Stacie Friend | University of Edinburgh (original) (raw)
Papers by Stacie Friend
Creativity Research Journal, Jun 22, 2022
Aristotelian Society Supplementary Volume
C. Thi Nguyen claims that although we can make aesthetic judgements based on testimony or inferen... more C. Thi Nguyen claims that although we can make aesthetic judgements based on testimony or inference, we resist doing so owing to a contingent norm of our social practice. For Nguyen, aesthetic engagement involves a ‘motivational inversion’ similar to games in which we adopt inefficient means of winning so that we can enjoy the process of playing. Similarly, he says, adopting the norm enables us to engage in the autonomous activity of appreciation. I argue that Nguyen is right that the purpose of our practice is appreciation, but wrong to think any motivational inversion is required in pursuing it.
1980 260) This description, which concludes an argument for Nabokov‟s interpretation, is controve... more 1980 260) This description, which concludes an argument for Nabokov‟s interpretation, is controversial: the text says only that Gregor Samsa has been turned into a gigantic “vermin ” (Ungeziefer). Nabokov agrees with a number of critics that Gregor has become an insect, but the text never specifies which kind. Here is part of Nabokov‟s argument that Gregor becomes a beetle: Next question: what insect? Commentators say cockroach, which of course does not make sense. A cockroach is a vermin that is flat in shape with large legs, and Gregor is anything but flat: he is convex on both sides, belly and back, and his legs are small. He approaches a cockroach in only one respect: his coloration is brown. That is all. Apart from this he has a tremendous convex belly divided into segments and a hard rounded back suggestive of wing cases. In beetles these cases conceal flimsy little wings that can be expanded and then may carry the beetle for miles and miles in a blundering flight. Curiously e...
Kendall Walton’s “Categories of Art” (1970) is one of the most important and influential papers i... more Kendall Walton’s “Categories of Art” (1970) is one of the most important and influential papers in twentieth-century aesthetics. It is almost universally taken to refute traditional aesthetic formalism/empiricism, according to which all that matters aesthetically is what is manifest to perception. “Categories” thus played a key role in ushering in the ascendancy of contextualism in the philosophy of art, generating widespread agreement with Walton’s conclusion “that (some) facts about the origins of works of art have an essential role in criticism” (337). Although most commentators assume that Walton's argument encompasses works of literature, in fact it turns on features of sensory perception, specifically “perception in a category,” that are not easy to extend to the literary case. In this paper I consider two challenges in applying Walton’s argument to literature. First, what aspect of reading literature corresponds to perception in a category? Second, in what sense are liter...
Sage, Jan 28, 2021
Two pre-registered studies investigated associations of lifetime exposure to fiction, applying a ... more Two pre-registered studies investigated associations of lifetime exposure to fiction, applying a battery of self-report, explicit and implicit indicators. Study 1 (N=150 university students) tested the relationships between exposure to fiction and social and moral cognitive abilities in a lab setting, using a correlational design. Results failed to reveal evidence for enhanced social or moral cognition with increasing lifetime exposure to narrative fiction. Study 2 followed a cross-sectional design and compared 50-80 year-old fiction experts (N=66), nonfiction experts (N=53), and infrequent readers (N=77) regarding social cognition, general knowledge, imaginability, and creativity in an online setting. Fiction experts outperformed the remaining groups regarding creativity, but not regarding social cognition or imaginability. In addition, both fiction and non-fiction experts demonstrated higher general knowledge than infrequent readers. Taken together, the present results do not support theories postulating benefits of narrative fiction for social cognition, but suggest that reading fiction may be associated with a specific gain in creativity, and that print (fiction or non-fiction) exposure has a general enhancement effect on world knowledge.
Philosophers and psychologists have argued that fiction can ethically educate us: fiction suppose... more Philosophers and psychologists have argued that fiction can ethically educate us: fiction supposedly can make us better people. This view has been contested. It is, however, rarely argued that fiction can morally “corrupt” us. In this paper, we focus on the alleged power of fiction to decrease one’s prejudices and biases. We argue that if fiction has the power to change prejudices and biases for the better, then it can also have the opposite effect. We further argue that fictions are more likely to be a bad influence than a good on
Thought: its Origins and Reach. Essays for Mark Sainsbury
A popular way for irrealists to explain co-identification-thinking and talking 'about the same th... more A popular way for irrealists to explain co-identification-thinking and talking 'about the same thing' when there is no such thing-is by appeal to causal, historical or informational chains, networks or practices. Recently, however, this approach has come under attack by philosophers who contend that it cannot provide necessary and/or sufficient conditions for co-identification. In this paper I defend the approach against these objections. My claim is not that the appeal to such practices can provide necessary and sufficient conditions for co-identification, but rather that it is a mistake to seek these in the first place.
Scientific Study of Literature
We present two experiments examining the effects of reading narrative fiction (vs. narrative non-... more We present two experiments examining the effects of reading narrative fiction (vs. narrative non-fiction vs. expository non-fiction) on social and moral cognition, using a battery of self-report, explicit and implicit indicators. Experiment 1 (N = 340) implemented a pre-registered, randomized between-groups design, and assessed multiple outcomes after a short reading assignment. Results failed to reveal any differences between the three reading conditions on either social or moral cognition. Experiment 2 employed a longitudinal design. N = 104 participants were randomly assigned to read an entire book over seven days. Outcome variables were assessed before and after the reading assignment as well as at a one-week follow-up. Results did not show any differential development between the three reading conditions over time. The present results do not support the claim that reading narrative fiction is apt to improve our general social and moral cognition.
Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, Jan 31, 2022
Philosophers and psychologists have argued that fiction can ethically educate us: fiction suppose... more Philosophers and psychologists have argued that fiction can ethically educate us: fiction supposedly can make us better people. This view has been contested. It is, however, rarely argued that fiction can morally “corrupt” us. In this article, we focus on the alleged power of fiction to decrease one's prejudices and biases. We argue that if fiction has the power to change prejudices and biases for the better, then it can also have the opposite effect. We further argue that fictions are more likely to be a bad influence than a good one.
The Routledge Handbook of Philosophy of Imagination, 2016
Book synopsis: Imagination occupies a central place in philosophy, going back to Aristotle. Howev... more Book synopsis: Imagination occupies a central place in philosophy, going back to Aristotle. However, following a period of relative neglect there has been an explosion of interest in imagination in the past two decades as philosophers examine the role of imagination in debates about the mind and cognition, aesthetics and ethics, as well as epistemology, science and mathematics.
In this paper I consider the role of real portraits in works of fictional literature. Such portra... more In this paper I consider the role of real portraits in works of fictional literature. Such portraits play a dual role, both as entities that are represented by the fiction, and as representations of actual individuals. I argue that this duality has implications for how we should appreciate the literary works in which real portraits appear. In making this argument I contrast the treatment of portraiture in two murder mysteries: Josephine Tey’s The Daughter of Time, in which a portrait of Richard III plays a significant role in the foreground of the plot; and Orhan Pamuk’s My Name is Red, in which Gentile Bellini’s portrait of Sultan Mehmet II plays an equally significant role in the background. In light of this contrast, I describe a largely unnoticed way in which works of literature can misrepresent the real world: namely, by mischaracterizing the functions of representations themselves.
The British Journal of Aesthetics, 2022
In this paper, I review developments in discussions of fiction and emotion over the last decade c... more In this paper, I review developments in discussions of fiction and emotion over the last decade concerning both the descriptive question of how to classify fiction-directed emotions and the normative question of how to evaluate those emotions. Although many advances have been made on these topics, a mistaken assumption is still common: that we must hold either that fiction-directed emotions are (empirically or normatively) the same as other emotions, or that they are different. I argue that we should reject this dichotomy.
The Scientific Imagination, 2019
Many philosophers have drawn parallels between scientific models and fictions. This chapter is co... more Many philosophers have drawn parallels between scientific models and fictions. This chapter is concerned with a recent version of this analogy, which compares models to the imagined characters of fictional literature. Though versions of the position differ, the shared idea is that modeling essentially involves imagining concrete systems analogously to the way that we imagine characters and events in response to works of fiction. Advocates of this view argue that imagining concrete systems plays an ineliminable role in the practice of modeling that cannot be captured by other accounts. The approach thus leaves open what we should say about the ontological status of model systems, and here advocates differ among themselves, defending a variety of realist or anti-realist positions. I argue that this debate over the ontological status of model systems is misguided. If model systems are the kinds of objects fictional realists posit, they can play no role in explaining the epistemology of...
The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, 2017
Australasian Journal of Philosophy, 2016
I argue that judgements of what is 'true in a fiction' presuppose the Reality Assumption: the ass... more I argue that judgements of what is 'true in a fiction' presuppose the Reality Assumption: the assumption that everything that is (really) true is fictionally the case, unless excluded by the work. By contrast with the more familiar Reality Principle, the Reality Assumption is not a rule for inferring implied content from what is explicit. Instead it provides an array of realworld truths that can be used in such inferences. I claim that the Reality Assumption is essential to our ability to understand stories, drawing on a range of empirical evidence that demonstrates our reliance on it in narrative comprehension. However, the Reality Assumption has several unintuitive consequences, not least that what is fictionally the case includes countless facts that neither authors nor readers could (or should) ever consider. I argue that such consequences provide no reason to reject the Reality Assumption. I conclude that we should take fictions, like non-fictions, to be about the real world.
Creativity Research Journal, Jun 22, 2022
Aristotelian Society Supplementary Volume
C. Thi Nguyen claims that although we can make aesthetic judgements based on testimony or inferen... more C. Thi Nguyen claims that although we can make aesthetic judgements based on testimony or inference, we resist doing so owing to a contingent norm of our social practice. For Nguyen, aesthetic engagement involves a ‘motivational inversion’ similar to games in which we adopt inefficient means of winning so that we can enjoy the process of playing. Similarly, he says, adopting the norm enables us to engage in the autonomous activity of appreciation. I argue that Nguyen is right that the purpose of our practice is appreciation, but wrong to think any motivational inversion is required in pursuing it.
1980 260) This description, which concludes an argument for Nabokov‟s interpretation, is controve... more 1980 260) This description, which concludes an argument for Nabokov‟s interpretation, is controversial: the text says only that Gregor Samsa has been turned into a gigantic “vermin ” (Ungeziefer). Nabokov agrees with a number of critics that Gregor has become an insect, but the text never specifies which kind. Here is part of Nabokov‟s argument that Gregor becomes a beetle: Next question: what insect? Commentators say cockroach, which of course does not make sense. A cockroach is a vermin that is flat in shape with large legs, and Gregor is anything but flat: he is convex on both sides, belly and back, and his legs are small. He approaches a cockroach in only one respect: his coloration is brown. That is all. Apart from this he has a tremendous convex belly divided into segments and a hard rounded back suggestive of wing cases. In beetles these cases conceal flimsy little wings that can be expanded and then may carry the beetle for miles and miles in a blundering flight. Curiously e...
Kendall Walton’s “Categories of Art” (1970) is one of the most important and influential papers i... more Kendall Walton’s “Categories of Art” (1970) is one of the most important and influential papers in twentieth-century aesthetics. It is almost universally taken to refute traditional aesthetic formalism/empiricism, according to which all that matters aesthetically is what is manifest to perception. “Categories” thus played a key role in ushering in the ascendancy of contextualism in the philosophy of art, generating widespread agreement with Walton’s conclusion “that (some) facts about the origins of works of art have an essential role in criticism” (337). Although most commentators assume that Walton's argument encompasses works of literature, in fact it turns on features of sensory perception, specifically “perception in a category,” that are not easy to extend to the literary case. In this paper I consider two challenges in applying Walton’s argument to literature. First, what aspect of reading literature corresponds to perception in a category? Second, in what sense are liter...
Sage, Jan 28, 2021
Two pre-registered studies investigated associations of lifetime exposure to fiction, applying a ... more Two pre-registered studies investigated associations of lifetime exposure to fiction, applying a battery of self-report, explicit and implicit indicators. Study 1 (N=150 university students) tested the relationships between exposure to fiction and social and moral cognitive abilities in a lab setting, using a correlational design. Results failed to reveal evidence for enhanced social or moral cognition with increasing lifetime exposure to narrative fiction. Study 2 followed a cross-sectional design and compared 50-80 year-old fiction experts (N=66), nonfiction experts (N=53), and infrequent readers (N=77) regarding social cognition, general knowledge, imaginability, and creativity in an online setting. Fiction experts outperformed the remaining groups regarding creativity, but not regarding social cognition or imaginability. In addition, both fiction and non-fiction experts demonstrated higher general knowledge than infrequent readers. Taken together, the present results do not support theories postulating benefits of narrative fiction for social cognition, but suggest that reading fiction may be associated with a specific gain in creativity, and that print (fiction or non-fiction) exposure has a general enhancement effect on world knowledge.
Philosophers and psychologists have argued that fiction can ethically educate us: fiction suppose... more Philosophers and psychologists have argued that fiction can ethically educate us: fiction supposedly can make us better people. This view has been contested. It is, however, rarely argued that fiction can morally “corrupt” us. In this paper, we focus on the alleged power of fiction to decrease one’s prejudices and biases. We argue that if fiction has the power to change prejudices and biases for the better, then it can also have the opposite effect. We further argue that fictions are more likely to be a bad influence than a good on
Thought: its Origins and Reach. Essays for Mark Sainsbury
A popular way for irrealists to explain co-identification-thinking and talking 'about the same th... more A popular way for irrealists to explain co-identification-thinking and talking 'about the same thing' when there is no such thing-is by appeal to causal, historical or informational chains, networks or practices. Recently, however, this approach has come under attack by philosophers who contend that it cannot provide necessary and/or sufficient conditions for co-identification. In this paper I defend the approach against these objections. My claim is not that the appeal to such practices can provide necessary and sufficient conditions for co-identification, but rather that it is a mistake to seek these in the first place.
Scientific Study of Literature
We present two experiments examining the effects of reading narrative fiction (vs. narrative non-... more We present two experiments examining the effects of reading narrative fiction (vs. narrative non-fiction vs. expository non-fiction) on social and moral cognition, using a battery of self-report, explicit and implicit indicators. Experiment 1 (N = 340) implemented a pre-registered, randomized between-groups design, and assessed multiple outcomes after a short reading assignment. Results failed to reveal any differences between the three reading conditions on either social or moral cognition. Experiment 2 employed a longitudinal design. N = 104 participants were randomly assigned to read an entire book over seven days. Outcome variables were assessed before and after the reading assignment as well as at a one-week follow-up. Results did not show any differential development between the three reading conditions over time. The present results do not support the claim that reading narrative fiction is apt to improve our general social and moral cognition.
Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, Jan 31, 2022
Philosophers and psychologists have argued that fiction can ethically educate us: fiction suppose... more Philosophers and psychologists have argued that fiction can ethically educate us: fiction supposedly can make us better people. This view has been contested. It is, however, rarely argued that fiction can morally “corrupt” us. In this article, we focus on the alleged power of fiction to decrease one's prejudices and biases. We argue that if fiction has the power to change prejudices and biases for the better, then it can also have the opposite effect. We further argue that fictions are more likely to be a bad influence than a good one.
The Routledge Handbook of Philosophy of Imagination, 2016
Book synopsis: Imagination occupies a central place in philosophy, going back to Aristotle. Howev... more Book synopsis: Imagination occupies a central place in philosophy, going back to Aristotle. However, following a period of relative neglect there has been an explosion of interest in imagination in the past two decades as philosophers examine the role of imagination in debates about the mind and cognition, aesthetics and ethics, as well as epistemology, science and mathematics.
In this paper I consider the role of real portraits in works of fictional literature. Such portra... more In this paper I consider the role of real portraits in works of fictional literature. Such portraits play a dual role, both as entities that are represented by the fiction, and as representations of actual individuals. I argue that this duality has implications for how we should appreciate the literary works in which real portraits appear. In making this argument I contrast the treatment of portraiture in two murder mysteries: Josephine Tey’s The Daughter of Time, in which a portrait of Richard III plays a significant role in the foreground of the plot; and Orhan Pamuk’s My Name is Red, in which Gentile Bellini’s portrait of Sultan Mehmet II plays an equally significant role in the background. In light of this contrast, I describe a largely unnoticed way in which works of literature can misrepresent the real world: namely, by mischaracterizing the functions of representations themselves.
The British Journal of Aesthetics, 2022
In this paper, I review developments in discussions of fiction and emotion over the last decade c... more In this paper, I review developments in discussions of fiction and emotion over the last decade concerning both the descriptive question of how to classify fiction-directed emotions and the normative question of how to evaluate those emotions. Although many advances have been made on these topics, a mistaken assumption is still common: that we must hold either that fiction-directed emotions are (empirically or normatively) the same as other emotions, or that they are different. I argue that we should reject this dichotomy.
The Scientific Imagination, 2019
Many philosophers have drawn parallels between scientific models and fictions. This chapter is co... more Many philosophers have drawn parallels between scientific models and fictions. This chapter is concerned with a recent version of this analogy, which compares models to the imagined characters of fictional literature. Though versions of the position differ, the shared idea is that modeling essentially involves imagining concrete systems analogously to the way that we imagine characters and events in response to works of fiction. Advocates of this view argue that imagining concrete systems plays an ineliminable role in the practice of modeling that cannot be captured by other accounts. The approach thus leaves open what we should say about the ontological status of model systems, and here advocates differ among themselves, defending a variety of realist or anti-realist positions. I argue that this debate over the ontological status of model systems is misguided. If model systems are the kinds of objects fictional realists posit, they can play no role in explaining the epistemology of...
The Journal of Aesthetics and Art Criticism, 2017
Australasian Journal of Philosophy, 2016
I argue that judgements of what is 'true in a fiction' presuppose the Reality Assumption: the ass... more I argue that judgements of what is 'true in a fiction' presuppose the Reality Assumption: the assumption that everything that is (really) true is fictionally the case, unless excluded by the work. By contrast with the more familiar Reality Principle, the Reality Assumption is not a rule for inferring implied content from what is explicit. Instead it provides an array of realworld truths that can be used in such inferences. I claim that the Reality Assumption is essential to our ability to understand stories, drawing on a range of empirical evidence that demonstrates our reliance on it in narrative comprehension. However, the Reality Assumption has several unintuitive consequences, not least that what is fictionally the case includes countless facts that neither authors nor readers could (or should) ever consider. I argue that such consequences provide no reason to reject the Reality Assumption. I conclude that we should take fictions, like non-fictions, to be about the real world.
Appeared in _Philosophical Perspectives, 17, Language and Philosophical Linguistics_, 2003. Stac... more Appeared in _Philosophical Perspectives, 17, Language and Philosophical Linguistics_, 2003. Stacie Friend and I wrote this when we were both at umich, and the idea was to show how semantic deference (for example, about word meaning) was not automatic but had to be earned by a series of challenges. Deference is a product of disagreement, and thus so is understanding. And just to prove our point, the paper is written as a dialogue between two people arguing. Does understanding result? You be the judge. Trigger warning: the paper is heavy on Gilligan's Island and Happy days.