[rohrpost] CALL FOR PAPERS (20-4-2013): Workshop on "The Altered Self and Altered Self Experience" May 30-31 2013 UNL Portugal

[Ingeborg Reichle]

Workshop on

The Altered Self and Altered Self-Experience
May 30-31, 2013
New University of Lisbon

>From a theoretical point of view the experiences in which the feeling
of self is temporarily or permanently altered, pose opportunities to
apply, critically verify or even renew theories of the self.

The altered self, from a human point of view, gains its most relevance
when it is related to psychological sufferings, their comprehension,
relief or treatment. However, not all altered self-experiences imply
suffering or respective treatment. In eastern (and some western)
philosophical traditions a „No-Self“ is considered. Techniques of a
Self/ No- self include states of meditation, mindfulness or effortless
attention. Moreover, for some, self-alterations are desired as in
technically achieved, or drug induced suspensions of a “fixed”,
„regular“, „normalized“ or „orthodox“ experience of self. Other
self-alterations are even conceived as deliberately induced
„enhancements“ of the self.

Different conceptual and clinical notions of the altered Self and
different modes of altered self-experience will be explored in this
intensive workshop in order to clarify the notion of the self.

Organizers:

Dr. Jorge Gonçalves jorgealvesenator at gmail.com

Dr. Alexander Gerner alexandergerner at gmail.com

(Members of the Research Project: Cognitive Foundation of the Self)

“Fundamentos Cognitivos do Si”


Call for abstracts:

DEADLINE FOR ABSTRACTS: 20th of April 2013

ACCEPTANCE NOTIFICATION: until 25th of April 2013

Here a list of possible (not necessary, nor exclusive) topics to be
treated in the workshop with some examples


(1) What can (Psycho-) pathologies of the self from different perspectives

(Phenomenology, Psychiatry, Psychoanalysis, Philosophy of Mind,
Evolutionary

Psychology, Cognitive (Neuro-) Sciences etc.) tell us about the
phenomenon of the self?

Examples:

- Different notions of self/other in Autism/ Schizophrenia/
Dissociated Identity

Disorder/ ADHD etc.


(2) Different conceptual approaches towards the altered self in
philosophy of psychiatry

and modes of treatment

Examples:

- Dysfunctional/ disrupted/ disturbed/ pathologic/ abnormal/
suffering/ ill/

partitioned/ split/ restituted or altered Self

- Dichotomies of „order/disorder“ „normality/pathology“,
„regularity/irregularity“ in

relation to the self in „mental disorders“

- Altered self- other relations

- Altered social and ecologic self and its psychosomatic co-relations

- Non- reductionistic accounts of the altered self in philosophy and
psychiatry


(3) Altered self in between the minimal/ primordial bodily self and
the extended/

personal self


(4) Mineness, Ownership, Self-Control and its exuberance or denial in
altered self states

Examples:

- Thought insertion, dissociative self states, Self delusion, Self
deception, Self

rejection, delirium, hallucinating Self (auditory, visual, vestibular
hallucinations)


(5) Constitution, change/dynamics and alteration of the unity of self

Examples:

- The unity/disunity of self

-The unity/disunity of the self in between first- person and second-
person

perspective

- (Dis-) unity of the Self : Split self, Altered Self-demarcation,
self- consistancy, selfcoherence

- Transitivism, Ipsiety, territorialization/ desterritorialization of
the Self


(6) Modeling or transcending the self? Philosophical concepts and the
praxis of the No-

Self in western and eastern (buddist, Indian, Japanese, Chinese)
psychological

philosophical traditions


(7) Altered bodily self-awareness: Altered self- affection, Hyper- and
hypo-responsiveness

of the bodily self

Examples:

- Hyperreflexive, self-centered or hyperactive self

- hyperbolic self-experience

- altered existential feelings of self:

- Self as stranger: being in the wrong body, feeling dead, changes in
the feeling of

vitality etc.


(8) Altered Self-agency and altered self-concepts


(9) Altered Corporality of the self, altered self –perception,
disembodiment and

autoscopic self-experiences,

Examples:

- Self in Out-of-body experiences and different forms of autoscopic
experience

(polyopic autoscopy, heautoscopy, the feeling of a presence etc.)

- Constitution and alteration of the first- and second- person
perspective in

autoscopic experiences

- Doubles of self

- Altered bodily experience between selfhood and otherness


(10) Techniques of alteration of the self and its philosophical groundings

Examples:

- Self- techniques

- Altered self-experience in flow and effortless attention

- Techniques of mindfulness, compassion, wisdom and meditation as
altered selfexperience

- Philosophical approaches to self-techniques and self-development


(11) Drugs and altered self-experience: pharmacological and
technological inductions of

altered self-experience.

Examples:

- Pharmacological alteration of the self

- Altered Self and the drive for "intoxication"


(12) Self-enhancement: Philosophical issues in non-invasive and
invasive (Brain-)

Technological and psychopharmacological interventions and changes of
the minimal

bodily self and the personal self

Examples:

- Can (and should) the self be enhanced?

- invasive (brain-)technological induced alteration of the self

among other topics of Altered Self and Altered Self-experience (ASASE)

Location:

Institute of Philosophy of Language (IFL),

New University of Lisbon (FCSH, UNL)

Lisbon 30 -31th of May 2013, 10-18h

Participation at this workshop is open to other researchers although
will be limited to around 20 participants. Those who would like to
participate at the workshop are invited to send an email with the
title and an original extended abstract (max. 500 words) proposals
with the following SUBJECT line: “ASASE 2013 Abstract Proposal [name]”
to both organizers:

Dr. Jorge Gonçalves jorgealvesenator at gmail.com

Dr. Alexander Gerner alexandergerner at gmail.com


Please include a short CV (until 180 Words) both in doc and pdf
format. The presentation of selected papers should not exceed 20min at
length, and will be followed by 10-20 min of discussion after a panel.
The conference language is English.

This workshop is part of the Portuguese Government funded project
(FCT) on the Cognitive Foundations of the Self:

Site: http://foundationsoftheself.squarespace.com/

Funding: PTDC/FIL-FCI/110978/2009