Extended Cognition as a Case of Bottomless Theory Building

Extended cognition is the thesis that vehicles realizing cognitive systems can possibly extend beyond traditional boundaries of brain, skin, or skull. It is a popular thesis because of its counterintuitive consequence that coupled systems of vehicles of very different entities could form a realizer of one cognitive systems. Popular examples consist of human-handy-systems or human-notebook-systems, and it is a thesis that could non-dogmatically decide what individuates the realizers of cognitive systems. But the thesis is in need for individuation-criteria： How could we individuate a coupled system of different systems of vehicles？ We inspect some of the usually handled candidates for individuation-criteria and argue that in principal there will be no successful candidate due to methodological problems. We aim to show this by using a cookbook theory of extended cognition and add different types of candidates. No candidate is non-arbitrary or non-intrinsic, which leads the proponent to the forced selection between arbitrary or intrinsic candidates. We argue that without criteria, the talk about extended cognition is a bottomless pit that should only serve as an example for bottomless theory-building.

Five Major Ethical Issues Concerning Extended Cognitive Technology

Extended cognitive technology refers to technology that extends cognitive activity from the human brain,or body,to an external cognitive environment.This technology is best represented by the Internet.While significantly benefiting humanity and social development,extended cognitive technology has also triggered a range of ethical controversies.This paper first defines extended cognitive technology and analyzes related concepts,then explores five major ethical issues it raises.Suggestions regarding ethical governance are then proposed.

Grasping Heaven and Earth(Qian Kun Zai Wo):The Body-as-Technology in Classical Chinese Medicine

Shifting focus from the patient’s body to the healer’s body,this essay focuses on how Chinese physicians instrumentalized their bodies to heal(ie,body-as-technology)and their hands to think with(ie,hand-memory techniques or simply,hand mnemonics).When physicians used their hands to memorize concepts related to clinical practice,calculate with time variables,and carry out ritual gestures intended to reduce risk,improve fortune,and even cure,their hands became extensions of their minds.This essay has three parts that follow the discovery process of the author’s research on hand-memory techniques found in Chinese medical texts.The first part“Divination and Revelation”explains the significance of how the author first learned about Chinese divination practices that used hand mnemonics.The second part“Original Frame”introduces the scholarship on arts of memory in Europe that informed interpretations of the earliest hand mnemonics found in Chinese medical texts.The third part“Expanded Frame”deploys some concepts from cognitive science to help situate Chinese medical hand mnemonics more broadly as an example of extended cognition.The essay concludes with an important distinction:sometimes Chinese healers’hands were used separately from their bodies to think through things and sometimes hand and body had to be integrated in order for the healer’s body-as-technology to act as a therapeutically effective instrument.