Marco Viola, “Ma(s)king Faces. The exaptation of social functions in biology and material culture”

Social psychologists conceive the face as a primary channel for social communication. However, evolutionary biology suggests that in principle the face was but a set of sensory and homeostatic organs. This set of organs is then exapted to become a powerful communication tool for conveying several kinds of social information. Building on this sketchy taxonomy of face functions, I propose a taxonomy of functions for an artifact that interacts with the face, namely the mask. Construing mask as a tool whose purpose is to interact with face, I distinguish between protective and social masks depending on whether their proper function is to interact with the sensory/homeostatic or with the social functions of the face. Within social masks, I distinguish between masks designed to add, that alter, or that remove social information offered by the face. However, similarly to biological organs adapted for a given function, artifacts designed to play a given proper functions often ends up having some side-effects and perhaps they get repurposed for other functions too. This is particularly evident for masks due to the overcrowding of functions of the face. To show whether it is the case, I will show how the Covid facemask, originally designed to work as a protective mask, ends up playing several social functions too.

Event is free and open to interested philosophers and scientists! Contact John (jbickle@philrel.msstate.edu) or Antonella (antonella.tramacere2@unibo.it) for login instructions.