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The cognitive niche

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Jochen Fromm-5

The cognitive niche

Nick,
you are an expert in evolutionary psychology.
Do you agree with Humphrey's hypotheses that
human consciousness is an adaptation to living
in a society of selves and Pinker's similar idea
that language is an adaptation to the cognitive
niche? see http://bit.ly/dOeRLZ

-J.

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Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
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Eric Charles

Re: The cognitive niche

Jochen,
I'm not Nick, but we usually think pretty similarly about these issues, so I will attempt a short answer:

The most obvious problem with Humphrey's hypothesis is that lots of things that are not humans are conscious.

The problems with Pinker's hypothesis are much more awkward to explain. One relatively light weight problem is that it is much more natural to think of our cognitive prowess as relying on our linguistic ability, but Pinker's theory would require that we be in the 'cognitive niche' before we evolved language. (A more complex problem is that Pinker's theory is inherently incompatible with Darwin's notion of evolution, which was about the distribution of traits over geographic space. Things that are useful everywhere cannot, by definition, count as adaptations. But that is a messy, messy can of worms.)

Eric

P.S. Most modern evolutionary psychologists would have very different opinions about these issues than Nick and I.

On Sat, Feb 19, 2011 05:37 PM, "Jochen Fromm" <[hidden email]> wrote:

Nick, 
you are an expert in evolutionary psychology. 
Do you agree with Humphrey's hypotheses that 
human consciousness is an adaptation to living 
in a society of selves and Pinker's similar idea 
that language is an adaptation to the cognitive 
niche? see http://bit.ly/dOeRLZ

-J.


============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org

Eric Charles

Professional Student and
Assistant Professor of Psychology
Penn State University
Altoona, PA 16601

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org

Nick Thompson

Re: The cognitive niche

Jochen,

I CRINGE when anybody calls me an expert, but I have to admit that in my last job, I served as an evolutionary psychologist. Before that, I was a comparative psychologist, ethologist, and sociobiologists, more or less in that order. Unfortunately, any of these roles would designate me as a person who should feel guilty if he cannot shed light on your question.

I skimmed the article, but not Humphreys book, obviously. Articles drive me wild that purport to explain human beings but which begin by asserting them as. Explanations must inevitably place the explained thing in a wider context and, thereby, render it less unique just to extent that they are successful. So, such articles (and perhaps the book on which this one is based) always make me feel that the author is trying to have his cake and eat it to, the cake being to be a scientist and the eating of the cake being to sell large numbers of books to readers who want to feel that they are unique.

I am also not particularly keen on the notion that consciousness is private, which appears as a premise of the article. To me, my consciousness is just the set of events and objects to which I am responding; to the extent that you respond to those same events and objects, you share my consciousness. A FRIAM member once asserted to me that I didn’t “believe that crap” which ironically seemed to prove me right, since on his account he had to be a party to my consciousness to be in a position to make such a statement. I will attach a little bit of light reading (really!) which will give you an idea how somebody might actually come to “believe that crap”. It may not get past the FRIAM message size limit, in which case I won’t attach it.

Finally, I think that Humphreys identification of “consciousness” with meta consciousness is preposterously narrow. Even conceding that definition, however, I am not prepared to rule out the idea that some animals engage in meta-conscious behavior. Predators, observing their prey when they are not actually hunting, seem to be discovering the factors to which the prey are responding … i.e., adopting their consciousness.

As for language, it undoubtedly affords greater co-ordination of behavior with respect to events and objects not immediately before the animals that are coordinating … i.e., the sharing of consciousness.

I think the plain fact is that I am not terribly interested in the question of how and why humans are unique. We are unique, I guess, in the scale and grandeur of the mess we are making. (The only predecessors that I can think of are those creatures that poisoned themselves to extinction by producing oxygen.) Beyond that obvious fact, the best way to approach the question would be, I would suppose, work hard for a couple of hundred years to show all the ways in which humans are like animals and then, if that project fails, sweep the leftover bits up into a pile and call it human uniqueness.

All the best,

Nick

From: [hidden email] [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of ERIC P. CHARLES
Sent: Saturday, February 19, 2011 6:14 PM
To: Jochen Fromm
Cc: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] The cognitive niche

Nick,

you are an expert in evolutionary psychology.

Do you agree with Humphrey's hypotheses that

human consciousness is an adaptation to living

in a society of selves and Pinker's similar idea

that language is an adaptation to the cognitive

niche? see http://bit.ly/dOeRLZ

-J.

============================================================

FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv

Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College

lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org

Eric Charles

Professional Student and
Assistant Professor of Psychology
Penn State University
Altoona, PA 16601

Nick Thompson

Re: The cognitive niche

In reply to this post by Eric Charles

OOOOPS

Forgot to send the paper!

Jochen,

I'm not Nick, but we usually think pretty similarly about these issues, so I will attempt a short answer:

The most obvious problem with Humphrey's hypothesis is that lots of things that are not humans are conscious.

The problems with Pinker's hypothesis are much more awkward to explain. One relatively light weight problem is that it is much more natural to think of our cognitive prowess as relying on our linguistic ability, but Pinker's theory would require that we be in the 'cognitive niche' before we evolved language. (A more complex problem is that Pinker's theory is inherently incompatible with Darwin's notion of evolution, which was about the distribution of traits over geographic space. Things that are useful everywhere cannot, by definition, count as adaptations. But that is a messy, messy can of worms.)

Eric

P.S. Most modern evolutionary psychologists would have very different opinions about these issues than Nick and I.

On Sat, Feb 19, 2011 05:37 PM, "Jochen Fromm" <[hidden email]> wrote:

Nick,

you are an expert in evolutionary psychology.

Do you agree with Humphrey's hypotheses that

human consciousness is an adaptation to living

in a society of selves and Pinker's similar idea

that language is an adaptation to the cognitive

niche? see http://bit.ly/dOeRLZ

-J.

============================================================

FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv

Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College

lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org

Eric Charles

Professional Student and
Assistant Professor of Psychology
Penn State University
Altoona, PA 16601

Old Realist 23.doc (132K) Download Attachment

Jochen Fromm-5

Re: The cognitive niche

In reply to this post by Nick Thompson

That is true :-)

----- Original Message -----
From: Nicholas Thompson
To: 'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group'
Sent: Sunday, February 20, 2011 6:23 AM
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] The cognitive niche

[..] I am not terribly interested in the question of how and why humans are
unique. We are unique, I guess, in the scale and grandeur of the mess we are
making. [..]

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org

Jochen Fromm-5

Re: The cognitive niche

In reply to this post by Nick Thompson

Thanks for the interesting paper, you even mention
the FRIAM group! Is it possible to cite it?
I guess it is going to be published in
"Interview with an old new realist. In Eric P. Charles (Ed.),
A New Look at New Realism: E. B. Holt Reconsidered, Transactions Publishers
(2011)"
http://www.amazon.com/New-Look-Realism-Psychology-Philosophy/dp/1412842425

Right ?

-J.

----- Original Message -----
From: Nicholas Thompson
To: 'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group'
Sent: Sunday, February 20, 2011 6:36 AM
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] The cognitive niche

OOOOPS

Forgot to send the paper!

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org

Stephen Guerin

Re: The cognitive niche

In reply to this post by Eric Charles

Thank you for sharing the interview, Nick. It was a lot of fun to see the world from your perspective.

I look forward to your book, Eric!

Nick when you write: "To me the New Realism concedes our right to a point of view while demanding our obligation to share it. Each of us is obligated to give clear instructions for how to stand where we are standing, so that others can see what we see." I believe this has been the greatest gift you have brought to FRIAM...and we're still struggling with it.

-S

Nick Thompson

Re: The cognitive niche

Oh wait a minute. I was editing to remove the echo with the next sentence.

So, I guess it’s “To me the New Realism concedes our right to a point of view while DEMANDING THAT WE share it. Each of us is obligated to give clear instructions for how to stand where we are standing, so that others can see what we see.”

But I am not an obsessive twit. Honest!

Nick

From: [hidden email] [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf Of Stephen Guerin
Sent: Sunday, February 20, 2011 3:54 AM
To: Friam Friam
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] The cognitive niche

Thank you for sharing the interview, Nick. It was a lot of fun to see the world from your perspective.

I look forward to your book, Eric!

-S

Nick Thompson

Re: The cognitive niche

In reply to this post by Jochen Fromm-5

Thanks, Jochen,

I don't think we knew that the book was already known to Amazon, so your
guess is as good as ours. Better in fact!

Nick

-----Original Message-----
From: [hidden email] [mailto:[hidden email]] On Behalf
Of Jochen Fromm
Sent: Sunday, February 20, 2011 3:06 AM
To: The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] The cognitive niche

Thanks for the interesting paper, you even mention the FRIAM group! Is it
possible to cite it?
I guess it is going to be published in
"Interview with an old new realist. In Eric P. Charles (Ed.), A New Look at
New Realism: E. B. Holt Reconsidered, Transactions Publishers (2011)"
http://www.amazon.com/New-Look-Realism-Psychology-Philosophy/dp/1412842425

Right ?

-J.

----- Original Message -----
From: Nicholas Thompson
To: 'The Friday Morning Applied Complexity Coffee Group'
Sent: Sunday, February 20, 2011 6:36 AM
Subject: Re: [FRIAM] The cognitive niche

OOOOPS

Forgot to send the paper!

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives,
unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org

============================================================
FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv
Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College
lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org