Is the folk concept of pain polyeidic?

Borg, Emma; Harrison, Richard; Stazicker, James David; Salomons, Tim V.

doi:10.1111/mila.12227

Cited by 25 publications

(39 citation statements)

References 40 publications

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“…This property can be construed in terms of a dimension that grows with the magnitude of felt unpleasantness (Price 2000). Some authors suggest a dimension with two mutually exclusive extremes modeling magnitudes of negative and positive valence (e.g., Borg et al 2020). I will model the affective dimension only in terms of unpleasantness as the valence of pain is negative in paradigmatic cases.…”

Section: Phenomenal Structurementioning

confidence: 99%

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A multidimensional phenomenal space for pain: structure, primitiveness, and utility

Coninx

2021

Phenom Cogn Sci

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Pain is often used as the paradigmatic example of a phenomenal kind with a phenomenal quality common and unique to its instantiations. Philosophers have intensely discussed the relation between the subjective feeling, which unites pains and distinguishes them from other experiences, and the phenomenal properties of sensory, affective, and evaluative character along which pains typically vary. At the center of this discussion is the question whether the phenomenal properties prove necessary and/or sufficient for pain. In the empirical literature, sensory, affective, and evaluative properties have played a decisive role in the investigation of psychophysical correspondence and clinical diagnostics. This paper addresses the outlined philosophical and empirical issues from a new perspective by constructing a multidimensional phenomenal space for pain. First, the paper will construe the phenomenal properties of pains in terms of a property space whose structure reflects phenomenal similarities and dissimilarities by means of spatial distance. Second, philosophical debates on necessary and sufficient properties are reconsidered in terms of whether there is a phenomenal space formed of dimensions along which all and only pains vary. It is concluded that there is no space of this kind and, thus, that pain constitutes a primitive phenomenal kind that cannot be analyzed entirely in terms of its varying phenomenal properties. Third, the paper addresses the utility of continued reference to pain and its phenomenal properties in philosophical and scientific discourses. It is argued that numerous insights into the phenomenal structure of pain can be gained that have thus far received insufficient attention.

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Section: Phenomenal Structurementioning

confidence: 99%

“…This paper does not concern the notion "pain" and the construction of a conceptual space that represents the different manners in which it is used (e.g.,Borg et al 2020). The focus is not to better understand the composition and acquisition of concepts, but to develop an approach to the phenomenal complexity and variability of pain.…”

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A multidimensional phenomenal space for pain: structure, primitiveness, and utility

Coninx

2021

Phenom Cogn Sci

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“…Indeed, the preliminary results of an empirical survey among scientists and clinicians strongly suggest that they don't think the relevant body parts can have subjective experiences in them. See below.3 In philosophical literature, this puzzle has come to be called the "paradox of pain"(Hill 2006(Hill , 2009Borg et al 2019;Bradley 2019). I prefer "puzzle" over "paradox" since the latter may imply that the conception is internally incoherent.…”

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confidence: 99%

“… 3 In philosophical literature, this puzzle has come to be called the “paradox of pain” (Hill 2006, 2009; Borg et al 2019; Bradley 2019). I prefer “puzzle” over “paradox” since the latter may imply that the conception is internally incoherent.…”

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confidence: 99%

“…The other is that depending on how you set up the vignettes and questions, you can get results supporting either strand; this is not surprising at all. To see a detailed and pretty convincing criticism of their work along these lines, see Borg et al (2019). Furthermore, it is not at all clear what Sytsma and his colleagues think the bodily conception of pain is that they attribute to Folk.…”

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What Is a Pain in a Body Part?

Aydede

2019

Can. J. of Philosophy

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The International Association for the Study of Pain’s (IASP) definition of “pain” defines it as a subjective experience. The Note accompanying the definition emphasizes that, as such, pains are not to be identified with objective conditions of body parts (such as actual or potential tissue damage). Nevertheless, it goes on to state that a pain “is unquestionably a sensation in a part or parts of the body, but it is also always unpleasant and therefore also an emotional experience.” This generates a puzzle that philosophers have been well familiar with: how to understand our utterances and judgments attributing pain to body parts. (The puzzle is, of course, general extending to all sensations routinely located in body parts.) This work tackles this puzzle. I go over various options specifying the truth-conditions for pain-attributing judgments and, at the end, make my own recommendation which is an adverbialist, qualia-friendly proposal with completely naturalistic credentials that is also compatible with forms of weak intentionalism. The results are generalizable to other bodily sensations and can be used to illustrate, quite generally, the viability of a qualia-friendly adverbialist (but naturalist and weakly intentionalist) account of perception.

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The Meaning of Pain Expressions and Pain Communication

2019

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Both patients and clinicians frequently report problems around communicating and assessing pain. Patients express dissatisfaction with their doctors and doctors often find exchanges with chronic pain patients difficult and frustrating. This chapter thus asks how we could improve pain communication and thereby enhance outcomes for chronic pain patients. We argue that improving matters will require a better appreciation of the complex meaning of pain terms and of the variability and flexibility in how individuals think about pain.We start by examining the various accounts of the meaning of pain terms that have been suggested within philosophy and suggest that, while each of the accounts captures something important about our use of pain terms, none is completely satisfactory. We propose that pain terms should be viewed as communicating complex meanings, which may change across different communicative contexts, and this in turn suggests that we should view our ordinary thought about pain as similarly complex. We then sketch what a view taking seriously this variability in meaning and thought might look like, which we call the "polyeidic" view. According to this view individuals tacitly occupy divergent stances across a range of different dimensions of pain, with one agent, for instance, thinking of pain in a much more 'body-centric' kind of way, while another thinks of pain in a much more 'mind-centric' way. The polyeidic view attempts to expand the multidimensionality recognised in, e.g., biopsychosocial models in two directions: first, it holds that the standard triumvirate -dividing sensory/cognitive/affective factors -needs to be enriched in order to capture important distinctions within the social and psychological dimensions. Second, the polyeidic view attempts to explain (at least in part) why modulation of experience by these social and psychological factors is possible in the first place. It does so by arguing that because the folk concept of pain is complex,different weightings of the different parts of the concept can modulate pain experience in a variety of ways. Finally, we argue that adopting a polyeidic approach to the meaning of pain would have a range of measurable clinical outcomes. Clinical Implications (101)First, by making a subject's tacit beliefs about pain explicit it will be possible to create a more open, shared space for pain communication (particularly between clinicians and patients) and support a move away from purely quantitative measures of pain towards more discursive pain narratives. Secondly, the polyeidic view might provide a mechanism for predicting who will do well or badly from cognitive interventions for pain management, allowing more efficient use of healthcare resources. Finally, the polyeidic approach might also contribute to the creation of more nuanced cognitive interventions, by elucidating the pre-conscious beliefs that influence a subject's experience of pain.

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Is the folk concept of pain polyeidic?

Cited by 25 publications

References 40 publications

A multidimensional phenomenal space for pain: structure, primitiveness, and utility

A multidimensional phenomenal space for pain: structure, primitiveness, and utility

What Is a Pain in a Body Part?

The Meaning of Pain Expressions and Pain Communication

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