The Philosophical Study Of Cognitive Enactivism

Enactivism is a newly emerging cognitive research program in cognitive science. It was sprouted in Ecology of Mind, born out of Cognitive Ecology, and it grows and matures in Enactive Cognitive Science. It has recently developed into a research paradigm which can contend with cognitivism and connectionism. As a completely new paradigm of cognitive science, it has promoted the fusion of cognitive science and humanities; as a completely new theory of philosophy of mind, it has fundamentally gone beyond the traditional ideas of philosophy of cognition. This paper aims to systematically argue for the rationality and validity of enactivism as a research program in cognitive science, and mainly elaborate its philosophical insights on cognitive research. Based on this central purpose, this paper unfolds from the following five aspects.The aim of chapter 1 is to explore the historical backgrounds of the formation of enactivism, in order to lay strong foundations for precisely grasping its core ideas and theories and constructing its epistemological and methodological principles. Specifically, this chapter consists of two parts. The first is the philosophical and cybernetic dimensions outside the cognitive science. On the philosophical level, it attempts to reveal the advantages of enactivism compared to traditional ideas of philosophy of cognition, and analyze the important roles of phenomenology in the construction of enactive framework. On the cybernetic level, it explores the cybernetic roots that are seriously ignored but eventually shape the enactive cognitive science. The second is the dimension of paradigm shift within the cognitive science. It comparatively analyzes the fundamental differences between the enactivism and traditional cognitive paradigms.Chapter 2 argues for the rationality of life-mind continuity thesis as the working hypothesis of enactive cognitive science, and briefly introduces its core themes. After the analysis of cognitive gap that continuity thesis itself has epistemologically, it points out that methodological individualism is the main cause of this gap, and sociality is the essential factor for bridging the gap. Thus it puts forward strategies of theoretical biology and phenomenology to resolve this problem. Finally, based on the analysis of working hypothesis and core themes, it argues for the theoretical possibility of enactivism as a cognitive program, and shows its revolutionary significances as a non-representational framework.Chapter 3 tries to construct the epistemological principles of enactivism, and analyze its related epistemological problems. Its main epistemological principles include:autonomy principle, sense-making principle, mutual specification and co-emergence principle, embodied action principle and empirically based brain-body structure principle. Its epistemological problems include:mind-body problem, problem of other mind and cognitive gap. For the mind-body problem, it analyzes the difficulties that cognitivisim encounters and formulates the bio-phenomenological perspective of enactivism that is based on an anti-representational stance. For the problem of other mind, it emphasizes the constitutive role of sociality and reveals the second-person perspective of our pre-reflective understanding of others from the perspective of phenomenology; it discusses the extended body hypothesis as it is used to account for the possibility of our sharing experience with others, and invokes the concept of participatory sense-making as the basis of the pre-reflective understanding of others. For the cognitive gap, it analyzes the importance of the resolution of the problem of other mind to bridging the gap, and discusses some concrete integrated proposals.Chapter 4 intends to construct the methodological principles of enactivism (corresponding to epistemological principles). Enactive cognitive science has broadened the methodological scope of traditional cognitive science. For one thing, on the basis of the third-person methodology that absorbs the methods of biology and dynamics, it incorporates the first-person methodology that inquires the experience or consciousness into cognitive science. These first-person methods mainly come from western scientific psychology, phenomenological tradition and eastern Buddhist tradition. For another thing, in order to effectively bridge the scientific mind and experiential mind, or realize the reciprocal cycle between them, it attempts to construct the second-person methodology on the basis of the integration of the first- and third-person methodologies, which is typically represented by Dennett’s heterophenomenology and Varela’s Neurophenomenology.Chapter 5 discusses the extension and revision of enactive approach. It analyzes the possibility of the application of enactive approach to social cognitive field and refines an enactive approach to social interactions. Then, it investigates the dynamic modes of world constitution in transpersonal psychology and phenomenology that are similar to enactive approach: participatory enaction and transcendental enaction. It believes that these three dynamic modes have the potential of integrating together. Finally, it integrates these three dynamic modes on the basis of phenomenology,and puts forward a general theory of enaction in order to enrich and develop the enactive approach from a broader perspective, and to promote the further development of cognitive science.