Radical enactivism, Wittgenstein and the cognitive gap

Radical enactive (or embodied) cognition (REC) holds that some mental activities do not involve informational content but are instead physical interactions between an agent and the environment, while other mental activities do involve content scaffolded by social and linguistic practices. This raises a cognitive gap question: how do non-contentful behaviors give rise to contentful ones? The paper argues that if REC endorses claims by the later Wittgenstein, it can deny that there is any synchronous gap in intelligent behavior.

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Abstract

REC or radical enactive (or embodied) cognition involves the claim that certain forms of mentality do not involve informational content and are instead to be equated with temporally and spatially extended physical interactions between an agent and the environment. REC also claims however that other forms of mentality do involve informational content and are scaffolded by socially and linguistically enabled practices. This seems to raise what can be called a cognitive gap question, namely, how do non-contentful behaviours give rise to contentful behaviours? In this paper, I show how REC can tackle a certain understanding of this question. I argue that if REC were to endorse claims made by the later Wittgenstein, then REC could deny that there is any (synchronous) gap in our intelligent behaviour.