Academic Front (Part II)
Back to the extended mind (because I do have a point)…so Andy talks about fingers being a tool of the extended mind: they are reliably there to make cognitive processes run smoother. Simple as it may seem, to take that perspective to the evolution of the human mind…people are reliably there. So what about extended social cognition?
I met with him about my ideas for my Master’s dissertation, theory of mind as the fundamental evolutionary development in human’s extended social cognition. (Theory of mind is the understanding that others see and think about the world differently than you do…to recognize other selves and their intentions, basically. In my view, language is not possible without this.) He said that he liked the picture I painted (his words) and would love to work with me! Yay!!!
I am a bit nervous to say the least. He is quite the name, the high-profile academic in philosophy of the mind and philosophy of science. During our talk, he kept using big words that independently I knew the meaning of, but when combined to form a new entity, baffled me. Hmmm…definitely need to do some reading on that. Although, I must say that just reading doesn’t help. I referenced Kim Stirlny (as I pronounced it), and he later recast that name as it’s properly pronounced…THEN…I referenced Sterelny’s papers, “her this…her that…” He again recast my error, “Well HIS work blablabla…”. Doh. I of course made a joke about it, as is my custom/coping mechanism for awkward situations.
He’s also very involved in artificial intelligence, connectionism (neural networks), and other technological, geeky pursuits. But what I thoroughly enjoy about his work is the humanistic view he takes on such traditionally geeky pursuits; it’s not just technothings that interest him, but how the human mind, culture, and technology interact. For instance, he synonymizes the extended mind with the extended self; therefore, if you invade someone’s privacy by reading their diary, for example, you are essentially invading/violating their person.
He also focuses a great deal on Alzheimer’s patients. When these patients are in a hospice setting, they have themselves built or had others build a reference system of pictures, reminders, and other tools to help with day-to-day tasks. But if these individuals are taken from the hospice—from their extended mind, essentially—their selves are being violated. Regarding my topic, extended social cognition, enculturated apes also show the effects of violating one’s (socially) extended self. (Enculturated apes are those which have been raised in human environments with human language. Many even show linguistic competence matching that of a human 3 year-old!, and it is argued that the exposure to human language and culture actually gives them the cognitive scaffolding that allows for consciousness).
Anyways, when funding runs out and the enculturated chimps are returned to medical testing facilities or other ape homes with non-enculturated apes, they go mad. Absolutely bonkers. Roger Fouts, the “father” of Washoe the ASL signing chimp in Ellensburg, Washington, often speaks of the cruelty of taking apes out of their humanized social structure. In the same sense that tampering with a person’s extended mind is a violation to their self, it is a similar violation to tamper with the extended social cognition of such enculturated apes. While to some the idea of the extended mind/self is boringly mundane, it obviously has very practical implications for our society.
Enough ramblings. But as you can tell, I’m fantastically excited about my project: taking the extended mind notion and applying it to (my obsession with) the evolution of human social cognition. AND how brilliant that I'm getting to work with Andy Clark, the guy whose idea I'm running with!?! Some of you have already expressed interest in reading up more on the topic and on Andy Clark’s work. They’re easily accessible online. (Just tried hyperlinky things and that didn’t so much work out. So I’ll just list the applicable websites).
Andy Clark papers online:
http://www.cogs.indiana.edu/cgi-bin/andy/pubs.pl
Great resource for a number of papers on the mind, consciousness, and language:
http://consc.net/online.html
I met with him about my ideas for my Master’s dissertation, theory of mind as the fundamental evolutionary development in human’s extended social cognition. (Theory of mind is the understanding that others see and think about the world differently than you do…to recognize other selves and their intentions, basically. In my view, language is not possible without this.) He said that he liked the picture I painted (his words) and would love to work with me! Yay!!!
I am a bit nervous to say the least. He is quite the name, the high-profile academic in philosophy of the mind and philosophy of science. During our talk, he kept using big words that independently I knew the meaning of, but when combined to form a new entity, baffled me. Hmmm…definitely need to do some reading on that. Although, I must say that just reading doesn’t help. I referenced Kim Stirlny (as I pronounced it), and he later recast that name as it’s properly pronounced…THEN…I referenced Sterelny’s papers, “her this…her that…” He again recast my error, “Well HIS work blablabla…”. Doh. I of course made a joke about it, as is my custom/coping mechanism for awkward situations.
He’s also very involved in artificial intelligence, connectionism (neural networks), and other technological, geeky pursuits. But what I thoroughly enjoy about his work is the humanistic view he takes on such traditionally geeky pursuits; it’s not just technothings that interest him, but how the human mind, culture, and technology interact. For instance, he synonymizes the extended mind with the extended self; therefore, if you invade someone’s privacy by reading their diary, for example, you are essentially invading/violating their person.
He also focuses a great deal on Alzheimer’s patients. When these patients are in a hospice setting, they have themselves built or had others build a reference system of pictures, reminders, and other tools to help with day-to-day tasks. But if these individuals are taken from the hospice—from their extended mind, essentially—their selves are being violated. Regarding my topic, extended social cognition, enculturated apes also show the effects of violating one’s (socially) extended self. (Enculturated apes are those which have been raised in human environments with human language. Many even show linguistic competence matching that of a human 3 year-old!, and it is argued that the exposure to human language and culture actually gives them the cognitive scaffolding that allows for consciousness).
Anyways, when funding runs out and the enculturated chimps are returned to medical testing facilities or other ape homes with non-enculturated apes, they go mad. Absolutely bonkers. Roger Fouts, the “father” of Washoe the ASL signing chimp in Ellensburg, Washington, often speaks of the cruelty of taking apes out of their humanized social structure. In the same sense that tampering with a person’s extended mind is a violation to their self, it is a similar violation to tamper with the extended social cognition of such enculturated apes. While to some the idea of the extended mind/self is boringly mundane, it obviously has very practical implications for our society.
Enough ramblings. But as you can tell, I’m fantastically excited about my project: taking the extended mind notion and applying it to (my obsession with) the evolution of human social cognition. AND how brilliant that I'm getting to work with Andy Clark, the guy whose idea I'm running with!?! Some of you have already expressed interest in reading up more on the topic and on Andy Clark’s work. They’re easily accessible online. (Just tried hyperlinky things and that didn’t so much work out. So I’ll just list the applicable websites).
Andy Clark papers online:
http://www.cogs.indiana.edu/cgi-bin/andy/pubs.pl
Great resource for a number of papers on the mind, consciousness, and language:
http://consc.net/online.html
posted by Amity at 3:40 PM
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