How is life related to the mind? This book explores the gap between biological life and consciousness. It argues that where there is life, there is mind: life and mind share common principles of self-organization, and the self-organizing features of mind are an enriched version of the self-organizing features of life.

Klappentext Thompson explores the "explanatory gap" between biological life and consciousness, drawing on sources as diverse as molecular biology, evolutionary theory, artificial life, complex systems theory, neuroscience, psychology, Continental Phenomenology, and analytic philosophy to show that mind and life are more continuous than previously accepted.Thompson explores the "explanatory gap" between biological life and consciousness, drawing on sources as diverse as molecular biology, evolutionary theory, artificial life, complex systems theory, neuroscience, psychology, Continental Phenomenology, and analytic philosophy to show that mind and life are more continuous than previously accepted.

Autorentext

Evan Thompson

Klappentext

How is life related to the mind? The question has long confounded philosophers and scientists, and it is this so-called explanatory gap between biological life and consciousness that Evan Thompson explores in Mind in Life.

Thompson draws upon sources as diverse as molecular biology, evolutionary theory, artificial life, complex systems theory, neuroscience, psychology, Continental Phenomenology, and analytic philosophy to argue that mind and life are more continuous than has previously been accepted, and that current explanations do not adequately address the myriad facets of the biology and phenomenology of mind. Where there is life, Thompson argues, there is mind: life and mind share common principles of self-organization, and the self-organizing features of mind are an enriched version of the self-organizing features of life. Rather than trying to close the explanatory gap, Thompson marshals philosophical and scientific analyses to bring unprecedented insight to the nature of life and consciousness. This synthesis of phenomenology and biology helps make Mind in Life a vital and long-awaited addition to his landmark volume The Embodied Mind: Cognitive Science and Human Experience (coauthored with Eleanor Rosch and Francisco Varela).

Endlessly interesting and accessible, Mind in Life is a groundbreaking addition to the fields of the theory of the mind, life science, and phenomenology.

Zusammenfassung
Thompson explores the explanatory gap between biological life and consciousness, drawing on sources as diverse as molecular biology, evolutionary theory, artificial life, complex systems theory, neuroscience, psychology, Continental Phenomenology, and analytic philosophy to show that mind and life are more continuous than previously accepted.

Inhalt

Preface Acknowledgements Part I: The Enactive Approach 1. Cognitive Science and Human Experience 2. The Phenomenological Connection 3. Autonomy and Emergence 4. The Structure of Behavior Part II: Life in Mind 5. Autopoiesis: The Organization of the Living 6. Life and Mind: The Philosophy of the Organism 7. Laying Down a Path in Walking: Development and Evolution Part III: Consciousness in Life 8. Life Beyond the Gap 9. Sensorimotor Subjectivity 10. Look Again: Consciousness and Mental Imagery 11. Temporality and the Living Present 12. Primordial Dynamism: Emotion and Valence 13. Empathy and Enculturation Appendix 1: Husserl and Cognitive Science Appendix 2: Emergence and the Problem of Downward Causation References