Philosophy and Phenomenological Research © 2013 Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, LLC The Role of Bodily Perception in Emotion: In Defense of an Impure Somatic Theory LUCA BARLASSINA* AND ALBERT NEWEN Ruhr-Universitat€ Bochum Abstract In this paper, we develop an impure somatic theory of emotion, according to which emotions are constituted by the integration of bodily perceptions with representations of external objects, events, or states of affairs. We put forward our theory by contrasting it with Prinz’s (2004) pure somatic theory, according to which emotions are entirely constituted by bodily perceptions. After illustrating Prinz’s theory and discussing the evidence in its favor, we show that it is beset by serious problems—i.e., it gets the neural correlates of emo- tion wrong, it isn’t able to distinguish emotions from bodily percep- tions that aren’t emotions, it cannot account for emotions being directed towards particular objects, and it mischaracterizes emotion phenomenology. We argue that our theory accounts for the empirical evidence considered by Prinz and solves the problems faced by his theory. In particular, we maintain that our theory gives a unified and principled account of the relation between emotions and bodily per- ceptions, the intentionality of emotions, and emotion phenomenol- ogy. 1. Introduction In this paper, we propose that emotions are constituted by the integration of bodily perceptions with representations of external objects, events, or states * Corresponding author. Address: Ruhr-Universit€at Bochum, Institut fur€ Philosophie II, GA3/39, Universit€atsstr. 150, D-44780 Bochum, Germany. Tel.: +49-234-32-24721. E-mail address:
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