Enactive Pragmatism and Ecological Psychology

Abstract

A widely cited roadblock to bridging ecological psychology and enactivism is that the former identifies with realism and the latter identifies with constructivism, which critics charge is subjectivist. A pragmatic reading, however, suggests non-mental forms of constructivism that simultaneously fit core tenets of enactivism and ecological realism. After advancing a pragmatic version of enactive constructivism that does not obviate realism, I reinforce the position with an empirical illustration: Physarum polycephalum, a communal unicellular organism that leaves slime trails that form chemical barriers that it avoids in foraging explorations. Here, environmental building and sensorimotor engagement are part of the same process with P. polycephalum coordinating around self-created, affordance-bearing geographies, which nonetheless exist independently in ways described by ecological realists. For ecological psychologists, affordances are values, meaning values are external to the perceiver. I argue that agent-enacted values have the same status and thus do not obviate ecological realism or generate subjectivism. The constructivist-realist debate organizes around the emphasis that enactivists and ecological theorists respectively place on the inner constitution of organisms vs. the structure of environments. Building on alimentary themes introduced in the P. polycephalum example and also in Gibson's work, I go on to consider how environment, brain, visceral systems, and even bacteria within them enter perceptual loops. This highlights almost unfathomable degrees of mutually modulating internal and external synchronization. It also shows instances in which internal conditions alter worldly configurations and invert values, in Gibson's sense of the term, albeit without implying subjectivism. My aim is to cut across the somatic focus of enactive constructivism and the external environment-oriented emphasis of ecological realism and show that enactivism can enrich ecological accounts of value.

Explanation, Enaction and Naturalised Phenomenology

“…For example, a particular accumulation of chemicals only becomes food or a threat in and through the presence of a cogniser with the relevant capacities and concerns. In response to this, both Crippen (2020) and Rolla and Figueredo (2021, p. 3) offer arguments for a "middle way" between realism and idealism -arguments that, as we will see, are couched in the kind of temporal terms accessible to Sassian phenomenological explanations.…”

“…The importance to enactivism of the rich, complex interplay between synchronic and diachronic axes -and the concomitant importance of modes of inquiry that are especially sensitive to such factors -is apparent in recent work defending enactivism against accusations of idealism. Crippen (2020) and Rolla & Figueiredo (2021) note that the emphasis upon the cogniser's active role in generating meaning and enacting its world has led to enactivism sometimes being positioned as a form of subjectivism (even though the 'subject' in question can be a very basic organism). The concern is that enactive sense-making can start to sound like the projection of values and attributes upon an environment which is never truly encountered 'in itself', especially since the world that is enacted -the meanings, possibilities and threats -are not taken exist without the cogniser.…”

Enactivism and Material Culture: How Enactivism Could Redefine Enculturation Processes

“…Despite these shared commitments and other apparent resonances between approaches, communication between these two groups of researchers has been surprisingly sparse [48]. However, in a compilation of recent publications, conflicting positions are found, and some consider that there are insoluble conceptual incompatibilities between these two approaches [49] or that ecological psychology is realistic while enactivism is constructivist [50]. In any case, several authors are committed to the complementarity of these two approaches, assuming that the differences may be merely apparent [49].…”

Neither mindful nor mindless, but minded: habits, ecological psychology, and skilled performance

“…Instead, we sketch an outline for a radical embodied, non-representational theory of skilled motor behavior based on the combination of ecological psychology (Gibson, 1979(Gibson, [2015; Chemero, 2009) and the philosophy of Dewey. In order to justify this connection, it is worth mentioning that Dewey anticipated many important ideas also present ecological psychology (see Heras-Escribano, 2019b;Crippen, 2017Crippen, , 2020Crippen & Schulkin, 2020). First, he rejected the assumption that perception is a passive happening whereby the agent is impressed by some external stimuli.…”