scholarly journals Agency, Responsibility, Selves, and the Mechanical Mind

Philosophies ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 7
Author(s):  
Fiorella Battaglia
Keyword(s):  
Philosophy Of Technology ◽  
Extended Mind ◽  
Human Machine Interaction ◽  
Person Perspective ◽  
Legal Perspective ◽  
Area Of Concern ◽  
Third Person Perspective ◽  
The Mind ◽  
The Impact ◽  
The Brain

Moral issues arise not only when neural technology directly influences and affects people’s lives, but also when the impact of its interventions indirectly conceptualizes the mind in new, and unexpected ways. It is the case that theories of consciousness, theories of subjectivity, and third person perspective on the brain provide rival perspectives addressing the mind. Through a review of these three main approaches to the mind, and particularly as applied to an “extended mind”, the paper identifies a major area of transformation in philosophy of action, which is understood in terms of additional epistemic devices—including a legal perspective of regulating the human–machine interaction and a personality theory of the symbiotic connection between human and machine. I argue this is a new area of concern within philosophy, which will be characterized in terms of self-objectification, which becomes “alienation” following Ernst Kapp’s philosophy of technology. The paper argues that intervening in the brain can affect how we conceptualize the mind and modify its predicaments.

Expanding the mind – growing the brain . . .

2014 ◽  
Vol 26 (6) ◽  
pp. 889-889
Author(s):  
Craig Ritchie
Keyword(s):  
Gray Matter ◽  
The Mind ◽  
The Impact ◽  
The Brain

What does learning to juggle, to golf, to drive, and to be a doctor all have in common? Valkanova and colleagues, in our editors’ choice for “paper of the month,” note the impact they have on gray matter growth.

scholarly journals The Influence of Embodiment as a Cartoon Character on Public Speaking Anxiety

2021 ◽  
Vol 2 ◽  
Author(s):  
Anna I. Bellido Rivas ◽  
Xavi Navarro ◽  
Domna Banakou ◽  
Ramon Oliva ◽  
Veronica Orvalho ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Public Speaking ◽  
Human Condition ◽  
Public Speaking Anxiety ◽  
Body Ownership ◽  
Speaking Anxiety ◽  
Person Perspective ◽  
Cartoon Character ◽  
Third Person Perspective ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Virtual Body

Virtual Reality can be used to embody people in different types of body—so that when they look towards themselves or in a mirror they will see a life-sized virtual body instead of their own, and that moves with their own movements. This will typically give rise to the illusion of body ownership over the virtual body. Previous research has focused on embodiment in humanoid bodies, albeit with various distortions such as an extra limb or asymmetry, or with a body of a different race or gender. Here we show that body ownership also occurs over a virtual body that looks like a cartoon rabbit, at the same level as embodiment as a human. Furthermore, we explore the impact of embodiment on performance as a public speaker in front of a small audience. Forty five participants were recruited who had public speaking anxiety. They were randomly partitioned into three groups of 15, embodied as a Human, as the Cartoon rabbit, or from third person perspective (3PP) with respect to the rabbit. In each condition they gave two talks to a small audience of the same type as their virtual body. Several days later, as a test condition, they returned to give a talk to an audience of human characters embodied as a human. Overall, anxiety reduced the most in the Human condition, the least in the Cartoon condition, and there was no change in the 3PP condition, taking into account existing levels of trait anxiety. We show that embodiment in a cartoon character leads to high levels of body ownership from the first person perspective and synchronous real and virtual body movements. We also show that the embodiment influences outcomes on the public speaking task.

The Self-Awareness of the Mind: Phenomenal World and the Mind Beyond

Diogenes ◽  
2015 ◽  
Vol 62 (2) ◽  
pp. 16-25
Author(s):  
Ja-Kyoung Han
Keyword(s):  
The Self ◽  
Self Awareness ◽  
Phenomenal World ◽  
Person Perspective ◽  
The World ◽  
Third Person ◽  
Third Person Perspective ◽  
The Mind ◽  
The Third Person ◽  
Conceptual Language

What we regard as real are the objects of the phenomenal world which we perceive. We regard those that we see objectively, as in the third person perspective, as real. What then is the mind that perceives the world? Is it possible for us to realize the very mind that perceives the world? This article discusses the existence of the world perceived by the mind in order to deal with the existence of the mind which perceives the world and the knowability of the mind. Phenomenal world is a perceptual world which is a fictitious world constructed by our conceptual language system. And the base of the fictitious phenomenal world, the object itself, is emptiness. The emptiness is the emptiness of the mind that perceives and constructs the world. Thus, the awareness of the emptiness of the world is the self-awareness of the mind. Since the emptiness of my mind is the same emptiness of all other beings, the mind is the capacity to sympathize with the whole world, the universal mind, One-mind. Every man is aware of oneself as One-mind. “Gong-juk-young-ji” or the “original enlightenment” of Buddhism is the self-awareness of the mind as emptiness.

scholarly journals Intervensi Inklusif Sukan Terhadap Murid Gangguan Kecelaruan Tumpuan dan Hiperaktif (ADHD)

2020 ◽  
Vol 35 (2) ◽  
pp. 131-143
Author(s):  
Mohd Arshad Yahya ◽  
Mohd Firdaus Abdullah
Keyword(s):  
Sleep Time ◽  
Hyperactivity Disorder ◽  
Sport Activities ◽  
Long Time ◽  
Special Education Program ◽  
The Subject ◽  
The Individual ◽  
The Mind ◽  
The Impact ◽  
The Brain

Attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is a form of disruption to the brain often experienced by growing children. ADHD children are often labelled as naughty by some. There are several forms of treatment that can be taken against this disorder such as the use of medication. However, the use of medicine will side effect such as loss appetite, disrupting sleep time and anxiety. This study was conducted by observing and recording anecdotes as a means of collecting data. The subject was an ADHD student who had undergone academic inclusiveness and also a special need athlete. The purpose of the study was to explore the effects of sports inclusive intervention on the negative, physical behaviour and social of the student. The findings of the study show that sports inclusion interventions can reduce the negative behaviour of ADHD students and can be an alternative to medication treatment. The effect of this intervention is more harmonious with no side effects and impact for a long time. Sports activities also have goals such as the Individual Teaching Plan concept. In Malaysia, sports intervention is quite new in the Integrated Special Education Program. The impact of this study is expected to open the mind of all parties to make sure that sport activities for special needs students is conducted for the purpose of treatment. The cooperation of all parties including parents is important in this alternative treatment.

The Neuroaesthetics of Architecture

2021 ◽  
pp. 221-224
Author(s):  
Oshin Vartanian
Keyword(s):  
Magnetic Resonance Imaging ◽  
Magnetic Resonance ◽  
Environmental Psychology ◽  
Anterior Cingulate ◽  
Neural Data ◽  
Approach Avoidance ◽  
The Mind ◽  
The Impact ◽  
The Brain ◽  
Aesthetic Preferences

Environmental psychology is concerned with understanding the impact of the environment—built and natural—on the mind. Neuroscience of architecture can contribute to this aim by elucidating the workings of the brain in relation to features of our physical environment. Toward that end, Vartanian et al. (2013) examined the impact of contour on aesthetic judgments and approach-avoidance decisions while viewing images of room interiors in the functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) scanner. Participants found curvilinear rooms more beautiful than rectilinear rooms, and viewing curvilinear rooms in that context activated the anterior cingulate cortex—a region involved in processing emotion. That observation, coupled with the finding that pleasantness accounted for majority of variance in beauty judgments, supports the idea that our preference for curvilinear design is driven by affect. This study represents an example of how neural data can reveal mechanisms that underlie our aesthetic preferences in the domain of architecture.

The Victorian Extended Mind: George Eliot, Psychology and the Bounds of Cognition

2020 ◽  
pp. 43-60
Author(s):  
Peter Garratt
Keyword(s):  
Nineteenth Century ◽  
George Eliot ◽  
Extended Mind ◽  
Empirical Work ◽  
Extended Cognition ◽  
Victorian Culture ◽  
Mental Experience ◽  
Franz Joseph Gall ◽  
The Mind ◽  
The Brain

The modern identification of the mind with the brain has its roots in the intellectual traditions of the nineteenth century. Isolating the brain as the seat of mental experience, and as the organ of the mind, emerged in the empirical work of Franz Joseph Gall and Johann Spurzheim and became a central, normative assumption of Romantic and Victorian culture, cutting across literary and psychological discourses. Less understood, however, is the extent to which novelists and critics thought seriously about the mind as a distributed phenomenon – or what might be described as Victorian extended cognition. Focusing on George Eliot, and exploring relevant aspects of nineteenth-century psychology, this chapter seeks to recover just that. At issue is the idea that mid-Victorian writing and culture did not always think of the mind as sealed hermetically in the head, a point developed through readings of such texts as The Lifted Veil and Middlemarch which show how Eliot’s fiction intuitively probes some defining claims in 4E cognitive theories.

The technology of relating to the past and the conditions of memory

2011 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 195-206
Author(s):  
ALBRECHT FRITZSCHE
Keyword(s):  
Human Activity ◽  
Philosophy Of Technology ◽  
Human Life ◽  
Technical Approach ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Enlightenment ◽  
Historic Memory ◽  
The Mind ◽  
The Impact

Depending on the modality of the argument, memory can be a source of influence from an indeterminate past or a means of reference to the historical conditions of human life. The historic perspective is strongly related to the Enlightenment. Based on recent contributions to the philosophy of technology, which describe thinking in terms of tools and machines as a general human activity, historic memory can be interpreted as a technical approach to the past. Similar to the determinate operations in technology, the references to the past though the exhibits of museums, the contents of archives, and similar means dominate reflection about the past. The mind has to move around them. Nevertheless, they require additional effort to become usable in their function for memory. Technicians illustrate this effort in their role as enablers of tools and machines. Similarly, curators and archivists can be understood as enablers of relation to the past, in museums, archives, etc. The efforts of technicians can be categorized according to different concepts of rationality. In the discussion about memory, the impact of museums, archives, and other enabling circumstances for memory is yet rather unclear. The comparison with technology can serve as an inspiration for further research in this direction.

scholarly journals Protective and damaging effects of stress mediators: central role of the brain

2006 ◽  
Vol 8 (4) ◽  
pp. 367-381 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Prefrontal Cortex ◽  
Chronic Stress ◽  
Allostatic Load ◽  
The Body ◽  
Stressful Events ◽  
Whole Body ◽  
Acute And Chronic Stress ◽  
The Mind ◽  
The Impact ◽  
The Brain

The mind involves the whole body and two-way communication between the brain and the cardiovascular, immune, and other systems via neural and endocrine mechanisms. Stress is a condition of the mind-body interaction, and a factor in the expression of disease that differs among individuals. It is notjust the dramatic stressful events that exact their toll, but rather the many events of daily life that elevate and sustain activities of physiological systems and cause sleep deprivation, overeating, and other health-damaging behaviors, producing the feeling of being "stressed out." Over time, this results in wear and tear on the body which is called "allostatic load," and it reflects not only the impact of life experiences but also of genetic load, individual lifestyle habits reflecting items such as diet, exercise, and substance abuse, and developmental experiences that set life-long patterns of behavior and physiological reactivity. Hormones associated with stress and allostatic load protect the body in the short run and promote adaptation by the process known as allostasis, but in the long run allostatic load causes changes in the body that can lead to disease. The brain is the key organ of stress, allostasis, and allostatic load, because it determines what is threatening and therefore stressful, and also determines the physiological and behavioral responses. Brain regions such as the hippocampus, amygdala, and prefrontal cortex respond to acute and chronic stress by undergoing structural remodeling, which alters behavioral and physiological responses. Translational studies in humans with structural and functional imaging reveal smaller hippocampal volume in stress-related conditions, such as mild cognitive impairment in aging and prolonged major depressive illness, as well as in individuals with low self-esteem. Alterations in amygdala and prefrontal cortex are also reported. Besides pharmaceuticals, approaches to alleviate chronic stress and reduce allostatic load and the incidence of diseases of modern life include lifestyle change, and policies of government and business that would improve the ability of individuals to reduce their own chronic stress burden.

Variations on Embodied Cognition

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Shaun Gallagher
Keyword(s):  
Embodied Cognition ◽  
Empirical Evidence ◽  
Brain Function ◽  
Extended Mind ◽  
Biological Model ◽  
System P ◽  
Neural Reuse ◽  
The Mind ◽  
The Brain

This chapter maps out a range of embodied cognition (EC) theories, starting with ‘weak EC’, which focuses on body-formatted representations and the neural reuse hypothesis, and remains close to traditional cognitivist conceptions of the mind. This approach to EC is then contrasted to functionalist proposals for extended mind, to a biological model of EC, and finally to enactivist proposals. Each section includes discussions of the empirical evidence for these approaches. The chapter concludes by arguing that weak EC’s representationalist conception of brain function is not compatible with the more radical conceptions of EC, which suggest that we rethink how the brain works within a dynamical brain–body–environment system.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document