Rupert Review of Rowlands New Science

At NDPR.

From Blomberg's Review of Rowlands' New Science

    To sum up, The New Science of the Mind is in my view an uneven book. The first part is a brief and useful introduction to the philosophy of embodied, extended and enactive cognition. The second part is an excellent analysis of counterarguments to the embodied and extended mind (and their combination in the amalgamated mind), and an interesting response to these arguments via a plausible criterion of what counts as a cognitive process. As far as I know, critics of the extended mind (such as Fred Adams, Kenneth Aizawa or Robert Rupert) have not responded to Rowlands criterion (first presented in Rowlands 2009). It would be interesting to see what they make of it.

I have written a reply to Rowlands, (2009), on this.  It is in Aizawa, K. (2010).  "The Coupling-Constitution Fallacy Revisited,  (2010), Cognitive Systems Research, 11, (4), 332-342

And, actually, Mark and I talked about this in our discussion on Philosophy TV.

Blomberg Review of Rowlands' New Science

In Metapsychology here.

I have my copy of Rowlands' book, which looks interesting, but alas I doubt I can get to this until June.

Menary on Causation and Manipulation

What I do say is that a clear way of motivating cognitive integration was first presented by Mark Rowlands which he calls the manipulation thesis: “Cognitive processes are not located exclusively in the skin of cognising organisms because such processes are, in part, made up of physical or bodily manipulation of structures in the environments of such organisms.” (Rowlands 1999 p. 23)
     It is very clear, to me at least, that the manipulation thesis does not depend upon any kind of causal coupling (in Adams and Aizawa’s sense)

Ok.  Here's something I don't get at all.  Manipulation does not depend on any kind of causal coupling?  But, how can one manipulate structures in the environment without a causal connection to them?  It looks to me as though manipulation just is one kind of causal coupling.

Note when Rowlands writes that "[cognitive] processes are, in part, made up of physical or bodily manipulation of structures in the environments of such organisms.” (Rowlands 1999 p. 23), it seems plausible to me at least to think that he means all cognitive processes are, in part, made up of physical or bodily manipulations of structures, so that all cognitive processes are extended.  Granted in other places he claims only that some cognitive processes are extended.

Differently Quantified Versions of EC

In recent days, I've been tussling here with Mark Rowlands over how one might interpret some of what he has written. This exchange highlights three different EC sorts of hypotheses that different in what quantifiers they invoke, namely,
     1) All cognitive processes are extended.
     2) Most cognitive processes are extended.
     3) Some cognitive processes are extended.
Now, Mark vigorously denies that he has ever held 1), but instead only 3).  And, he indicates that even I accept 3), so that we are really on the same side after all.

But, I only accept 3), insofar as I do, because it's just so hard to muster an argument that absolutely all cognitive processes are indeed internal.  I've all along admitted that extended cognitive processes are possible, so it's hard to rule out any instances of that possibility.

Instead, I have resisted all the proffered instances of EC, e.g. Inga-Otto, Tetris, Kanzi, Rush Hour, the Globe Theatre, etc., etc., and the reasoning that has been offered in support of those instances.

Now, philosophers typically gravitate to the universal and existential quantifiers, but I think the more interesting versions of EC are those that involve other quantifiers, such as in 2).  Now, to my knowledge, no advocates of EC has ever explicitly endorsed a version such as 2), rather than 1) or 3).  1), of course, entails 2), but even advocates of 3) seem to run arguments that, if they were good (which I generally think they are not), would suffice to establish something like 2).  So, philosophers often "undersell" the strength of the arguments they offer.  (To take a possible case, Clark suggests that we are natural born cyborgs.  Maybe if we are perennial tool users and tool use leads to extended cognition, then something like 2) would follow.) 

I think versions like 2) are the most interesting, since 1) is, well, obviously false as Rowlands will now help me argue and 3) is so weak that it does not challenge the scientific enterprise of intracranial cognition.  It doesn't that much matter if there is some unique exotic case of one person with a brain implant in which cognition is extended.  If most instances of cognition are intracranial, then there is perhaps enough there to study to warrant cognitive psychology going on in much the way cognitivists have been going for a couple of decades now.

So, to borrow a phrase from Sutton, et al., I think that versions of EC quantified along the lines of 2) form the rich middle ground.

Who Supports Revolutionary EC 10?

“Instead, it [working memory] must be viewed as essentially hybrid, made up of two distinct components. In particular, the processes involved in working memory must be viewed as made up of both biological processes and processes of external manipulation of relevant information-bearing structures in the environment.” (Rowlands, 1999, p. 147)

Vaesen and the State of Play in EC

These are thorny issues indeed, [This is not to say that they can’t be handled satisfactorily. Quite convincing [extended cognition] (counter)arguments are e.g., Clark (2007), Menary (2006) and Rowlands (2009).]

Just for the record, there are further replies to these, including some in The Bounds of Cognition,  Aizawa, (2010), and Adams and Aizawa (forthcoming).

 In truth, I don't see that Vaesen needs to have our critique rebutted in order to have his project go forward.  He doesn't endorse a kind of extended cognition that A&A challenge.  So, to put matters as I see them, even though there is essentially no extended scientific cognition out there, this is not a problem for Vaesen.

Rowlands' New Science of the Mind now available

It's here at Amazon.

Check out Philosophy TV

Philosophy TV is a Bloggingheads kind of deal just for philosophy.  It apparently goes live on September 6 with Peter Singer and Michael Slote. Then on September 9 it is Andy Egan and Josh Knobe.  Alas, it hits a minor bump in the road when Mark Rowlands and I talk about EC.

Why is the C-C Fallacy So Common? 3

In a recent post on Rowlands, 2009, I noted that it is common to find in the EC literature the view that when some thing is coupled "in the right way" to the mind, then the thing becomes a part of one's cognitive system.  This, however, sometimes leads to the C-C fallacy.  But, what encourages perseverance in the fallacy is, in part, how one understands "in the right way".  For the cognitivist, "in the right way", means something like in the right causal economy of a computation.  But, for Clark, for example, "in the right way" means something about "trust and glue".  So, one might conjecture that part of what enables Clark to commit the C-C fallacy is not appreciating the difference between the two ways of cashing out "in the right way".

Again, this is more speculation on the source of the C-C fallacy.

Rowlands on the Rationale for EC

 In "Enactivism and the Extended Mind", Rowlands writes,

It is possible to understand EM as asserting a necessary truth about the composition of mental processes: that, necessarily, some mental processes are partly constituted by processes of environmental manipulation, etc. It is possible, but inadvisable. The underlying rationale for EM is provided by a liberal form of functionalism. And the entire thrust of liberal functionalism is to leave open the possibility of different ways of realizing the same (type of) mental process. By understanding EM as asserting a necessary truth, therefore, the proponent of EM is at risk of undermining his or her own primary motivation. (p. 54).

But, I don't think there is a consensus that "The underlying rationale for EM is provided by a liberal form of functionalism"  Liberal functionalism does not seem to be Haugeland's rationale for EC.  Nor does it seems to be Chemero's rationale for EC (his rationale being some combination of dynamical systems theory and Gibsonian ecological psychology).

Rowlands vs. Menary (Revolutionary EC)

In a recent paper, Rowlands claims that

It is possible to understand EM as asserting a necessary truth about the composition of mental processes: that, necessarily, some mental processes are partly constituted by processes of environmental manipulation, etc. It is possible, but inadvisable. (Rowlands, 2009b, p. 54)

But, this seems to be a direct assault on Revolutionary EC, as articulated by, for example, Menary:

The manipulation of external vehicles is importantly different from the manipulation of internal vehicles and their integration is the unit of cognitive analysis. We are not just coupling artifacts to pre-existing cognitive agents; the organism becomes a cognitive agent by being coupled to the external environment. (Menary, 2006, p. 342) 

It looks like Menary is defining cognition or offering a theory of what cognition is which makes it a necessary truth the cognition is extended.

Same goes if you read Clark and Chalmers as offering a definition, or theoretical account, of active externalism, (rather than a reason for it) in this passage:

We advocate a very different sort of externalism: an active externalism, based on the active role of the environment in driving cognitive processes (Clark & Chalmers, 1998, p. 7)

Rowlands (2009) on Noë's Enactivism

Although I very often offer criticisms, it is nice to be able to draw attention to points of common ground with others in the EC literature.  In earlier posts, I noted some points of agreement between Rowlands and myself regarding such things as the need for a MotC and a target for the concept of cognition to be studied.  I am in fairly widespread agreement with almost everything in Rowlands (2009), but I want to draw attention to Rowlands' discussion of Noë's enactivism.  This brings out other points of agreement.

Rowlands identifies two distinct claims in Noë's enactivism

Visually perceiving the world is made up of two things: 

(1) Expectations about how our experience of an object will change in the event of our moving, or the object of our vision moving, relative to us (or some other
object moving with respect to that object—for example, in front of it). Noe¨ calls this sensorimotor knowledge or knowledge of sensorimotor contingencies.
When our expectations are correct, this is because we have mastered the relevant sensorimotor contingencies.
(2) The ability to act on the world—i.e., to probe and explore environmental structures by way of the visual modality. (p. 55).

Rowlands also distinguishes two versions of (2).  (2a), we might label it, claims that perceiving only requires an ability, where (2b) claims that perceiving requires the exercise of an ability.  (1) and (2a) come very close to being what I have called "weak enactivism", where (2b) is very close to "strong enactivism" (See my forthcoming "Consciousness: Don't Give up on the Brain" )  It's good to have some agreement on at least some of the options in Noë's view.

Rowlands and I also agree that (1) and (2a) do not support EC (Cf, Aizawa, 2007, pp. 17-18), but get to those conclusions by distinct arguments.  Rowlands and I also agree that (2b) is not very plausible, though we again get there by distinct arguments.

Who Supports Revolutionary EC? 4

Mark Rowlands:

I shall argue that there is no theoretically respectable reason for separating the mind off from the world in the way the internalist picture tells us we should.  There is, in other words, no theoretically respectable reason for thinking of cognitive processes as purely and exclusively internal items.  And to say there is no theoretically respectable reason, here, simply means that there is no reason that can be derived from psychological theory as such.  The parsing of the realm of cognition into, on the one hand, cognitive processes that are conceived of as purely internal items and, on the other, external causes, stimuli, orcues of these internal items is not something that is demanded by our theorizing about the mind, but an optional extra.  It is a pre-theoretical picture we use to interpret our explicit theorizing, not something mandated by that theorizing.  It is, in short, a mythology. 
(Rowlands, 1992, pp. 12-13)

Problems for Rowlands' MotC

1. Chatterbots seem to satisfy Rowlands' conditions but are not cognitive agents.
2. Pure look-up tables seems to satisfy Rowland's conditions, but are not cognitive agents.
3. CD players seem to satisfy Rowland's conditions, but are not cognitive agents.

So, it looks like Rowlands needs some additional restriction on what kinds of manipulations are performed on non-derived representations.  Of course, that would make his view even more similar to the Adams and Aizawa view.

Rowlands' MotC and Cognitive Science Practice

The idea underpinning the criterion is that if we want to understand what cognitive processes are, then we had better pay close attention to the sorts of things cognitive scientists regard as cognitive. That is not to say that we must restrict ourselves to the pronouncements or determinations of cognitive scientists, or that we should regard these as decisive, but merely that we had better be prepared to use these as our starting point. A significant part of the criterion I shall defend can be extracted from a careful examination of cognitive-scientific practice. When we examine such practice, I shall argue, what we find is an implicit mark of the cognitive ... (Rowlands, 2009, pp. 7-8).

Here we find an approach much like that in Adams and Aizawa, and similar in spirit to Chemero (who resists the idea of a MotC).

Rowlands buys non-derived content

I earlier mentioned how Mark Rowlands embraces a "mark of the cognitive approach" to adjudicated matters regarding extended cognition.  In fact, here is his account:

A process P is a cognitive process if and only if:
(1) P involves information processing—the manipulation and transformation of
information-bearing structures.
(2) This information processing has the proper function of making available either to the subject or to subsequent processing operations information that was
(or would have been) prior to (or without) this processing, unavailable.
(3) This information is made available by way of the production, in the subject
of P, of a representational state.
(4) P is a process that belongs to the subject of that representational state.  (Rowlands, 2009, p. 8)

Then, regarding (3) he writes,

I shall assume that the type of representational state invoked in (3) is one that
possesses non-derived content. Derived content is content, possessed by a given state, that derives from the content of other representational states of a cognizing subject or from the social conventions that constitute that agent’s linguistic milieu. Non-derived content is content that does not so derive. A form of content being nonderived is not equivalent to its being sui generis: non-derived content can, for example, derived from, and be explained in terms of, the history or informational carrying profile of the state that has it. It is what content is derived from that is crucial. Non-derived content is content that is not derived from other content – it is not content that is irreducible or sui generis.  (pp. 9-10).

So, where Adams and Aizawa have been non-committal regarding what theory of non-derived content to invoke, Rowlands take the plunge.

Mark Rowlands' "Extended Cognition and the Mark of the Cognitive"

I earlier mentioned how Mike Wheeler embraces what I would call a "mark of the cognitive approach" to adjudicated matters regarding extended cognition.

But, Mark Rowlands has also embraced a lot of the approach as well.

Gotta like it.  There are at least some points where the advocates and critics of EC are not talking past each other.