Minds, Brains, and Capacities: Situated Cognition and Neo-Aristotelianism

This article compares situated cognition to contemporary Neo-Aristotelian approaches to the mind. The article distinguishes two components in this paradigm: an Aristotelian essentialism which is alien to situated cognition and a Wittgensteinian “capacity approach” to the mind which is not just congenial to it but provides important conceptual and argumentative resources in defending social cognition against orthodox cognitive (neuro-)science. It focuses on a central tenet of that orthodoxy. According to what I call “encephalocentrism,” cognition is primarily or even exclusively a computational process occurring inside the brain. Neo-Aristotelians accuse this claim of committing a “homuncular” (Kenny) or “mereological fallacy” (Bennett and Hacker). The article explains why the label “fallacy” is misleading, reconstructs the argument to the effect that encephalocentric applications of psychological predicates to the brain and its parts amount to a category mistake, and defends this argument against objections by Dennett, Searle, and Figdor. At the same time it criticizes the Neo-Aristotelian denial that the brain is the organ of cognition. It ends by suggesting ways in which the capacity approach and situated cognition might be combined to provide a realistic and ecologically sound picture of cognition as a suite of powers that flesh-and-blood animals exercise within their physical and social environments.

PSYCHOLOGICAL CONCEPTS IN COGNITIVE NEUROSCIENCE

The use of psychological concepts in cognitive neuroscience is heavily criticized by Bennett & Hacker's Philosophical Foundations of Neuroscience. The central objection points to neuroscience's attribution to the brain of psychological concepts that are meaningful only when applied to the entire being. That is supposedly the case of “seeing,” “communicating,” and “reading.” Bennett & Hacker identify in such attributions what they call a mereological fallacy. The critical revision of Bennett & Hacker's argument is an opportunity to present the debate about philosophy and psychological neuroscience and outline a Wittgensteinian perspective about the meaning of psychological concepts, its interest, and its relevance to scientific research.

The concept of (depth) cues: An exemplification of homuncular language in vision science

The term “depth cue” is fundamental to and widely used in vision science. However, despite the prevalence and importance of that concept, there is virtually no study on its theoretical foundations and coherence. This article aims at filling that gap by investigating both its historical development and its current use within the predominant computational approach to vision. Against the backdrop of Wittgenstein’s therapeutic approach to philosophy, it is shown that both traditional and current characterizations of depth cues suffer from a serious logical flaw known as “homunculus” or “mereological fallacy.” It is suggested that the problem of homuncular language impedes critical thinking and theorizing in vision science since it obscures the matters at issue by disguising explanatorily empty expressions as explanatory hypotheses. Furthermore, it is argued that homuncular language is not confined to the concept of depth cues but typical of current cognitive science in general since it is linked to its most fundamental assumption of the brain being an information processing system. In conclusion, resulting implications for cognitive science and cognitive scientists are considered.

The Nonsense View

Chapter 5 is the first of three chapters articulating alternatives to Literalism. Chapter 5 presents Bennett and Hacker’s Wittgenstein-inspired criticism of ascriptions of psychological capacities to brains by cognitive neuroscientists. On their view the uses violate semantic rules of proper use and so are nonsensical. The mereological fallacy, as they label this conceptual violation, is to ascribe psychological features of persons to their parts. This chapter shows that their criticism fails by their own standards, and that it is not endorsed by neuroscientists aware of their criticism. It presents Dennett and Searle’s responses to Bennett and Hacker, and contrasts their responses to the Literalist view.

The brain as the subject’s heir?

‘The brain as the subject’s heir?’ critiques the claims according to which subjectivity is to be regarded as an epiphenomenon of neuronal processes and thus one’s experience of agency and freedom of choice should be seen as an illusion. First it is shown that the subjectivity of ‘experiential facts’ cannot be reduced to objective or physical facts about brain processes. Likewise, the reduction of the intentionality of consciousness to relations of representation is refuted. Moreover, the identification of the subject with the brain leads to fundamental category mistakes which are examined as the ‘mereological fallacy’ and the ‘localization fallacy’. On this basis, a critique of the thesis of the powerlessness of the subject is developed. The summary analyses the basic ‘naturalistic fallacy’ of an objectifying account of consciousness which believes it can remove itself from its rootedness in the lifeworld.

Transforming Neuroscience into a Totalizing Meta-Narrative

The present work is developed within the frame of so-called critical neuroscience. The aim of this article is to explain the transition from a kind of neuroscience understood as a strict scientific discipline, possessing a methodology and a specific praxis, to a kind of neuroscience that has been transformed into a meta-narrative with totalizing claims. In particular, we identify and examine eleven catalysts for such a transition: 1) a lack of communication between scientists and journalists; 2) the abuse of information by the sensational press; 3) the acceptance of specific philosophical approaches (like eliminative materialism) by a wide range of scientists; 4) the widespread transmission of two conceptual mistakes: a) an identification between methodological and ontological reductionism and b) the mereological fallacy; 5) the influence of post-Cartesian philosophical thinking in the scientific community; 6) an overwhelming scientific hyper-specialization; 7) the illegitimate transfer of authority from humanities to the sciences; 8) an inbuilt human preference for visual data; 9) economic interests; 10) scientific utopianism; and 11) the new self-help movements and their alliance with neuro-enhancement. Finally, our essay seeks to draw attention to the most damaging consequences for both science and human ways of living.