Francesco Ellia, PhD

Honorary Scholar

Biography


I am a Philosopher of Science working on the theoretical foundation of the Neuroscience of Consciousness and the Mind-Body Problem. I obtained my BA in Philosophy from the University of Bologna in 2015 and my MSc from Edinburgh in 2016, specializing in Philosophy of Science. Between 2018 and 2019, I was a partner of the Alma Idea Project: “I-Core: Interconnettività e Resilienza.” Between 2019 and 2020, I was a visting honorary scholar at the Center for Sleep and Consciousness, where I worked under the supervision of Prof. Giulio Tononi. In 2020 I completed the doctoral supervision program “European Ph.D. Network in Philosophy” from the universities of Bergen (Norway), Bielefeld (Germany), Bologna (Italy), Bucharest (Romania), Helsinki (Finland), Uppsala (Sweden). In 2021, I received my Ph.D. in “Philosophy, Science, and Cognition” from the University of Bologna, with a thesis titled “Integrated Information Theory: An Empirically Testable Solution to the Mind-Body Problem”.

Research Interests: Integrated Information Theory, Consciousness, Causation, Emergence, Reductionism, Free Will, Philosophy of Science, Theoretical Neuroscience.

Selected Publications


Ellia F, Hendren J, Grasso M, Kozma C, Mindt G, Lang JP, Haun A, Albantakis L, Boly M and Tononi G (2021) Consciousness is a structure, not a function. Neuroscience of Consciousness, 2021(2). doi: 10.1093/nc/niab032

Ellia F, Chis-Ciure R. (in press) Consciousness and Complexity: Integrated Information Theory and Neurobiological Naturalism. Consciousness and Cognition.

Ellia F (2021) Integrated Information Theory: An Empirically Testable Solution to the Mind-Body Problem. Doctoral Dissertation, Alma Mater Studiorum University of Bologna.

Chis-Ciure R, Ellia F (2021) Facing Up to the Hard Problem of Consciousness as an Integrated Information Theorist. Foundations of Science, 1-17. Special Issue on “Connecting Things in the setting of Foundations and Philosophy of Science”. doi: 10.1001/s10699-020-09724-7

Ellia F (2018) Francis Crick and the Hard Problem of Consciousness. In C. Chesi & G. Piredda (eds.) Proceedings of the 15th Conference of the Italian Association for Cognitive Sciences (AISC 2018). IUSS Pavia, 17-19 December 2018.