher and scientist aimed at solving a certain cognitive problem. This requires the direct participation of the philosopher already at the stage of experiment design, with the subsequent philosophical understanding of experimental data and hypotheses for further experimental verification. In this case, we are not talking about a “roll call of two neighbors” but about joint purposeful interdisciplinary interaction.

Today, hardly anyone doubts that experimental philosophy is the interaction of philosophy and experimental science. The name speaks for itself. However, questions arise about the nature of this interaction. The very notion of the experiment requires clarification. Mental experiments, which some consciousness researchers rely on, obviously do not belong to scientific experiments.

Nevertheless, mental experiments are widely represented in the philosophy of consciousness, especially in its analytic version. Undoubtedly, they perform essential functions related to focusing attention on the problem, hypothesizing, predicting, and analyzing consequences, but they cannot, of course, be regarded as scientific and experimental substantiation of theoretical statements. The mental representation on which the thought experiment is based and the represented direct experience in the conditions of a scientific experiment are not identical in their cognitive status and are aimed at solving different cognitive tasks. The thought experiment is not aimed at scientific justification, confirmation, or refutation, and can be included in the experimental-philosophical discourse only with certain reservations.

Modern science convincingly demonstrates that philosophical questions can arise not only for philosophers. Psychologists, STEM scientists, first, physicists and biologists, and neuroscientists, in their scientific activity investigating nature and man, strive to discover the fundamental dispositions underlying life, consciousness, behavior, and morality. Naturally, such studies cannot but touch upon the most general philosophical questions about the structure of the world and human nature. It is no less natural to refer these studies, called to life and based on scientific experiments, to the field of experimental philosophy, albeit with certain reservations.

Another vital feature of experimental philosophy we have already mentioned is its fundamental interdisciplinarity. In this regard, there are often statements in the literature that may not be correctly interpreted outside the broader context of experimental philosophy. For instance, the authors of [9. P. 2] write that the number of experimental philosophers who “use experimental psychological methods to develop and evaluate philosophically significant concepts” is gradually growing. J. Alexander writes about the same in his book [10], stating that experimental philosophers use the methods of social and cognitive sciences. A literal reading of these statements can be misleading. Suppose a researcher is a professional philosopher without specialized training in the relevant empirical sciences. In that case, it is very doubtful that he or she can conduct an empirical study and obtain reliable verified conclusions expertly. Unfortunately, especially in the field of research related to sociology, this happens from time to time. Suffice it to recall the work [5], traditionally cited as one of the first studies in experimental philosophy. Its authors, not sociologists or psychologists, base their conclusions on their own surveys. J. Sytsma and many others have similarly conducted their research. Fortunately, in the field of neurocognitive sciences, such independent creativity by philosophers is practically impossible.

From our standpoint, except for rare cases of successful combination, a philosopher always remains a philosopher, and a cognitive scientist always remains a cognitive scientist. The problem is not that the former starts doing empirical research, and the latter takes up philosophy (although this also happens). What makes philosophy experimental is the collaboration of philosophers and cognitive scientists in solving philosophical problems. Today, interdisciplinary research teams are emerging that include psychologists, philosophers, neuroscientists, AI specialists, etc. As an argument in favor of the productivity of such teams, it is enough to recall the union of F. Varela, E. Thompson, and E. Rosch and the neurophenomenology associated with Varela’s name based on Husserl’s phenomenology.

Phenomenology was methodologically close to natural science and neurocognitive sciences. Its founder Husserl’s call to return to “the things themselves” demanded an objectivity of consideration based on description and observation. Phenomenology’s emphasis on the subject’s direct experience proved relevant to this call. Not surprisingly, it is phenomenological studies of consciousness “from the first person” with an emphasis on basic cognitive concepts and structures that have been in demand in modern cognitive science, biology, psychology, psychiatry, and medicine. Scientists objectively investigating cognitive processes of different levels want to know what is behind the fixed scientific data and what phenomenal experiences they correspond to.

Phenomenology, focusing on experience as subjective experience, has influenced and continues to influence the formation and development of psychiatry, existential medicine, and psychotherapy. Suffice it to mention Karl Jaspers, Eugène Minkowski, and Ludwig Binswanger. They were united by the conviction that the approach to the patient should be phenomenologically oriented, purified from various assumptions and prejudices that distort the understanding of subjective experiences. These ideas were reflected and developed in the works of F. Perls, C. Rogers, R. May, R. Laing, A. Giorgi, E. Spinelli, E. Gendlin, and many others.

Almost all mental illnesses are associated with changes in subjective life experience. The scientific study of the physiological basis of mental illnesses tends to focus on objective measures and observable behavior, which limits the potential for our understanding of the nature and mechanisms of disease states and, consequently, of possible treatments. Applying objective scientific methods, designed primarily to interpret objective behavioral indicators, to describing subjective states is not productive because it encounters a host of intractable problems that require consideration of the patient’s subjective experiences. Hippocrates’ call to “treat the person, not the disease” is relevant. Contemporary researchers are increasingly turning to phenomenology, appreciating the potential of first-person phenomenological methodology to explain the basis of mental illness and generate new and fruitful proposals for neurobiological research, development of neurointerface technologies, bioethical expertise, and other areas.

The rapid development of technologies related to human consciousness implies the study of consciousness itself as a complex interdisciplinary field based on an integrated methodology that includes phenomenological research and scientific methods. The successful development of interface technologies (brain-computer interface – BCI, or brain-machine interface – BMI), which involve recording the user’s brain activity and transforming its commands for external application, requires understanding that the brain is not the subject of communication between a human and a technical device, but only represents a bodily conscious agent, constantly interacting with the environment, experiencing different modi of conscious subjective experience. What is the impact of new-generation implantable devices with brain-computer interfaces on subjective experience? Whether there are internal changes in phenomenal experience, selfhood, self-identity, and proprioception require the broadest possible discussion and relevant research. Obviously, obtaining and adequately interpreting such information is only possible through research based on first-person accounts.

In the small amount of literature on this problem, attention is drawn to clinical invasive trials on humans, the purpose of which was to study changes in subjective experience before implantation of BCI advisory devices and after implantation (ref., e.g., [11; 12]). Researchers stated various vectors of changes in subjective experience, which can be positively and negatively characterized. The peculiarity of such studies was the use of integrated methodology – along with objective data, phenomenologically oriented interviews of patients were used. The results showed that, on the one hand, BCIs can positively influence, for example, self-image and sense of self-control. On the other hand, they can cause radical distress and a sense of loss of control and self-identity in the patient. The results of such studies are difficult to overemphasize. They focus our attention on the need for proactive action to avoid potential negative consequences for the individual. Phenomenological research and phenomenologically oriented protocols should be included in the arsenal of such proactive tools. The evolution of BCI-controlled prosthetic limbs raises questions that require clarification of the concepts of self, self-ownership, body ownership, self-identity, self-image, minimal self, narrative self, sense of independence, and others developed in the phenomenological paradigm. To what extent is the implanted BCI device integrated into the patient’s sense of self? This question has solid bioethical underpinnings.

Obviously, solving these and similar problems will require interdisciplinary interaction. Experimental philosophy is an example of such interaction. The fundamental interdisciplinarity of research, of course, entails severe consequences. First, the commonality of interests and tasks naturally stipulates that experimental philosophical research can and often does have significance for philosophy and related sciences. This happens for several reasons and in various forms. We have already given some examples of such research above.

Secondly, the interdisciplinary format of experimental philosophy research undoubtedly enhances the scientific potential and the scientific intensity of the results. It should be noted that the concept of scientific results and their reliability in philosophy and natural sciences for a long time differed significantly. As is known, this is due to different criteria of scientism, due to the specificity of humanitarian and natural science knowledge, and ultimately explained by differences in methods. The only exception in this respect is philosophical logic, in which almost the exact requirements as in mathematics, supplemented by philosophical specificity, have always been applied to the scientific result. In the case of experimental philosophy, the criteria of scientism and assessment of the validity of research results adopted in natural science are directly or at least indirectly applicable.

A natural tightening of the criteria was the so-called negative program of experimental philosophy (ref., e.g., [13]). Historically, the distinction between positive and negative experimental philosophy emerged within the analytic tradition and was connected with the treatment of philosophical intuition. The role of intuition in the positive version of analytic experimental philosophy is twofold – it can serve as a source of data for conceptual analysis or play the role of justification or even proof. The latter hypostasis of philosophical intuition is directly related to the method of mental experimentation. Moreover, mental experimentation turns out to be the main target of the negative program, which calls into question the reliability of the intuitive method in philosophy. In a sense, the negative program of experimental philosophy complements the positive program by discarding unreliable intuitive generalizations, data, and conclusions by applying stricter criteria of philosophical scientism.

To summarize this introductory section, it is critical to note that, in our opinion, it would be wrong to treat experimental philosophy as a special autonomous direction or current of philosophical thought. Its characterization as a new stage in the development of philosophy is closer to the truth, but it needs to be corrected. There are and always will be philosophical problems, the solution of which does not involve experimental methods. Below, we will substantiate the point of view that experimental philosophy is not just one of the directions or currents in modern philosophical thought but an interdisciplinary synthesis of scientific and philosophical research based on an integrated methodology. In this sense, experimental can be analytical and continental philosophy, metaphysics and epistemology, ethics, aesthetics and logic – any direction in philosophy allows for an experimental approach. Thus, experimental philosophy should be understood as a change in philosophical methodology, which implies the synthesis of traditional philosophical methods and methods of empirical science to solve philosophical problems.

Back to Human

What explains the interest of philosophers in the methods of experimental science? Why is the experimental turn taking place precisely in our days?

One of the reasons is the practical turn in philosophy that took place earlier in the 1970s–1980s. The shift of philosophical interest, especially manifested in social science and sociology, from the metaphysical-substantial to the sphere of everyday experience, the agent’s lifeworld, in a certain sense, prepared the ground for a more fundamental experimental turn, which became a natural continuation of philosophy’s movement toward practice. Pragmatism, the turn to the subject, and the emphasis on the study of consciousness are characteristic features of the philosophy of our time. Against this background, it is natural for humanities science to strive for objectivity in its results and practical significance.

An equally important reason for the experimental turn, often cited by analytic researchers, was the desire to make conceptual analysis more precise as the primary method of desk philosophizing. Analytic philosophers resort to the experimental approach in the hope of clarifying vague intuitions to a certain extent, revealing typical errors and cognitive distortions, in a sense “grounding” philosophical reasoning with empirical methods of verification (primarily taken from the arsenal of sociology and psychology), thereby, as it were, giving philosophical knowledge an objective character as opposed to the purely subjective opinion of this or that researcher. Hence, the paradigm of typical research is carried out in the analytical tradition and claims to be experimental. Speech protocols, often presented in written form, are used as material, and the study itself is a sociological or psychological survey, for example, on the perception of counterfactual utterances. We have already touched on the problematic question of the competence of researchers conducting such surveys. Be that as it may, backing up conceptual analysis with empirical material, cleansing it from cognitive distortions, is helpful for any philosopher, regardless of his or her philosophical position.

The third reason that made the experimental turn possible was the progress in neurocognitive research methods achieved at the beginning of the century. New opportunities have opened for researchers to study neurocognitive mechanisms and establish correlations between brain activity and cognitive functions. This makes it possible to raise questions about why and how people carry out cognitive operations, investigate thinking, and, at a new stage, seek approaches to understanding consciousness and intelligence. It is important to note that technological progress has led to an intensification of experimental-philosophical research in two related but distinct modus operandi. Firstly, philosophers got an opportunity to investigate consciousness with the help and based on neuroscience methods. Secondly, neuroscientists faced truly philosophical problems in their research, which they can only adequately pose and solve with the help of professional philosophers.

Phenomenology is the most productive in synthesizing philosophy and cognitive science within the framework of the experimental approach. Phenomenology is not only an effective means of linking together numerous disparate data from empirical studies and offering their philosophical interpretation and explanation. Because of its original focus on the first-person study of the phenomena of consciousness, it is the best candidate for splicing with cognitive, including neuroscience, for a comprehensive study of cognition. A vivid example and confirmation of the fruitfulness of such a synthesis is F. Varela’s neurophenomenology, which he characterized as a project of fusing modern cognitive science with Husserlian phenomenology. According to the idea of its creators, such a project was supposed to overcome the well-known “failure in explanations” through the use of first-person data supplied by “phenomenologically trained” agents when constructing explanatory models. This is an example of a kind of “naturalization of phenomenology” due to the desire to objectify phenomenological research data scientifically. The opposite path of “phenomenologized natural science” is also possible when scientists turn to phenomenology to conceptualize and justify empirical data. A notable representative of this direction is S. Gallagher, who advocates using phenomenological conceptual apparatus and research methods to design neuroexperiments.

In any case, the alliance of phenomenological and cognitive neuroscientific research justifiably claims to be a comprehensive study of consciousness, both from the phenomenological “first-person” and scientific “third-person” positions. This approach considers the two-sided specificity of consciousness: on the one hand, consciousness is a way of constituting the world, and on the other hand, it is itself an object of this world. D. Zahavi and S. Gallagher [14] emphasize the fundamental role of phenomenology as first-person research for a comprehensive study of consciousness based on the belief that no objectivity is not contaminated by subjectivity. The neuroscientist must understand what is behind the data of neuroresearch.

The deep conceptual connection of philosophy with the various cognitive sciences and with neuroscience, in particular, is not in doubt today. Suffice to mention Gestalt and phenomenological psychology (F. Perls, K. Koffka), neurophenomenology and enactivism (F. Varela, E. Rosch, E. Thompson), the theory of embodied simulation (V. Gallese), the interaction theory of S. Gallagher.

Increasingly, scientists engaged in empirical research in various academic fields are trying to rise to the philosophical level of understanding the world, addressing questions about the nature of consciousness and morality, thinking and language, free will, and many others traditionally within the competence of philosophy. A. Damasio, H. Maturana, F. Varela, F. de Waal, N. Chomsky, S. Pinker, R. Sapolsky, A. Wierzbicka and hundreds of other researchers in their books raise questions that can equally easily belong to the field of modern biology, psychology, psycholinguistics, neuroscience, as well as be directly attributed to the general section “philosophy”. It is no coincidence that in the so-called “Barrett Memorandum”, the authors (thirteen cognitive scientists, including the famous L.F. Barrett) call for a revision of the assumptions established in neurocognitive research about localization and mutually unambiguous correspondence between selected neuronal ensembles and mental events or cognitive functions. It is particularly noted that, firstly, the revised assumptions and premises are interpreted as ontological and belong to the sphere of philosophy of science. Secondly, a fruitful study of the brain as a complex system involves an approach based on constructing a model of the phenomenon under study, part of which is an explicit formulation of the assumptions and ontological assumptions to be made [15. P. 253–254].

Conclusion

The articles presented in this journal issue illustrate in the best possible way both the plurality of approaches to understanding experimental philosophy presented above and the fruitfulness of experimental-philosophical research in quite different fields. They can be divided into two groups: articles devoted to the justification of this or that interpretation of experimental philosophy and the prospects for developing this philosophical trend and articles that discuss the possibilities or directly present the results of experimental-philosophical research.

The works of the first group include the article by O.A. Vlasova, Old Problems and New Prospects of Neurophenomenology in Psychiatry: Chronicle of a Radical Turn, devoted to psychiatric neurophenomenology. The paper traces the transformation of traditional problems in psychiatry, emphasizing the importance of an interdisciplinary approach to solving them. The author substantiates that neurophenomenology is the most fruitful ground for experimental philosophy in general and psychiatry in particular.

In her article What Can Be Different? The Role of Experience in Philosophy, E.V. Kosilova raises the question of understanding experience in philosophy and its place in philosophical reasoning. The author puts forward a hypothesis on the role of experience as a filter in the process of substantiating metaphysical judgments.

E.V. Falev’s paper “Epistemologically Different Worlds” (from J. Uexküll to G. Vacariu) analyzes the concept of “epistemologically different worlds” introduced by G. Vacariu in comparison with J. Uexküll’s concept of Umwelt and traces the latter’s connections and influence on E. Husserl’s phenomenology, M. Heidegger’s fundamental ontology, and F. Varela’s neurophenomenology.

The articles Experimental Philosophy and Cognitive Science in the Context of Understanding Hybrid Intelligence: Philosophical and Anthropological Aspect (G.E. Bokov, E.V. Chapny) and Methodological Interaction Between Experimental and Computer Philosophy (E.A. Alekseeva) occupy an intermediate position. The authors proceed from a specific understanding of experimental philosophy and, at the same time, appeal to empirical studies confirming the prospectivity of their interpretation. G.E. Bokov and E.V. Chapny emphasize the possibilities offered by a close dialog between philosophy and cognitive science, comprehending experimental philosophy as “a philosophy that is open to comprehension of new data obtained experimentally.” The authors intend to illustrate the fruitfulness of this approach by the prospects of application of convergent NBIC-technologies, research of neurointerfaces, in particular, the results of the work of the scientists of the Scientific and Research Technological Center of Neurotechnologies (NITC Neurotechnology) of Southern Federal University (SFU) in the field of hybrid intelligence. E.A. Alekseeva seeks to discover the interrelations between experimental philosophy and computer philosophy. In this regard, the scholar discusses the possibility of experimental philosophical research devoted to the problem of justification in evidence-based medicine.

The second group of articles is opened by an article by professional psychologists N.E. Veraksa, A.N. Veraksa, Z.V. Hayrapetyan and E.E. Krasheninnikova Development of Dialectical Thinking: the Role of Structured and Organized Daily Life of a Child in Preschool Childhood. The authors of the article focus on the problem of processing contradictory information. The experimental basis of the work was a longitudinal study conducted by the authors aimed at clarifying scientific ideas about the development of dialectical thinking in preschool and junior school age.

In her article Philosophical and Cognitive Aspects of Visual Metaphor in Political Discourse, E.L. Kabakhidze investigates the philosophical and cognitive foundations of metaphor in American, British, and Chilean linguistic and cultural communities. For this purpose, the author developed a special methodology, and 30 caricatures of political leaders served as stimulus material.

V.A. Chaly’s article Experimental Ethics and Kantian Deontology examines J. Greene’s experiment-based critique of deontological normative theory. The author interprets the experimental data and questions Greene’s critical conclusions.

The work Metrics of Phenomenological Virtual Experience by O.I. Elkhova can also be referred to as the emerging tradition of experimental-philosophical research. The study’s subject becomes the phenomenology of virtual experience, and it combines the phenomenological approach with natural science methods.

Thus, the selection of publications preceding this article, with all the differences in approaches, interpretations, and objects of philosophical-experimental research, confirms the understanding of experimental philosophy as a methodological turn that is equally fruitful in any field and adopts any philosophical assumptions.

About the authors

Natalia V. Zaitseva

Lomonosov Moscow State University

Author for correspondence.
Email: natvalen@list.ru
ORCID iD: 0000-0002-1691-1402
SPIN-code: 3458-9236

PhD in Philosophy, Leading Research Associate, Department of Philosophy of Language and Communication, Faculty of Philosophy

27/4 Lomonosovsky Prospekt, Moscow, GSP-1, 119991, Russian Federation

Dmitry V. Zaitsev

Lomonosov Moscow State University

Email: zaitsev@philos.msu.ru
ORCID iD: 0000-0002-9076-4658
SPIN-code: 3506-3020

DSc in Philosophy, Department of Logic, Faculty of Philosophy

27/4 Lomonosovsky Prospekt, Moscow, GSP-1, 119991, Russian Federation

References