Larry Shapiro on the Brain Science Podcast

Links here and here.

Martiny Review of Shapiro's Embodied Cognition

Link here.

Walter's "Cognitive extension: the parity argument, functionalism, and the mark of the cognitive"

Available online here: http://www.springerlink.com/content/h21565731471r11h/fulltext.pdf;.

Sven has a nice discussion of the use of the Parity Principle.

Check out, as well, the other papers in the issue by my buds, Carl, Larry, Jacqueline, John, Philippe, and Tom.  It was edited by Jacqueline Sullivan.

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).

Shapiro's New Book: Embodied Cognition

You can now pre-order it here from Amazon or here from Amazon.uk.  Do it.  Do it now.

Congrats, Larry!  The cover is very cool.

I read (and commented on) the original manuscript.  It's a great read that provides more than a recitation of the familiar embodied cognition memes.  It takes much of this standard material and challenges the reader to think more critically about what is being claimed.  I think that it is much more than just a book for students.

Oh, and I have a cover blurb for the book.  The truncated version of my comments that they published may seem a little over the top, but it really is a must have book.  They didn't like the first draft of my comments:

Embodied Cognition is Shapiro acting out his firmest belief, " I don't have anything to say ...  That's not going to stop me! "  The many philosophical pratfalls and missteps in this book show why those who know Shapiro best think of him as the Jerry Lewis of academic philosophy.