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Gendler, Tamar. Intuition, Imagination, and Philosophical Methodology
2010, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
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Added by: Jie Gao
Publisher's Note: This volume consists of fourteen chapters that focus on a trio of interrelated themes. First: what are the powers and limits of appeals to intuition in supporting or refuting various sorts of claims? Second: what are the cognitive consequences of engaging with content that is represented as imaginary or otherwise unreal? Third: what are the implications of these issues for the methodology of philosophy more generally? These themes are explored in a variety of cases, including thought experiments in science and philosophy, early childhood pretense, self?deception, cognitive and emotional engagement with fiction, mental and motor imagery, automatic and habitual behavior, and social categorization.

Comment: The book contains fourteen previously published essays. The first six essays are on thought experiments and the use of the imagination therein. Mainly, these essays take up the tasks of explaining how thought experiments produce novel beliefs and explaining whether and how thought experiments justify beliefs. Those are good papers for teachings on methodology of philosophy and intuitions. The next six essays are on imagination in general: its nature, its role in motivating action and producing emotion, and its relations to other mental states. It covers a range of topics including the paradox of fictional emotions and the nature of self-deception, the puzzle of imaginative resistance, the problem of the precipice. The topic of the last two essays is a mental state called "alief" which are highly relevant materials for teachings on mental states in action, implicit bias and etc.

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Jackson Balcerak, Magdalena. Justification by Imagination
2018, In Fiona Macpherson & Fabian Dorsch (eds.), Perceptual Imagination and Perceptual Memory. Oxford University Press. pp. 209-226
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Added by: Giada Fratantonio
Summary: The author argues that experience constraints the nature of imagination in such a way that this results having a justificatory role.

Comment: Good to use as further reading in a course on the topic of the epistemology of imagination.

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Jacskon Balcerak, Magdalena. On the Epistemic Value of Imagining, Supposing and Conceiving
2016, In Amy Kind & Peter Kun (eds.), Knowledge Through Imagination. Oxford: Oxford University Press (2016)
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Added by: Giada Fratantonio
Abstract: Abstract. Philosophers frequently invoke our ability to imagine, conceive or suppose various thing in order to explain how we achieve our cognitive goals when we make decisions about future actions, when we perform thought experiments, and when we engage in games of pretense. But what is the relationship between imaginings, conceivings, and supposings? And what exactly are the epistemic roles they play in the cognitive projects in which they are involved? This chapter provides answers to these questions by first bringing out a contrast between what we do when we imagine and what we do when we suppose, and then by showing how to fit conceivings into the emerging systematic picture of the ways we use different forms of hypothetical thinking to acquire knowledge.

Comment: Good resource as further reading in an undergraduate course on epistemology of imagination, or as core reading in a graduate class on a similar topic.

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