Is the subtitle of Evan Thompson’s Chapter 7 in his book Life in Mind (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2007), the main title of which is “Laying down a path in walking.” Therein he details the received view of biological evolution and compares it with the enactive, dynamic systems view. It is highly technical and beyond my current knowledge of the topic, but nonetheless instructive in my burgeoning education down this path in walking. A copy of the chapter can be…
The article by the above name is here, first published 4/1/14 in Evolutionary Psychology. The abstract: “Evolutionary developmental psychology represents a synthesis of modern evolutionary theory and developmental psychology. Here we introduce the special issue on evolutionary developmental psychology by briefly discussing the history of this field and then summarizing the variety of topics that are covered. In this special issue, leading researchers provide a collection of theoretical and empirical articles that highlight recent findings and propose promising areas for…
I’ve sensed some tension between these fields in our discussions of both topics. As my knowledge of EP is minimal I’ve decided to do some research on the topic, hence my latest posts. It turns out there is a much broader and ongoing tension between these two fields as highlighted by this article, abstract following. Paul (and others) can let me know if their presentation is accurate and fair. “Much recent work stresses the role of embodiment and action in…
Article with the subtitle: “A unifying meta-theory of psychological science,” Review of General Psychology 16(1):10-23 · March 2012. Given there seems to be a conflict between evolutionary psychology and dynamic systems theory this article is relevant. The abstract: “Psychology is a theoretically heterogeneous discipline seeking a single, cohesive framework to unite the subdisciplines. To address this issue, I propose a hierarchical metatheory of psychological science that synthesizes neo-Darwinian selectionist thinking and dynamic systems theory by organizing evolutionary psychology, evolutionary developmental biology, developmental…
The main title is “The serpent’s gift,” Chapter 22 of The Cambridge Handbook of Consciousness (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007). A copy can be found at this link. A copy of this chapter can be found here. The abstract: “As a higher-order cognitive system enabling access to intentional states, and one that few (if any) other species even marginally possess, consciousness or, more appropriately, self-consciousness has likely been both selectively advantageous and the source of adaptive conflict in human evolutionary…
Article by Jiaying Zhao et al. in The Conversation. Some excerpts: “Despite the strong evidence that human activities are contributing to climate change, a small minority of the public disagrees with the scientific consensus. […] When we analyzed the data, we found a pattern: Conservatives who were less concerned about climate change were less likely to see climate-related words than liberals who were worried about the issue. In short, conservatives showed climate change blindness.” “Now that we know people’s political…
See this study. The blurb: “New brain published in the journal Scientific Reports sheds new light on how LSD produces its psychedelic effects. The drug resulted in the ’emergence of new type of order in the brain,’ the researchers found. The study used a new mathematical method to analyze brain activity, known as connectome-harmonic decomposition, to examine how LSD caused alterations in consciousness. A connectome is a distinctive pattern of neural connections — like a wiring diagram of the brain.”
This is from a review/analysis of Damasio’s book Self Comes to Mind: “On Page 8 he says, ‘I believe that conscious minds arise when a self process is added to a basic mind process.’ So, in Damasio’s view the difference between mind and consciousness is all about the self. He defines ‘mind’ as the process by which the brain creates images based on its maps, both of the body and of the world. But he says that the mind is…
Recall the anterior cingulate cortex’s (ACC) role in meditative states from the last post. This neuroscience article by the above name claims that “self-awareness is a pivotal component of conscious experience. It is correlated with a paralimbic network of medial prefrontal/anterior cingulate and medial parietal/posterior cingulate cortical ‘hubs’ and associated regions. Electromagnetic and transmitter manipulation have demonstrated that the network is not an epiphenomenon but instrumental in generation of self-awareness.” Concerning meditation and this brain network: “The new understanding of…
See Dan Brown talking about it in this video. He is also co-author in the paper “Mapping complex mind states.” Some excerpts from the latter follow. Note that it does not differentiate the different aspect of ‘self’ as discussed by Damasio. It appears that what it means by ‘self’ is the autobiographical self-reference system. However Damasio would see some of these results as examples of the proto-self and core self. This neuroscience article compares Damasio’s different types of self to…