Extended cognition and intrinsic properties

Abstract

The hypothesis of extended cognition (HEC) has been criticized as committing what is called the coupling–constitution fallacy, but it is the critic's use of this concept which is fallacious. It is true that there is no reason to deny that the line between the self and the world should be drawn at the skull and/or the skin. But the data used to support HEC reveal that there was never a good enough reason to draw the line there in the first place. The burden of proof has fallen on the mind–brain identity theory, now that our intuitions/prejudices no longer support it. One of those “intuitions” is the Aristotelian assumption that the world can be neatly divided into objects that possess intrinsic causal powers, and the causal relations that connect those objects. In modern science, however, the concept of intrinsic causal powers is only a temporary stopgap that makes it possible to begin research in a particular area. It therefore seems best to assume that the line between mind and world is both pragmatic and dynamic. Consequently, the mind might best described as a fluctuating field, rather than an object or structure.

Keywords:

• Behavioral Field
• Coupling–Constitution Fallacy
• Extended Cognition
• Frederick Adams
• Robert Rupert
• Andy Clark
• Kenneth Aizawa

Notes

[1] This is one of the most common, and most easily answered, objections to HEC. Bickle implies that the mind–brain identity theory must be true because “We cannot—as a matter of empirical fact, not metaphysical intuition—intervene into any environmental components of a causal nexus to change the behavioral effect, without evoking changes in the nervous system” (2008, p. 510). However, this fact, and the other empirical facts that Bickle cites after this quote, only show that the brain is necessary for mental states, and identity requires both necessity and sufficiency. Spark plugs are necessary in order to have a functioning car, but the fact that they are not sufficient prevents one from driving to work with nothing but a set of spark plugs. He also points out that “we can invoke behavioral change by manipulating neural components in the causal nexus, without changing the normal environmental components one iota … experimental techniques exist for doing exactly this” (Bickle, 2008, pp. 510–511). This does not, however, prove that these neural components are identical to the experiences of the organism being manipulated. A fuse box can control the lighting system of an entire house, but that does not make the fuse box identical to the lighting system. Neurophilosophers often cite detailed facts to support a position, but the real challenge is often determining whether facts of that sort actually support their position.

[2] Or more accurately, societies of cognizers understanding their world, although that idea is still new even for HEC theorists. We obviously do not live in a multisolipsistic universe in which each organism has its own self-contained world. The world in the mind's brain–body–world nexus contains not only other physical items, but also other minds. The symbiotic relationship that mutually constitutes minds and physical items is both different from and similar to the sympathetic relationship that mutually constitutes minds in a shared world. There is obviously a great deal that needs to be said about these similarities and differences. Heidegger acknowledged the differences when he made a distinction between (1) the present-at-hand and ready-to-hand being of physical objects and (2) the being-with that we share with other dasein (Heidegger, 1926/1962, pp. 153–163). However, as is his wont, Heidegger said very little about how to explain these differences in scientific terms. In Rockwell (2007), there is some discussion of the possibility that people who have strong sympathetic attachments to each other (family, friends, etc.) could be said in some sense to feel the same emotion, rather than be aware of each other's different emotions. These kinds of sympathetic attachments would fluctuate if the mind is a behavioral field, which would create the illusion that these minds are intrinsically separate and distinct. Like the rest of the HEC, this is counterintuitive and weird, but there is no denying that there are serious problems with the current paradigm of isolated rational egos that has emerged from our Cartesian presuppositions. That, however, is a subject for another book, at the very least.