Shorter Sutton and Menary

One nagging concern I've had about the Sutton, et al., and Menary "Holy Grail" papers is that they do not seem to me to be all that interested in the claim that cognitive processes are realized by (or supervene upon) processes in the brain, body, and world.   This, however, seems to me to be one of the least problematic ways of stating the hypothesis of extended cognition.  I worry that the discussion has somehow gotten off track.

Parsing the A&A Rhetoric

One does not have to insist that the hypothesis of intracranial processes of memory processing is a mere relic of an unexamined Cartesian prejudice. Instead one can  maintain, as we do, that there is a scientifically and philosophically motivated  reason to believe that there are psychological processes that are found in brains that are unlike processes that span brains, bodies, and environments. (2008, p.179)

This rhetoric is particularly puzzling from the point of view of a complementarity theorist, whose projects rest on analyzing such differences between coordinated internal and external processes. In characterizing Sutton’s work as ‘non-revolutionary’, then, Adams and Aizawa must be construing a truly ‘revolutionary’ form of extended cognition as the view that external resources always constitute psychological processes, and that thus memory processing, for example, is never intracranial: but this dramatically extremised view is not one that complementarity theorists, at least, have ever defended .

There are two claims that are up in the air: A) Cognitive processes are commonly realized by the brain, body, and world.  B) There are no intracranial cognitive processes.  A&A think both are false.  A) Sutton, et al., no longer seem to want to argue about this, dismissing the talk of where the mind "really" is.  B) is the "dramatically extremised view" that Sutton, et al., have not noticed has been advocated by many in the EC literature. That's what all the posts on revolutionary EC are about.  Maybe Wilson and Sutton have not made these claims, but plenty of others have.

N.B.: Rowlands vigorously protests that he does not deny, and never has denied, instances of purely intracranial cognition.   (See comments here.)  I still find what he has written on this more equivocal than he does, but that's the state of play.

The Rich Middle Ground

So Adams and Aizawa first treat extended cognition as a ‘revolutionary’ thesis which denies intracranial cognition, and then suggest that complementarity fails to deliver on the revolutionary promise. They are thus seeking to trap the extended cognition theorist in a dilemma: either maintain the extreme ‘revolutionary’ position, or collapse back into individualism. But we reject the alleged dilemma. Along with Clark and the others, we inhabit a rich middle ground, one which this paper continues to develop, which is entirely distinct both from internalist forms of cognitivism and from externalist anti-cognitivism. Yet when Adams and Aizawa do accurately acknowledge that our views are not anti-cognitivist, they try to assimilate us to a more conservative internalism. (Sutton, et al.)

A&A don't offer this dilemma.  That dilemma is of Sutton, et al.'s, making.  The A&A view is easy.  Complementarity does not support the rejection of intracranial cognition.  That's now common ground between A&A and Sutton, et al.  Second, complementarity does not offer an argument for HEC. A&A argued for this, and Sutton, et al., apparently don't want to fight over HEC versus HEMC.  This whole middle ground that they want to explore is what we conceded they should explore ... just don't take it to be HEC or to undermine intracranial cognition.

To me, again the upshot is that, apparent misunderstandings aside, the rich middle ground is a fine topic to study.

A&A vs Sutton, et al.

The empirical programs we describe below have their own momentum, independent of any connection with philosophical issues. In particular, we do not argue that the Desert Song case, or any of the other examples of collaborative recall which we discuss below, entails any particular view on whether cognition and memory are in fact often extended or distributed. Theorists can continue to treat each individual’s cognitive processes in isolation, as occurring solely within the head, even if causally triggered or cued by non-cognitive external input. (Sutton, Harris, Keil, & Barnier).

Sutton’s project, they say, ‘can be undertaken while leaving much of the cognitive psychology of memory as the study of processes that take place, essentially without exception, within nervous systems’ (2008, p.179). 

So, why do Sutton, et al., want to disagree with us?  We seem to be on the same page.

A&A's Concession to Complementarity

Here is what Sutton, et al., have to say about the A&A concession to complementarity:

After quoting Clark (1998) and Sutton’s (2010) exposition of the complementarity principle, Adams and Aizawa write ‘We agree with this completely’. We are delighted that they accept the basic claims of the complementarity argument.

But, that doesn't get our view right.  We concede that there is a complementarity between brain processes and environmental processes, but we do not concede an argument from complementarity of brain and environmental processes to extended cognitive processes.  So, we do not accept the basic claims of the complementarity argument.  Consider the text of The Bounds of Cognition,

“Second-wave” extended cognition, however, is based on what Sutton calls a ‘complementarity principle”: 

in extended cognitive systems, external states and processes need not mimic or replicate the formats, dynamics, or functions of inner states and processes.  Rather, different components of the overall (enduring or temporary) system can play quite different roles and have different properties while coupling in collective and complementary contributions to flexible thinking and acting” (Sutton, forthcoming)

We agree with this completely.  Only, we do not think this in any way supports the hypothesis that cognitive processes extend from the brain into the body and environment.  Many of the ideas we have developed in previous chapters should make it clear why.  (Adams & Aizawa, 2008, p. 145).

The A&A view is that there is complementarity, but that's no reason to believe in HEC.  One should, however, bear in mind that A&A draw a distinction between the hypothesis of extended cognitive systems and the hypothesis of extended cognition (or hypothesis of extended cognitive processes).

Sutton's Project and Intracranialism

Sutton’s project, they say, ‘can be undertaken while leaving much of the cognitive psychology of memory as the study of processes that take place, essentially without exception, within nervous systems’ (2008, p.179). We disagree: this reversion to internalism is not an implication of Sutton’s view. (Sutton, Harris, Keil, and Barnier, forthcoming, pp. 8-9).

I think there is a misinterpretation here.  The A&A claim (as one can see from the fragment that Sutton, et al., quote right there) is that Sutton's project can be undertaken ...  It is not that Sutton's project requires or implies that cognitive psychology of memory is, or must be, the study of processes that take place, essentially without exception, within nervous systems.  So, the earlier comment Sutton, et al., made on this score is not a mere typo or accidental infelicity in wording.  They seem genuinely to have mistaken the A&A claim.

For Sutton, et al. HEC vs. HEMC is not at Issue (Mostly)

Placing different cases within such a multidimensional framework is a more fruitful empirical project than continuing to debate whether cognition or memory is ‘really’ extended or ‘merely’ embedded.  (Sutton, et al.)

So, here, HEC versus HEMC seems to be dismissed or downplayed.

Assessing these two distinct lines of thought, Clark saw the complementarity between heterogeneous inner and outer resources as grounding ‘the more interesting and plausible argument’:

The argument for the extended mind thus turns primarily on the way disparate inner and outer components may co-operate so as to yield integrated larger systems capable of supporting various (often quite advanced) forms of adaptive success. The external factors and operations, in this model, are most unlikely to be computationally identical to the ones supported directly in the wetware ... (Clark 1998, p.99)

(Sutton, et al.)

But, here Sutton, et al., seem to be citing Clark, with approval, as holding the view that complementarity leads to HEC.  Maybe Sutton, et al., don't care to fight over HEC versus HEMC, but I am assuming that Clark did and was supporting HEC.

Yet, as we’ve noted, some common objections to parity- or functionalism-based extended cognition do not apply to complementarity-based extended cognition: in turn, the latter view may face different challenges of its own. Complementarity therefore deserves fuller and independent exploration if we want to evaluate the overall case for extended cognition. One tack for such constructive exploration involves detailed application of complementarity considerations to the key domain of memory, and this is the driving aim of the research program we describe in the second half of this paper. First we need to examine responses to complementarity.   (Sutton, et al.)

Now, in the first passage, Sutton, et al., suggest that they are not going to engage the HEC versus HEMC issue, but then in the second they cite with approval Clark's apparent efforts to argue for HEC by way of complementarity.  Then in the third, they suggest that this is a complementarity argument for EC, which I'm guessing is HEC.

It doesn't matter that much to me which road Sutton, et al. want to take, i.e. whether they want to engage HEC versus HEMC or not, but what I care about is that a) complementarity does not seem to support HEC and b) complementarity does not rule out intracranial cognition.  And, in an exchange over at Gary's blog, John seems to agree with me on this. 

And, I think John and I also agree that the study of the complementary relations between brain and body and environment are ok.

So, I'm not sure that I have that much in the way of substantive disagreements with Sutton, et al.

Who Supports Revolutionary EC 8?

So, Sutton, et al. have (probably) never denied that cognitive processes take place in the brain:

“We are entirely happy to treat study of ‘the kinds of processes that take place in the brain’ as scientifically valid, and to accept intracranial cognition: we have never argued otherwise, and nor to our knowledge has Clark.”

But, there is a fairly robust group of 4EA type philosophers who have.  This includes Haugeland, Hurley, Menary, Rowlands, and Thompson.  In particular, Clark has, at least at times, rejected intracranial cognition.  Here is one point.

“I’d encountered the idea that we were all cyborgs once or twice before, but usually in writings on gender or in postmodernist (or post postmodernist) studies of text. What struck me in July 1997 was that this kind of story was the literal and scientific truth. The human mind, if it is to be the physical organ of human reason, simply cannot be seen as bound and restricted by the biological skinbag. In fact, it has never been thus restricted and bound, at least not since the first meaningful words were uttered on some ancestral plain. But this ancient seepage has been gathering momentum with the ad-vent of texts, PCs, co evolving software agents, and user-adaptive home and office devices. The mind is just less and less in the head.”  Clark, Natural Born Cyborgs, p. 4

Now, I know that in Supersizing Clark has been happy to talk about a "cognitive core",  but here is a case where he appears to deny this. It's probably possible to read this as not denying intracranial cognition (it's hard to really pin an unwanted view on a philosopher), but then again it is also plausible to read this as denying intracranial cognition. 

Shapiro Gets it Wrong

On the dustcover to The Bounds of Cognition, Larry writes,

"Adams and Aizawa have written a book that is going to leave more than a few researchers in the burgeoning field of embodied cognition scratching their heads and wondering how they could have said those things."

He's wrong, because we've written a book that is leaving Sutton, Harris, Keil, and Barnier, bewildered (rather than scratching their heads) and saying they never said those things (rather than wondering how they could have said those things).

We are bewildered at the dialectic on which Adams and Aizawa here rely. We are entirely happy to treat the study of intracranial processes as scientifically valid, and to accept intracranial cognition: we have never argued otherwise, and nor to our knowledge has Clark (nor Rowlands, nor Wilson). Cognition is not necessarily or always extended (Wilson & Clark 2009, p.74; Sutton 2010, p.191; Rowlands 2010).

Now, I think it may well be true that Sutton never denied that there are intracranial cognitive processes and perhaps Rob Wilson never has as well.   I don't know of text in which they deny this.  On the other hand, many advocates of EC do deny this.  For quotations to this effect, check out my posts labeled "Revolutionary EC".  The revolutionary claim is that there is no intracranial cognition.

I'll be posting a few more references to this in the coming days.

I will also be indicating respects in which I think that Sutton, et al., misinterpret what A&A are up to, so readers might check out the four brief pages where A&A discuss complementarity in The Bounds of Cognition.  (They are pages 143-7).

Future posts 11/16/2010

This week I'll be leaving off with the Runeson posts, then turning briefly to some largely supportive (for me) comments on Krist Vaesen's "Knowlege without credit, exhibit 4: Extended Cognition".  It is conveniently available for download here.

Next week I think I'll be turning to Sutton, Harris, Keil, and Barnier, (2010), "The Psychology of Memory, Extended Cognition, and Socially Distributed Remembering".  Marko Farino and Gary Williams have chided me about this one.  You can see the principal lines of my reply to Sutton, et al., over at Gary's blog.

After that, I'll have a few stray comments before, I think, returning to the TSRM paper.  Billing to the contrary, I don't think that TSRM solve either Fodor & Pylyshyn's Trivialization Problem or the problem of illusions.  The problems, indeed, interact.