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On The Extended Mind, Clark & Chalmers (1998)

1.
“The moral is that when it comes to belief, there is nothing sacred about skull and skin. What makes some information count as a belief is the role it plays, and there is no reason why the relevant role can be played only from inside the body.”

2.
Clark and Chalmers are saying here that, in the ongoing discussion about how cognition originates and where it takes place, there is no reason that scientists and researchers must delimit the mind as only the brain, contained within each person’s physical body. Behaviorists and materialists have attempted to show that there is nothing to the mind outside the body—there is not a soul in the mystical sense, separate from but somehow coinciding with the brain. Clark and Chalmers imply that in the zeal of those (behavioral materialist) writers to show that the mind is contained in the body and, indeed, is merely the name laypeople give to the collection of neurons in the brain, they have gone too far and have put a dogmatic limitation on a person’s cognitive processes being contained solely within each person.

Even outside of strict materialist circles, beliefs are traditionally viewed as being held solely within one’s own mind, unexposed and inaccessible to anyone else except when explicitly given through verbal or written communication. Viewing the body and mind as comprising the functional unit of a person, Clark and Chalmers posit the view that the different roles that different bits of information (and, additionally, some forms of computation) play makes them what they are—in this case, that certain types of information are beliefs because they play the role of beliefs, not that the definition of belief must necessarily include “being contained within the person’s body.”

3.
The claim that the mind can be extended into the world, including beliefs and computations, is a radical one in light of the vast majority of the history of philosophy of the mind. Clark and Chalmers are not content to accept the claim that whatever is outside of the body is outside of the mind; nor are they satisfied with the claim that meaning can be outside of the body and, therefore, the mind must be extended into the world. They claim, instead, that the functional interaction of the body, including the brain, with the outside world, can also constitute mind, or contain it, in a way that allows for the mind to act directly on the objects in the world.

Clark and Chalmers reference investigations in the differences between epistemic and pragmatic actions: while pragmatic actions change something in the world because of physical necessity or desirability, epistemic actions are changes in the world in order to augment cognitive processes (as in the case of physical versus mental rotation of blocks that fit certain sockets, as in, e.g., Tetris). This distinction allows them to distance themselves from the passive externalism of Putnam and Burge, by claiming that epistemic actions engage the world directly in the cognitive loop, and are not merely “dangling at the other end of a long causal chain.” Thus, flipping blocks in Tetris to aid judgment-of-fit of a given block, or rearranging the letters on a tray in a game of Scrabble, are both examples of extended cognition. This, Clark and Chalmers go on to say, is much simpler than the “needlessly complex” explanation of inputs, mental connections, and actions that characterize most cognitive-behavioral speech.

In this way, too, are beliefs and other traditionally “inner” pieces of information given external cognitive existence. Clark and Chalmers point to the case of a man with a peculiar sort of amnesia, who remembers to check his notebook for things he needs to remember; his beliefs about the placement of things and places in the world are contained in that notebook, and are a part of his cognitive processes, even though they are contained physically outside of his head. Their point is that what is important is the role being played by a series of actions or by an external source of information, not by the locations of these sources in space or in relation to the body, whether inside of it or outside.

On The Extended Mind, Clark & Chalmers (1998)

1.
“The moral is that when it comes to belief, there is nothing sacred about skull and skin. What makes some information count as a belief is the role it plays, and there is no reason why the relevant role can be played only from inside the body.”

2.
Clark and Chalmers are saying here that, in the ongoing discussion about how cognition originates and where it takes place, there is no reason that scientists and researchers must delimit the mind as only the brain, contained within each person’s physical body. Behaviorists and materialists have attempted to show that there is nothing to the mind outside the body—there is not a soul in the mystical sense, separate from but somehow coinciding with the brain. Clark and Chalmers imply that in the zeal of those (behavioral materialist) writers to show that the mind is contained in the body and, indeed, is merely the name laypeople give to the collection of neurons in the brain, they have gone too far and have put a dogmatic limitation on a person’s cognitive processes being contained solely within each person.

Even outside of strict materialist circles, beliefs are traditionally viewed as being held solely within one’s own mind, unexposed and inaccessible to anyone else except when explicitly given through verbal or written communication. Viewing the body and mind as comprising the functional unit of a person, Clark and Chalmers posit the view that the different roles that different bits of information (and, additionally, some forms of computation) play makes them what they are—in this case, that certain types of information are beliefs because they play the role of beliefs, not that the definition of belief must necessarily include “being contained within the person’s body.”

3.
The claim that the mind can be extended into the world, including beliefs and computations, is a radical one in light of the vast majority of the history of philosophy of the mind. Clark and Chalmers are not content to accept the claim that whatever is outside of the body is outside of the mind; nor are they satisfied with the claim that meaning can be outside of the body and, therefore, the mind must be extended into the world. They claim, instead, that the functional interaction of the body, including the brain, with the outside world, can also constitute mind, or contain it, in a way that allows for the mind to act directly on the objects in the world.

Clark and Chalmers reference investigations in the differences between epistemic and pragmatic actions: while pragmatic actions change something in the world because of physical necessity or desirability, epistemic actions are changes in the world in order to augment cognitive processes (as in the case of physical versus mental rotation of blocks that fit certain sockets, as in, e.g., Tetris). This distinction allows them to distance themselves from the passive externalism of Putnam and Burge, by claiming that epistemic actions engage the world directly in the cognitive loop, and are not merely “dangling at the other end of a long causal chain.” Thus, flipping blocks in Tetris to aid judgment-of-fit of a given block, or rearranging the letters on a tray in a game of Scrabble, are both examples of extended cognition. This, Clark and Chalmers go on to say, is much simpler than the “needlessly complex” explanation of inputs, mental connections, and actions that characterize most cognitive-behavioral speech.

In this way, too, are beliefs and other traditionally “inner” pieces of information given external cognitive existence. Clark and Chalmers point to the case of a man with a peculiar sort of amnesia, who remembers to check his notebook for things he needs to remember; his beliefs about the placement of things and places in the world are contained in that notebook, and are a part of his cognitive processes, even though they are contained physically outside of his head. Their point is that what is important is the role being played by a series of actions or by an external source of information, not by the locations of these sources in space or in relation to the body, whether inside of it or outside.