This volume provides a broad overview of some cutting-edge philosophical topics of growing interest at the juncture between cognitive science and biology. The main goal is not to integrate the variety of approaches into a single account, but rather to offer diverse perspectives on a collection of selected biological issues of particular philosophical relevance, reflecting the plurality of current research in these areas.
Four conceptual vectors give this volume its coherence:
- Animal and human cognition: With respect to animal cognition, this volume focuses on self-awareness and methodological flaws in the science of animal consciousness. Regarding human cognition, the authors of this volume address various aspects of so-called 4E cognition.
- Genetics: The role of genes in the development of mind and life has always been philosophically controversial. In this volume, the authors address the possibility of considering post-genomic genes as natural kinds and the proper analysis of the concept of genotype.
- Teleology: This volume addresses issues of evolutionary causality and teleosemantics, as well as questions relating to biological teleology and regulation.
- Evolution: Evolution exemplifies better than any other concept the convergence point between philosophy, biology and cognitive sciences. Among other things, the volume deals with the origin of novelties in evolutionary processes from various viewpoints (e.g., cultural evolution and developmental plasticity).
Despite their disparity, all these topics belong to a common naturalistic framework. By presenting them in a single volume, the editors want to emphasize the need to always conduct philosophical research on mind and life with tangential domains in mind.
This book is a valuable resource for students and researchers of philosophy with a special interest in life, cognition, and evolution, as well as for biologists and cognitive scientists.
Author(s): José Manuel Viejo, Mariano Sanjuán
Series: Interdisciplinary Evolution Research, 8
Publisher: Springer
Year: 2023
Language: English
Pages: 329
City: Cham
Preface
Contents
Contributors
Life and Mind: An Introduction
1 Life and Mind: An introduction
2 Introduction to Part I: Embodiment, Perception and Cognition
3 Introduction to Part II: Evolution, Language and Culture
4 Introduction to Part III: Gene and Genotype Metaphysics
5 Introduction to Part IV: Teleology in Biology and Cognitive Sciences
6 Conclusion
References
Part I: Embodiment, Perception and Cognition
Animal Understanding and Animal Self-Awareness
1 Introduction
2 Understanding and Animal Understanding
3 Understanding and Self-Understanding
4 Self-Understanding and Agency
5 Social Self-Understanding, Social Agency and Social Self-Awareness
6 Awareness and Understanding
7 Conclusion
References
A Methodological Response to the Motley Crew Argument: Explaining Cognitive Phenomena Through Enactivism and Ethology
1 Introduction
2 Enactivism´s Methodological Challenges and First Steps to a Full Response
2.1 Enactivism: Basic Ideas and Concepts
2.2 The Ethological Approach to Behavior
2.3 Conceptual Common Ground: The Notion of Action-Readiness
3 Ethology´s Options to Render ``Motley Crews´´ Scientifically Accessible
3.1 A Case Study of Risk Evaluation in Gregarious Birds
3.2 Further Ethological Support: A Distributed Network of Constituents for Flight Initiation
4 Conclusion
References
Causal Closure, Synaptic Transmission and Emergent Mental Properties
1 The Causal Argument for Physicalism
2 Two Models of Mental Causation
3 The Causal Closure Principle
4 The Argument from Physiology
4.1 The First Component
4.2 The Second Component
5 Synaptic Transmission, Causal Closure and Emergence
References
Color and Competence: A New View of Color Perception
1 Introduction: Why Non-Ideal Cases Matter from the Start
2 Three Desiderata for Philosophical Accounts of Color Perception
2.1 A View Should Not Attribute Widespread Failure to (Normally Functioning) Color Visual Systems
2.2 A View Should Allow for Instances of Color Visual System Failure
2.3 A View Should Allow us to Evaluate and Explain Specific Color Experiences
3 The Competence-Embeddedness of Color Vision
3.1 Competences and Capacities
3.2 Relevant Competences
3.3 Case Study: The Color Visual System and Figure-Ground Segregation
3.4 Why Color Perception Is Not a Competence
4 ``Textbook Color Illusions´´ as Test Cases
4.1 Clashing Competences
4.2 Color Assimilation: Watercolor Effect
4.3 Simultaneous Color Contrast: Pink/Grey Petals
5 Objections, Replies, and Further Developments
5.1 Intuitions and Common Sense
5.2 The Second Desideratum and Normal Illusion Talk
5.3 When the Chromatic Experiences of Normal Perceivers Dramatically Diverge: ``The Dress,´´ Etc
6 Conclusion: The Three Desiderata Revisited
References
Menstrual Cycles as Key to Embodied Synchronisation
1 Introduction
2 The Evolution of Synchronised Cognition
2.1 A Coordinated Definition of Cognition
2.2 The Physiological, Psychosocial, and Environmental Realms of Cognition
2.3 Acknowledging the Vulnerability of the Organism to Desynchronisation
2.4 Cognitive Enablement Through Participatory Sense-Making
3 The Relevance of Synchronisation in Biological Rhythm
3.1 The Evolutionary Predisposition to Synchrony
3.2 A Second Biological Clock, the Infradian Rhythm
4 Benefits of Adapting Everyday Habits to Bodily-Rhythms
4.1 Physiological and Psychosocial Changes Throughout Circadian Cycles
4.2 Cognitive Changes Throughout the Menstrual Cycle
4.3 The Benefits of Adopting Infradian Routines
5 The Desynchronised Menstruating Organism
5.1 The Consequences of a Desynchronised Menstruating Organism
5.2 Stigmatising Menstruating Organisms and Effects on the Promotion of Menstrual Awareness
5.3 Resynchronising Through the Menstrual Participatory Sense-Making
5.4 A New Domain of Menstrual Significance
6 Conclusion
References
Part II: Evolution, Language and Culture
Is Cultural Selection Creative?
1 Introduction
2 Creative Products and Evolutionary Products
3 Is Natural Selection Creative?
4 Is Cultural Selection Creative?
4.1 Selection Initiates Evolutionary Change
4.1.1 Some Examples
4.2 Selection Directs Evolutionary Change
4.2.1 Some Examples
4.3 Population Processes Matter to Creativity
5 Conclusions
References
Incommensurability in Evolutionary Biology: The Extended Evolutionary Synthesis Controversy
1 Introduction
2 Pigliucci, Kuhn, and Incommensurability
2.1 Incommensurability in SSR
2.2 What Does Pigliucci Say and Why Is It Problematic?
3 A Closer Look at the Problems of Pigliucci´s Analysis
3.1 Incommensurability Is Not a Holistic Phenomenon
3.2 Analyses of Incommensurability Should Focus on the Most Controversial Aspects of the Dispute
3.3 Observational Incommensurability Is Really About Ontological Assumptions
3.4 Incommensurability Does Not Imply Paradigm-Shifting Revolutions
4 An Alternative Analysis of Incommensurability Between the MS and the EES
4.1 Methodological Incommensurability Between the MS and the EES
4.2 Observational (That Is, Ontological) Incommensurability Between the MS and the EES
4.3 Semantic Incommensurability Between the MS and the EES
5 What Type of Scientific Change Is Currently Going on?
6 Conclusion
References
Ontologies in Evolutionary Biology: The Role of the Organism in the Two Syntheses
1 Introduction
2 Darwinian Gradualism, Inheritance, and the Organism
3 From the Modern Synthesis to a Gene-Based View of Evolution
4 Two Kinds of Ontological Objections to the Modern Synthesis
4.1 Gradualists and Structuralists (or Typologists)
4.2 Objections to the Genetic View of Evolution
5 The (Re)Introduction of Developmental and Ecological Aspects into Evolutionary Biology
5.1 The Generative Role of Development
5.2 Developmental Plasticity
5.3 Organisms as Ecological Agents
6 The Role of the Organism: Organicism, Evolution, and the Extended Synthesis
7 Conclusions
References
Tree Thinking and the Naturalisation of Language
1 Introduction
2 Evolutionary Psychology
3 Darwin and Language
3.1 Evolutionary Mechanisms of Languages: Languages Such as Species
3.1.1 Limits of the Darwinian Approach
3.1.2 Philosophical Consequences
Complexity in Terms of the Perfection of a Language
Complexity in Terms of the Cultural Progress of a Society
3.2 Evolution of the Faculty of Language
3.2.1 Continuity
3.2.2 Imitation
3.2.3 Coevolution
3.2.4 Thresholds
3.2.5 Philosophical Consequences
4 Tree Thinking
5 The Consilience Approach
6 Conclusion
References
Part III: Gene and Genotype Metaphysics
A New Perspective on Type-Token Distinction in the Genotype and Phenotype Concepts
1 Introduction
2 Genotype and Phenotype Are Type Concepts
2.1 Type-Token Distinction and Natural Kinds
2.2 Genotype and Phenotype Concepts under the Type-Token Distinction
3 Genotype and Genotoken Distinction
3.1 The Classification of Genes Cannot Be the Framework for Genotoken Classification
3.2 Rethinking Genotypes as Self-Templated Replication Processes
4 Phenotype and Phenotoken Distinction
5 Concluding Remarks
References
The Gene as a Natural Kind
1 Introduction
2 A Brief History of the Gene
2.1 The Gene in the ``Postgenomic´´ World
3 Natural Kinds and Biological Kinds
3.1 Natural Kinds
4 The Gene as a Natural Kind
4.1 Gene Classifications and Taxonomies
4.2 The Gene Is a Natural Kind
5 Conclusions
References
Part IV: Teleology in Biology and Cognitive Sciences
Teleological Explanations and Selective Mechanisms: Biological Teleology Beyond Natural Selection
1 Introduction
2 Selected-Effects Theories
3 Modelling Biological Selective Processes on Natural Selection
4 Selection Generalized
5 Intentional Selection
6 Natural Selection
7 Regulation
8 Conclusions
References
Evolutionary Causation and Teleosemantics
1 Introduction
2 Brentano´s Problem through Kant´s Puzzle: Setting Teleosemantics´ Core
2.1 Brentano´s Problem and Kant´s Puzzle
2.2 Teleosemantics´ Core and Etiological Teleosemantics
3 Evolutionary Causation: The Causalist School
3.1 The Causal Structure of Etiological Teleosemantics
3.2 Populational Causation
4 Evolutionary Causation: The Statisticalist School
5 Challenges for Etiological Teleosemantics?
5.1 Challenge 1: Functions without Causation?
5.2 Challenge 2: Statistical Norms for Nonstatistical Explanations?
6 Agential Teleosemantics: A New Solution to Kant´s Puzzle, a New Solution to Brentano´s Problem
6.1 Agential Teleology
6.2 Towards Agential Teleosemantics
References
