Chiara Brozzo

Alumni of the Department Human Perception, Cognition and Action
Alumni of the Research Group Body and Space perception

Main Focus

I work on empirically informed philosophy of mind and action, with a focus on the connection between intentions and actions via motor representations, as well as on action understanding.

In the former field, I have investigated the connection between the philosophical notion of intention and the neuroscientific one of motor representation. I have suggested a revision to previous proposals concerning this connection (e.g., Pacherie 2008), and formulated, as an alternative, the notion of motor intention (Brozzo 2017), which is useful for interpreting a number of data from the neuroscience of action. I have also worked on knowledge of one's own actions, by defending the idea that humans can know what they are doing to a striking level of detail thanks to their fine-grained intentions -- for example, motor intentions (Blomberg and Brozzo forthcoming).

In the field of action understanding, I have established that understanding others' bodily actions can consist in minimal forms of mental state ascription (Brozzo in preparation).

I have additionally done theoretical work in the field of body representation, by trying to establish a connection between different body size estimation methods and the specific body representations into which they tap.

I also coordinate the Space and Body reading group.

http://www.kyb.tuebingen.mpg.de/research/rg/mohlergroup.html

http://www.findingperspective.org

Curriculum Vitae

CHIARA BROZZO

Areas of Specialization

Philosophy of Mind and Action, Philosophy of Psychology

Areas of Competence

Cognitive Neuroscience of Body and Action, Aesthetics, Logic

POSITIONS HELD

Postdoctoral Fellow

Philosophy of Neuroscience research group, Universität Tübingen

& Max Planck Institute for Biological Cybernetics, Tübingen

2015 - present

Postdoctoral Fellow

Centre for Philosophical Psychology, Universiteit Antwerpen

2014 - 2015

Postdoctoral Fellow

Philosophy of Neuroscience research group, Universität Tübingen

2013 - 2014

EDUCATION

PhD in Philosophy

Università degli Studi di Milano

2010 - 2013

Grade: Excellent

Supervisors: Stephen Butterfill, Corrado Sinigaglia, Alessandro Zucchi

Main examiner: Elisabeth Pacherie (CNRS, Institut Jean Nicod, Paris)

Master of Mathematics and Philosophy

University of Oxford

2005 - 2009

PUBLICATIONS

O. Blomberg, & C. Brozzo (forthcoming). Motor intentions and non-observational knowledge of action: A standard story. Thought

C. Brozzo (2017). Motor Intentions: How intentions and motor representations come together. Mind & Language, 32(2), 234-259.

C. Sinigaglia, & C. Brozzo (2011). The enactive constitution of space. In L. Boi, C. Bartocci & C. Sinigaglia (eds.), New Trends in Geometry, and its Role in the Natural and Life Sciences. Imperial College Press, London.

AWARDS, FELLOWSHIPS AND GRANTS (>100,000 €)

  • SSNAP Grant Award (Templeton Foundation), 27,000 $

2016 - 2018
  • Helped write CIN Pool Project grant No. 2014-03 “Investigating Body Representation Distortions in Patient Populations using Biometric Self-Avatars in Virtual Reality”, 65,000 €

2015 - 2017
  • DFG grant “Teach@Tübingen”, 20,400 €

2013
  • Scholarship for a PhD in Philosophy (Università degli Studi di Milano)

2010 - 2013
  • Nuffield Scholarship (University of Oxford)

2006

TEACHING EXPERIENCE

Instructor, Department of Philosophy, University of Tübingen:

  • Graduate Seminar (Oberseminar): Philosophy of Mind and Cognitive Science: Predictive Coding (co-taught with Hong Yu Wong; winter semester 2016/17)
  • Guest Lecture at Graduate Seminar on “Embodiment, Emotion and Experience” (summer semester 2015/2016)
  • Graduate Seminar (Hauptseminar) on Stephen Butterfill’s “The Developing Mind” (winter semester 2015/16)
  • Undergraduate Seminar (Proseminar): Topics in the Philosophy of Mind and in Philosophy of Psychology and Neuroscience (summer semester 2013/14)
  • Graduate Seminar (Hauptseminar): Connecting Intentions with Actions (winter semester 2013/14)

Graduate student supervision:

  • C. Stegemann, Department of Philosophy MA, University of Tübingen (2016/2017)

(awarded a PhD scholarship in the Ambiguity Research Training Group at the University of Tübingen)

  • K. Sücker, Graduate Training Centre in Neuroscience MSc, University of Tübingen (2016/2017)
  • JP Gamboa, Department of Philosophy MA, University of Tübingen (2015/2016)

(awarded a PhD fellowship in History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Pittsburgh)

SUMMER SCHOOLS

  • Rethinking the Senses Spring School, Dubrovnik, April 2017
  • Summer Seminars in Philosophy and Neuroscience, directed by Felipe De Brigard and Walter Sinnott-Armstrong, at Duke University [accepted applications: 25%], May-June 2016

VISITING POSITIONS

Visiting Graduate Student:

  • Department of Philosophy, University of Warwick, 2012

Supervisors: Stephen Butterfill, Johannes Roessler

  • Department of Psychological Sciences, Birkbeck, University of London, 2011

Supervisor: Matthew Longo

  • Institute of Philosophy, School of Advanced Study, University of London, 2010-2011

Supervisors: Barry C. Smith, Hong Yu Wong

SELECTED PRESENTATIONS

Keynote speaker

“Mirror neurons and (motor) intentions: Not so high, not so low”

15th Szklarska Por?ba Workshop on the Roots of Pragmasemantics, Szrenica (Poland), February 2013

Invited speaker

“Is action understanding a form of mindreading?”

Corcoran Department of Philosophy, University of Virginia, February 2017

“Intentions & Motor Representations: A Hierarchical Framework”

Bodily Experience and Self-Consciousness Conference, National Taiwan University, Taipei, October 2016

“Against Dual Theories of Intention”

Early Career Mind Network Pilot Meeting, University of Warwick, August 2015

“How could action understanding (sometimes) be a perceptual process?”

Consciousness and Cognition Research Colloquium, Ruhr-Universität Bochum, May 2015

“Prior intentions vs. intentions in action: Dispelling the myth”

“Rationality, Self-Knowledge and Human Agency” workshop, Universidade do Porto, December 2013

“Intentions, motor representations and body model”

Body Representation Laboratory weekly meeting, Department of Psychological Sciences Birkbeck, University of London, September 2013

“Action in (the content of) perception”

Doc’In Nicod (PhD student seminar), Institut Jean Nicod, Ecole Normale Supérieure, Paris, November 2010

Speaker at peer-reviewed conference

“Understanding motor actions: is this mindreading?”

ESPP conference, University of St Andrews, August 2016

“From Interaction to Intersubjectivity”, Aegina Summer School, June 2016

“The representational structure of action” (Olle Blomberg & Chiara Brozzo)

ESPP conference, University of St Andrews, August 2016

“How could action understanding (sometimes) be a perceptual process?”

“Practical Reasoning and Motor Representation” Workshop, University of Warwick, June 2015

“Simulating intentions without matching intentions” (Chiara Brozzo & Luca Barlassina)

“Reciprocity and Social Cognition” workshop, Berlin School of Mind & Brain, March 2015

ESPP conference, Universidad de Granada, July 2013

Workshop “Personal and Shared Intentions”, Max Planck Institute for Human Development, Berlin, May 2012

“Motor intentions: How intentions and motor representations come together”

ESPP conference, Noto, Università di Messina, September 2014

8th annual seminar “Self & Agency: Phenomenological approaches”, Université de Liège, April 2014

“Motor Intentions: Connecting Intentions with Actions”

“Shared Agency: International Masterclass with Michael Bratman”, Universiteit Antwerpen, August 2013

“Prior intentions vs. intentions in action: exploding the myth”

ESPP conference, University of London, August 2012

“Grasping motor concepts”

Sensory-Motor Concepts in Language and Cognition, Heinrich-Heine-Universität Düsseldorf, December 2011

ECAP (European Conference of Analytic Philosophy), Università degli Studi di Milano, September 2011

“Affording real enactivism” (Chiara Brozzo & Corrado Sinigaglia)

ESPP conference, Ruhr-Universität Bochum, August 2010

Discussant

Casey O’Callaghan’s “Enhancement through Coordination”

“Sensory Interactions” Workshop on C. O’ Callaghan’s work, Eberhard Karls Universität Tübingen, 2016

Alessandro Farné’s “Seeing to Feel”

Rethinking the Senses seminar, Institute of Philosophy, University of London, November 2014

Matthew Longo’s “Distorted Body Representations in Healthy Adults”

“Body Perception Workshop”, Eberhard Karls Universität Tübingen, November 2013

Louise Richardson’s “Smelling sweet things”

“Perception, Memory and Imagination” Workshop, Gargnano del Garda, September 2012

PROFESSIONAL ACTIVITY AND SERVICE

Refereeing

  • Referee for Philosophical Psychology (2015)
  • Referee for Review of Philosophy and Psychology (2014)

Conference organization

  • Organizer (with M. Stapleton) of the Interoception, Emotion and Embodiment workshop, Eberhard Karls Universität Tübingen (2016)
  • Organizer (with G. Hochstetter) of the Philosophy of Neuroscience Summer Research Forum, Eberhard Karls Universität Tübingen (2014)
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