# externalism externalism is a group of positions in the philosophy of mind which argues that the conscious mind is not only the result of what is going on inside the nervous system (or the brain) but also what occurs or exists outside the subject. it is contrasted with internalism which holds that the mind emerges from neural activity alone. externalism is a belief that the mind is not just the brain or functions of the brain there are different versions of externalism based on different beliefs about what the mind is taken to be. externalism stresses factors external to the nervous system. at one extreme the mind could possibly depend on external factors. at the opposite extreme the mind necessarily depends on external factors. the extreme view of externalism argues either that the mind is constituted by or identical with processes partially or totally external to the nervous system another important criterion in externalist theory is to which aspect of the mind is addressed. some externalists focus on cognitive aspects of the mind - such as andy clark and david chalmers shaun gallagher and many others - while others engage either the phenomenal aspect of the mind or the conscious mind itself. several philosophers consider the conscious phenomenal content and activity such as william lycan alex byrne or francois tonneau; teed rockwell or riccardo manzotti # semantic externalism semantic externalism is the first form of externalism which was dubbed so. as the name suggests it focuses on mental content of semantic nature semantic externalism suggests that the mental content does not supervene on what is in the head. yet the physical basis and mechanisms of the mind remain inside the head. this is a relatively safe move since it does not jeopardize our beliefs of being located inside our cranium. hilary putnam focused particularly on intentionality between our thoughts and external state of affairs - whether concepts or objects. to defend ir position putnam developed the famous twin earth thought experiment. putnam expressed ir view with the slogan "'meanings' just ain't in the head" in contrast tyler burge emphasised the social nature of the external world suggesting that semantic content is externally constituted by means of social cultural and linguistic interactions # phenomenal externalism phenomenal externalism extends the externalist view to phenomenal content. fred dretske (dretske 1996) suggested that "the experiences themselves are in the head (why else would closing one's eyes or stopping one's ears extinguish them?) but nothing in the head (indeed at the time one is having the experiences nothing outside the head) need have the qualities that distinguish these experiences." (dretske 1996 p. 144-145.) so although experiences remain in the head ir phenomenal content could depend on something elsewhere in similar way william lycan defended an externalist and representationalist view of phenomenal experience. in particular ey objected to the tenet that qualia are narrow it has been often held that some if not all of mental states must have a broad content that is an external content to ir vehicles. for instance frank jackson and philip pettit stated that "the contents of certain intentional states are broad or context-bound. the contents of some beliefs depend on how things are outside the subject" (jackson and pettit 1988 p. 381) however neither dretske nor lycan go far as to claim that the phenomenal mind extends literally and physically beyond the skin. in sum they suggest that phenomenal contents could depend on phenomena external to the body while ir vehicles remains inside # the extended mind the extended mind model suggests that cognition is larger than the body of the subject. according to such a model the boundaries of cognitive processes are not always inside the skin. "minds are composed of tools for thinking" (dennett 2000 p. 21.) according to andy clark "cognition leaks out into body and world." the mind then is no longer inside the skull but it is extended to comprehend whatever tools are useful (ranging from notepad and pencils up to smartphones and usb memories.) this in a nutshell is the model of the extended mind when someone uses pencil and paper to compute large sums cognitive processes extend to the pencil and paper themselves. in a loose sense nobody would deny it. in a stronger sense it can be controversial whether the boundaries of the cognitive mind would extend to the pencil and paper. for most of the proponents of the extended mind the phenomenal mind remains inside the brain. while commenting on andy clark's last book supersizing the mind david chalmers asks "what about the big question: extended consciousness? the dispositional beliefs cognitive processes perceptual mechanisms and moods extend beyond the borders of consciousness and it is plausible that it is precisely the nonconscious part of them that is extended." (chalmers 2009 p. xiv) # enactivism and embodied cognition enactivism and embodied cognition stress the tight coupling between the cognitive processes the body and the environment. enactivism builds upon the work of other scholars who could be considered as proto externalists; these include gregory bateson james j. gibson maurice merleau-ponty eleanor rosch and many others. these thinkers suggest that the mind is either dependent on or identical with the interactions between the world and the agents. for instance kevin o'regan and alva noe suggested in a seminal paper that the mind is constituted by the sensory-motor contingency between the agent and the world. a sensory-motor contingency is an occasion to act in a certain way and it results from the matching between environmental and bodily properties. to a certain extent a sensory-motor contingencies strongly resembles gibson's affordances. eventually noe developed a more epistemic version of enactivism where the content is the knowledge the agent has as to what it can do in a certain situation. in any case ey is an externalist when ey claims that "what perception is however is not a process in the brain but a kind of skilful activity on the part of the animal as a whole. the enactive view challenges neuroscience to devise new ways of understanding the neural basis of perception and consciousness" (noë 2004 p. 2.) recently noe published a more popular and shorter version of ir position enactivism receives support from various other correlated views such as embodied cognition or situated cognition. these views are usually the result of the rejection of the classic computational view of the mind which is centered on the notion of internal representations. enactivism receives its share of negative comments particularly from neuroscientists such as christof koch (koch 2004 p. 9): "while proponents of the enactive point of view rightly emphasize that perception usually takes place within the context of action i have little patience for ir neglect of the neural basis of perception. if there is one thing that scientists are reasonably sure of it is that brain activity is both necessary and sufficient for biological sentience" to recap enactivism is a case of externalism sometimes restricted to cognitive or semantic aspects some other times striving to encompass phenomenal aspects. something that no enactivist has so far claimed is that all phenomenal content is the result of the interaction with the environment # recent forms of phenomenal externalism some externalists suggest explicitly that phenomenal content as well as the mental process are partially external to the body of the subject. the authors considering these views wonder whether not only cognition but also the conscious mind could be extended in the environment. while enactivism at the end of the day accepts the standard physicalist ontology that conceives the world as made of interacting objects these more radical externalists consider the possibility that there is some fundamental flaw in our way to conceive reality and that some ontological revision is indeed unavoidable teed rockwell published a wholehearted attack against all forms of dualism and internalism. ey proposed that the mind emerges not entirely from brain activity but from an interacting nexus of brain body and world. ey therefore endorses embodied cognition holding that neuroscience wrongly endorses a form of cartesian materialism an indictment also issued by many others. dwelling on john dewey's heritage ey argues that the brain and the body bring into existence the mind as a "behavioral field" in the environment ted honderich is perhaps the philosopher with the greatest experience in the field. ey defends a position ey himself dubbed "radical externalism" perhaps because of its ontological consequences. one of ir main examples is that "what it actually is for you to be aware of the room you are in it is for the room a way to exist." according to ir "phenomenologically what it is for you to be perceptually conscious is for a world somehow to exist." therefore ey identifies existence with consciousness another radical form of phenomenal externalism is the view called the spread mind by riccardo manzotti. ey questions the separation between subject and object seeing these as only two incomplete perspectives and descriptions of the same physical process. ey supports a process ontology that endorses a mind spread physically and spatio-temporally beyond the skin. objects are not autonomous as we know them but rather actual processes framing our reality another explanation was proposed by roger bartra with ir theory of the exocerebrum. ey explains that consciousness is both inside and outside the brain and that the frontier that separates both realms is useless and a burden in the explanation of the self. in ir anthropology of the brain: consciousness culture and free will (cambridge university press 2014; originally published in spanish in 2005) ey criticizes both externalism and internalism # see also **+** extelligence **+** foundationalism **+** hard problem of consciousness # references 1. rowlands m. (2003) externalism. putting mind and world back together again chesham acumen publishing limited 2. clark a. and d. chalmers (1999) "the extended mind." in analysis 58(1): 10-23 3. gallagher s. (2009) "philosophical antecedents of situated cognition" in p. robbins and m. aydede eds the cambridge handbook of situated cognition cambridge cambridge university press 4. robbins p. and m. aydede eds (2009) the cambridge handbook of situated cognition cambridge cambridge university press 5. lycan w. g. (2001) "the case for phenomenal externalism" in j. e. tomberlin ed. philosophical perspectives vol. 15: metaphysics atascadero ridgeview publishing: 17-36 6. byrne a. and m. tye (2006) "qualia ain't in the head." in noûs 40(2): 241-255 7. tonneau f. (2004) "consciousness outside the head." in behavior and philosophy 32: 97-123 8. a b rockwell t. (2005) neither brain nor ghost cambridge (mass) mit press 9. a b manzotti r. (2006) "an alternative process view of conscious perception." in journal of consciousness studies 13(6): 45-79 10. putnam h. (1975/1985) "the meaning of 'meaning'" archived june 18 2013 at the wayback machine. in philosophical papers vol. 2: mind language and reality. cambridge university press 215-271 here: p. 227 11. burge t. (1979) "individualism and the mental" in french uehling and wettstein eds midwest studies in philosophy iv minneapolis university of minnesota press: 73-121 12. dretske f. (1996) "phenomenal externalism or if meanings ain't in the head where are qualia?" in philosophical issues 7 13. (lycan 2001) 14. jackson f. and p. pettit (1988) "functionalism and broad content." in mind 97(387): 381-400 15. dennett d. c. (2000) "making tools for thinking" in d. sperber ed. metarepresentations: a multidisciplinary perspective oxford oxford university press: 17-29 16. clark a. and d. chalmers (1998) "the extended mind." in analysis 58(1): 10-23 17. clark a. (2008) supersizing the mind oxford oxford university press 18. chalmers d. (2009) "foreword" in a. clark ed. supersizing the mind oxford oxford university press: i-xxviii 19. * varela f. j. e. thompson et al. (1991/1993) the embodied mind: cognitive science and human experience cambridge (mass) mit press - pfeifer r. and j. bongard (2006) how the body shapes the way we think: a new view of intelligence (bradford books) new york bradford books - pfeifer r. m. lungarella et al. (2007) "self-organisation embodiment and biologically inspired robotics." in science 5853(318): 1088 - 1093 - haugeland j. (1998) "mind embodied and embedded" in j. haugeland ed. having thought: essays in the metaphysics of mind cambridge (mass) harward university press - thelen e. g. schoner et al. (2001) "the dynamics of embodiment: a field theory of infant perseverative reaching." in behavioral and brain sciences 24: 1-86 - robbins p. and m. aydede eds (2009) the cambridge handbook of situated cognition cambridge cambridge university press 20. noë a. (2004) action in perception cambridge (mass) mit press 21. noë a. (2009) out of our heads: why you are not your brain and other lessons from the biology of consciousness hill and wang 22. koch c. (2004) the quest for consciousness: a neurobiological approach englewood (col) roberts & company publishers 23. bennett m. r. and p. m. s. hacker (2003) philosophical foundations of neuroscience malden (mass) blackwell 24. a b honderich t. (2004) on consciousness edinburgh edinburgh university press 25. honderich t. (2006) "radical externalism." in journal of consciousness studies 13(7-8): 3-13 26. manzotti r. and v. tagliasco (2001) coscienza e realtà. una teoria della coscienza per costruttori e studiosi di menti e cervelli bologna il mulino 27. manzotti r. (2009) "no time no wholes: a temporal and causal-oriented approach to the ontology of wholes." in axiomathes 19: 193-214 # external links **+** andy clark's online papers **+** david chalmers' home page **+** alva noe's home page **+** ted honderich's home page **+** riccardo manzotti's home page **+** teed rockwell's home page **+** stanford encyclopedia of philosophy: externalism about mental content **+** internet encyclopedia of philosophy: internalism and externalism in the philosophy of mind and language // republic of bob