Active Externalism and Epistemic Internalism
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The Extended Mind Thesis and Mechanistic Explanations
The Extended Mind Thesis and Mechanistic Explanations Peter Fazekas Institute of Philosophy, Research Centre for the Humanities Hungarian Academy of Sciences email: [email protected] Abstract The Extended Mind Thesis (EMT) is traditionally formulated against the bedrock of functionalism, and ongoing debates are typically bogged down with questions concerning the exact relationship between EMT and different versions of functionalism. In this paper, I offer a novel ally for EMT: the new mechanistic approach to explanation. I argue that the mechanistic framework provides useful resources not just to disambiguate EMT, and to show which objections fail to pose a serious challenge, but also to answer some of the deeper problems that stem from the functionalist roots of EMT. ! 1. Introduction The Extended Mind Thesis (EMT), first proposed by Clark and Chalmers (1998), claims that the vehicles of our cognitive processes and mental states can and sometimes do extend beyond the boundaries of our brain and even body (cf. Clark, 2008, p. 76). If a physical object plays a part in the machinery realising a cognitive process, then that physical object is part of the cognitive process, no matter whether it is inside or outside the head. This is the so-called parity principle (Clark & Chalmers, 1998, p. 8), the heart and soul of EMT. The most well-known illustration is the case of Otto and Inga. When Inga hears about a new exhibition at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) she retrieves from her biological memory that it is on 53rd Street and goes to the museum. Her counterpart, Otto, who suffers from a mild form of Alzheimer’s disease, uses a notebook to jot down and retrieve information. -
Extended Cognition and Extended Consciousness∗
Extended Cognition and Extended Consciousness∗ David J. Chalmers It’s a pleasure to contribute to this volume honoring Andy Clark. Andy has been an influential figure for me ever since I read his first book Microcognition while I was in graduate school. A few years later I took up my first job as a post-doctoral fellow working with him in the newly initiated Philosophy-Neuroscience-Psychology program at Washington University in St Louis. We had a lot of adventures, but the one that seems to have left the most traces is our joint paper on “The Extended Mind”, which argued that cognitive processes can extend outside the brain and the body to include objects that we interact with in our environment. I recently came across hard copies of two early drafts of “The Extended Mind” in my files. The first draft was by Andy on his own, and is covered in handwritten comments by me. The second draft is a co-authored version with revisions by me, and is covered in handwritten comments by Andy. (I have put these two online at consc.net/papers/e-drafts.html.) There were many further iterations after that. The whole thing is a wonderful record of distributed and extended cognition, involving a complex cognitive process spread between Andy, me, various notes on paper, and computer files. I’m proud to have played a role in constituting this process. That said, I have to acknowledge that as with many cases of distributed cognition, there was an individual at the core who set the whole process into motion and who bears primary responsbility, and that individual was Andy. -
Extended Emotion
Forthcoming in Philosophical Psychology EXTENDED EMOTION J. Adam Carter, Emma C. Gordon & S. Orestis Palermos Abstract: Recent thinking within philosophy of mind about the ways cognition can extend (e.g. Clark 2011; Clark & Chalmers 1998; Wilson 2000, 2004; Menary 2006) has yet to be integrated with philosophical theories of emotion, which give cognition a central role. We carve out new ground at the intersection of these areas, and in doing so, defend what we call the extended emotion thesis: i.e., the claim that some emotions can extend beyond skin and skull to parts of the external world. 0. INTRODUCTION Under certain descriptions, the claim that emotions ‘extend’ can be used to express ideas that are natural and familiar. Marshall McLuhan, for instance, famously advocated a very broad and intuitive idea of ‘human extension’ according to which individuals’ intellectual and emotional lives could be thought of as ‘extending’ into the world, through the resources of mass media and technology1. Within academic philosophy, at least one familiar expression of the idea of emotions ‘extending’ can be traced to David Hume’s account of motivational psychology; on this view, sentiment is necessary to motivate action, and thus as the thought would go, we might think of emotions as ‘extending’ through the causal vehicle of the actions they motivate. A much more provocative way, however, to think about emotions extending is along the following lines: that emotions themselves can extend beyond biological agents, and include parts of the physical world, external to the agent. On this proposal, the notion of emotions extending is not a metaphysically innocent metaphor: rather, some emotions themselves are claimed to supervene partly on extraorganismic elements in the 1 McLuhan (1964) world. -
PHIL10024: Theories of Mind
Course Guide PHIL10024: Theories of Mind 2017/18 Course Organiser: Dr Paul Schweizer Office Location: Room 5.13 DSB Office Hours: Friday 2-3pm and by Appointment Course Secretary: Ann-Marie Cowe ([email protected]) Contents 1. (Course) Aims and Objectives 2. Intended Learning Outcomes 3. Seminar Times and Locations 4. Seminar Content 5. PPLS Undergraduate Student Handbook 6. Readings 7. Assessment Information 8. Learn 9. Useful Information 10. Common Marking Scheme Department of Philosophy School of Philosophy, Psychology and Language Sciences University of Edinburgh 1. Course Aims and Objectives What is a mind – what are the essential characteristics distinguishing mental from non- mental systems? Two key features traditionally offered in response to this question are (1) representational content: mental states can be about external objects and states of affairs, they can represent and bear content or meaning; (2) conscious experience: only minds are consciously aware and have subjective, qualitative experiences – roughly, there is something it is like to be a mind. A central aim of the course will be to examine the extent to which these two features can be captured or explained by computational and/or physicalist methods, and to explore some of the conceptual issues basic to Cognitive Science and Artificial Intelligence as theoretical approaches to the mind. 2. Intended Learning Outcomes Students are asked to read, critically assess and discuss some of the most important texts in the philosophy of mind. Students will acquire the necessary conceptual resources to analyze and criticize different theoretical positions in this area. Students are encouraged to develop their critical and analytic skills in individual research. -
The Emergence of Distributed Cognition: a Conceptual Framework
submitted for Proceedings of Collective Intentionality IV, Siena (Italy), to be published as a special issue of Cognitive Systems Research The Emergence of Distributed Cognition: a conceptual framework Francis HEYLIGHEN, Margeret HEATH and Frank VAN OVERWALLE Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Pleinlaan 2, B-1050 Brussels, Belgium {fheyligh, mheath, fjvoverw}@vub.ac.be ABSTRACT: We propose a first step in the development of an integrated theory of the emergence of distributed cognition/extended mind. Distributed cognition is seen as the confluence of collective intelligence and “situatedness”, or the extension of cognitive processes into the physical environment. The framework is based on five fundamental assumptions: 1) groups of agents self-organize to form a differentiated, coordinated system, adapted to its environment, 2) the system co-opts external media for internal propagation of information, 3) the resulting distributed cognitive system can be modelled as a learning, connectionist network, 4) information in the network is transmitted selectively, 5) novel knowledge emerges through non-linear, recurrent interactions. The implication for collective intentionality is that such a self-organizing agent collective can develop “mental content” that is not reducible to individual cognitions. Extended Mind: collective intelligence and distributed cognition From a cybernetic perspective [Heylighen & Joslyn, 2001], a cognitive system cannot be understood as a discrete collection of beliefs, procedures, and/or modules. Cognition is a continuously evolving process which relates present perceptions via internal states to potential further perceptions and actions. It thus allows an agent to anticipate what may happen, adapt to changes in its environment, and moreover effect changes upon its environment [Kirsch & Maglio, 1994]. -
Schwitzgebel December 17, 2012 USA Consciousness, P. 1 If Materialism Is True, the United States Is Probably Conscious
If Materialism Is True, the United States Is Probably Conscious Eric Schwitzgebel Department of Philosophy University of California at Riverside Riverside, CA 92521 eschwitz at domain: ucr.edu December 17, 2012 Schwitzgebel December 17, 2012 USA Consciousness, p. 1 If Materialism Is True, the United States Is Probably Conscious Abstract: If you’re a materialist, you probably think that rabbits are conscious. And you ought to think that. After all, rabbits are a lot like us, biologically and neurophysiologically. If you’re a materialist, you probably also think that conscious experience would be present in a wide range of naturally-evolved alien beings behaviorally very similar to us even if they are physiologically very different. And you ought to think that. After all, to deny it seems insupportable Earthly chauvinism. But a materialist who accepts consciousness in weirdly formed aliens ought also to accept consciousness in spatially distributed group entities. If she then also accepts rabbit consciousness, she ought to accept the possibility of consciousness even in rather dumb group entities. Finally, the United States would seem to be a rather dumb group entity of the relevant sort. If we set aside our morphological prejudices against spatially distributed group entities, we can see that the United States has all the types of properties that materialists tend to regard as characteristic of conscious beings. Keywords: metaphysics, consciousness, phenomenology, group mind, superorganism, collective consciousness, metaphilosophy Schwitzgebel December 17, 2012 USA Consciousness, p. 2 If Materialism Is True, the United States Is Probably Conscious If materialism is true, the reason you have a stream of conscious experience – the reason there’s something it’s like to be you while there’s (presumably!) nothing it’s like to be a toy robot or a bowl of chicken soup, the reason you possess what Anglophone philosophers call phenomenology – is that the material stuff out of which you are made is organized the right way. -
Pushing the Boundaries of Consciousness and Cognition
Pushing the Boundaries of Consciousness and Cognition Kenneth Pepper PhD University of York Philosophy September 2014 Abstract This thesis synthesises material from contemporary cognitive science, analytic philosophy of mind continental phenomenology to defend a view of the mind as embodied and extended. The first three chapters focus primarily on embodiment, while the last two chapters focus more on factors external to the body. In chapter I, I introduce Merleau-Ponty's concept of the body schema and argue that we should resist reducing the body schema to an internal representation of the body, and also that it does not always coincide with the boundaries of the biological body. In chapter II, I explicate and defend the sensorimotor approach to visual perception, further invoking Merleau-Ponty's phenomenology to support the arguments therein and to address certain worries internal to the sensorimotor approach. Chapter III builds on the conclusions of chapters I and II to explore one way in which technological extensions of the body can lead to novel perceptual experiences, and tentatively suggests a limited sense in which these experience may still be said to be visual in character. In chapter IV, I move beyond the body to explicate and defend the extended mind thesis, according to which cognition can and often does take place partly outside of brain and body via the active use of external aids and props. Finally, in chapter V, I consider the question of whether, given the perceptual phenomenology described in chapter II and the case for cognitive extension presented in chapter IV, consciousness might also be said to be extended, and argue that if certain assumptions are granted, it can. -
Extended Mind-Wandering Bruineberg
Habitual smartphone use as extended mind-wandering Preprint before review, June 7, 2021 Jelle Bruineberg [email protected] ORCID: 0000-0001-5675-3376 Department of Philosophy, Macquarie University Regina E. Fabry [email protected] ORCID: 0000-0003-1078-1499 Department of Philosophy II, Ruhr University Bochum Habitual smartphone use as extended mind-wandering Jelle Bruineberg & Regina E. Fabry1 Abstract Smartphone use plays an increasingly important role in our daily lives. Philosophical research that has used first-wave or second-wave theories of extended cognition in order to understand our engagement with digital technologies has focused on the contribution of these technologies to the completion of specific cognitive tasks (e.g., remembering, reasoning, problem-solving, navigation). However, in a considerable number of cases, everyday smartphone use is either task-unrelated or task-free. In psychological research, these cases have been captured by notions such as absent-minded smartphone use (Marty- Dugas et al., 2018) or smartphone-related inattentiveness (Liebherr et al., 2020). Given the prevalence of these cases, we develop a conceptual framework that can accommodate the functional and phenomenological characteristics of task-unrelated or task-free smartphone use. To this end, we will integrate research on second-wave extended cognition with mind- wandering research and introduce the concept of ‘extended mind-wandering’. Elaborating the family resemblances approach to mind-wandering (Seli, Kane, Smallwood, et al., 2018), we will argue that task-unrelated or task-free smartphone use shares many characteristics with mind-wandering. We will suggest that an empirically informed conceptual analysis of cases of extended mind-wandering can enrich current work on digitally extended cognition by specifying the influence of the attention economy on our cognitive dynamics. -
Extended Mind” Thesis Helps to Solve a Fundamental Dilemma of Literacy Theory
AVANT Volume IV, Number 2/2013 www.avant.edu.pl/en AVANT, Vol. IV, No. 2/2013 ISSN: 2082-6710 avant.edu.pl/en DOI: 10.12849/40202013.0709.0005 How the “Extended Mind” Thesis Helps to Solve a Fundamental Dilemma of Literacy Theory Marcin Trybulec Maria Curie-Sklodowska University in Lublin marcin.trybulec[]umcs.pl Received 25 June 2013; accepted 7 September 2013; published Autumn 2013. Abstract The aim of the paper is to outline the basic theoretical reasons for applying the concept of extended mind to literacy theory. In order to explicate theoreti- cal difficulties faced by literacy theory, one needs to take into account the de- bate regarding technological determinism. Using this debate as an example, one can observe two basic strategies applied to defining the concept of a me- dium. On the one hand, there exists a strategy to formulate a narrow defini- tion of a medium in terms of material artifacts. On the other hand, one can observe a strategy which relies on creating a wide definition of a medium. According to this definition, a medium is understood as a social institution which denotes a particular way of behaving and thinking. The paper aims at justifying the hypothesis that both interpretational strategies employed in defining a medium and the related concept of technology are inaccurate in certain important respects. If the argumentation presented here proves cor- rect, literacy theory will be faced with a serious dilemma: a choice between two equally unsuitable definitions of technology/media. However, the theoret- ical dilemma pertaining to the question of media can be elucidated by appeal- ing to the conceptual framework of the extended mind hypothesis. -
Foreword to Andy Clark's Supersizing the Mind
Foreword to Andy Clark’s Supersizing the Mind David J. Chalmers A month ago, I bought an iPhone. The iPhone has already taken over some of the central functions of my brain. It has replaced part of my memory, storing phone numbers and addresses that I once would have taxed my brain with. It harbors my desires: I call up a memo with the names of my favorite dishes when I need to order at a local restaurant. I use it to calculate, when I need to figure out bills and tips. It is a tremendous resource in an argument, with Google ever present to help settle disputes. I make plans with it, using its calendar to help determine what I can and can’t do in the coming months. I even daydream on the iPhone, idly calling up words and images when my concentration slips. Friends joke that I should get the iPhone implanted into my brain. But if Andy Clark is right, all this would do is speed up the processing, and free up my hands. The iPhone is part of my mind already. Clark is a connoisseur of the myriad ways in which the mind relies on the world to get its work done. The first part of this marvelous book explores some of these ways: the extension of our bodies, the extension of our senses, and crucially, the use of language as a tool to extend our thought. The second part of the book defends the thesis that in at least some of these cases, the world is not serving as a mere instrument for the mind. -
10 the Boundaries of the Mind 1
10 THE BOUNDARIES OF THE MIND 1 Katalin Farkas 1. The Cartesian conception of the mind The subject of mental processes or mental states is usually assumed to be an indi- vidual, and hence the boundaries of mental features – in a strict or metaphorical sense – are naturally regarded as reaching no further than the boundaries of the individual. This chapter addresses various philosophical developments in the 20th and 21st century that questioned this natural assumption. I will frame this discus- sion by fi rst presenting a historically infl uential commitment to the individualistic nature of the mental in Descartes’ theory. I identify various elements in the Carte- sian conception of the mind that were subsequently criticized and rejected by vari- ous externalist theories, advocates of the extended mind hypothesis and defenders of embodied cognition. Then I will indicate the main trends in these critiques. Descartes’ work was partly a response to developments in natural science in the 17th century, and one of his goals was to provide a theoretical-philosophical foundation for modern science which rejected Aristotelian natural philosophy. Descartes was not the last philosopher who hoped to make a lasting contribution by providing a theory that integrates philosophy with modern science. Ever since the 17th century, there has been an occasionally reoccurring anxiety in philoso- phy – famously expressed for example by Kant in the Critique of Pure Reason – about the fact that while the sciences appear to make great progress, philosophy in comparison seems to make very little, if any progress. Various remedies have been suggested, for example by offering a methodology or grounding for philosophy that is either imported from the sciences, or is comparable to the objectivity and explanatory power of scientifi c method. -
Predictive Processing and Extended Consciousness: Why the Machinery of Consciousness
DEUTS FAILURE 1 Predictive processing and extended consciousness: why the machinery of consciousness is (probably) still in the head and the DEUTS argument won’t let it leak outside Abstract Consciousness vehicle externalism (CVE) is the claim that the material machinery of a subject’s phenomenology partially leaks outside a subject’s brain, encompassing bodily and environmental structures. The DEUTS argument is the most prominent argument for CVE in the sensorimotor enactivists’ arsenal. In a recent series of publications, Kirchhoff and Kiverstein have deployed such an argument to claim that a prominent view of neural processing, namely predictive processing, is fully compatible with CVE. Indeed, in Kirchhoff and Kiverstein’s view, a proper understanding of predictive processing mandates CVE. In this essay, we critically examine Kirchhoff and Kiverstein’s argument. Our aim is to argue in favor of the following three points. First, that Kirchhoff and Kiverstein’s emphasis on cultural practices lends no support to CVE: at best, it vindicates some form of content externalism about phenomenal content. Secondly, the criteria Kirchhoff and Kiverstein propose to identify a subject’s phenomenal machinery greatly overgeneralize, leaving them open to a “consciousness bloat” objection, which is an analog of the cognitive bloat objection against the extended mind. Lastly, we will argue that the “consciousness bloat” problem is inbuilt in the very argumentative structure of the DEUTS argument. We will thus conclude that, contrary to the philosophical mainstream, DEUTS is not the best argument for CVE in the sensorimotor enactivists’ argumentative arsenal. Keywords: Predictive Processing, Free Energy Principle, Markov Blankets, Extended Consciousness, Sensorimotor Enactivism.