Philosophy Study 2013-12

Philosophy Study

Volume 3, Number 12, December 2013 (Serial Number 28)

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Publication Information: Philosophy Study is published monthly in print (ISSN 2159-5313) and online (ISSN 2159-5321) by David Publishing Company located at 16710 East Johnson Drive, City of Industry, CA 91745, USA. Aims and Scope: As a monthly peer-reviewed journal, Philosophy Study commits itself to promoting the academic communication about developments in philosophy; it includes all sorts of research into Epistemology, Ethics, History of Philosophy, Philosophy of Science, Philosophy of Language, Philosophy of Religion, Philosophy of Mind, Political Philosophy, and other relevant areas, and seeks to provide a platform for scholars worldwide. Manuscripts and correspondence are invited for publication. You can submit your papers via Web Submission system, or e-mail to [email protected] (org) or [email protected]. Submission guidelines and Web Submission system are available at http://www.davidpublishing.com. Editorial Office: Tel: 1-323-984-7526, 1-323-410-1082; Fax: 1-323-984-7374, 323-908-0457 E-mail: [email protected] (org), [email protected] Copyright©2013 by David Publishing Company and individual contributors. All rights reserved. David Publishing Company holds the exclusive copyright of all the contents of this journal. In accordance with the international convention, no part of this journal may be reproduced or transmitted by any media or publishing organs (including various websites) without the written permission of the copyright holder. Otherwise, any conduct would be considered as the violation of the copyright. The contents of this journal are available for any citation; however, all citations should be clearly indicated with the title of this journal, serial number, and the name of the author. Peer Review Policy: All research articles published in Philosophy Study have undergone rigorous peer review, based on initial editor screening and anonymized refereeing by at least two anonymous referees. Editorial Procedures: All papers considered appropriate for this journal are reviewed anonymously by at least two outside reviewers. The review process usually takes three to four weeks. Papers are accepted for publication subject to no substantive, stylistic editing. The Editor reserves the right to make any necessary changes in the papers, or request the author to do so, or reject the submitted paper. A copy of the edited paper along with the first proofs will be sent to the author for proofreading. They should be corrected and returned to the Editor within three working days. Once the final version of the paper has been accepted, authors are requested not to make further changes to the text. Abstracted / Indexed in: Cambridge Scientific Abstracts (CSA) Chinese Database of CEPS, American Federal Computer Library Center (OCLC) Chinese Scientific Journals Database, VIP Corporation, Chongqing, P.R. China EBSCO Databases Norwegian Social Science Data Services (NSD) The Philosopher’s Index ProQuest Summon Serials Solutions Ulrich’s Periodicals Directory Universe Digital Library S/B Subscription Information: $450 (print/year); $320 (online/year); $600 (print and online/year) David Publishing Company 16710 East Johnson Drive, City of Industry, CA 91745, USA Tel: 1-323-984-7526, 1-323-410-1082; Fax: 1-323-984-7374, 323-908-0457 E-mail: [email protected], [email protected]

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Philosophy Study

Volume 3, Number 12, December 2013 (Serial Number 28)

Contents Indian Philosophy

Study on the Organic Correlation of Prāṇa Energy 1061

Hae-Young Won

Philosophy of Science

Extended Cognition as a Case of Bottomless Theory Building 1071

Gerhard Chr. Bukow

Aristotle’s Definition of Phýsis in Physics B 1 1088

Camilo Vega González

Phenomenology

The Habitus Made Me Do It: Bourdieu’s Key Concept as a Substruction of the Monad 1094

Carlos Belvedere

Logic

Logic as an Art and Logic as a Science: Is It Only Precedents or Tradition? 1109

Konstantin Skripnik

Aesthetics

Metaphor in Cinema Revisited 1118

Alberto J. L. Carrillo Canán, Víctor Gerardo Rivas López, May Zindel

Lived Music—Multi-dimensional Musical Experience: Implications for Music Education 1124

Cecilia Ferm Thorgersen

Philosophy Study, ISSN 2159-5313 December 2013, Vol. 3, No. 12, 1061-1070

Study on the Organic Correlation of Prāṇa Energy

Hae-Young Won

Korea University

Since India’s philosophical discussion on the correlation between the mind and the body, the goal achieved through

practice has been imbued with much meaning under the influences of yoga. Self-transcendence can be reached

through self-discipline that is founded upon the fundamental change and potential for existential practice. The mind

and the body do not comprise a binary relationship but instead maintain an intimate relationship bound by the

medium of organic energy of breathing, breath, and prāṇa. Of these medium that form the relationship, the prāṇa

has a natural healing tendency, which has been well documented within classics such as Upaniṣads and Bhagavad

Gītā. Classic yoga explains that prāṇa imbues within it a vivacious passion and energy that will connect the human

body with the human mind. Thus, the prāṇa functions as bio-energy. From ancient Indian philosophy to Buddhism,

yoga therapy actively utilizes practice as a main element. In particular, the Patañjali yoga’s methodology details the

organic correlation within its eight limbs (支) yoga practices. The prāṇa is breath. This is the only sense in which

Patañjali has used this word. Breath is called prāṇa because it moves on continuously throughout the body and

reaches the basic circle of the individual self. It pervades mouth, nostrils, heart, navel region and toes. As a result, it

is a healing method that achieves far more than the scientific healing methods common in society.

Keywords: India’s philosophical, between the mind and the body, fundamental change, eight limbs (支) yoga

practices, healing method, the organic energy of breathing, breath, prāṇa

1. Introduction

In Indian philosophy, yoga has existed as a philosophical and religious tradition with its own unique

metaphysics and practice. Yoga, on the other hand, has also expanded to the general public through its

abstemious methods and meditation practices. A central topic within the discussion of yoga would be the

manner in which the practice perceives the relationship between the mind and the body. A psychological

perspective on this topic would be useful. Yoga has existed well before the establishment of a scholarly system

of depth-psychology, in which various conditions of human existence is analyzed in detail. Indian sages of the

past were able to delve into the human unconscious and analyze the incompleteness of human conditions. Such

works were possible because the sages completely believed in the fundamental changes and potentials of the

manner of human existence, as well as in the effects of the practices that would achieve these changes (Koller

1982, 172-173). “Success is achieved through practice. The practitioner gains absolute freedom through

practice. Complete consciousness comes from practice. Yoga is completed through practice” (Śiva Samhita

4.9-11).

Hae-Young Won, Ph.D., Post-doctor, Research Institute of Korean Studies, Korea University, Korea; main research fields:

Early Buddhism, Indian Philosophy, Buddhist Logic, the Feminine Gender, Literature, Aesthetic, and Codicology. Email: [email protected].

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STUDY ON THE ORGANIC CORRELATION OF PRĀṇA ENERGY

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The common element within various forms of yoga is that, regardless of all the differences that exist

among the various types of yoga, each of the yoga types fully developed the varying methodologies to the

fullest. Yoga believes that self-transcendence is achieved through self-discipline (Koller 1982, 170-177). Eliade

professed that yoga has a religious meaning because it opened up the potential for the human to overcome the

practical conditions imposed on them (Eliade 1988, 7).

If the dualistic perspective of the human mind and the human body is the notion of the Western philosophy,

the philosophy of yoga practices is founded on that there is no intrinsic discrepancy between the human mind

and the human body. Yoga emphasizes the daily life that is experienced by the composite form that the mind

and body comprise. Senart claimed that Buddha, rather than rejecting the Indian traditions of abstinence and

meditation, actually embraced it and completed it. He stated that, “the birth of Buddha was made possible

through the soil of yoga. He was able to apply any and all innovation within the frames of yoga. Therefore, it

can be said that Buddhism was founded within the boundaries of yoga” (Eliade 1973, 162).

Ancient yoga emphasized the mind over the body, so it can be described as being restrictive towards the

body. The Hatha yoga was centered around the body so the physical discipline introduced by the Hatha yoga

actively engages the human body. The body is a container that shelters the atman, with its unbounded possibilities

(Atharva Veda 10.2; Jean Varenne 1989, 90). Yoga in no way rejects or undermines either the human mind or

the human body. Yoga instead, uniquely embraced the importance of the interconnected relationship between

the human mind and the human body and was founded upon this intimate connectivity of the two elements.

However, based on the different types of yoga, there were different personalities of the yoga practice. Yoga was

treated as a single ecological system and based on this unified foundation, it emphasized that the mind and the

body cannot be distinguished as two parts.

The various practices of yoga help the human mind and the human body. In this discussion, the “breathing,

breath” will be the thesis that connects the passionate energy between mind and body. “Breathing, breath” heals

the stresses imposed on the human and allows the rediscovering of the human equilibrium. Prāṇa has a natural

healing characteristic and therefore this paper will delve into the discussion of prāṇa.

2. The History and Characteristics of Prāṇa

2.1. Prāṇa in Ancient Periods

We are interested in “breathing, breath” or “prāṇa,” which is the academic term widely used in India, it is

the living energy that freely interweaves the mind and the body. It is undoubtedly impossible to narrate the full

historical chronology of the development of yoga from a mystical story to a scientific philosophy. Among the

four elements that include the earth, the water, the fire, and the wind, prāṇa has an interesting position within

the development of Indian philosophy. Swami Vivekananda (1955) professed that, “breath is like the

mechanical wheel of the human body. The most detailed and delicate mechanic movement is transferred from

one finder to the other finder, […] breathing is moved by a very regular force and therefore is the controlling

wheel of the mechanical cycle of the human body” (39-40). This type of mechanical interpretation of

“breathing, breath” can be well fused into the current scientific interpretation. “Breathing, breath” and “prāṇa”

are past interpretations that were mystical and classical. Maitrī-upaniṣad classified prāṇa into five distinct

categories that were referred to as the five wind (vāyu).


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Prajāpati created various existences and when he saw that all that he had created had no consciousness

decided that “he must enter into them to awaken them.” He transformed into a form similar to the wind and

entered into his existences. But he could not do all that he wished by himself so he split his own self into five

different forms. The form that ascended was prāṇa, the form that descended was apāna, the form that

integrated the prāṇa and the apāna and maintained this composition was the vyāna, the form that was delivered

to all as the nutrients spread through apāna was the samāna, and the form that swallowed and digested was

udāna (Maitrī-upaniṣad 2.6).

The functions and concepts of the 5 vāyu are organically explained within the Maitrī-upaniṣad. The prāṇa

is the entering breath. It is the breath that enters the body through the nose and the mouth and is thus the

inhalation. Apāna is the descending breath or the exhalation. When breath is exhaled, it is a strength that leaves

the body through the anal passage. In this instance, bodily secretion, bodily excretion, semen, and menses all

function as exiting the body. Samāna is the breath that divides. It exists within the heart and acts to control the

inhaling and exhaling breaths. Externally, it acts by forming the bond with the other. Udāna is ascending breath

and is therefore the strength that ascends to the head. It is materialized as language and can act as self-pride.

Vyāna is the omnipresent breath. Because it is omnipresent throughout the body it vitalizes the body’s strength.

It acts as the origins of intimacy and unity. Among the forces that act upon the body, prāṇa is the weakest and

vyāna is the strongest. The analyses of the 5 vāyu in the Maitrī-upaniṣad are extremely detailed. Prāṇa can be

found in any living thing, from the most basic single cell organism such as an amoeba to the most intricate and

complex living organism such as the human. It exists within every atom. Even those things that seem to have

no life are simply manifested by the lack of this fundamental force. Ancient Indians were therefore extremely

interested in the subject of the prāṇa.

Bhagavad Gītā (4.29) notes that, “some offered the exhaling breath apāna to the inhaling breath prāṇa.

Also, by offering the exhaling breath to the inhaling breath, they tried to restrict the inhaling and exhaling

breaths and ultimately regarded the control of breathing as the fundamental goal”. Indians treated the

foundational force, which is prāṇa, as the universal origin of all phenomenological energy and forces. As the

origin of all energy existing within all living things, prāṇa can be distinguished into that which has life and that

which does not have life. Also, this can be treated as the origin of living activities and the energy to sustain life.

Yogananda (2006), which can be classified as an ancient yoga, notes the following, “Kriya yoga is a

simple and mental-physiological methodology. It converts the air brought into the body into the vivacious flow

of prāṇa to enliven the chakra of the brain and spin centers. An expert yoga practitioner can convert one’s cells

into pure energy. These experts utilize this skill to dematerialize their own bodies at will” (307),. Body, mind,

and prāṇa are treated as the essential elements crucial to the human existence. The vivacious energy is

introduced to the body in order to express the mind. Each of the body’s institutions and organs has an

intellectual existence, and a very strong determination can cleanse and heal a specific part of the body. In order

for every part of the body to function properly and maintain the desired balance, the unwavering determination

of the mind is vital. The prāṇa energy, which definitely has a mystical quality, plays a significant role within

yoga. Prāṇa is an energy that embraces all just like fresh air, but it is not air. It is absorbed into the body with air.

Many reasons are continuously interested in the essence and utility of the prāṇa is because it is a crucial

element in controlling the most fundamental force that sustains the human body. Prāṇa is an absolutely

necessary essential force that allows life.


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2.2. The Organic Composition of Patañjali 8 Limbs

Numerous yoga types affiliate themselves with the Patañjali yoga, but it is not often that these yoga

families imply the Raja yoga. In many instances, there are implications behind why this can be stated. These

are mainly an issue of seeking cultural legitimacy (Larson 2008, 435). There are various traditions that have

been influenced by Patañjali yoga but there are also those that are very distant from it. These traditions often

blatantly reject the philosophies upheld by Patañjali yoga or frequently use a very different set of terminologies

and definitions from those used in Patañjali yoga. All yoga families that affiliate themselves with the title of

Patañjali yoga, are all undoubtedly non-denominational religious traditions (Larson 2008, 136). The Patañjali

yoga professes that there are eight intricately related steps. These are termed the 8 limbs of the Patañjali yoga.

Human is regarded as a single unified body and an organic body. It is not possible to split a human form into

separate parts. That is why there is the discussion of the wholeness. No part can be left out when one delves

into the topic of the human. The eight limbs that are described in the “Yoga Sūtra” need to be actively utilized

in order to apply clean energy. One must always be consciously striving to be awake in daily life. As the ugly

and the beautiful are paired, it is not possible to consume only a specific part. If there is something ugly, it must

be converted and delved into as a whole. Nothing should be restrained and all should be achieved through

change. The eight limbs of yoga is the energy that makes this possible. Yamā→Niyama→Āsana→Prāṇayāma→Pratyāhāra→Dhāraṇa→Dhyāna→Samādhi (Yogasūtra-Bhāṣya 2.29). The yamā that is discussed in Patañjali implies restraint. It does not mean that one should restrict oneself

but rather to give oneself direction in life. Instead of restricting the provided energy, it utilizes that energy in the

right direction. There are countless orientations in the way of life. From these possibilities, one should orient

one’s energy in the proper direction. To delve in with an awakened mind is yamā. Only a harmonious unified

body can orient oneself properly and justly use one’s energy.

Niyama is the practice of following a set commandment with self-admonishment. As a practitioner, one

must not be a slave to one’s instincts and to avoid these natural tendencies one must set up a guiding

commandment that can conduct one’s life. This way one can reign over as the owner of one’s life.

Āsana is the sitting position. That which is rigid and comforting is āsana (Yogasūtra-Bhāṣya 2.46). That

which is rigid does not falter and leads to comfort. It is to sit in a certain manner. It is to sit peacefully without

doing anything. It is very challenging but also very beautiful. Āsana is a relaxed state of the body and is

therefore followed by rest. The state of relaxation within this context does not imply passing time or sitting

thoughtlessly, but rather maintaining a stable and comfortable state of mind. Relaxation will allow a great sense

of vivacity and strength. Absolute relaxation allows rest that will reveal the original process. A partial and

mechanical act will convey the universal energy.

According to the description from “Yoga Sūtra,” the uniformity in breathing interrupts the process of

inhalation and exhalation once āsana is set (Yogasūtra-Bhāṣya 2.49). This is similar to the notion in Yogananda,

which teaches that breathing methods is the works of the mind through the control of prāṇa. However, rather

than putting the meaning in the control of prāṇa, there is a need to achieve voluntary breathing termination

(Rukmani 1989; Jai-Min 2010, 206). When the body knows how to rest then naturally one can control the

breathing. Prāṇayāma shows that through an individual’s uniformity in breathing it can be seen that every

person’s breathing and rhythm is different. As a state that follows āsana and precedes the restraint of the

feelings, “it is the mind that is appropriate for dhāraṇa, and the breathing is long and fine to remove the external


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and internal boundaries” (Yogasūtra-Bhāṣya 2.50-51). Breathing is an individualistic phenomenon that the

individual must find one’s own rhythm to soothe the mind and maintain the body’s peaceful state. The

exhalation of breath and termination of it can comfort the mind (Yogasūtra-Bhāṣya 2.53). One needs to accept

the diversity of breathing and feel the moment that one aligns and unifies with the universe. Through the

continued training of breathing, an internal journey can be traveled. The outside and the inside can be

connected in order to move on to the next phase.

Pratyāhāra is to enter the internal by restraining the feelings. Through breathing an individual returns to

the rightful place of existence. By giving an orientation to the conscious, the individual allows the mind not to

wander and spread but to gather to one place. This is dhāraṇa, or the gathering and sustaining of the mind at a

specific position. To gather to one specific point is dhāraṇa. Dhyāna is the state of not being wavered and maintaining stability. It is gathering the mind to one point. To

concentrate the mind means to stop the flow of thought. When there are thoughts it means that the individual no

longer exists alone but exists as two. To even lower the target is to achieve dhyāna. Everything has fallen away

to allow a brightly awakened state of mind. Everything has ceased to exist.

The eight limbs in yoga have unlimited energy. The eight limbs in yoga seek balance. It strives for the

harmony between the mind and the body. If the psychological mechanism is all coiled up, one must listen to the

internal voice. Deep sympathy may direct towards a target, but it must also focus on the self. Only through

self-motivation to practice can one truly be able to deeply understand life. To maintain the intimacy with the

whole universe, the individual must focus on the body, the mind, and the prāṇa. When one’s surrounding does

not waver, one can find peace and positive, and passionate energy will flow through the individual.

Because prāṇa is omnipresent, it exists wherever there is life. Prāṇa is the original force that gathers the

material and the energy to embrace the sacred mind. Relaxation and healing undergoes specific steps through

prāṇa in order to complete the body and mind.

2.3. Communication Between Prāṇa and the Universe

Within the modern scientific theories, breathing is only limited to the absorption of oxygen and its usage

through a cyclical machine. On the other hand, yoga practitioners go further to describe that breathing implies

the absorption of both air and prāṇa that will ultimately be manifested through the nervous systems of the body

(Ramacaraka 2011, 217). Those who think of their body as impure are not welcoming of how a particular

bodily function takes part in their daily lives. For those that are still consumed with outdated notions that

certain parts of the body are impure, it is unexpectedly difficult to inform them of the important functions that

each and every part of the body implements.

The reason that ancient yoga practitioners designated the body as the tunnel to the mind is because they

were able to convince their peers through defining the vivacious energy of prāṇa as the medium that

communicates with the universe. “The universe is extensive and is comprised of countless great universes.

Based on the professing of Nirvāṇa-Tantra, all that exists within the first extensive universe also exists within

the second great universe. Within the great universe, there are bigger worlds and the small universe that reflects

on the great universe like a mirror is home to all the earthly bodies and existences” (Woodroff 2004, 35). “The

ancient yoga practitioners discovered that the secrets of the universal consciousness lie in breathing. Within the

world’s intellectual consciousness, India’s such unique perspective is an indelible contribution” (Yogananda


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2006, 309). Through a rhythmic breathing practice, greatly increased prāṇa can be absorbed and controlled.

Breathing notices the external world and serves as the windstorm that stirs the mind’s calm waters. This effect

on the emotions creates bodily consciousness and relaxation ultimately achieving unification and removing

self-consciousness (Yogananda 2002, 501).

Our body follows the rhythmic rule like the stars that revolve around the sun. Thus, one must be

stimulated by the natural rhythm that exists everywhere to achieve balance and harmony within one’s body.

Through rhythmic breathing and movement the prāṇa circulated within the body can be increased.

Prāṇa selects an independent path. The free prāṇa continues to undergo changes. The active development

of prāṇa integrates with the institutions of the mind. Even though the physical body may disappear, it is only

the beginning of the creation of a new body. Flexible and active healing can be achieved. To submit to nature is

to understand the theory of yoga. Even though it may appear simple, the body cannot find any liveliness

without the prāṇa. With the addition of the vivacity of the prāṇa, the bodily decay can be prevented and through

the energy flow of apāna, the body will grow and the changes with growth will eventually halt. By finding

stability within the heart, the yoga practitioner can learn how to control the lively energy (Yogananda 2006,

308). The origin of all activity, vigor, life can be found. This fact has been present in the teachings of numerous

yoga practitioners throughout the centuries. In order to avoid misunderstandings and confusions due to the

various theories that discuss the control of the original force, the original forces are all referred to as prāṇa and

it implies “complete energy” (Ramacaraka 2011, 212-213). The practice of yoga allows the mind to move every

time the body moves. As our mind wanders to anything that one is naturally attracted to, the practice of yoga

allows the mind to concentrate. By imbuing determination, every instance of forming a certain pose, the flow of

prāṇa is dispersed throughout the body. The advantages of the body and mind are increased. The prāṇa system

is the communication between the self and the universe.

The relationship between the mind and the body is founded on a communication much like the universe.

Only when the mind is moved does the body also work. The concentrating process in yoga trains the body and

epitomizes an individuals’ determination. “Ancient yoga methodologies transformed breathing into the mind.”

Through a spiritual development, the practitioner will be able to perceive breathing as the “breathing as dream”

(Yogananda 2006, 310). Prāṇa also additionally supplies energy. That is why the body and the mind can be

healed and revitalized. To concentrate on the determination through training is the way the yoga practitioners

implement their teachings. It is stern and certain when it comes to control a specific part of the body in a simple

manner. It is effective when one strongly evokes each part of the body to carry out their respective functions.

The practitioner will therefore send the vivacious prāṇa to strengthen and stimulate a specific part of the body.

When the practitioner gathers one’s mind and focus on the aṇga, it will be possible to achieve physical

completeness. With every breath, the prāṇa is spread throughout the body. The prāṇa can strengthen and

stimulate every cell, muscle, atom, nerve, artery and vein, and enliven it.

3. The Healing Power and Directivity of Prāṇa

The significant point within the discussion is that one systematically categorizes oneself through the eight

limbs of yoga. This practice overtakes the minimal innate habits. Character is formed by habit, and habit is

formed by repetitive behavior. Mental confusion is caused by lethargy from the lack of training. For example,

entertainment, distraction, interruption, lethargy, jealousy, and neglect are behaviors and attitudes that can be


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overruled through the unification of breathing, which is the most important bodily function. Unity can be

referred to as the human effort towards universalization. The transformation from chaos to universe can be

foreseen through all mental physiological methods of yoga, starting from āsana to ekāgratā. Ekāgratā collects

and stabilizes the flow of consciousness, establishes an emotional condition that is not segmented, and unifies

thoughts. It allows continuous perception of the wholeness of the body and therefore allows the feeling of

oneness and unity. This will allow the diversity sought by life and reunite all by eliminating division.

Breathing is an important element related to life. The forceful suppressing or terminating of breath is an

evil act against life. Natural breathing is the actualization of the rhythms to all levels of organic life. Prāṇa

connects the body and the mind, and in order to maintain all the organic institutions within that flow prāṇa

withholds a complex networked corridor called nādi. The human’s body is a sacred force, and the dynamic

energy, or prāṇa that fuels all the forces needed by the body, is much more intricate than the electrical energy.

One cannot know of all the diverse fields related to the mysteries of life. However, breathing, or prāṇa should not only be ascribed to animals and humans. The idea related to an organic life form should be expanded

to the universe. If it is applied to plants as well, one can profit from gaining seeking comfort within the

embraces and wealth of plants. In addition to understanding oneself, one can conceive of other existences as

well as the universe itself.

Botanical forms of life imply wealth in life within Indian ideologies. The legends or Indian contexts

shown in Purāṇa often borrow root plans and water lilies to symbolize the incarnation of the universe. The

water lilies represent creation. Plants always evoke notions of wealth, fertility, and germination of all species.

However, just as humans are materialized within the front of botanical life it cannot imply retreat, in terms of

the bounded and repetitive organic cycle of life. Discovering botanical congruity within yoga positions,

breathing, and prāṇa allows one to be pious. Prāṇa and botanical conformity can be fully described within the

frames of classic symbolism of restoration.

In Indian paintings, similar to the frescoes of the Ajanta caves, the people’s gestures are soft like the

branches of water plants and this depiction conveys the general sense of joy. It is as if the figures within such

paintings have bodies flowing with liquid rather than thick blood (Eliade 1985, 67-68). The lack of distinction

between the plants and the human implies a strong symbolism within ancient works.

However, there is a strong discrepancy between the plants and the human and that is related to pain. There

is no specific answer to whether a plant can or cannot feel pain or show signs of expression. Still, it is

indisputable that humans know pain and suffering. The human cannot be freed from pain. There is an origin to

all pain and every human desires to be freed from the reigns of pain. Pain, however has a regenerative nature.

So, although one may feel freed of one certain pain one soon finds the beginning of new pain. Buddhism

professes that one should eliminate desires and greed that cause pain. Everything can lead to pain and no

human can be freed from it. But, there is also happiness and joy. Upon being exposed to pain, Buddhism moved

deeper within it. It did not deny pain. It is important to limit or prevent the creation of pain. So, Buddhism

identifies the factors that cause pain and provides ways to eliminate these factors.

Pain is a significant matter in Sāṃkhya philosophy. The physical body is pain, because it is the physical

location of pain. Senses, perceptions, and subjects are pain. This is because these factors lead to pain

(Sāṃkhya-sūtra 2.1). The mind and body are even more interdependent than one assumes. Most illnesses are a

physical manifestation of mental and emotional confusion. Yoga-sūtras unveils the deep implications of


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breathing. “The respiratory function precedes all functions of the body” (Yoga-sūtras 1.34). There is always a

relationship between the condition of the mind and breathing. Those that are amidst anger have irregular and

excited breathing, whereas those that are focused show rhythmical and quiet breathing. Breathing has been used

as a tool that unifies the conscious mind. The physical health is generally dependent on mental health. A

peaceful state of mind, that is, a mind that can control the mental health is vital.

Harmonized breathing or the smooth operation of the prāṇa energy is to understand and control the

powers of emotions. By controlling emotions, one can lead a creative and successful life. One can escape pain

and one can gain the greatest joy. The ultimate mental state only unfolds once one establishes true humility.

Through the practice of breathing or prāṇa, the body’s overall chi that is established by the positive and

negative forces flowing within the body reaches a stable state. This means that an overly passionate and excited

state of life will calm to establish a peaceful way of life and the nervous system will be cleansed. Pain comes

from the senses. Senses spreads and wastes the energy of the mind. Even if it is for a short moment, one must

always remember that the mind only engages in one subject at a time. When the mind settles on multiple

subjects, the mind becomes dissipated and the level of concentration will weaken. When the mind flows

naturally without interruption, the concentrated flow of mind will travel inwards. Here, the body is stagnant and

breathing becomes quiet and peaceful.

The human mind is a storage facility of unlimited creative potential. Because pain can change depending

on this state of mind, it is crucial to utilize the energy of breathing or prāṇa. One’s life not only resides within

the body but also exists within breathing. The energy of breathing or prāṇa implies the circulation of chi. The

circulation of chi is even more intricate than the physical body and is a bridge that connects the body and the

mind. The practice of yoga merges the mind and the body so that the two elements cannot be disconnected.

Once the appropriate condition of breathing is achieved, there is a sense of unity, rhythm, lyrical

satisfaction as well as a sense of stabilization of the physiological discords that cannot be described with words.

Once this phase has passed, an unclear sense of presence emerges within one’s body. Then, one ultimately

comes to realize one’s true potential. Through this process, happiness replaces pain. Anyone who has

experienced the preliminary levels of breathing will know the true meanings of these experiences. Stcherbatshy

described that, “such pleasant feelings” can be compared to the music that he plays (Stcherbatsky 1978, 15).

Upon learning of breathing or prāṇa energy, one can realize the higher dimension of life and ultimately learn to

control one’s own mind. This has led to Buddhist traditions. There are differences in the perspective of

resolving pain, but it is indisputable that prāṇa contains healing powers.

4. Conclusion

The prāṇa is internally aroused cutaneous sensation. A series of them is experienced by the yogis who

perceives them as something rising up their back. This plays a leading part in the dhāraṇās explained by

Bhagavadgītā and Gheraṇḍasṁhitā, because the yogi has to direct prāṇa in this sense, to the dhyānasthāna

prescribed for each of these dhāraṇās. Though no object actually moves, when the yogi tires to move the kind

of object he has previously perceived as moving, he experiences the sensations wherever he takes this object

(Bhagavad Gītā 61, 69-73, 94). It is important not to confuse prāṇa with ego even if prāṇa is treated as a

mystical energy. Ego is the sacred piece of the mind that exists within all spirits, and that by gathering all the

materials and energy it forms a chunk of sacred intentions around the mind. Prāṇa is only one energy form that


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can materialize the ego (Ramacaraka 2011, 213). When death begins, the vivacious energy of prāṇa will

disappear eventually.

“Breathing, breath” and “prāṇa” are used to treat the free body and mind within Indian philosophy,

Buddhism, and modern yoga. Inhaling breath, exhaling breath, and breathing all function to form a lively body

and mind. The mystical quality and significant nature of this activity has been stressed since the ancient times.

“The individual who is distanced from external exposure, can maintain the balance in the middle of the

forehead, can main the peaceful state of the inhaling and exhaling breaths, can control the emotions and the

mind, and who treats transcendence as the ultimate goal in life to avoid all desires, fear and anger is the true

sage that is free” (Bhagavad Gītā 5.27, 28). “Transcendence can be achieved by the process of separating the

inhaling and exhaling breaths” (Yogananda 2006, 308). It is inevitable that masses adhere to the religious and

free method.

No extreme physical strain is necessary. Accept everything that is as it is, let go of all suspicions, and even

let go of the resistance from the unconscious. Then, the prāṇa can be supplied to the point in the mind where

the conscious states are all collected and blood circulation will become smooth. Expand the exhaling breath and

let the prāṇa flow. Gradually allow it to expand. Even without extreme exercising, provide all bodily institutions

with vivacity through relaxed movement. The practitioner can achieve a lively and harmonized new state of the

body by finding the breathing rhythm and letting the prāṇa flow to all the bones, the muscles, the nerves, the

cells, the organs, and everything within the body. Imbue the whole body with the newly created body, the

organic relationship implied through prāṇa and that transcends the relaxation of the body and mind, is the

unification of the universe and the individual. The body and the mind are not conflicting factors but are paired

and responsive to one another through the medium of prāṇa.

Works Cited

Atharva Veda: Maurice Bloomfield, Hymns of the Atharva-Veda, Sacred Books of The East, Volume 42, 1897. Bhagavad Gītā : Zaehner, R. C. The Bhagavad Gītā, Oxford University Press, 1969. Śiva Samhita: Ghosh, Shyam, The Original yoga: as expounded in Siva-samhita, Gheranda-samhita, and Ptanjala Yoga-sutra,

New Delhi: Munshiram Manoharlal, 1980. Maitrī-upanisad : Patrick Olivelle, Upanisads, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1998.

Sāṃkhya-sūtra : Garbe, Richard, Samkhya sutra ＆ Samkhya system: Aniruddha's ＆ Mahadeva's commentaries, New Delhi:

Trirup Prakashan, 1987. Yoga-sūtras : Desai, M. R, The Yoga-sutras of Patanjali: a commentary, Kolhapur: Prin. Desai Publication Trust, 1972. Yogasūtra-Bhāsya: Leggett, Trevor, Sankara on the Yoga-sutras: The vivarana sub-commentary to Vyasa-bhasya on the

Yoga-sutra-s of Patanjali, London : Boston: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1981. Eliade, Mircea. Yoga: Immortality and Freedom. Princeton University Press, New York: 1973. 162. ---. Patañjali. tra. In-Chal Park, Seoul: Dae-Won-Sa Publ., 1988. 7.

---. Yoga: Immortality and Freedom. Trans, from the French by Wilard R. Trask, Bollingen Series LⅥ, Princeton UP, 1958;

Re-Trans. We-Gyu, Jang, Seoul: Korea-Won, Publ., 1989. Jean Varenne. Yoga and Hindu Tradition. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 1989. Jai-Min, Kim. “Study on Yogananda’s Kriya Yoga: forcusing on Classical Yoga.” Korean Journal of Indian Philosophy Vol. 30

Seoul: Korea Society for Indian Philosophy, 2010. 206. Koller, John. M., The Indian Way. New York: Macmillan Publishing Co. Inc., 1982. Larson, Gerald James, and Ram Shankar Bhattacharya, eds. “Yoga: India’s Philosophy of Meditation.” Encyclopedia of Indian

Philosophies. Vol. Ⅻ. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass Publishers, 2008.


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Ramacaraka, Yogi. Hatha Yoga. tra. Jai-Min, Kim & Yu-Jin, Hwang. Seoul: You-Rae, Pubss., 2011. Rukmani, T. S., Yogavārttika of Vijñānabhiksu. text, with English translation and critical notes, along with the text and English

translation of the Patanjala Yogasutras and Vyasabhasya. Vol.2. Delhi: Munshiram Manoharlal Publishers Pvt. Ltd, 1981. Th. Stcherbatshy, with comprehensive analysis & introd. by Jaideva Singh. The Conception of Buddhist Nirvāna: With Sanskrta

Text of Madhyamaka-Karika. Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 1978. 15. Swami Vivekananda. Raja-Yoga. Rev. ed. New York: Ramakrishna-Vivekananda Center, 1955. Yogananda, Paramahansa. The Essence of Kriya Yoga. Union City, Alight Pub., 2006. ---. “The Bhagavad Gita.” Yogoda Satsanga Society of India. Vol.1. Kolkata: Yogoda Satsanga Society of India, 2002. Woodroff, Sir John. Introduction to Tantra Śāstra. T. Nagar, Ganesh & Co., 2004.


Extended Cognition as a Case of Bottomless Theory Building

Gerhard Chr. Bukow

University of Magdeburg

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.

Keywords: extended cognition, cognitive system, coupled system, individuation-criteria

1. Intuitions about Realization of Cognition Need Scientific Advice

Ask yourself whether there are other cognitive beings in the world (“cognizers”): beings that are cognitive

or fulfill cognitive tasks? At least some philosophers hold the thesis that our human intuition tells us that there

are cognizers out in the world―or, more generally, that there is the phenomenon of cognition in the world.

They accept cognition as a given phenomenon in the sense that we do not need to prove that there is cognition.

So, this essay does not question this intuition―for the sake of argument, let us assume that there are cognizers

in the world. But whatever cognition is, by this intuition about the existence of a phenomenon, nothing is told

us about how the phenomenon is realized in all cases. Why is this a problem for the debate? It is a problem

because typical answers are based on intuition pumps (this means they are not based on legitimated arguments).

Just consider these two pumps just for illustrative purposes of introduction.

Look at that old man around there using his notebook to memorize his days―is cognition (i.e.,

memorizing) realized by the old man or by the old man plus his notebook? Prima facie, by taking away the

notebook the old man has “lost” his memory, so we should talk about cognition realized by the “coupled

system” consisting of an old man plus his notebook. Something is wrong with this argument: There is no direct

argument or proof and it is not necessary to agree with this argument (for any reasons of ontology or

epistemology). It is based on your “charity” and if your charity differs from mine nothing could force you to

Gerhard Chr. Bukow, M.A., Research Associate, Institute of Philosophy, University of Magdeburg, Germany; main research

fields: Philosophy of Cognition, Philosophy of Science; Rationality, and Agent Theory. Email: [email protected].

DAVID PUBLISHING

D

EXTENDED COGNITION AS A CASE OF BOTTOMLESS THEORY BUILDING

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agree with me. This is a well-known intuition pump―and because it is an intuition pump, some philosophers

also agree that our intuition needs philosophical and scientific advice.

However, the traditionalists cannot give this answer with guarantee (i.e., with the strength necessity). Just

consider this intuition pump: Well, look out at the world: first, look what the man on the street says about the

location of thought. The man on the street may say: thoughts are in the head or have you ever seen them?

Second, look what scientists say: thoughts are in the brain or at least realized by the brain, because by our

experiments we investigate into the structure of thought, which is somehow connected to the structure of the

brain. This is similar to the saying of the man on the street and it is connected to modern research programs of

neurology. But this traditional answer is also based on an intuition pump. It pumps thoughts into your head by

considering daily psychology without giving any guarantee that any cognition is necessarily realized in the

head. You may choose any other internals of any other entity―brain, head, body, or else. Internalism does not

provide any argument of necessity favoring this or that entity.

Let us restate the views shortly. With respect to realization, some philosophers hold the “traditional”

internalistic view that the individual systems in the internals brain, body, or skull determine the material limits

of the vehicles realizing individual cognitive systems. Extended cognition is the externalistic view that the

vehicles of cognitive systems extend beyond brain, body, or skull. The traditional answer is called the

internalistic view because it locates realization of cognition into the internals of the brain or head (or any other

“closed” entity like human body). The non-traditional answer is called the externalistic view, because it locates

the realization of cognition not just into the internals of a specified entity.

But the two intuition pumps cannot give any guarantee, which means that neither the “externalistic” view

nor the “internalistic” view can give an argument based on necessity how cognition is realized. For this lack of

guarantee (necessity), both groups of philosophers (and other scientists) may agree that intuition needs advice

by philosophy or other science. We may call a view grounded on advice that it is not just “only” a view but a

serious thesis. But what argument can force us to agree that man plus notebook realize cognition? What

argument can force us to choose just the brain as the realizer of cognition? Some may argue that we need

criteria that are based on properties of systems realizing cognition. If we want to demarcate systems realizing

cognition from other systems then these realizer-systems must have this extrinsic or that intrinsic property.

Other may argue that it is the successful use of the thesis in the sciences and the successful use of this or that

thesis may decide between this or that thesis. After all, extended cognition could be at least a successful

heuristics of science. However, we argue in detail that no strategy of finding an extrinsic or intrinsic property or

using extended cognition as a heuristic is successful. The structure of the problems the extended

cognition-theorist is opposed to lets us conclude that extended cognition is a case of bottomless theorizing.

In this essay, we first give a specification of the extended cognition-thesis, because this thesis is often

confounded with other hypotheses about “what” and about “how” cognizers should think (see Section 1.1). We

then consider some methodological aspects about the debate. This discussion puts our argument into a specified

frame that is especially concerned with the type of arguments used in the debate. If you have asked yourself

while reading Section 1 and Section 1.1 what “proving” the extended cognition-thesis (or its internalistic

opponent) means, then the subsection 1.2 is of interest for you. After providing this methodological basis, we

present an overview of our argument (see Section 1.3). Then we will discuss in detail whether there are intrinsic

or extrinsic properties of systems realizing cognitive systems. Because of the richness of additional theses in the

debate, our discussion is based on the use of skeletons of theories introduced in Section 2, which we call


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cookbook theories. Then we discuss in more detail on two examples handled in the extended cognition-debate

(see Section 3) which are based on the externalist’s intuition pump introduced in Section 1. This paves the way

for a detailed discussion about the main problems and suggestive solutions in Section 4, which includes a

discussion of finding intrinsic or extrinsic properties individuating systems realizing cognition. Subsequently, we

formulate our argument as a horn for the extended cognition-thesis in Section 5 and conclude in Section 6 that

extended cognition is a case of bottomless theorizing.

1.1. The Pure Extended Cognition-Thesis and Its Popular Consequences

A commonly used picture in the debate speaks about the systems realizing cognition as “vehicles.” These

vehicles realize thought in a way that has to be specified. Thus, the extended cognition-thesis we deal with

wants to be a “grounded” thesis about the individuation of systems of vehicles of cognition. It does not say

anything about the semantics of cognition, or what cognizers think, or how they should think in terms of norms.

So let us clarify the thesis again.

Extended cognition in its pure form just is a thesis about the individuation of coupled systems of vehicles

of cognition. It should not be confused with extended mind or semantic externalism. This constraint of pureness

does not prove the thesis to be uninteresting. In the opposite, the thesis is claimed to be interesting if we would

find marks or criteria that prevent every cognitive system being coupled with every other cognitive system by

extensions pervading the whole world. From the perspective of preventing dogmatism, the consequence of

extended cognition should be welcomed, because then it is an open question whether the traditional view about

realization is the right one or even the only one (though possibly the right one). This means that we should only

accept the traditional view if we can give individuation-criteria or marks that prove this view to be the right one.

These criteria or marks must prove that brain, body, or skull really give us the material limits of the vehicles of

cognition. Thus, it is an open question whether the traditional internalistic view is right, or whether we should

revise the traditional individuation-criteria while accepting the consequence that cognitive systems may be

extended.

Without question, the consequences of proving such a thesis would be popular: not individuals like

“closed” bodies but coupled systems extending over several bodies could realize cognition. Finding appropriate

criteria, one could hypothesize that even technical artifacts could be (perhaps additional) realizers of my

cognition. Though we do not want to speculate about the reasons for the counterintuitive power of this

consequence, for a better understanding these two reasons could help. First, in some sense, the extended

cognition thesis can violate a principle of closedness that says that whatever is coupled or building up a system

is connected within a closed space without having parts existing not in this space. This closedness with respect

to spacetime, for example, is commonly used to individuate individual human bodies: an individual body is

marked by generating such a closed space that whatever parts of the body are connected, they are connected

within this space. For short, all my parts belong to me and there is no part that is mine but not connected to me

within the regions of space-time occupied by my body. Such a principle might be adapted to individuate other

systems, for example systems of vehicles of cognition. Second, if we want to decide whether some vehicles

form one or many systems, we may not have intuitive criteria to count for the one or the other decision. For

example, is it acceptable to say that we could outsource cognitive tasks in the sense that an external computer

would memorize or revise our beliefs? If so, do we have legitimated criteria to argue that brain and

computer-processors form a coupled vehicle of cognition or that this is not the case?


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The popularity of the thesis is documented by the many different publications exploring its consequences,

interactions with other hypotheses as well as criticism. The thesis has gained increasing attention during the last

20 years, starting in the 1990s until today in 2013. There are endless reviews about the arguments and

consequences of extended cognition (just to cite Rupert (2004) that works out some challenges and literature

for the hypothesis). One of the main consequences and interactions of the thesis seems to be the link between

extended systems and streams of situated cognition or embodied cognition. The main idea behind this link is

that both hypotheses share the burden of proving the “extension” of the realizers of cognition beyond the

traditional internalistic view (see 1.2 for a discussion about “proving” such a hypothesis). This has been

explored, for example, in Wilson and Clark (2009). Of course, there is also criticism to the hypothesis which is

mainly based on criticizing the inference from coupled extended systems to the constitution of a cognitive

system. This criticism has been developed by Adams and Aizawa (2001; 2010) and has influenced the debate

strongly.

However, our work does not rest on any specific literature as we intend to give a minimalistic “cookbook”

for developing the extended cognition-hypothesis in Section 2. We think that this cookbook is in accord with

the main proponents and main criticism of the debate, especially with respect to Clark and Chalmers (1998) and

Adams and Aizawa (2001; 2010). For this reason, we do not intend to give a review or exegesis about the

existing literature about the extended mind-hypothesis that is based on these main actors. Instead, our essay is

concerned with (1) the problem of what it does mean to show or prove the hypothesis; and (2) with the

problems of showing the hypothesis with the help of different individuation-criteria.

To sum up, the popularity of the thesis seems to be mainly driven by its consequences. If the thesis just

could be shown, or if the thesis just could be proven to be right or legitimated―then there would be all these

counterintuitive and interesting consequences. However, what does this vocabulary of showing, proving,

legitimating or else mean in this debate? Is it indeed possible to give something like a proof of necessity of

extended cognition, or are there other grades of strength of argument that are intended by proponents of

extended cognition? To understand what strength of argument proponents do intend—and what follows for

them by our argument—we discuss this issue shortly now.

1.2. What Does “Proving the Extended Cognition-Thesis” Mean?

If you consider the strength of argumentation from the viewpoint of logic, then there are different types

and grades of strengths of arguments: arguments can have strength of necessity, arguments can have the

strength of impossibility or possibility, and arguments can be constructible or not. Arguments of necessity

consist of a conclusion following necessarily from premises in all worlds, e.g., by a logical inference like

Modus Ponens. Arguments of possibility consist of a conclusion following possibly from premises in some

worlds. If an argument is constructible, then there is a legitimated way to construct a proof for a specific

hypothesis, e.g., by a theorem prover using a legitimated logic with its inferences like Modus Ponens. If an

argument is not constructible, then there is in principal no proof for a specific hypothesis, for example in case

of undecidable problems―and this deficit of constructability can be proven. But are such characterizations of

strength of argument apt for the debate in extended cognition? Do these theorists really handle with proofs,

logical inferences or else?

We doubt that these characterizations are apt―but for what reason? First, they are fairly traditional

characterizations. Let us think first that extended cognition would be an empirical hypothesis about the realizers


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of cognition in our actual world. However, then it is an important problem whether such a “logical”

classification of strength can be applied to empirical hypotheses. The problem is that it is an open question

whether the world inherently is logically organized such that the extended cognition thesis could be (and if so:

would be) a true conclusion of some true premises. No proponent of extended cognition―or opponent―has

given an argument based on logical necessity in the sense that the concluded thesis is a necessary truth about

our world.

Of course, nobody has shown that the world is logically organized such that our true conclusions about the

world must follow logic. Or, in a weaker sense, nobody has shown that successful science is logically organized

such that an intended conclusion follows logically from a true set of basic sentences. This was a typical

assumption of the Vienna Circle. For example, Carnap (1931) argued this way in his essay “Die physikalische

Sprache als Universalsprache der Wissenschaft”―which was not successful in the sense that the Vienna Circle

has provided us with a fixed set of basic truths about the world that enables us to conclude other truths. For this

reason, proponents of extended cognition either provide us with a successful Vienna Circle-argument which has

extended cognition-thesis as its conclusion, or they provide us with another argument.

Perhaps, one could argue in the view of this deficit, theorists of extended cognition should argue with the

help of empirical arguments, for example experiments. But what experiment should the theorist use for his

arguments? If there is a consensus in philosophy of science concerning the significance (or probative force) of

experiments, then it is the argument that there is no experimentum crucis―no decisive experiment showing the

truth of the extended cognition-hypothesis. However, we do not know any experiment that has been conducted

and guided by the thesis of extended cognition―which would be more decisive than adopting a post

hoc-hypothesis.

Instead of such traditional considerations about truth-preserving logic of argument or decisive experiments,

the debate about extended cognition has lived mostly by arguments of plausibility, charity, and intuition pumps.

These arguments are used to develop criteria how to individuate systems realizing cognition (especially how to

individuate them in contrast to systems not realizing cognition). But these individuation-criteria should not be

based only on intuition—because it can be realized that intuition seems to fail at least in some cases where we

need advice (consider the examples given above) or that different people have different intuitions concerning

the same case. One can see this difficulty for example with respect to the question whether man plus notebook

form a coupled system realizing cognition or not.

For this reason, philosophers and other scientists have called for stronger arguments―i.e., arguments

stronger than “just so”-stories about intuitions or plausibility. However, these stronger arguments are not

logical proofs or facts of reality or experiments. Instead, these arguments do rely on using markers for

individuation-criteria. The idea is that giving non-arbitrary individuation-criteria of extended systems provides

the proponent with a solid base for arguing for extended cognition. It is this middle-ground that makes the

arguments interesting for the debate―and which makes the debate interesting for a discussion of what

proponents of extended cognition can show by using them. Some candidates for arguments are introduced in

Section 4.1-4.3: These arguments for specific individuation-criteria are based on extrinsic properties, roles, and

finally intrinsic properties. We are afraid that proponents of extended cognition drift into a realm of bottomless

theorizing, because their arguments on individuation-criteria cannot show what they are intended for while

respecting the quest for non-arbitrary strong arguments. We now give an overview about our argument (see


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Section 1.3) arousing our fears and then discuss it in detail based on the introduction of a skeleton of a theory

about extended cognition in Section 2.

1.3. An Overview about the Argument of This Essay

The aim of the extended cognition thesis is to provide an interesting thesis about actual or possible

extended systems realizing cognition. Because the thesis cannot be shown directly in a logical or experimental

sense, it has to rely on a middle-ground of arguments. Thus, it relies on finding legitimated criteria individuating

extended systems realizing cognition. We argue that the debate about the extended cognition thesis has a

serious methodological problem in giving such legitimated criteria or marks. The problem is to find a

non-arbitrary way to legitimate the chosen individuation-criteria that is not based on intuition or charity (too

weak), or logics (the failed “Vienna-Circle-argument”) or experiments (no experimentum crucis).

We argue that there are at least three candidates for such an argument showing extended cognition with the

help of individuating such systems. The first candidate uses extrinsic markers of individuation, for example the

reliability of coupling of systems. It could be argued that extended systems realizing cognition require for

reliable coupling between the different subsystems such that finally an “extended system” can be established.

One might be tempted to say: “Well, if these systems are coupled reliably to x%, then these systems do form

‘an extended system’.” But we argue that the debate does not give a non-arbitrary way to diagnose reliable

coupling to x%―further that there is in principle no favored way of diagnosing reliability. This argument of

reliability might be misunderstood by some philosophers, because reliability is not an inherent property of the

extended system―it is an arbitrarily fixed measure based on a procedure scientists have agreed on. There is no

definitive measure of x%―even not in the weak sense of a heuristic.

One might use roles to individuate extended systems realizing cognition. For example, one could argue for

functional roles or causal roles. But we argue that there is no “stop-criteron” for causal roles in the sense that

we do not have a hard criterion that prevents extended systems from extended to the whole world. With respect

to functional roles, we argue in a similar way that there is no way to show that system A fulfills no function for

system B (where B could be the whole world). If extended systems should be individuated by functional roles,

one just cannot prevent A from fulfilling functions for all other systems in the world. In both cases, extended

systems individuated by roles could extend into the whole world. But it is not an interesting case that by this

unfortunate argument of individuation by role every system could extend into the whole world. Extended

cognition based on this unfortunate individuation just is a misfortune and not a powerful thesis. There is no

reason why one should favor extended cognition compared to other theses about systems fading through the

whole world.

Finally, one could argue for using an intrinsic property of extended systems realizing cognition to

individuate these extended systems. For example, one could argue for a mark of the cognitive. But with respect

to this suggestion, there exists strong criticism by Adams and Aizawa (2001; 2010) well known in this debate.

Let us sum up: Either these criteria are based on extrinsic markers or roles of coupled systems, which are

regularly arbitrarily chosen and developed or which are even not developed by scientists at all. Or they are

based on intrinsic markers or properties, which are regularly criticized. Now let us formulate a horn stabbing

the proponent of extended cognition.

Aim of the debate: Find a non-arbitrary argument for extended cognition without relying on: (1) intuition

or charity (too weak); (2) logic in the sense of the Vienna-Circle (failed); or (3) an experimentum crucis


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(consensus about non-existence of such an experiment).

Extrinsic Horn: If one argues for extrinsic reliability or roles, then one must concede the arbitrariness of

establishing reliability or stopping extend systems.

Intrinsic Horn: If one argues for an intrinsic mark of the cognitive, then well-known criticism by Adams

and Aizawa is effective.

Changing from the extrinsic horn to the intrinsic horn due to criticism requires for some knowledge

nobody seems to have by argument or intuition—that is knowledge about intrinsic properties of the realizers of

cognition.

Changing from the intrinsic horn to the extrinsic horn due to criticism requires for some knowledge

nobody seems to have―that is knowledge about a non-arbitrary way of establishing reliability or a

stop-criterion.

Because in the last years a whole bunch of several different theories about extended cognition have been

developed, we discuss some problematic examples with the help of a “cookbook” of theories of extended

cognition in the first part of the work. This cookbook provides a minimalistic framework which can be

decorated by specified theses about criteria of individuation. The debate seems to be very alive because of the

arbitrariness of these criteria, which we will show in the third and fourth part. Then, we sum up our criticism by

“two horns” for the debate in the fifth part and discuss the consequences for the debate in the sixth part.

2. A Minimalistic Cookbook for Theories of Extended Cognition Based on the Individuation of Extended Systems

There are many theories of extended cognition. Some are confused with other theories, while others have

specific additional assumptions. For this reason, first, we propose the following cookbook theory based on five

assumptions:

Cookbook theory of extended cognition:

(1) There is the phenomenon of cognition instanced in the form of cognitive systems;

(2) There are vehicles of cognition that realize the cognitive systems;

(3) There are individuation-criteria for vehicles;

(4) Coupled systems of individuated vehicles individuate a cognitive system;

(5) There are individuation-criteria for coupled systems of vehicles of cognition that realize cognitive

systems.

We think that this cookbook is in accord with the main proponents of the hypothesis, namely Clark and

Chalmers (1998), and we also think that it is in accord with its main criticism, namely Adams and Aizawa

(2001; 2010). For this reason, we do not intend to make further exegesis of literature based on these actors in

the debate.

The first assumption says that there is cognition and—despite other possibilities—cognition is realized in

the form of cognitive systems. We know by intuition or insight somehow that there is cognition. There may be

other forms how cognition could be realized—for example atomic cognizers without inner structure, or

whatever. However, here we propose the systematic character of cognition. This may be due to the thesis that

whatever cognition is, some potential candidates for realization are conceptualized as systems―systems of

nerve cells, for example. This connects the first assumption to the second one. There may also be other reasons

for the commitment to systems, but we will not discuss them here.


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The second assumption says that there are vehicles that realize cognition. This assumption is due to the

established distinction between the content of cognition and what realizes cognition (the “vehicles”). This

distinction constraints us to the discussion of vehicles and not of extended mind, content, semantic externalism,

or something else. So whatever these vehicles are, they have to be individuated. Several candidates exist for

such individuation: for example causal role, functional role, material property, etc.. We will not discuss them

here, but we will discuss how systems of vehicles may be individuated.

This has to be discussed because the fourth assumption states that cognitive systems are individuated by

systems of (individuated) vehicles. If a vehicle system is not extended, then its corresponding cognitive system

is individuated by one system of vehicles, for example the system we find in nerve cells. However, if a vehicle

system is extended, then the corresponding cognitive system is individuated by more than one system of

vehicles. These systems have to be coupled somehow.

Fifth and finally, we assume that the individuation of such coupled systems of vehicles is done by criteria

we have to find. Under which conditions do we have reason to argue that there is an extended system literally

consisting of several coupled systems? This means that a cognitive system is finally individuated by (possibly

coupled) system(s) of vehicles. Then, there are three conceptually possible outcomes:

Possible outcomes of the extended cognition debate if there are individuation-criteria:

(1) The traditional view has it right and the found criteria show that principally only non-extended systems

can exist and to them the criteria can be applied;

(2) Both the traditional view and extended cognition have it half right, and the found criteria show that

principally both extended and non-extended systems can exist. But to the best of our empirical sciences only

extended (or only non-extended) systems exist;

(3) The traditional view has it wrong: The found criteria can be applied to (all) existing cognitive systems

and they exclude principally the traditional view.

We will decide later on whether we are in a position to decide what outcome we have to choose. But now

let us discuss the aspect of minimalism in this theory. This minimalistic theory is minimalistic in the sense that

it only describes structural parts of the extended cognition theory. One could also state the theory in a neutral

way for any other phenomenon X realized in the form of Y by some vehicles:

The neutral statement of the cookbook theory:

(1) There is the phenomenon X instanced in the form of Y;

(2) There are vehicles of X that realize Y;

(3) There are individuation-criteria for vehicles;

(4) Coupled systems of individuated vehicles individuate Y;

(5) There are individuation-criteria for coupled systems of vehicles of X that realize Y.

Whatever X and Y are―in the end, one needs individuation-criteria for the coupled systems mentioned in

Section 5. These criteria are not packed into the theory axiomatically and they are not logical consequences of

the theory! Whatever we will do to get them, we must add them to the theory by scientific discourse (e.g., heuristics,

experiments, and properties) or we must argue that the world already is constituted such that there are worldly

properties of coupled systems. Then, we must add something in a background theory, whereas our cookbook

theory is built upon this background theory. Let us see now by the help of two examples how one could

decorate such a minimalistic theory.


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3. Two Examples Commonly Handled in the Extended Cognition Debate

One of the most famous examples used to support the thesis of extended cognition is Clark and Chalmers

(1998) notebook argument. In their paper, they create a twin earth thought experiment in which we have our

two protagonists Inga and Otto. Both Inga and Otto want to visit the MOMA that is located in the 53th Street.

In order to get there, Inga thinks about the location of the museum and then, after finding the needed belief

about the MOMA being located in the 53th Street, she starts her journey and arrives at the desired destination a

couple of hours later. Otto on the other hand suffers from Alzheimer’s disease and needs to rely on a notebook

that he always carries around with him. In order to get to the MOMA, Otto needs to look up the necessary

information in his notebook that, according to Clark and Chalmers, takes the same functional role than the long

term memory has for Inga. After using his notebook, he now takes departure and also arrives at the MOMA

successfully. In another possible world, maybe Otto noted the wrong information in his notebook, and for

example, will find himself in the 51th Street, and so misses his appointment.

So, now, what has happened here? We have agents like Inga and Otto that are capable of instantiating

cognitive processes. This presupposes that in some way there are cognitive processes out there in the world.

Inga is a vehicle of cognition and Otto is a vehicle of cognition. In Inga’s case, in order to get to the museum,

she only needs her own cognitive resources to succeed in the given task. She just uses her memory to get access

to a certain belief. Otto in the other hand cannot rely on his memory, and in order to find the museum, he

“outsources” so to speak his beliefs onto another medium, and couples with it. Now, it is the coupled system,

Otto and the notebook, and only Otto and the notebook, that is the supervenience basis for the cognitive

processes that are going on in order to find the MOMA. Clark and Chalmers choose reliability and their famous

parity principle1 to individuate the Otto notebook system and the cognitive process that is carried on this

vehicle is individuated by the functional role of the notebook, in this case, (long term) memory.

Another famous example is the usage of pen and paper when performing calculations. When someone is

using pen and paper to calculate, vehicle externalists claim that the person2 performing the calculation

outsources cognitive burdens into the external world. The person calculating does not have to remember all the

digits in his head, he has not constantly remind himself at which step of the calculation he is at the moment

because he, the pen and the paper form a coupled system that carries out the calculation. The coupled system

consisting out of the human and the pen is the vehicle of the cognitive processes that do the calculation. In this

sense, it is not the person that is doing the calculation, but only the coupled system that is performing it.3

So again, there we have the phenomenon of cognition, instantiated by a certain individual, and now this

individual forms a coupled system that is now the carrier of the cognition that is going on in order to calculate

the given problem. The cognitive processes “extend” out into the pen and the paper. The mentioned system in

individuated with certain criteria, again, the reliability and the parity principle shall do the trick. This

phenomenon of cognition is individuated functionally, because it is claimed that pen and paper have the same

functional role than my working memory when I perform the calculations in my head.

4. Problems and Three Suggestive Solutions

Let us ask more generally: What types of individuation-criteria could be applied to determine and

individuate coupled systems as they are suggested exemplarily in the third section? If these criteria do not exist

as clear cut-criteria, is it useful to think about extended cognition just as a heuristic and not in its literal sense?


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Let us start with reliability as an often handled extrinsic criterion for determining the coupling of two systems.

The following table 1 gives an overview about types of individuation-criteria and examples used in the text.

Table 1

Types of Individuation-Criteria and Corresponding Examples

Type of criteria Example

Extrinsic Reliability

Role Functional role

Intrinsic Mark of the cognitive

4.1. Reliability as Individuation-Criteria of Coupled Systems

For introduction, think about the example of calculator. The example argued that the coupling between

calculator and human (or its brain) is reliable and for this reason we should think about man plus calculator

being an extended system realizing cognition. The main proponents of the extended cognition-thesis argued for

reliability, too in Clark and Chalmers (1998): “the real moral of the portability intuition is that for coupled

systems to be relevant to the core of cognition, reliable coupling is required” (11).

However, we do not know from the armchair whether this coupling is reliable but must determine it

empirically. Given a definition of reliability, experiments, or structural analysis must reveal whether the

focused coupling between calculator and human (or its brain) is reliable. Reliability is an extrinsic criterion: it

is not defined intrinsically as a property of an entity, but as a property of the trustworthiness of (scientific)

measurement. If we want to test for coupling in terms of reliability, then we have to design experiments testing

on interaction between the systems and say something about the reproducibility of the experiments. One can

see that coupling in terms of reliability in terms of reproducibility of interaction experiments is a derived and

extrinsic property of a highly specified experimental apparatus. It is not an investigation into intrinsic properties

of the vehicle of a cognitive system.

The main consequence of using reliability as a marker for coupling is that there may be very different

coupled systems relative to the reliability-predicate we have chosen. For example, the following list shows two

different coupled systems relative to two different reliability-predicates. One could say, without going into

technical details, that one reliability-predicate is “stronger” than the other one. Stronger predicates sort out

more candidates for reliable coupling than weaker predicates.

Subsystems: A, B, C:

Reliably coupled system with respect to reliability-predicate R1: A, B;

Reliably coupled system with respect to reliability-predicate R2: A, B, C.

Here, the problems for reliability as a criterion of “coupling” do start. The main problem is: If we have

different candidates for reliably coupled systems, we have different candidates for individuation of cognitive

systems. This would be no problem if we could decide which reliability-predicate (and the corresponding

couplings) we should choose. The argument is that whatever experimental procedure and value we use for

testing for reliability, counting a “coupling” reliable is always arbitrary―because it is relative to an arbitrarily

chosen experimental procedure we used for testing for reliable. Saying that a coupling is 80% reliable then has

no worth.

The argument can be developed in the following way: Construct a cookbook theory of extended cognition

with an additional reliability-predicate and see the problem of choosing a reliability-predicate.


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Argument for the arbitrariness of the reliability-predicate:

(1) Assume the cookbook theory of extended cognition;

(2) Give a definition of reliability with an operationalization (e.g., reproducibility as an operationalization);

(3) Choose an experimental procedure to test for reliability based on interaction between systems (because

reliability is relative to this experimental procedure);

(4) Choose a value x%, i.e., that the experimental procedure is reproducible in x% of all series of

experiments.

A proponent of extended cognition should give decision procedures for Section 3 and Section 4. These

criteria or procedures should say why one should choose these experimental procedures and values and not the

other ones. Otherwise, the proponent cannot select a clear cut set of coupled systems of vehicles that realize a

certain cognitive system.

However, what could be a decision procedure for choosing experimental procedures that serve to establish

the judgment of reliable coupling? Take the discarded example of the man-calculator-coupling. A usual story of

extended cognition would say that the coupling is reliable if the calculator gives (probably) right answers, is

highly visible and accessible to this man, be it via conscious or unconscious access. As a result, the man

outsources some calculation and uses the numerical result without doing any calculation or knowing what is

going on inside the artifact. Well, but this is a “just so”-story―it does not say how we can establish the

judgment of reliability. One must say what kinds of experiments he would use and why. To see the point,

consider that we would tell you that it is enough to give the example of adding: “If I can use the calculator

reliably for additions like 3 + 4 and it answers right then this just is enough to say that the coupled system of

vehicles consisting of man and calculator is reliable.” Of course, this is not enough―what about other

arithmetic, what about different environmental conditions, what about error and deception? You may add

several other experiments. By every added experiment, your judgment of reliability could be changed. Possibly,

you will have infinitely many combinations of series of experiments and for this reason infinitely many

reliability-predicates. Worse, you will have infinitely many different candidates for individuating cognitive

systems by reliable coupling. Where do you stop? Here, you may say that with respect to Section 4, there will

be some point like 60% reliable, 70% reliable or whatever. How would you―as a proponent of extended

cognition―decide what numerical value should signal that we have enough? We guess that the proponent of

extended cognition cannot give such a decision procedure that selects on out of many reliability-predicates.

But, one may hastily argue, this is the realm of scientific discourse: New sciences will bring us new

agreements about what is reliable and what is not. However, if you argue this way, you may question the status

of assumption 1 (that there is the phenomenon of cognition), for two reasons: First, how is it that you know

reliably about at least some cognitive systems that let you state this assumption? You will have to legitimate

assumption 1 by choosing a reliability-predicate, if you want to legitimate it scientifically. This may not be the

same procedure or the same predicate—but it may be a procedure and a predicate. Otherwise, you must rely on

extra-scientific resources like oracles, pre-theoretic intuition, native insights, or something else. But then it is

hard to see how these resources could be adopted to scientifically grounded criteria we are searching for and

why they should be a mark for science. Second, of course science may bring new arguments and new values.

But science is not arbitrary (or one has to argue for this conception of science)—and choosing a predicate or

value is not arbitrary, too. Whatever new values science will bring on, the values will have non-arbitrary


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legitimations. Then, you may ask: “So, dear proponent of extended-cognition, what is your non-arbitrary

legitimation for this or that value?” There will be silence. So maybe there is a need for other types of criteria.

4.2. Roles as Individuation-Criteria of Coupled Systems

Another suggestion is that we should use roles for individuation, for example causal or functional roles

systems fulfill for other systems. If system A has a role for system B and vice versa, then A and B should be

seen as “coupled.” It is a question of granularity, whether you choose causal role or functional role. Accepting

the analysis of Cummins, there are usually much more functional roles than causal roles, because the same

causal role can be subsumed under many different functional roles—though it can be subsumed non-arbitrarily

via role-analysis. This suggestion may result from an analysis of the functional talk in examples like the

calculator-example. Whatever the calculator may be, it does not matter—what matters is that the calculator

fulfills his role for the human using it. If it fulfills its role, then there is a coupling. But using roles for

individuation is problematical for the substance of extended cognition. Let us discuss this in detail.

4.3. Causal Roles as Individuation-Criteria of Coupled Systems

One system has a causal role for another system and vice versa, for this reason the systems are (causally)

coupled. If so, then they may be called coupled and build an extended vehicle system individuation a cognitive

system. Is this a good idea? If extended cognition simply is a thesis about causal roles, then extended cognition

degenerates to a “simple” theory about causality. But, in a realistic sense, everything could be connected

causally with everything in the universe directly or indirectly; there is no island in the sense of closed causal

systems (though those islands could be simulated to a specific degree). But then extended cognition is just an

inflationary thesis about causal connections pervading the whole world. If the proponent relies on indirect

connections, then the thesis might be inflationary. But relying on direct connections is no solution—since it is

hard to explain how direct causal connections do exist between the calculator and the brain, for example. Direct

connections in a literal sense are merely simplistic textbook examples—they are not able to support a thesis

about complex, extended coupled systems. Otherwise, we would be pleased to get to know this theory of

causation or that explanation that can say: “Well, X and Y are coupled via this causal chain, but then the causal

chain stops here.” Note, that the introduction of the notion “significant” in the sense of “significant causal

influence” provides no help: If we state that only systems should be named “coupled” if they are causally

connected to a significant degree, then we must give a procedure that decides what this degree is. Maybe you

say that this degree is determined by the used measurement apparatus. But then we should ask, why use this

and no other apparatus with another degree? Whatever you do, there will be no criterion based on causal role.

4.4. Functional Roles as Individuation-Criteria of Coupled Systems

Functional role analysis as a source for individuation criterion could be derived from functional talk in

certain examples handled in the extended cognition debate. Some system has a functional role for another

system and vice versa―for this reason, the systems could be named coupled. What about this idea? If

functional roles are analyzed by (or as) causal roles, then the criticism above will appear. If functional roles are

meant as genuine functional roles that cannot be derived or analyzed by just causal analysis, then it is an

important question how they could be analyzed experimentally or empirically at all. And if so, there are two

tasks that have to be done constructively: Positively, one has to show that one system has a functional role for

another system and vice versa. But from this argument it does not follow that this is the only coupling or at


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least a non-inflationary coupling. Negatively, one has to show that one system does not have a functional role

for another system, and vice versa.

We have no clue how this could be shown constructively in the following sense: there is an argument that

shows: for this or that reason, this system at hand does not fulfill functional roles for at least these other

systems at hand here. Because one cannot apply something like a “tertium non datur” on functional roles in the

way that fulfilling one functional role prevents the system from fulfilling any other functional role. But if there

is no stop-argument, then the thesis gets inflationary and any system could fulfill a certain functional role for

any other system―you cannot exclude this.

Otherwise, you may argue for using the ceteris paribus-condition. But this is a non-constructive condition

that cannot show the “negative”-part―it just assumes it. But should we base realistic theses just on

assumptions? The extended cognition-thesis has its popularity because of its more or less direct showing of

counterintuitive examples. So, why it is not in the need to show that by directly showing something the

opposite is not the case? Exactly this is the problem of finding demarcation-or stop-criteria. You cannot solve it

by the assumption that it is solved by the ceteris paribus-condition.

A weaker position of functional roles for individuation bases on the idea that we can only numerically

individuate systems by their cores of functional roles. Perhaps we cannot give a clear cut demarcation for fully

determined individual systems that stop here or there. But step by step of functional role-analysis, we could

find out that there are systems that regularly have a critical core of identical or similar functional

roles—neglecting all the other possible but varying roles. Then, one could at least numerate these cores and say

that coupling relies on complementing cores in the following sense: If there is a system i with a core c1

consisting of functional roles r1, then there is another system j with a core c2 consisting of functional roles

r2—such that out of r1 and r2 one could construct pairs of roles (ri of r1, rj of r2) such that ri and rj

complement each other. Complementing means the condition of fulfillment a functional role: ri complements r

jiff ri implies that for fulfilling ri the system must be coupled with a system having rj, vice versa. One could

argue: Of course, this needs further explanation, but this may be the task for the functional role-theorist. We are

just interested in using such a notion as a marker for coupling.

But determining coupling by cores is not done easily. What counts as a core of functional roles and what

does not count as part of the core? What predicate of identity or similarity do we use to say that two cores are

identical or similar? Why are we necessarily able to neglect roles that are not within the core? These questions

will enforce the same discussion as for the predicate of reliability as long as one cannot give decision

procedures to decide between different answers. But what procedure should decide in principle whether we

should use these or those criteria of similarity? What procedure should decide about the degree of similarity?

Necessarily, every answer to these questions will be based on some arbitrariness―which cannot be allowed if

extended cognition is taken as a realistic claim.

A third and weakest option of using roles for individuation may be the following one: Maybe one could

argue that we should give up the reflexity-property of role-relations between coupled systems and only use

irreflexive relations. But then the same argument follows from above. How could we determine irreflexive

relations between two systems? And if so, how could we exclude irreflexive relations between systems without

inspecting all systems? Only questions, no answers.

Let us sum up: If extrinsic criteria should be used for individuating extended cognitive systems in a literal

and realistic sense, then there must be clear cut decision procedures or other arguments that determine how


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exactly we can determine candidates of coupled systems of vehicles for individuating certain cognitive systems.

We doubt that these criteria will exist for the principal reasons named above. Without procedures for

determining the choosing in Section 3 and 4, the proponent of extended cognition will always have problems of

finding a definite set of coupled systems. Otherwise, we would be pleased to get to know such extrinsic criteria

and deliver this as a task for the scientific community. So maybe we need intrinsic criteria instead of inspecting

experimental procedures applied to systems or inspecting roles of systems.

A last position is based on the idea that we should use intrinsic properties as criteria for individuating

(coupled) systems of vehicles of cognitive systems. One such criterion could be something like a “is

cognitive”-property, which is named “mark of the cognitive” in the debate. Such criteria will rely on

metaphysical assumptions about the structure or properties of the world in the sense that this structure or that

property—given by the world―solves our problem of individuation.

One of the most famous critics of the extended cognition thesis is Kenneth Aizawa. Together with Frederik

Adams, they created a series of papers that attacked the thesis on the grounds that in order to claim that

“cognition” can be extended into the world, into notebooks, pencils and even other human beings, one has to

clearly define what cognition then is. One has at least to be able to demarcate cognitive from non-cognitive

processes, if such a thing as cognition really exists (Adams and Aizawa 2001).

This of course is a problem for the extended cognition community, because as we have seen with the other

criteria for individuating coupled systems, this “just so”-approach (i.e., giving thumb criteria) is not only

unscientific; it leads to all those dead ends we have shown above.

Now, in order to get rid of this need and spell out a clear cut demarcation line for the phenomenon of

cognition, the vehicle externalist has come up with the following solution: We do not need to give a clear cut

definition of what the so called mark of the cognitive is, because the internalists (i.e., the traditional view) do

not know it either! It is unfair to load the whole burden of defining these boundaries on the shoulders of the

externalist, because the internalists are in the same position as we are.

If the preceding chapters of this paper are right, then we claim that this is not the case anymore. If all the

other criteria for individuation of coupled systems fail, the last stand for the vehicle externalist are the

boundaries the phenomenon of cognition itself drawing around the coupled system that carries it. The extended

cognition thesis then needs a very strong metaphysical assumption about the existence of cognition in the world,

and a very good explanation about the structures of this obscure entity that intrinsically holds coupled systems

together, after the external properties failed to do so.

In order to make the individuation criteria for coupled systems cleared cut, one then has to give clear cut

demarcation criteria for a mark of the cognitive, exactly as Aizawa and Adams demanded in many of their

papers.

To be able to give those necessary and sufficient properties that demarcate cognitive from non-cognitive

processes, the vehicle externalist has to come up with a scientific and precise description to explain his almost

obscure ontology of a certain something called “cognition” “extending” into something like a pencil or a

notebook without falling back into using functional roles or arbitrary criteria like reliability, without sacrificing

important relations like systematicity, and without giving up a naturalistic description of those phenomenon.

A very hard task as it seems to us, because of the individuating power this metaphysical entity has to have

in order to save the thesis of extended cognition from arbitrariness while keeping it from degenerating into an

unscientific, almost ghost-like entity that infuses certain objects with cognitive processes, and others not.


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4.5. Extended Cognition as a Heuristic

After some criticisms, a proponent of extended cognition might concede that it would be not a good idea

to read the thesis literally or realistically. Maybe we should be more careful and just use it as an interesting

heuristic and weaken the criteria. But this cannot be the case: Even an interesting heuristic must provide a

non-arbitrary constraint on the set of possible candidates of coupled systems so that there will not be

inflationary many systems. The heuristic is still in the need of criteria. However, the above mentioned

candidates are no candidates for this interpretation. Perhaps, one could live with the idea that there will be

many different sets of candidates for individuation with different but arbitrary legitimations that exclude each

other. But even finitely many (and not infinitely many) different candidates for individuation are too many.

Then extended cognition neither can be used empirically and fruitfully because of a lack of constraint of

candidates, nor can it be used in a principal way to show something about the three possible outcomes of the

debate mentioned above in Section 2.

Finally, it is not the case that extended cognition as a heuristic can simply adopt an interesting notion of

coupling coming up from empirical sciences. If this would be done, it would not make extended cognition

being a successful empirical theory or heuristic. In the opposite, another theory would have done what extended

cognition just has assumed. It is not at all guaranteed that this is a theory that is compatible with extended

cognition. Adopting a notion from an incompatible theory (e.g., incompatible with respect to background

assumptions) is not advisable.

5. Two Horns and a Methodological Problem for Extended Cognition

Let us sum up our criticism in the form of two horns as we already did in Section 1.3: Either the extended

cognition-proponent wants to use extrinsic criteria―then there will be arbitrariness, rule of thumb and just

so-stories. This is neither acceptable for a realistic thesis nor for a heuristic. Or the extended cognition wants to

use intrinsic criteria like a mark of the cognitive―then well-known criticism by Adams and Aizawa (2001;

2010) stabs the proponent.

Now let us use the cookbook theory to show the pointlessness of circumventing the horns. Assume that the

cookbook theory is embedded into some background theory. If you want to circumvent these horns, you either

have to add an arbitrarily chosen criterion axiomatically to the cookbook theory to just state that this is the right

criterion. Or you have to find a metaphysical background theory that makes your chosen criterion just right,

even if it implies methodologically arbitrariness. The following Table 2 lists these options.

Table 2

Ostensible Options of Circumventing the Horns

Case 1 Case 2

Fixed background theory Changed background theory

Cookbook theory Cookbook theory

Axiomatically added criterion Added criterion Criterion follows from changed background theory

In the first case, you have to question if you solve the problem constructively or if you just assume that it

can be solved by choosing arbitrarily a criterion and take it as an axiom. You just put into the theory what the

theory needs. In the second case, you do not solve the problem but make the world just so that the problem is


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solved. In the best, you solve that problem in a world where you may already know what the right criterion is.

But this does not seem to be our world. Both cases are no solutions for the problem itself.

The problems of finding scientifically legitimated individuation-criteria for coupled systems are complemented

by another methodological problem underlying assumption 1: we may be able to realize a certain phenomenon

like cognition at first only by intuition and only in some cases, so goes the assumption. But gluing together

scientific advice in form of legitimated individuation-criteria and intuition to solve some border cases is

methodologically difficult, because there is no method how to glue them together. And if intuition is sometimes

wrong with respect to so called border cases―the reason for the popularity of the extended cognition thesis―why

should intuition be right in other cases? Must we “believe” that we are just right here and just wrong there?

Who does know this and why does he know this? If one could answer this, surely intuition could be handled as

an objective mark. But, there is no known argument that intuition of the phenomenon of cognition is an

objective mark for developing scientific criteria of individuation of coupled systems. In the opposite, it is

argued that we err by intuition and need advice by finding individuation-criteria. And if intuition would be a

good heuristic, why would we need other advice by science that is handled in the debate of extended cognition?

As we have seen, currently there is no such advice in a realistic or heuristic sense that could complement

intuitions―be they right or wrong. So, the claim of having both an objective and erroneous insight into a

phenomenon is dubious. Even if our scientific advisory criteria could reproduce our supposed objective insights,

this is no guarantee for their validity in case of the unsolved border cases. But this seems to be bottomless

theorizing.

6. Extended Cognition as a Case of Bottomless Theory-Building

Let us go back to the point that extended cognition is welcomed from the perspective of preventing

dogmatism. We argued that if the debate had developed individuation-criteria, extended cognition could serve

to decide between three possible outcomes:

(1) The traditional view has it right and the found criteria show that principally only non-extended systems

can exist and to them the criteria can be applied;

(2) Both the traditional view and extended cognition have it half right, and the found criteria show that

principally both extended and non-extended systems can exist. But to the best of our empirical sciences only

extended (or only non-extended) systems exist;

(3) The traditional view has it wrong: the found criteria can be applied to (all) existing cognitive systems

and they exclude principally the traditional view.

This decision would be based on criteria that let extended cognition being an interesting thesis and not an

inflationary thesis. However, this is not the case at all. One can see that theories of extended cognition either

just assume criteria (like reliability or role) and avoids spelling out their production―or just rely on some

metaphysical resort that there will be an intrinsic mark. Both horns will not lead to a decision between the

mentioned outcomes and they will not guide or adapt to empirical research.

For this reason, extended cognition is a good candidate of bottomless theory-building. There could be

infinitely many papers about extended cognition and its counterintuitive consequences if one just had criteria

individuating extended systems realizing cognition. Or there could be infinitely many papers about arbitrarily

chosen parameters like “x% reliability means ‘coupling’.” Or there could be infinitely many papers about using

extended cognition as a heuristic―if one just had criteria reducing non-arbitrarily the set of individuation


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candidates of cognitive systems to just one set. Or there could be infinitely many papers telling “just so”-stories

about calculators, notebooks, and people. But none of them makes extended cognition being an interesting

thesis, as the proponent has claimed. The reason can be found in the structure of generating criteria needed to

ground or complement the structure of extended cognition-theories. As a result, extended cognition without

criteria is neither interesting as a specific thesis nor is it interesting from the point of preventing dogmatism.

Instead, it is bottomless.

Notes

1. Parity principle: “if, as we confront some task, a part of the world functions as a process which, were it done in the head,

we would have no hesitation in recognizing as part of the cognitive process, then that part of the world is (so we claim) part of the cognitive process” (Chalmers and Clark 1998).

2. Neither Clark and Chalmers nor our essay is constrained to a specific theory of person. If one thinks this would be a deficit, then one has to explain how such a constraint will make a contribution to the extended cognition-thesis.

3. This goes so far as to vehicle externalists claiming that, e.g., Einstein did not find the theory of relativity on his own, but the coupled system consisting out of Einstein and his pens and papers.

Works Cited

Adams, Fred, and Kenneth Aizawa. The Bounds of Cognition. Singapore: Blackwell Publishing Ltd. 2010. ---. “The Bounds of Cognition.” Philosophical Psychology 14 (2001): 43-64. Carnap, Rudolf. “Die Physikalische Sprache Als Universalsprache Der Wissenschaft.” Erkenntnis 2.1 (1931): 432-65. Clark, Andy. “Microcognition.” A Bradford Book. 2nd ed. 1991. Clark, Andy, and Chalmers, David. “The Extended Mind.” Analysis 58 (1998): 7-19. Rupert, Ryan. “Challenges to the Hypothesis of Extended Cognition.” Journal of Philosophy 101.8 (2004): 389-428. Wilson, Robert Anton, and Arnold Clark. “How to Situate Cognition: Letting Nature Take its Course.” The Cambridge Handbook of

Situated Cognition. Ed. Murat Aydede and Philip Robbins. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2009. 55-77.


Aristotle’s Definition of Phýsis in Physics B 1

Camilo Vega González

University of Antioquia

In Physics B 1, Aristotle establishes a detailed definition of phýsis. For that purpose, Aristotle distinguishes phýsis

from téchnē and his domain. He did this to offer a satisfactory account of the physical being. In this process, phýsis

is defined as an immanent principle of movement and as matter and as form. As matter phýsis could be understood

as “the primary underlying matter in each case, of things which have in themselves a source of their movements

and changes”. To consider phýsis as form Aristotle appeals to four arguments where priority of form over matter

appears to be evident and where the identifying of eîdos/morphé with tò télos/tò hoû héneka will be crucial,

especially for later developments. The reconstruction of Aristotle’s reasoning on his definition of phýsis in Physics

B 1 emphasizing the problems that such effort of definition implies is the purpose of this paper.

Keywords: phýsis, téchnē, hýlē, eîdos/morphé, tò télos/tò hoû héneka

1. Context

In Physics A 7, when the “coming to be” (gígnesthai) and the things subject to it are being defined,

Aristotle indistinctively takes into account both natural and artificial products. In this way, along with plants

and animals, which come from seeds, he also mentions processes that imply the operation of téchnē, as the

making of a statue, a sculpture, or a house (190b4-10).1 However, it is not until Phys. B 1 when Aristotle

makes a precise distinction between phýsis and téchnē.2 Products from the outcome of art (téchnē) are

considered to be of a different and inferior order for they have “no innate tendency to change” (192b18-19).3 In

contrast, the tendency to change is characteristic of the things constituted by nature, which have themselves “a

source of change and staying unchanged, whether in respect of place [local], or growth and decay [quantitative],

or alteration [qualitative]” (192b14-16). Per accidens, products from the outcome of art (téchnē) can have a

certain “natural” tendency and consistency, given that natural constituents take part in their material

composition.4 As Ross notices, “manufactured things have a tendency to move (e.g., up or down) not as such

but in virtue of the material of which they are made” (Ross 1995, 69). However, regarding movement, phýsis is

a principle primun et per se, while téchnē is a secundum et per accidens. Aristotle confirms such a unique

character of phýsis as an intrinsic principle of movement (vs. the per accidens of téchnē) when he states:

“nature is a sort of source (principle: archê) and cause of change and remaining unchanged (ēremeîn) in that to

which it belongs primarily of itself, which is not by virtue of concurrence (accident: katà symbebēkós)”

(192b21-22).5 In short, phýsis can be considered as an intrinsic principle of movement while téchnē can be

considered as an external principle of movement in something else. As it is stated in De Gen. Anim. II, “for the

Camilo Vega González, Ph.D. candidate, Professor, Institute of Philosophy, University of Antioquia, Colombia; main

research fields: Ancient Greek Philosophy, Aristotle, and Aristotelianism. Email: [email protected].

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ARISTOTLE’S DEFINITION OF PHÝSIS IN PHYSICS B 1

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art is source (archê) and form of the product, but in another thing; but the movement of nature is in the thing

itself, being derived from another nature which contains the form actualized” (735a3-5).

In order to clarify concepts a digression is needed to be made.

2. Excursus: Téchnē vs. Phýsis

Téchnē can be defined putting it in contrast with phýsis. As Radice affirms, “the relation of opposition

between nature and art constitutes a symmetry that is both logical and terminological” (Radice 2011, 768, n.

35). In several parts of the corpus, we find references to téchnē and his domain that can help us to reconstruct

its meaning. By definition, téchnē is a human activity, moreover, a productive one, and for that reason it is

distinguished from phýsis. Furthermore, their products, being contingents, are opposites of the things from

phýsis, which are necessary (i.e., have their principle in themselves) (cf. Eth. Nic. VI 4, 1140a10-15): being

téchnei is not the same as being phýsei. Concerning the contingency of the products of téchnē, we can add an

additional nuance. Téchnē can be considered “a state (hexis) involving true reason concerned with production”

(cf. Eth. Nic. VI 4, 1140a9; a20), and the technítes—the productive agent who performs such téchnē—as the

one who, just before the beginning of the process and just before the actualization takes place, adds the form to

the product, form that is in his soul (cf. Met. Ζ 7, 1032b1). Therefore, the contingency of such products is

evident: “in one sense there is, and in another there is not an immaterial house, or health, or anything which

depends on art” (Met. Λ 3, 1070a16-17). Once subject to generation by means of téchnē, the formless matter,

which can or cannot be, begins to take the form of what is in the soul of technítes. This technítes can be an

architect or a physician. One can say that in his soul, in his mind, the architect has the sketch of the house’s

form, and that the production that he is able to do is the actualization of such form in the matter, i.e., to

produce-construct the house. One can say that, in his soul, the physician has the formula (lógos) and the form

(eîdos)6 of health,7 and that his production is to bring back healthiness: “this point on the process towards

health is called production” (Met. Ζ 7, 1032b11). Taking into account the examples of the architect and the

physician as “producers,” we can confirm the dictum: “the things produced by skill are those whose form is in

the soul of the producer” (Met. Ζ 7, 1032b1). Health is produced from the form of health (that is in the soul),

and the house from the form of the house (that is in the soul) (cf. Met. Ζ 7, 1032b11-14). The kind of generation

that téchnē has two interrelated moments: “thinking” (nóesis) and “production” (poíesis). The first derives from

the originating form (that is in the soul), and the second follows upon the completion of thinking (the

actualization of the form in the matter) (cf. Met. Ζ 7, 1032b15-17). Additionally, between the noetic and the

poietic processes, in the intermediate steps between what is thought (that is in the soul) and the completion of

the process, there are necessary conditions of possibility that must be reciprocal (cf. Met. Ζ 7, 1032b6-11), as is

said: “and the last thing [found] in the analysis would seem to be the first that comes into being” (Eth. Nic. III 3,

112b23-24).

3. Returning to the Analysis

After the excursus, we can continue with the definition of phýsis as in Phys. B 1 is made. A thing that has

phýsis as a principle is said to have “a nature,” and that thing is a substance (ousía), an underlying thing

(hypokeímenon), given that “nature is always in an underlying thing” (cf. 192b32-34).8 Here we can hear

echoes of what was said about hypokeiménē phýsis,9 reaffirming the character of phýsis as ousía10 and,

consequently, as hypokeímenon—which puts forward what will be said about phýsis as hylē. To explain what


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being “due to nature” (phýsei) and “in accordance with nature” (katà phýsin) are, Aristotle gives the example of

the way fire moves. Although fire moves upwards phýsei and katà phýsin, one could say that its movement

neither “has a nature” (échei phýsin) nor is “a nature.” Fire is and has phýsis per se. In contrast, fire’s

connatural movement can only be defined as being per accidens, simply but not substantially phýsei or katà

phýsin (cf. 192b35-193a1). With respect to the existence of phýsis, this is undeniable. Phýsis exists, and

evidence of it comes to us by means of experience. It is worth remembering that at the beginning of Physica

Aristotle takes for granted the existence of both phýsis and kínēsis, based on empirical evidence (ek tês

epagōgês) (cf. A 2, 185a13-14).

4. Senses in Which Phýsis can be Understood: The Twofoldness of Phýsis

Just like the analysis of génesis/gígnesthai, where Aristotle identifies hýlē and eîdos/morphé as always

manifested in any being phisikos,11 in the definition of phýsis these features are also manifested: both are

subject to the analysis phisikos. Thus, regarding phýsis, there are two main standpoints: one on behalf of matter

and the other on behalf of form.

4.1. Phýsis as Matter

For some, phýsis and the ousía of things phýsei is in the matter, in “the primary constituent present in it,

[something] unformed in itself” (193a10-11). This definition of phýsis as being such a “primary constituent” (tò

proton enypárchon) directs us to the previous definition of hýlē as tò ex hoû gígnethai ti enypárchontos, given

in Phys. A 9 (cf. 192a30-33). It also leads us to the subsequent definition that is given in Phys. B 3, once hýlē

has been identified with “material cause” (hé hýlē), as a constituent and “intrinsic cause” (aítion enypárchon):

“that out of which as a [immanent] constituent a thing comes to be” (tò ex hoû gígnethai ti enypárchontos)

(194b23-24). People who think phýsis as being in hýlē base their claims on considering the elements (cf.

193a21-23)12 as constituting the “final nature” of things13 and phýsis as being the primordial matter (formless

itself) from which all things would have grown. Regarding this view, the elements, being phýsis, are like the

eternal matter from which all the other things are just temporary modifications (193a25-27). To close his

argument, Aristotle reminds us that hýlē is just one way of using the word phýsis, understood as “the primary

underlying matter in each case, of things which have in themselves a source of their movements and changes”

(cf. 193a28-30).

4.2. Phýsis as Form

On the other hand, one can say that phýsis is “the shape (hé morphé) and form (tò eîdos) which accords

with a thing’s account (tò katà tòn lógon)” (193a30). Here, we can notice the closeness between tò kata tòn

logon and horismós, both of them involved with the elucidation of eîdos, of ousía: “it is now clear that a

definition is the formula stating what being is for a thing” (Ζ 5, 1031a11).14 Aristotle employs four arguments

for his definition of phýsis as eîdos/morphé.

The first argument consists of establishing a comparison between phýsis and téchnē (cf. 193a32-35). Both

have the character of actuality as a granter of entity. Actuality and entity are exclusive and privileged

characteristics of form, which makes the first ones possible. Without reaching their specific form—either by

configuration or by definition, none could say that the bed in potency is “in accordance with art” (katà tēn téchnēn)

or that it is art. Similarly, for the flesh or the bone in potency, none could say that they are nature or “in

accordance with nature” (katà phýsin). Aristotle sums up the privileged character of considering eîdos/morphé


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as phýsis by saying: “nature is the shape and form (hé morphé kaì tò eîdos) of things which have in themselves

a source of their changes, something which is not separable except in respect of its account (katà tòn lógon)”

(193b3-5).15

From the analogy phýsis-téchnē, Aristotle derives his second argument, which is the primacy of

eîdos/morphé on hýlē: “the form has a better claim that the matter to be called nature” (193b37). Phýsis as

entelécheia,16 as complete actuality. Eîdos/morphé being phýsis more properly than hylé, whose potential

character is declared in Met. Ζ 7: “it is in fact common to all things that are generated, whether by phýsis or by

téchnē, that they have matter. For each of them is capable both of being and of not being, and this is due to the

matter in them” (1032a20-22).

In this way, considering phýsis, according to which any being physikos is brought into being, as identified

with eîdos/morphé (cf. 1032a22-25), we arrive to Aristotle’s third argument: “for men come to be from men”

(193b8).17 Among the issues implied in this claim, the main ones are, first, the actualized form as being the

absolutely first (v.gr., the priority of the chicken regarding to egg, of the man regarding to sperm, of the actual

man regarding to the potential one, and so forth),18 and, second, the transmission of form among individuals of

the same species and definition.

The fourth argument is that “nature in the sense in which the word is used for a process proceeds towards

nature” (193b12-13). This claim shows phýsis as a process that cannot be explained in the same terms that we

explain artificial activity, whose principle and end are in other things: phýsis’s process is internal and its aim is

its progressive auto determination. The metaphor used by Aristotle to illustrate phýsis’s process is what lies in

the primitive meaning of phýsis as growth (the other meanings being: birth, sprout, and germ [seed]). A

linguistic singularity of the word permits Aristotle to construct such a metaphor: so “as if one were to

pronounce the ‘y’ in ‘phýsis’ long” (Met. Δ 4, 1014b16), in a way it sounds similar to the “y” in the verb

“phýo,” which entails in its meaning the notes of spring-growth (phyómenon). The two primary meanings of

phýsis developed in Δ 4 are clearly stated by Aristotle when he describes phýsis as “in one sense, the coming to

be of things that grow […], in another, the first constituent out of which a growing thing grows. Again, what

makes the primary change in any naturally existing thing a constituent of the thing qua itself” (Met. Δ 4,

1014b16-18). That way is how in Phys. B 1, pointing out the features that phýsis entails, Aristotle characterizes

eîdos/morphé as the thing towards what phýsis is tending, since “that which is growing, as such, is proceeding

from something to something” (193b17). If we are considering phýsis in such a process, in front of the question

“What, then, is it which is growing?,” and knowing that phýsis is not growing “out of, but it is growing into,”

the answer will be that phýsis is tending—it is growing—towards its eîdos/morphé, its distinctive ergón: “so the

form is nature” (193b18-19).19

5. Conclusion: Further Reading

The last definition of phýsis both as form and as process towards an end constitutes a reaffirmation of

the strong sense of phýsis given in Met. Δ 4: “The nature is both the first matter [...] and the form and

substance, that is, the fulfilment of their coming to be (tò télos tés genéseos)” (1015a6-11). Moreover, it

constitutes a turning point with regard to the explanation of phýsis’s inherent dynamism, which could be

understood through the relationship between its constituents matter and form. It is a development of what at the

end of Phys. Α 9 is slightly suggested: “But the truth is that neither can the form yearn for itself, since it is in

need of nothing, nor can its opposite yearn for it, since opposites are mutually destructive, but it is the matter


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which does the yearning” (192a20-22).20

The aforementioned last definition of phýsis (cf. 193b12-19) also implies the root base on what later in

Phys. Β 9 is going to be said about final cause (tò télos/tò hoû héneka) as form: “And since nature is twofold,

nature as matter and nature as form, and the latter is an end, and everything else is for the end, the cause as that

for which [hè hoû héneka: i.e, causa finalis] must be the latter” (199a30-32).21

Additionally, it also connects with other determining places in the corpus where Aristotle identifies

eîdos/morphé with tò télos/tò hoû héneka. In Metaphysics H 4, is said: “And what is the form (tò eîdos)? The

what-being-is (tò tí ên einai). And what is the purpose (tò hoû héneka)? The goal (tò télos). (These last are

perhaps identical.)” (1044a36-b1). In a metaphysical passage from De Generatione et Corruptione B 9, it is

reiterated: “So generation and corruption belong necessarily to what is capable of being and not being. That is

why it is the cause by way of matter of things which come to be: the cause by way of ‘that for the sake of

which’ is the shape or form, and this is the definition of the essence of each thing” (335b4-7).

In Short, the definition of phýsis made in Phys. B 1 consist in a detailed examination of the inner

constituents of the physical being: matter and form. This examination is useful for the understanding of

Aristotle’s “teleological commitment”, as can be seen in the later identifying of eîdos/morphé with tò télos/tò

hoû héneka.

Notes

1. Regarding the quotation of Aristotle’s works, the texts we follow are from the Oxonian Clarendon Aristotle’s Series: W.

Charlton (1970); Ch. Kirwan (1971); D. Bostock (1994); D. M. Balme (2003). For Met. Lambda, we use Blyth (1990). For Eth. Nic., we use T. Irwin (1999).

2. We must shed light on the fact that in B 1 Aristotle exclusively focuses on the definition of phýsis and that the other one of téchnē is just derivative. The different meanings of phýsis are also explained in Met. Δ 4, there, the last meaning summarizes the four previous ones and constitutes the chief definition of phýsis: “the nature which is primary and fundamentally so called is the substance (ousía) of those things that possess an origin of change in themselves qua themselves” (1015a13-15).

3. As it is known, among the species of Metabolé, Movement (kínēsis) is the accidental one. It occurs among contraries (enantía), being in three ways with respect to three of the first categories: local, quantitative, or qualitative (cf. Met. Ζ 7, 1032a12-16; Phys. Γ 1, 200b33-201a1; Δ 1, 225b7-8; Δ 2, 226a23-b1ss.; Cat. XIV, 15a13-14; and so forth). In a fragment of a previous paper we made a schematic reconstruction of the different meanings that Metabolé and its species génesis and kínēsis have among them; cf. Vega González (2012, 228-230).

4. “Considered as concurrently made of stone or earth or a mixture of the two” (192b20). 5. Cf. Met. Λ 3, 1070a7-8: “Now art is a principle [of motion] in another [kind of thing], while nature is a principle internal

to some [kind of] thing (since a man generates a man)”. 6. Met. Ζ 7, 1032b21-22: “the thing that produces health, and is what the process towards health begins from, is the form in

the soul -that is, if it is brought about by skill.” 7. Met. Ζ 7, 1032b5: “Thus health is the substance of disease, since disease is the absence of health, and health is the formula

in the soul and the knowledge of it [both of them on the part of the physician]”. 8. Radice (2011): “In this discourse ‘nature’ is natura naturans insofar as natura naturata” (766, n. 8). 9. This hypokeiménē phýsis, that only “must be grasped by analogy” (191a8), is the underlying matter, which was reached as

the third alternative term to the contraries (form and privation) in the account of what gígnesthai is. 10. Such as was stated in Met. Δ 4, 1015a13-15. 11. In the analysis of gígnesthai, Aristotle also identifies stérēsis, along with hýlē and eîdos/morphé. Here, in the definition of

phýsis, stérēsis also will be considered, just finishing the chapter (in, cf., 193b19-20), as being, in certain way, form. 12. Cf. also De Gen. et. Corr. II 1, where Aristotle talks about the elements and their relationship with prime matter. 13. The reference to Antiphon points to the persistence of the “last material” compound: the wood, in a buried bed and after

its decomposition (sēpedón), emphasizing the feature of hýlē that phýsis has (cf. 193a13-17; cf. 80B15 Diels-Kranz). Notwithstanding, maybe the wood is just pointing out to one of the elements, the earth, so to speak. About the wood, and even the bronze, as being “due to nature” from earth, cf. Met. Θ 7, 1049a17ss.

14. And before, in Δ 8 said that the lógos of the ousía is horismós: “what it is to be, the formula of which is a definition is also called each thing’s substance” (1017b23-24).


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15. By contrast we know that hýlē as such is unknowable (cf Met. Ζ 10, 1036a9), only indirectly by means of the form it

could be known: “we are acquainted with everything by its form (eîdos)” (Met. Γ 5, 1010a25). 16. Later in Phys. Γ 1, kínēsis is being explained in terms of entelécheia: “the fulfillment of what exists potentially insofar as

it exists potentially, is motion” (201a11-12). 17. This motto appears several times in the corpus. A list of its frequencies is annotated in Bonitz’s Index Aristotelicus, sub

verbo �νθρωπος, in its eighth meaning: (τ� περ� �χείαν, κύησιν κτλ.) �νθρωπος �νθρωπον γενν� (solenne generationis naturalis exemplum). Cf. Bonitz (1870, 59b40-60a5). We already talked about it in a paper presented to the Colombian 14th. National Philosophy Conference (November 2003). We also recommend looking at classical works on this topic, as K. Oehler’s (1963), or articles as D. M. Balme’s (1990). Also recent thesis as F. Scrivani’s (2009). The determining significance of this saying is brilliantly summed up by Düring: “in this concise formula [Aristotle] was able to give expression to a philosophy which brought together two seemingly incompatible elements: the immutability and eternity of form and movement, the mutability of individual things” (Düring 2005, 531).

18. Ultimately, the priority of enérgeia/entelécheia over dýnamis as is established in Met. Θ 8. For a precise and relatively recent account on that topic, cf. Beere (2009).

19. There is an additional subtlety with respect to phýsis as eîdos/morphé, and its primacy on hýlē, in one of the three senses in which ousíai could be considered in the frame of Met. Λ 3. In that context, that is similar to the context of Met. Ζ 3, 1029a2-7, Aristotle says: “the nature to which ‘this particular thing’ (i.e., matter) [is tending], as a particular state” (hê dè phýsis tóde ti kaì hexis tis eîs ên: 1070a11-12). The interpretation of that formula will surpass the scope of this paper, it would require an additional one to explain it. Nevertheless, we want to mention Blyth’s suggestive reading of that passage, a reading with which we completely agree: “As a nature-towards-which (compare 1070a2: “that into which is the Form”), form is treated as a resultant state (hexis) of the matter. In this sense, form is a télos or goal of a process of generation, the change involved in the realization of which is the actualization of the matter’s potential for such a form. Insofar as the process of change would not be determinate as a change except in virtue of the potential which is being actualized, and hence in virtue of the form which determines that potential by defining what it is a potential for, all natural change is inherently teleological, according to Aristotle, and can only be explained by reference to the form to be actualized, as a final cause” (Blyth 1990, 130).

20. As, in one way, Radice notices: “natural change is a process from nature as matter towards nature as form” (Radice 2011, 770, n. 45). Or, in another way, Stevens notices: “phýsis is the condition of natural change and form is the end of Its Growth” (Stevens 2002, 103, n. 1).

21. The last part of the argument is: Form is an end/Everything else is for the sake of the end/Therefore form is causa finalis.

Works Cited

Balme, David M. “�νθρωπος �νθρωπον γενν�: Human is Generated by Human.” Human embryo. Aristotle and the Arabic and European Traditions. Ed. Gordon. R. Dunstan. Exeter: University of Exeter Press, 1990. 20-31.

---. ed. and trans. De Partibus Animalium I and De Generatione Animalium I (with passages from II. 1-3). Oxford: Oxford UP, 2003 (Reprint).

Beere, Jonathan. “The Priority of Energeia (Theta 8).” Doing & Being: An Interpretation of Aristotle’s Metaphysics Theta. Oxford: Oxford UP, 2009. 285-324.

Blyth, Douglas James, trans. and comm. Aristotle’s Metaphysic’s Book Λ. Evanston: Northwestern University, 1990. Bonitz, Hermann. Index Aristotelicus. Berlin: Reimer, 1870. Bostock, David, ed. and trans. Metaphysics Books Z and H. Oxford: Oxford UP, 1994. Charlton, William, ed. and trans. Aristotle’s Physics: Books I and II. Oxford: Oxford UP, 1970. Düring, Ingemar. Aristoteles: Darstellung und Interpretation seines Denkens. 2th ed. Heidelberg: Universitätsverlag Winter, 2005. Irwin, Terence, ed. and trans. Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics. Indianapolis/Cambridge: Hackett, 1999. Kirwan, Christopher, ed. and trans. Metaphysics. Books Γ, Δ and E. Oxford: Oxford UP, 1971. Oehler, Karl. Ein Mensch Zeugt einen Menschen. Über Den Missbrauch Der Sprachanalyse in Der Aristoteles Forschung.

Frankfurt a.M.: Klostermann, 1963. Radice, Roberto, ed. and trans. Aristotele: Fisica. Milano: Bompiani, 2011. Ross, William David. Aristotle. 6th ed. Oxford: Routledge, 1995. Scrivani, Francesca. L’uomo Genera L’uomo. Riflessioni in Margine al De Generatione Animalium di Aristotele. Trieste:

Università degli studi di Trieste, 2009. Stevens, Annick, ed. and trans. Aristote: La physique. 2nd ed. Paris: Vrin, 2002. Vega González, Camilo. “La prueba y efectos de una causa eternamente actual: Aristóteles Metaphysica Lambda, 6.” (The Proof

and Effects of an Eternally Actual Cause: Aristotle Metaphysics Lambda, 6). Ontology Studies/Cuadernos de Ontología 12 (2012): 223-37.


The Habitus Made Me Do It: Bourdieu’s Key Concept as a

Substruction of the Monad

Carlos Belvedere

University of Buenos Aires

My claim is that Bourdieu’s concept of habitus is not consistent and its ambiguities conceal an imprecision

concerning the subject of social action. Indeed, Bourdieu defines habitus in three different ways: as a capacity, as a

set of dispositions, and as a scheme for practice. That is why he cannot solve the problem of the duality of agent

and habitus and produces a problem of fundamentation, as we can see in his troubles to determine which is the

substratum of social actions. Though Bourdieu claims he borrows the concept of habitus from Husserl and other

phenomenologists, many divergences can be stated in the way they conceive it. Unlike Bourdieu, phenomenology

can establish precise relations of fundamentation between agent, habitus, and the ego because it avoids the fallacy

of the wrong level involved in the attribution of systemic properties to personal eogic structures. Accordingly, it

provides a consistent and precise concept of the habitus.

Keywords: habitus, life-world, monad, substruction

1. Habitus as the Key Concept in the Sociology of Bourdieu

The sociology of Pierre Bourdieu is one of the most influential in our time. Not only his empirical studies,

but also the concepts he gave birth to have fostered countless investigations around the world. Bourdieu’s

promise to overcome the sterile divisions of dualism in the social sciences is among its most seductive promises.

In this framework, phenomenology is considered as subjectivism unable to account for the processes of

production and reproduction of social structures beyond the intended goals consciously sought by actors. This

subjectivism should be overcome although incorporated into a larger framework, related to the antagonistic

pole of objectivism. For this, it is necessary to abandon the sterile confrontations of dualism and address both

dimensions of social life, subjective, and objective.

In the context of this sociological project, it is particularly important that the notion of habitus as it would

allow to account for the subjective pole, and at the same time, for the objective pole of social life. It is true, as

claimed by subjectivism, that actors are guided by a subjective meaning which they project and pursue, which

give their world a meaning. But it is also true that subjects are structured in a certain manner, so that they are

predisposed to act in a certain way, and therefore their actions respond to previous processes that have

structured the structuring subject. The Bourdieusian theory of habitus seeks to account for these processes in a

complex way which subjectivism and objectivism would have seen only partially.

Carlos Belvedere, Ph.D., Professor, National Scientific and Technical Research Council, University of Buenos Aires,

Argentina; main research fields: Post Husserlian Phenomenology, Social Philosophy, Social Theory, and Ethnomethodology. Email: [email protected].

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Consequently, one might say that habitus is the “key concept” (Sapiro 2007, 37) and the “core concept”

(Bonnewitz 2003, 63) in the sociology of Pierre Bourdieu. Therefore, its critique would have global

consequences for his entire sociology, because if it is not well founded, then it would remain dogmatic. In this

paper, I will argue that this is the case. In other words, I will show that Bourdieu’s notion of habitus remains

groundless and consequently he cannot account for the monad, which is the only and concrete substratum of the

habitus. Instead, he substitutes the monad for an abstract concept of habitus performing a theoretical

substruction. In order to illustrate this, I will start by discussing Bourdieu’s concept of habitus. Then I will

compare it with different phenomenological descriptions of habitus (Husserl 2009; Schutz 1964; Merleau-Ponty

1999). I will end by drawing some conclusions from a phenomenological standpoint.

2. What is Habitus?

It is not possible to find a consistent definition in Bourdieu’s work and its ambiguities conceal a

deeper imprecision concerning the subject of social action. Actually, we can find at least three different

characterizations of habitus in Bourdieu’s work: as a capacity, as a set of dispositions, and as a scheme for

practice.

Firstly, Bourdieu (1980) claims that the habitus is an infinite capacity of engendering products of

perceptions, expressions, actions, and thoughts: “l’habitus est une capacité infinie d’engendrer en toute liberté

(contrôlée) des produits―pensées, perceptions, expressions, actions―qui ont toujours pour limites les

conditions historiquement et socialement situées de sa production” (the habitus is an infinite capacity to

engender, in full (controlled) freedom, products―thoughts, perceptions, expressions, actions―which always

have as a limit the historically and socially situated conditions of its production) (92). So, the habitus is a

capacity. Secondly, Bourdieu (1980) states that:

The habitus is a set of enduring transferable dispositions, which work as principles that generate and organize perceptions, practices and representations, and as motivational and cognitive structures that constitute the practical world as a world of goals already reached and objects provided with a permanent teleological character. […] As a system of dispositions, the habitus is a set of virtualities, potentialities and eventualities. (88-89)

Briefly speaking, habitus is a set of dispositions. Thirdly, Bourdieu alleges that the habitus is an enduring

transferable system of schemes of perception, appreciation, and action. These schemes, which are of a practical

kind, are the result of the incarnation of social structures. Hence, habitus is a system of incarnated practical

schemes. Finally, what is habitus?―A capacity? A set of dispositions? A system of schemes? Or all of the

above?

The most likely answer is that, for Bourdieu, the habitus is all three: a capacity, a disposition, and a

scheme for practice. But is that possible? On the one hand, a capacity is an ability to act, “une capacité …

d’engendrer … actions” (a capacity … to engender … actions) (Bourdieu 1980, 92), which involves activity; on

the other hand, a disposition is an “inclination” which, contrary to a capacity, implies passivity since it “makes

a person want to do something” (Cambridge Dictionary Online). Anyway both, capacities and dispositions, are

attributes of one subject, not as schemes, which to a certain degree are formal abstract structures that do not

strictly belong to the subject but can be transposed and passed from one subject to the other. So, it is not

possible to say in any precise sense that something (the habitus, for instance) is at the same time an ability (a

capacity), an inclination (a disposition), and an impersonal structure (a scheme). To admit all three


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characterizations of habitus (as a capacity, a disposition and a scheme) would mean admitting a nonspecific

definition of habitus, which is then left in relative inaccuracy. See for instance when Bourdieu (1992) describes

habitus as “a socialized subjectivity” (126), and at the same time, as the social incarnated, that is to say, the

biological individual socialized (Bourdieu 1992, 18, 133) through the incarnation of the collective or

transindividual (Bourdieu 2000).

Two things must be noted here. First of all, there is an oscillation between the individual and the social.

Which is first? Although many theories of society are based on this tension, which is quite frequent in the

history of sociology, it is problematic because, once again, Bourdieu brings together diverse elements without

accurately articulate them or clearly distinguish levels. Indeed, Bourdieu speaks of the socialized individual and

of the individuation of the social (i.e., its incarnation in a body) as if they were the same. So, what is grounded

on what, the social on the individual, or the other way around? Even if some might think that a primacy of

either the individual or the social is not needed, or that the history of sociology shows that this opposition is not

only dangerous but also counter-productive, we should at least admit that this indeterminacy is (not in the

history of sociology but, yes, in Bourdieu’s work) a serious deficiency because, as I will show latter, it produces

a problem of fundamentation in Husserl’s sense: because Bourdieu cannot establish clear relations of

subordination among the different features of the habitus, the whole set of them remains groundless. This leads

him to a kind of circularity so typical of Bourdieu (when he refers to the objectivity of subjectivity, to

structured structuring structures, and the like). Second, is it really the same, the individuation of the social and

the socialization of the individual? Bourdieu uses both expressions as synonymous. Even more, he uses several

different words as if they were interchangeable, such as individual, personal, and subjective; social, collective,

and interindividual; biological and bodily. However, “personal identity is not exactly the same as social identity

or habitus. […] Goffman’s notion of ‘distance from the role,’ for instance, can be interpreted as one

sociological attempt to describe this part of selfhood which resists sameness. […] And who someone is, for

Ricoeur, can never be totally predicted from what one is, that is, from one’s character or habitus” (Truc 2011,

154). That is why “two people―even twins―who possess the same habitus will never be entirely identical to

one another” (Truc 2011, 162). So, a more careful conceptual distinction in the use of terms such as

“individual,” “personal,” “personality,” and the like would make Bourdieu’s theory more specific and help

avoiding some semantic problems of his notion of habitus.

3. Some Semantic Problems of the Notion of Habitus

This kind of inaccuracy is typical in Bourdieu’s terminology,1 used to depict habitus with sweeping

statements. There is a semantic field to which this words family refers, but it is such a broad field that, if not

clearly circumscribed, it cannot provide specific references for each of these terms. For example, take the three

sets of terms we have just mentioned. The subjective is just one dimension of the personal, which in turn

implies a monadic unit not necessarily involved in the notion of the individual. So is it reasonable to ask: What

exactly is Bourdieu talking about? Not everything that can be said of the individual can be said of the person.

For example, a statistical sociologist could “count heads” without going into the complexities of the personal

lives of its units of analysis. The same applies mutatis mutandis to the relationship between the social, the

collective and the inter individual. These terms cannot be treated as synonyms, if rigor is to be kept. In addition,

sociological theory gives us countless examples of how these terms can and must be differentiated. For instance,

Luhmann (1995, 255, 265) conceives of the individual as an environment of the social system. Finally,


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“biological” and “bodily” are not at all interchangeable terms although, at times, Bourdieu employs “biological” in a

sense close to biology (with a critical nuance, as opposed to eugenics, for example, and alternatively with an

admissible sense, when he argues that the habitus is the biological socialized). Now, the body is not all

biological, let alone if we adopt a phenomenological approach where what matters is the phenomenal body, not

any uncertain biological entity. So, although for the purpose of field work and social critique, perhaps the most

valued aspects of the work of Bourdieu, these terminological inaccuracies do not have major consequences, on

the contrary, in the field of sociological theory they do have since precision is there a cardinal virtue. Therefore

it is sound to demand greater rigor in the definition of basic sociological concepts. By this we do not mean that

Bourdieu’s sayings are just wrong but that his language, although meaningful, sometimes is merely denotative

since it refers clumsily to something that is there presumably whatever we call it (individual, person or subject;

society, community or interaction; biology or body). That is also why his stance is involuntarily “realistic,”

because it assumes that those things exist beyond the way we name them.

A similar uncertainty, in some respects, subsidiary of this, can be found in the way of relating the notion of

habitus to that of “agent”. On one hand, if the substrate of habitus is the socialized biological individual, one

could think that it is s/he who acts, endowed with a habitus. I agree that would be a reasonable result. However,

on the other hand, Bourdieu insists that it is habitus who acts, which leads to an unintended and not assumed

anthropocentric notion since he describes habitus as acting in many ways (it can produce or reject practices, it

foresees possible futures, etc.) even though only concrete and personal human beings can act. Bourdieu would

expressly deny this but only nominally because he cannot specify which is the subjectum or hypokeimenon2

(i.e., the substratum) of social actions. For this reason, and symptomatically, Bourdieu avoids speaking of the

“subject” and substitutes this word by for word “agent.” Indeed, “the term ‘agent’ suits Bourdieu better than

‘actor,’ because the agent is being acted upon as much as, if not more than, he acts: in a way, what acts within

him is habitus, an entire socially incorporated structure […]” (Truc 2011, 156).

This substitution of the “subject” by the “agent” raises a number of questions:

If the agent does not correspond to the true subject of the action as long as he has not become aware of social determinations of which he is the support―these determinations accomplishing the action through him―can we therefore state that, since the agent is being acted upon by them rather than acting, it is precisely social determinations that constitute the subject? And yet, not even habitus can be said to correspond to a subject: in being but a notion without a real existence of its own, Bourdieu’s habitus is an abstract entity identified within the interval between a bodily and a spiritual dimension, one that refuses to become a substance. Henceforth, Bourdieu rejects any attempt to assign an action to an autonomous individuality, be that a person or a subject, thus running the risk to maintain the inconvenience of a badly guaranteed interval: “I have tried to say that the ‘subject’ of social actions―I use this term with inverted commas, is not a subject.” (Truc 2011, 158)

As a matter of fact, Bourdieu uses inverted commas ironically on a number of occasions, which illustrates

the ambiguity I am trying to disclose here. He does not really think there is a “subject” in the social realm

“precisely where habitus is, the subject cannot occur” (Truc 2011, 159), but he cannot help using this word

because he cannot come up with a better one. “At the very most Bourdieu admits that sociology ‘offers perhaps

the only means of contributing, if only through awareness of determinations, to the construction, otherwise

abandoned to the forces of the world, of something like a subject’” (Truc 2011, 158). “Unfortunately though,

‘something like’ a subject is not quite enough” (Swanson 2005, 5). Because, let me add, it means to elide the

subject of who is acting. Here, as Levinas (2002) says, the subject is out of subject.


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4. Which is the Substratum of the Habitus?

Bourdieu’s oscillations and lack of priorities produce a problem of fundamentation in Husserl’s sense

(1996), because since he cannot determine which is the substratum of social actions, he cannot decide which

strata of social reality is based on which and, in the end, which is the ultimate stratum that grounds all the

others.

In particular, Bourdieu cannot clearly tell if the agent grounds the habitus or if the habitus grounds the

agent. Sometimes he gives priority to the agent claiming that it is the agent who determines what is accessible

and inaccessible for him, personally and collectively (Bourdieu 1980, 107). He also says that social agents

actively determine their situation. This means that agents endow the situation of most of the power it has upon

them and that structures can only be produced by “true agents” (Bourdieu 1992, 140). Thus, it would seem that

the agent comes first. But sometimes Bourdieu says instead that it is the habitus which produces the principles

of perceptions as well as the anticipations of the possible futures (Bourdieu 1980, 89) and its perpetuation

(Bourdieu 2000, 152), suggesting that the habitus comes first. So, finally, he cannot tell which of them precedes

the other. He claims that, on the one hand, the agent does what he/she has to do, and on the other hand, the

habitus explains why, internalizing the objective structure of opportunities, he/she acts with rationality and

learns to read the future that suits him/her (1992). So, once again, we cannot tell what comes first: the agent

who acts or the habitus which explains the principles and rationality of his/her action.

Why is this so? Because Bourdieu has a distorted idea of what a subject is. On the one hand, all he can say

about the ultimate subject of social life is that it is an individual biological body. Thus what makes us individuals is

our biological body. On the other hand, he thinks that an agent becomes “something like a subject” (Bourdieu

2009, 21) as s/he consciously control his/her dispositions. Thus, Bourdieu switches from a conception of the

subject as a socialized biological individual, to a conception of the subject as someone who can consciously

control her/his dispositions. Bourdieu’s concept of subject is, then, doubly distorted given that it means either a

biological entity or a conscious rational one. Far from being a virtuous circle, this double reference of the

biological to the consciousness and vice versa is an impasse in Bourdieu’s theory. That is why I share

Crosseley’s (2001) idea that “a deeper exploration of the concept of habitus is to be conducted” (96), because

among other reasons, Bourdieu “argues that the habitus shapes and indeed constitutes human subjectivity

without selling out how we might examine this” (117).

5. The Interplay Between Dispositions and Conditions

Bourdieu’s distorted conception of the subject is related with his distortions regarding to its interchange

with the environment. He describes it as a relationship between the conditioned (the habitus’ dispositions) and

its conditions (fields, social space, history, etc.). He claims that habitus is produced by “the conditionings

associated with a particular class of conditions of existence” (Bourdieu 1980, 88). Furthermore, the homogeneity of

different habitus comes from the homogeneity of its “conditions of existence” (Bourdieu 1980, 98). From this

view, “objective conditions” generate dispositions “objectively compatible with those conditions,” adjusted to their

“conditions of productions” (Bourdieu 1980, 90). Consequently, dispositions find their limits in the historical

and social conditions of its production. That is why they are pre-adjusted to possible future “conditions of

operation” (Bourdieu 1980, 105). When both the conditions of production and the conditions of operation are

stable and remain the same, the habitus works just fine because it is adapted in advance to its conditions but


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when they differ, conflict, and change arise, and different outcomes are possible, from adaptation to

maladjustment, from resignation to revolution (Bourdieu 1980, 105).

Some have criticized Bourdieu’s stance saying that it is “reproductionst” (as argued by Grignon and

Passeron (1989)), “determinist” or even “fatalist” (such are the names that Bouveresse (2010, 36) calls them in

order to argue that they only have a less than “secondary importance” (Bouveresse 2010, 37)). It is not so

difficult to find in Bourdieu’s sayings a reply to these kinds of objections, since he makes it clear that the

interaction of habitus and its conditions is complex and open to a wide range of different possible outcomes.

Thus, since most of the time people are exposed to conditions that suit those conditions that generated their

habitus (Boudieu and Wacquant 1992), dispositions and conditions might relate in various ways. At one end,

when the conditions of production and the conditions of functioning are identical or comparable (Boudieu and

Wacquant 1992), they are pre-adjusted and consequently the habitus is left alone to its spontaneous inertia

which tends to perpetuate its structures already adjusted to its conditions of production. At the other end, when

this correspondence is disrupted, then the habitus might confront its conditions of production whether perpetuating

obsolete dispositions whether originating new dispositions adjusted to new conditions (Bourdieu 2000, 161).

However, that Bourdieu is not a determinist does not mean that the way in which he depicts the relation of

the habitus and its conditions is not a problem. Rather, it means that there are deeper difficulties than those

noticed by the critics just mentioned, as they only refer to how the condition is articulated with the conditioned

(e.g., deterministically), but not to how this very distinction is established. Determinism is only possible once a

distinction between the condition and the conditioned has already been established.

What is problematic here is that the distinction between dispositions and conditions makes an ontological

distinction out of an analytical one because it assumes unreflectively―i.e., in a dogmatic way―an unexamined

axiom such as the idea that one element of the pair is “conditioned” by the other. Both determinism and

freedom are understood in the context of such a distinction. Bourdieu himself addresses this problem as a whole

by referring to a “full conditional freedom” (Bourdieu 1980, 92) conceived in pre phenomenological terms, as

one of his philosophical partners involuntarily testifies by saying that he thinks he has convinced Bourdieu that

his conception of freedom was close to that of Leibniz because even a possible “proof that determinism is true”

would not change his idea of what a free action is (Bouveresse 201, 39). This shows that, for Bourdieu,

freedom and determinism are given on the same horizon within which both can be opposed as well as

complemented.

I will show later (in Section 11) that phenomenology conceives this in a different manner which will show

Bourdieu’s stance as fictitious not because we are absolutely free but because the bond between dispositions

and their environment is not a relationship of the condition and the conditioned but of “belonging together.” As

will be seen, phenomenology shows that we are not constrained by the surrounding world but open to it by the

“operating intentionality” of our own body, which is not yet a habitus but the bearer of a habitus, that relates

responsively to its circumstances, neither in a mechanistic determinism nor in a wild, disembodied liberty.

Bourdieu has addressed this theoretical problem scarcely because he does not believe in the intrinsic

qualities of theory since he only accepts an empirical validation of sociological ideas through “fieldwork”

(Bourdieu 1987, 13-46). Maybe his empirical descriptions do in practice solve in some of these problems,

nonetheless they have not even have a theoretical formulation. As a consequence, they remain unnoticed as

theoretical problems, even if Bourdieu’s empirical accounts of how a habitus have been generated, acquired,

and put to work in Algeria or elsewhere are far more solid and enlightening than the concepts outlined by him.


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6. The Habitus in Phenomenological Perspective

Bourdieu claims that he borrows the concept of habitus from Husserl among others such as Aristotle,

Thomas Aquinas, Merleau-Ponty, and Heideger (Bourdieu 1987, 20) and that he heavily relies on the

phenomenological tradition. Nonetheless, at least one main difference can be stated: that in the

phenomenological perspective, it is not the habitus but the concrete personal ego which acts.

Indeed, for Husserl, any act occurs in the temporal flow of consciousness and, if it has a “new objective

meaning” the “I” acquires a new property that will be maintained permanently, not only as something remembered

but also as something that “has been.” The “I” can always return to that property numerous times and always

finds it there for him as his own, as an acquisition of his habitus (Martinez 2007, 148). For Husserl, the habitus

is the mediator between the passive “already there” and the activity of knowledge and it also constitutes the

sedimentations of the life-world’s doxic soil (Martinez 2007, 150). Consequently, it is the passive synthesis

which is presented to the ego in the form of a habitus and thus which encompasses the work of the active

synthesis (Martínez 2007, 149).

In this light, the habitus is seen as an acquisition of the concrete persistent personal ego, constituted in its

temporalization (Husserl 1994, 280). In other words, the habitus is an egoic persistent substratum of egoic

qualities (Husserl 1994, 280). Therefore, it always pertains to an ego which persists, as a person, through the

changes of her/his habitus (Husserl 1994, 283-284), and who grows habitual properties (Husserl 2006, § 12, 41).

We may say then that the “substratum of habitualities” is the ego (Husserl 2006, § 34, 92).

The genesis of the ego’s persistent properties is to be found in the constitution, in the flowing intentional

life, of a surrounding world of objects endowed with their horizons and permanent ways of being and being-so

(Husserl 2006, § 33, 91). The ego is always surrounded by objects which affect it and incite it to action. Habitus

is what makes the world already available always there for the I (Martinez 2007, 149). Thus, habituality is the

correlate of the positing of these objects constituted in the I pole which performs them (Husserl 2006, § 33, 91).

This is how a habituality is constituted, and once constituted it pertains also to the constitution of objects

existing there for the I, so that it is always possible to go back to it again and again (Husserl 2006, § 38, 103-104).

These objects exist for me in my surrounding world in which I find both objects that are already familiar

to me with a permanent organization and objects whose knowledge is only anticipated by me. The first ones are

there for me by an original acquisition (i.e., due to an originary act of positing and specification in particular

intuitions of things I have never seen). This kind of object is constituted, throughout my synthetic activity, in

the explicit meaning form of what is identical to itself, determined by its many properties. My activity of

positing and specifying the being establishes a habituality of my own by which this object becomes permanently of

my property as an object with its own determinations. Such permanent acquisitions constitute my own known

surrounding world with its horizon of unknown objects, that is, still to be acquired, but already anticipated in its

formal object-like structure (Husserl 2006, § 33, 91-92).

As we can see, Husserl focuses not just on the habitus but on “the ego’s habitus” and consequently he

never loses sight of the fact that it is always the ego endowed with the habitus and not the habitus by itself who

acts. As a consequence, he takes as the basis of social phenomenology the concrete personal ego in a concrete

situation, related to concrete others. In this light, the habitus is seen as an acquisition of men in a concrete

situation (Husserl 2001, 327) and in social relationships, which are habitual associations of a habitual “we”

whose habitualities belong to them in a particular way (2011, 373). That is why Husserl refers to the habitus in


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the context of specific existing relationships such as a marriage, a friendship, a group, etc., taken as associations

of persons (Husserl 2011, 373). He also illustrates what habitus is by saying that the historians’ habitus

introduces them in the common horizon of the historians’ vocation, methods and labor (2000, 227). So, the

habitus is undertaken by real living people who acquire it and act by means of it.

7. Egology and Sociology

The idea that it is the concrete ego which acts is also supported by Schutz3 when he finds “the relevant

index to the social person” in the ego agens as “a pragmatic unification” (Schutz 2013a, 209) and as “the origo

of pure pragma” (Schutz 2013a, 210). In this context, Schutz claims that “the actor qua actor […] is subject,

substance, monad” (Schutz 2013a, 219). As can be seen, this perspective is in opposition to Bourdieu’s since

the actor is subject and not “something like a subject” in just some particular occasions. In addition, the habitus

is always personal; what is social is the “social personality”, which is orientated “around the ego agens”

(Schutz 2013a, 224) and is partial, fragmentary and even “schizophrenic” (Schutz 2013b, 249). Let us take a

closer look to Schutz’s ideas on the subject as monad and its relation to the social personalities.

The monad is a “subjective experiencing of temporality”―that is, a “constituted immanence” (Schutz

2013b, 265). This constituted immanence is in turn “a constituting moment for the stratification of the self”

through a series of modification of the “pure pragma of the self at work” (Schutz 2013b, 265). The ego agens is

the self “working on its pragma, [which] is always the ego ipse in its totality and fullness” (Schutz 2013b, 270).

However, it is not just my self who operates but, in particular, “my self now” (neither “my self before” nor “my

self later on”) (Schutz 2013b, 270). Even though “my self before” has operated in the pass, it does not operate

now. That is why I think about its actiones “only as its acta” (Schutz 2013b, 270).

As actiones, the pragmata constituted in my actual self are also co-constituting of public time:

As actiones these pragamata are co-constituting of public time which was the complete Now for the previously operating self, but to me, as reflecting self, appear as “then” emergent within the frame of public time. For detached from the actiones constituting it, public time is split up into a piece of world-time in which the acta have taken place in a sequential order of succession and in flowing duration and which my acta have constituted. […] What public time is today is created by my pragma in the process of execution, and tomorrow will fall again into world-time and its duration running its course. (Schutz 2013b, 270-271)

The split of social time between personal duration and world time is a necessary condition for the

constitution of the social persons since “the subjective experiencing of the temporality as constituting

immanence” is the constituting moment for their stratification (Schutz 2013a, 220). This is why social persons

don not have an immanence nor a historicality of their own “in the genuine sense” (Schutz 2013a, 220):

because they are only constituted, not constitiuting.

Indeed, social persons are constituted in the constituting immanence through a series of modifications,

starting with the ego ipse which is a pragmatic modification of the basic attitude of attention à la vie. About

this, Schutz (2013b, 276) says that, in the constitution of the ego ipse, the “pure pragma of the working self”

has a dominant role.

Here is where the body comes into play, although not conceived as a mere “biological” entity (as in

Bourdieu) but as an “animate organism [Leiblichkeit]” around which the world of the self is centered, where it

finds its “middle point” as a “core of reality” of kinaesthesias, perceptions, and apperceptions, including “what


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lies within the range of my sigh, of my hearing and reach” (Schutz 2013b, 280).

8. My Own Organism as a Somatic Living Being

As just said, my self is constituted around my own organism “as a somatic living being” which is “my tool

for intervening in world time and world space” (Schutz 2013b, 250). It also happens to be “the mediator in the

first place between my experiences in the durée and my ideas of a spatial-temporal world. […] it is only with

respect to this completely constituted organism (as our body) that we can speak of an outer and inner, of space

and also of space-time…” (Schutz 2013b, 257). In other words, it is our own organism which operates the split

of social time on which the differentiation of the self and the social person is based.

Concerning the self, Schutz distinguishes five “moments that lead from the basic positing of the fully

constituted organism to the constituting of the basic positing” of its unity (Schutz 2013b, 257-258). First, we

must consider my organism as my immediate organ of perception, which “always reveals itself with the

unmistakable index ‘my localizations’ to which, taken in the full sense, ‘my kinaesthesias’ and ‘my

localizations’ belong” (Schutz 2013b, 258). As such, my organism is “the bearer of the primal instituting of

active and passive kinds of experiencings,” including “a diversity of kinaesthetic and localizing phenomena that

make perception possible” (Schutz 2013b, 258). Second, we shall note that “my organism is the only constant

conscious process given me in primally instituting experience. Specifically, constant is the consciousness of the

limits of my organism which never leaves me” (Schutz 2013b, 258). Third, my organism is a “closed field of the

experience” of its own limits “distinguished form all other phenomena of the world by that fact that it alone is

truly governable by me. I am able to bring about changes in place of this, my organism, and together with it

intervene in world-time and world-space” (Schutz 2013b, 259). That is why Schutz thinks of the organism as

“the medium by which the duration-bound experience of movement in traversable space can be transformed”

(Schutz 2013b, 259). Accordingly, “my organism is the tool of my working, understanding by ‘working’ that

deed which intervenes in space. On this basis alone working is already revealed as my working and always

again only as my working” (Schutz 2013b, 259). Fourth, “my organism is the origin of my orientation in the

world.” Thus, it “constitutes my ‘hic’ with respect to which everything else is ‘illic’” (Schutz 2013b, 259). In

consequence, my organism:

is what allows me to change place and to transform what previously was “illic” into “hic” as a consequence of which the earlier “hic” now appears as “illic.” The primordial experiences of right and left, up and down, behind and in front, the entire three-dimensionality of my world-space and of my orientation in it are constituted by my organism that, metaphorically speaking, exhibits the “origo” of the system of coordinates that I apply to the world. And on the basis of the “hic” in question my surrounding world (the inanimate, the animate and the social) is constituted as the world within reach, within hearing and sight, and beyond that as the word of contemporaries, i.e., as a reachable world, as a phenomenon of probability. (Schutz 2013b, 259)

Fifth, we need to see that “my organism is the object of my growing older,” which is included in the “basic

anthropological phenomenon” that defines human existence as “being toward death” (Schutz 2013b, 259).

Though, “what distinguishes my organism is that it shares my growing older. […] in so far as it is the regulator

of the intensity of my life as well as the regulator of my tensions, defining, too, the domain of variation of my

attention à la vie” (Schutz 2013b, 258-259).

Schutz summarizes theses five steps in the following words:


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My organism as field of my perceptions as well as bearer of my primally instituting experiences of activity and passivity; my organism as a field of experience that/is constant, numerically identical and fashioning a quasi-continuum that is present to me at every moment; my organism as a tool of my working, as the gateway to world-time and world-space; my organism as the origin of my orientation in the world; my organism as the object of my growing older as well as the limit of the domain of variation of my attentions à la vie-: all of these are elements of the constitution of that one and unitary person that I call my own. (Schutz 2013b, 259-260)

9. The Ego Ipse as Ego Agens, the Split of Time and the Levels of Personality

According to Schutz, the unitary person is the ego ipse, which is actually realized by “the working self” (Schutz 2013b, 281). It is, then, an “ego agens”: a “self working on its pragma” (Schutz 2013b, 270). It is, also, a present self, actually working. Schutz calls it: “my self now” because the ego agens as “the ego ipse in its totatlity and fullness” is the self now that operates and “creates its public time while operating (Schutz 2013b, 270).

The ego agens (while “ego ipse in its totatlity and fullness”) operate as my self now by constituting its

actiones as pragmata and simultaneously co-constituting public time as “split up into a piece of world-time in

which the acta have taken place in a sequential order of succession and in flowing duration and which my acta

have constituted” (Schutz 2013b, 270). Briefly said, public time “is created by my pragma in the process of

execution” (Schutz 2013b, 270). This occurs in the present. So, it can be said that “the Now provides the

opportunity for the ego ipse to come into view in its fullness and totality as an operative [wirkendes] self in its

action” (Schutz 2013b, 271). On the contrary:

my self before now is already split up into its partial aspects and can never be visible in its fullness and totality but always only in its partial aspect. For only the action creates the relationship of unity [Einheitsbezug] of the ego ipse (at the same time with the constitution of public time). Only the self now operates so as to be able to achieve this production [Leistung] of the relationship of unity. My self before now does not operate, it has operated and its acta do not become allotted to the unitary ego ipse. Rather they are already revealed as acta of a partial self. (Schutz 2013b, 271)

In this framework, Schutz describes the partial selves of my self before as “dead partial selves” (Schutz

2013b, 272) which are nothing but “my acta that have run their course and been completed” (Schutz 2013b,

271). So, it is the sedimentation of my acta what constitutes my different partial selves allotted with “specific

attitudes of my self” (Schutz 2013b, 271). These attitudes are partial personalities orientated “around the ego

agens” (Schutz 2013a, 224) constituted by “habitualities and their automatisms” (Schutz 2013a, 224) by virtue

of the transferability of the own pragma (Schutz 2013b, 285).

In this process, the starting point, “the situation in its original fullness,” is “the basic attitude of attention à

la vie in the solitary self” (Schutz 2013a, 238). Then, through habituality (as well as trhough will, sociality,

education and culture), an interdependence and hierarchy of attentions à la vie is formed (Schutz 2013a, 239).

In accordance, the new levels of personality become “eccentric from the levels of personality that until now

were central” and also, in the reverse process, potentialities that have become eccentric “can become central

again or devolve into ‘partial death’” (Schutz 2013a, 239).

Therefore, based on the ego ipse, we are able to constitute a variety of social persons that enable us to act

and interact in different social “circles.”

10. The Social Personality as an Interplay of Partial-Personalities

Schutz borrows the idea from Simmel that we do not enter social circles with all our personal self but with

only parts of our social person. According to Simmel, a group is formed by a process in which many


1104

individuals join parts of their personalities while what each personality really is stays out of this common area.

Groups are characteristically different because the personalities of its members and those parts of their

personalities with which they participate in the groups are different (Schutz, 1955, 253). This means that we are

living simultaneously at different levels of our personality (Schutz, 1947, 100). Thus, our social personality is

“a series of partial-personalities” (Schutz, 2013a, 216), a “play and counterplay” of them (Schutz, 2013b, 253).

Schutz lists a number of examples of how different social roles are based in different levels of our

personality: “As a citizen of my community, as someone who belongs to my political party, as member of my

church, over against these contemporary, more or less anonymous institutions, I take up attitudes that have their

origin in quite distinctly anchored levels of my self” (Schutz 2013b, 247).

The “diversity, change and succession” of the “deeply founded experiences” of the self living naively

straightforwardly, such as the acting self (ego agens), the reflection self (ego cogitans), and the like-fashion the

“the cosmos of my social attitudes” which is centereds around the person as “a core of my being […] of

ultimate intimacy, unreachable by my reflection” (Schutz 2013b, 250).

Occasionally (especially in cases of conflict), “it would seem that all of the sides of my self so

characterized are independent persons with their own wishes and wills, themselves standing in quasi-social

relations to each other even though they are still parts of my self” (Schutz 2013b, 249). Schutz designates the

conception dealing with the partial personalities of the self as “the schizophrenic hypothesis of the self” (Schutz

2013b, 249), considering that the study of schizophrenic patients teaches us that “it belongs to the possibilities

of the human spirit to develop such personality splits” (Schutz 2013b, 249).

Even if Schutz rejects the schizophrenic hypothesis of the self, he admits that a certain paradox is shown

since we can experience a cut in the bond of the unitary self (Schutz 2013b, 249). At times, “in a relatively

peripheral attitude, I can feel the emergence of a phenomenon as an ‘interruption’ belonging to the intimate

sphere” (Schutz 2013b, 249). So, even if Schutz does not accept this hypothesis and refuses to treat social

attitudes as hypostases and partial personalities of ourselves, he admits that we make a “more or less forcible

effort in the change of social attitudes” and that:

It is consistent with the unity and unification of self-consciousness that always other sides of ourselves, other moments of our personality, are put into play in our daily social life while other and perhaps more essential sides, where not entirely excluded, are thus still in / such measure crowded in the background. Those in the background then remain visible more as a horizon of that field of vision at the center of which our social attitudes in question stand. (Schutz 2013b, 249-250)

The attitudes and stances of the self living naively straightforwardly compose a system “defined by our

attitudes toward the different phenomena of the social world” (Schutz 2013b, 247). Schutz describes it as “a

system of interconnections of motivations” which are simply accepted “as habitual, traditional or affective

givennesses” (Schutz 2013b, 247). This system of attitudes is given in diverse ways, starting from standardized

normative attitudes in the cultural world of daily life, on to “the ultimate goals of our bearing on the great

systems of the state, of the law, of the economy in short, all of those phenomena of social being that form the

specific object of the social sciences” (Schutz 2013b, 248). Thus, it would seem that the systemic properties

belong to the ensemble of our social attitudes and not to the habitus, which is always personal.

Consequently, the habitus is not “a system,” as Bourdieu (1980, 87-88) implies. Here, he seems to commit

a fallacy of the wrong level by attributing to social structures features and operations proper of the personal ego

such as dispositions, principles of organization, estimation of chances, cognition, motivation, choices, anticipations,


1105

experiences, perceptions and appreciations, thinking, freedom, creativity, etcetera (Boudieu, 1980, 88-92). For

Schutz instead social structures are fragmentary, overlapped personal eogic structures of a higher level that

evolve from shared personal habitus held in common as embodied schemes for practice. That is why he could

not conceive of habitus as a system in Bourdieu’s terms, no matter how open or how relative the systemic

closure might seem (as cited in Bourdieu and Wacquant 1992, 115f) since only social (not personal) structures

can be seen as fragmentary, overlapped and partial sets endowed with wholistic characters such as closure,

consistency and the like. Summarizing, social systemic structures rely on habitus which, in turn, rely on the

personal ego which is always en acting embody self.

Here is where the body comes into play, although not conceived as a “biological” entity but as an “animate

organism [Leiblichkeit]” around which the world is centered “as the middle point” and as “a core of reality of

perceptions and apperceptions belonging to my surrounding world…” (Schutz 2013b, 280).

11. The Living Body and Embodied Action

It is our living body which is able to “acquire a habit,” i.e., which is able to “grasp and incorporate” tacit

and practical principles (Crossley 2001, 106). Thus, properly understood, Bourdieu’s “biological individual”

and the “conscious subject” compose a one and only entity: a living body who can acquire habits.

The preceding does not mean that there is no habitus at all but that it only exists incarnated in a living

body, as Merleau-Ponty has shown. And, for being bodily, every habitus4 is primarily motor and perceptual

because it resides between explicit perception and the actual movements, defining both our field of vision and

our field of action (Merleau-Ponty 1999, 177). Accordingly, the power of the habitual is not different from the

power of our body (Merleau-Ponty 1999, 169). In particular, it has to do with the “body schema,” which is a

system open to the world, correlative to the world (Merleau-Ponty 1999, 168, n1). It can be said then that habit

makes understandable the general synthesis of one’s own body (Merleau-Ponty 1999, 177). That is why

Merleau-Ponty speaks of our “habitual body”: because habitual behaviors organize and unify our motor schema

as a repertoire of possible movements which endow with meaning the perceived world as a set of practical

possibilities (García, 2012, 106).

Our “habitual body”―or our “body schema,” as Merleau-Ponty also calls it (García 2012, 116) is a form

(Gestalt) whose prime meaning―as we just saw―is related to motor skills (García 2012, 117). Thus, the habit

lies neither in thought nor in the objective body but in our body as a system of motor and perceptual powers

(Merleau-Ponty 1999, 179). Because of that, the habit is neither knowledge nor automatism but “a kind of

knowledge” that is in the hands, only delivered through bodily effort and impossible to translate into an

objective designation (Merleau-Ponty 1999, 168). Our movements get enchained in a semi-automatic way, in

half-consciousness, according to motor habits learned in the past, when we have learned to move in such and

such a way. Habit is then a peculiar “present past” which does not need to be explicitly brought back to

consciousness by memory because it is constantly, latently operating in the present and determining our field of

action and perception (García 2012, 112).

Hence, the acquisition of a habit is a reorganization and renewal of the bodily schema that gathers the

elemental movements, reactions and stimuli (Merleau-Ponty 1999, 166), which proves that the living body and

the perceived world are to a certain extent labile and plastic, always open to restructuring (García 2012, 107).

Therefore, habits express our power to expand our being in the world and change our own existence (Merleau-Ponty

1999, 168). That is why acquiring a habit means to acquire a certain style, a new use of one’s own body. Briefly,


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it is enriching and reorganizing the body schema (García 2012, 116).

As the substratum of habit is the living body, not the objective body, and because our body is a set of lived

meanings (Merleau-Ponty 1999, 179), to acquire a habit is also to grasp new meanings (Merleau-Ponty 1999,

167). Indeed, it is said that the body has reached an understanding and habit has been acquired when is able to

let new meanings in, when it has assimilated new kernels of meaning (Merleau-Ponty 1999, 171).

For this reason, it is not in the “biological individual” but in the lived body where habit lies. This leads to

observe more complex relations between the organic body and the lived body than that which Bourdieu has

shown. The organic body (here, Bourdieu’s “biological individual”) is just a condition for the acquisition of

motor habits, perceptions and behaviors of the lived body (García 2012, 112) but is not the substratum of the

habit, which lies in the concrete personal ego incarnated in a living body. Indeed, it is the living body which

incorporates the “broad forms of competence and a practical, pre-discursive grasp or understanding of principles”

(Crossley 2001, 106) which constitute the habitus.

The reason why the body has a habitus is because every experienced form tends towards a certain

generality (Merleau-Ponty 1999, 160) that allows the schemas to be transferred (García 2012, 108).

A habitus then is a set of generalized habits that can be transferred in three different ways: (1) from one

region of the body to another (Crossley 2001, 106); (2) “by way of a practical analogy” from familiar to

unfamiliar situations which we treat “as if they were of a familiar type” (Crossley 2001, 106); and (3) from one

monad to another, especially when they share those situations mentioned in “a” and “b”, since habits are learnt

while growing up in a community, in touch with other bodies that display such and such behaviors, in a

common cultural environment (García 2012, 106-107). Then, it is the habitus which opens for the body the

human and cultural environment (Merleau-Ponty 1999, 377), given that the body schema is constituted

intersubjectively in a coperceived world experienced in intercorporality (García 2012, 107).

12. Final Remarks

We can finally establish a hierarchy between the three overlapping elements in Bourdieu’s work: social

agents (or “social persons,” as Schutz puts it) are founded on shared habitus, which are practical principles

acquire by the personal ego in embodied actions in common environments or settings. Thus, it can be said that

the phenomenolgical perspective grounds the agent in the habitus and the habitus in the monad. We now know

that it is not the habitus itself which acts but the concrete embodied ego, endowed with a habitus which allows

her/him to become in part a social person.

Hence, Phenomenology retrieves the underlying unity of the concept of habitus. At the same time, it

retains the different levels of analysis considered by Bourdieu and relates them in a precise way. So we may

now attempt to find a concealed unity in the set of dispersed elements in Bourdieu’s theory by acknowledging

that a habitus may be thought of as a capacity in the sense of an egoic persistent substratum of egoic qualities. It

can also be considered as related to a set of dispositions produced by habitual practical actions of the “working

self.” Finally, we can consider that a disposition is the product of familiar schemes for practice on the acting

self. Thus, from a phenomenological point of view, it is possible to compose a consistent framework of the

different dimensions of habitus.

If this is so―i.e., if phenomenology embraces a conception of habitus that, in a more complete and

consistent way than in Bourdieu, accounts for what the habitus does in an articulated manner, then, it is not a

mere subjectivism but a deeper and more complex consideration about the acts of the concrete ego in the social


1107

world. So, far from being condemned to oblivion, being surpassed by a novel idea of habitus, phenomenology

is not only a valuable precedent but―as I argue here―a rich, valuable, and enduring reflection on the

constitution and action of the agent in the social life. In brief, phenomenology is not an extreme subjectivism

for it has not overlooked the importance of habitus. That is why it still has a great potential for sociology in our

time.

Notes

1. For instance, when Bourdieu criticizes subjectivism, he uses “slogan-like” labels (Endress 2005, 57). 2. I will get back on this issue, quoting Schutz on hypokeimenon. 3. On Schutz and egology, see Embree (2009). 4. Only twice in The Phenomenology of Perception Merleau-Ponty uses the word habitus (1999, 160, 377). He prefers

the French word “habitude” probably because he intended to avoid the moral and metaphysical connotations that the word habitus had in the context of scientific psychology, which Merleau-Ponty discussed there (Martínez 2007, 154). Although, what he said about “habitude” can be interpreted as a contribution to Husserl’s concept of habitus (see Martínez 2007, 151-158).

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Partners. Ed. Hisashi Nasu, Lester Embree, George Psathas, and Ilja Srubar. Konstanz: UVK Verlagsgesellschaft mbH, 2009.

Endress, Martin. “Reflexivity, Reality, and Relationality. The Inadequacy of Bourdiue’s Critique of the Phenomenological Tradition in Sociology.” Explorations of the Life-world. Continuing Dialogues with Alfred Schutz. Ed. Hisashi Nasu, Lester Embree, George Psathas, and Ilja Srubar. Dordrecht: Springer, 2005.

Grignon, Claude, and Jean-Claude Passeron. Le Savant et le Populaire. Misérabilisme et Populisme en Sociologie et en Literature (The Scientist and the Popular. Miserabilism and Populism in Sociology and Literature). Paris: Seuil, 1989.

Husserl, Edmund. La Crisis De Las Ciencias Europeas y La Fenomenología Trascendental (The Crisis of European Sciences and Transcendental Phenomenology). Buenos Aires: Prometeo, 2009.

---. Meditaciones Cartesianas (Cartesian Meditations). Madrid: Tecnos, 2006. ---. Sur la Methode de la Consideration Historique. Notes Pour un Projet de Suit a La Krisis (Mi août 1936) (On the Method of

the Historical Regard. Notes for a Project Following the Crisis (Mid August, 1936)). Alter, No. 8. 2000. ---. Communauté Avec Moi-Même et Communauté Avec d’autres en Tant Qu’unification du Pôle Egoïc, et Constitution

Corrélative D’une Nature Unitaire. Pôle égoïque, Moi Personnel et Temps (mai 1933) (Comunity with My self and Comunity with others as a Unification of the Egoic Pole, and the Correlative Constitution of a Unitary Nature. The Egoic Pole, the personal I and time (May, 1933)). Alter, No. 2. 1994.

---. Esprit Commun I.—Personne, Ensemble de Personnes, Communautés Personnelles D’action. Communauté—Société (Fribourg, 1921). Sur L’intersubjectivité, t. II. (Common spirit I.—Person, Ensemble of Persons, Personal Communities of Action. Community—Society (Fribourg, 1921). On Intersubjectivity, t. II). Paris, PUF, 2001.


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---. “Phénoménologie de la Communauté de Communication (La Parole en Tant Que Parole Adressée et en Tant Que Parole Reçue)

Par Opposition à la Simple Communauté Empathique (Etre Simplement Côte a Côte). Á Propos de L’experiénce (doxa) et de la Praxis (13 avril 1932 et Antérieurement, Conclusion le 15 avril 1932). ” Sur L’intersubjectivité, t. II. [“Phenomenology of the Community of Communication (Speech as Addressed and Received Speech) as Opposed to the Simple Empathic Community (just to be side by side). About Experience (doxa) and Praxis (April 13, 1932 and Previously, Concluded April 15, 1932).” On intersubjectivity, t. II]. Paris : PUF, 2011.

---. “Le Mode d’être Historique de L’intersubjectivité Transcendantale. Son Annonce Voilée Dans L’histoire Humaine et Dans L’histoire Naturelle (9/12 novembre 1931).” Sur L’intersubjectivité, t. II. Paris: PUF, 2001.

---. Le Monde et Nous. Le Monde Environnant Des Hommes et Des Bêtes (1934) (The World and Us. The Surrounding World of Men and Beasts (1934)). Alter, No. 3. 1993.

---. Science Universelle De L’esprit en Tant Qu’anthropologie (novembre-décembre 1932; á partir du 11 novembre 1932). Sur L’intersubjectivité, t. II (Universal Science of the Mind as Anthropology (November-December 1932; from November 11, 1932). On intersubjectivity, t. II). Paris: PUF, 2001.

García, Esteban. Maurice Merleau-Ponty. Filosofía, Corporalidad y Percepción (Maurice Merleau-Ponty. Philosophy, Corporality and Perception). Buenos Aires: Rhesis, 2012.

Levinas, Emmanuel. Hors Sujet (Out of subject). Saint Clément De Rivièr: Fata Morgana, 1987. Luhmann, Niklas. Social Systems. Stanford: Stanford UP, 1995. Martínez, M. T. Pierre Bourdieu. Razones y Lecciones de una Práctica Sociológica. Del Estructuralismo Genético a la Sociología

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Merleau-Ponty, Maurice. Phénoménologie de la Perception. Paris: Gallimard, 1999. Schutz, Alfred. “Equality and the Meaning Structure of the Social World.” Collected Papers: II Studies in Social Theory. The

Hage: Martinus Nihoff, 1964(1955). ---. “The Problem of Personality in the Social World.” Collected Papers VI. Literary Reality and Relationships. Dordrecht:

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Springer, 1937/2013b. Ralón de Walton, Graciela. “Corporalidad y Acción Responsiva.” Carlos Belvedere (comp.), La Constitución de lo Social. Aportes

Para el Diálogo Entre Sociología y Fenomenología (“Corporality and Responsive Action.” The Constitution of the Social. Contributions for a Dialogue Between Sociology and Phenomenology). Los Polvorines: Univrsidad Nacional de General Sarmiento, 2012.

Sapiro, Gisèle. “Una Libertad Restringida. La Formación de la Teoría del Habitus.” Patrick Ghampagne, Luis Pinto and Gisèle Sapiro (dir.), Pierre Bourdieu, Sociólogo (“A restricted freedom. The formation of the theory of habitus.” Pierre Bourdieu, Sociologist). Buenos Aires: Nueva Visión, 2005, 37-58.

Swanson, David. “Something Like a Subject: A Critique of Bourdieu’s ‘Critique of Theoretical Reason’.” Conference Papers for Mathematics Education and Contemporary Theory. Manchester: Manchester Metropolitan University, 2005. <http://www. esri. mmu.ac.uk/mect/papers_11/swanson.pdf>

Truc, Gérôme. “Narrative Identity Against Biographical Illusion. The Shift in Sociology from Bourdieu to Ricoeur.” Études Ricoeuriennes/Ricoeur Studies 2.1 (2011): 1-18.


Logic as an Art and Logic as a Science:

Is It Only Precedents or Tradition?

Konstantin Skripnik

Southern Federal University

Nowadays the answer to the question “what is logic?” seems very simple and obvious—“logic is a science,” and

after that usually one says what is this science about. As for the expressions “logic is an art” or “the art of logic,”

then they are only metaphors or some kind of “façon de parler” used in serious scientific discourse. One of my

aims here is to trace (on the base of as authentic texts as a commentator literature) the line of development of

dichotomy “logic as an art—logic as a science” and to demonstrate that both these feat uses of logic have

fundamental historical roots and play very important conceptual role in any theorizing about logic. Despite the fact

that (modern) logic is undoubtedly a science, it can be interpreted as an art, moreover, the analysis of logic from

this point of view expands, it seems to me, the researching possibilities in the field of the philosophy of logic at

least in better understanding what is logic, what creates its unity independently from the historical period of its

development, topics, and methods.

Keywords: logic, art of logic, logic as a science, history of logic

1. Introductions

Nowadays the answer to the question “what is logic?” seems very simple and obvious—“logic is a

science,” and after that one usually says what is this science about. But up to our days, many logical and

quasi-logical books have titles containing this word—“the art”—see, for example, Belnap (2009a; 2009b),

Bonevac (1990), Kennedy (2004); this list can be continued. I think many of our colleagues would want to call

their researches “the art.” Are the expressions “logic is an art” or “the art of logic” only metaphors or some kind

of “façon de parler” used in serious scientific discourse or do they mean a serious and deep point of view on

the nature of logic, because, as it is known, there are metaphors and metaphors?

For example, although N. Belnap does not comment at least to some extent on “the art of logic” in Belnap

(2009a), he makes a casual remark in Belnap (2009b): “This course assumes you know how to use truth

functions and quantifiers as tools; such is part of the art of logic. Our principal task here will be to study these

very tools; we shall be engaged in the part of the science of logic” (1).

It seems that this remark concerns not only “truth functions and quantifiers,” it has to be interpreted in

more extensive context; the key words here are “to use … as tools” and “to study these very tools.” To use logic

(its means, methods, and technique) is an art, the study logic is the science, at the same time it is clear that one

Konstantin Skripnik, Ph.D., Professor of methodology and philosophy of science of the faculty of Philosophy and Cultural

Studies, Southern Federal University, Russia; main research fields: Logic, History of General Semiotics, and Rhetoric. Email: skd53@ mail.ru.

DAVID PUBLISHING

D

LOGIC AS AN ART AND LOGIC AS A SCIENCE

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can use logical instruments without any theoretical underlying basis. I think this approach is very close to the

opposition between “practical” and “theoretic” logic. Moreover, as it can be seem from the comparison these

Belnap’s books that usage of at least some logical tools may takes priority over the studying of them.

D. Bonevac explains the difference between two aspects of logic in more details:

[…] logic is both an art and a science. Logic is concerned with constructing a theory of correct reasoning, making it a science. Indeed, modern symbolic developments have led to sophisticated mathematical theories of reasoning. But logic is also concerned with applying theory to practice, making it an art. Most people study logic to improve their ability to reason: to argue, to analyze, and to think critically about issues that concern them.[…] But it’s important to remember that without theories of reasoning, there would be nothing to apply. The art of logic depends crucially on the science of logic. (Bonevac

1990, 13)1

In other words, according to both authors, logic is an art when it is the study of logical techniques, rules,

and other “applications” of logical science. Nevertheless, it must be noted, that if Belnap does not explain

clearly the relationships between “logic as an art” and “logic as a science,” for D. Bonevac this relation is more

explicit—a theory (i.e., a science) dominates practice, the last one (practice) is determined by the theory of

logic. The more detailed discussion of this relationship would leads us to a more complex questions about the

descriptive or prescriptive (normative) character of logic, or to the question about the nature of logical

knowledge in general, and so on.

We may suppose that this opposition is not a modern novelty, it has been formed through a historical

process. It seems that it was vividly showed in medieval logic, and because of this fact, it is necessary to turn to

the most known medieval works for illustrating opposition at issue.

2. Exposition

My aim here is to trace (or to make some kind of outline of) a line of development of dichotomy “logic as

an art—logic as a science” and to demonstrate that both these features of logic have fundamental historical

roots and play very important conceptual role in any theorizing about logic. I am not pretend to complete

historical description and in-depth analysis here; I would pick out works, which were the clue points in

historical development of logic, and which were used for logical textbooks during a long time. Several books of

medieval authors are taken as a base for this issue: Isidore de Seville’s Etymologiae (Isidore de Seville 2006),

Roger Bacon’s Summulae dialectics (Bacon 2009), Summulae de Dialectica (Buridan 2001), Buridan’s

monumental work covering all aspects of his logical theory, and Ars Logica of John of St. Thomas (John

Poinsot), John of St. Thomas (1955a; 1955b), and Poinsot (1985). It seems that these works give us a quite

representative picture of various—really, very similar—views, opinions and ideas about our issue. In addition,

one has to remember that logic is one part of Trivium, i.e., it was an art “by definition.”

But, it is necessary and quite not out of place to draw attention to the general feature of medieval

understanding of ars: as U. Eco (2002) writes, ars in the middle ages is the construction of ships and houses,

making hummers or painting the miniatures; artifex (creator) means rhetorician and poet, painter and smith as

well as a shearer. Ars continues the work of nature, it connects odd things, separates unites, creates as the nature;

so, the notion of ars is very broad concept, which includes what may be named handicraft or technique, and the

theory of art is first of all the theory of handicraft (Compare this understanding with Aristotelian’s one: for

Aristotle, an art is what produces something new; an art is an act of creature).


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2.1. Etymologiae: Logic as a Science of Liberal Art

Our starting point is Isidore de Seville’s Etymologiae. The editors maintain, than the perfectly right view

on this work of Isidore is one, according to which: Etymologies amounts to a reorganized redaction and

compendium of writings mainly of the fourth to sixth centuries (with the large exception of Pliny), it could be

said that his work is not merely conditioned by, but in the main is comprised of, the major components of

intellectual history as they were handed down to him (Isidore de Seville 2006, 13).

Moreover, it has to take in account that Isidore himself defines etymology as “the origin of words, when

the force of a word or a name is inferred through interpretation.” He goes on: “the knowledge of a word’s

etymology often has an indispensable usefulness for interpreting the word, for when you have seen whence a

word has originated, you understand its force more quickly. Indeed, one’s insight into anything is clearer when

its etymology is known” (Isidore de Seville 2006, 55).

Logic, rhetoric and grammar are characterized by Isidore de Seville as the sciences of liberal arts

(disciplinae atrium liberalium), because sciences contain arts and vice versa, in other words, it may seems that

there is no difference between a science and an art. But it is not so—an art consists of instructions and rules and

deals with a thing that has a cause of its existence in its master (creator). In Isidore’s words, “an art (ars, gen.

artis) is so called because it consists of strict (artus) precepts and rules” (Notice: According to Ockham, the

teacher is causa efficiens of science). A science deals with that exists per se and necessary: “a discipline

(disciplina) takes its name from ‘learning’ (discere), whence it can also be called ‘knowledge’ (scientia)”

(Isidore de Seville 2006, 39).

Isidore (2006) refers to Plato and Aristotle: “they […] would speak of this distinction between an art and a

discipline: an art consists of matters that can turn out in different ways, while a discipline is concerned with

things that have only one possible outcome” (39).

He means that Aristotle in The Nicomachean Ethics wrote:

We all conceive that a thing which we know scientifically cannot vary […]. An object of Scientific Knowledge, therefore, exists of necessity. It is therefore eternal, for everything existing of absolute necessity is eternal; and what is eternal does not come into existence or perish. […] Scientific Knowledge, therefore, is the quality whereby we demonstrate, with the further qualifications included in our definition of it in the Analytics, namely, that a man knows a thing scientifically when he possesses a conviction arrived at in a certain way, and when the first principles on which that conviction rests are known to him with certainty—for unless he is more certain of his first principles than of the conclusion drawn from them he will only possess the knowledge in question accidentally. […] All Art deals with bringing something into existence; and to pursue an art means to study how to bring into existence a thing which may either exist or not, and the efficient cause of which lies in the maker and not in the thing made; for Art does not deal with things that exist or come into existence of necessity, or according to nature, since these have their efficient cause in themselves.” (Aristotle EN, VI, 3-4)

As for logic, it distinguishes true from false by reasoning; this thesis repeats the analogous Boethius’s

idea.

2.2. Roger Bacon: A Peak of Previous Period of the Development of Liberal Arts

The next figure, which stands in the focus of our theme, is Roger Bacon. Our interest in Bacon’s ideas is

explained by at least two factors: on the one side, Bacon had an incredibly broad range of intellectual interests

and “a willingness not to be bound by tradition in deciding what sorts of sources are appropriate” for his

researches and studies. R. Bacon like Isidore of Seville has to be viewed as a peak of previous period of the

development of liberal arts. A lot of different references that one can discover in Bacon’s works, and in


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particularly, in Summulae dialectices, is striking illustration of his intellectual power: references shows a

familiarity with the works of Aristotle, Isidore of Seville, Alfred of Sareshel, Sivestris, Robert Kilwardby,

Algesel, Ibn Sina, Ibn Rushd, Master Hugo and so on.

On the other side, according to the view of Jan Pinborg, Bacon’s Summulae dialectices together with

Summa grammatical and Summa de sophismatibus et distinctionibus are important witnesses to the

development of grammar, semantics, and logic at both Oxford and Paris in the first half of the thirteen century;

in his introduction to Bacon’s Summulae dialectics Th. S. Maloney notes: “they portray Bacon as one who

views the study of logic (and language) in considerably more scientific setting than do other important teachers

of this period whose works have survived, like William of Sherwood, Peter of Spain, and Lambert of Auxerre

(Bacon 2009, xiii).

Moreover, it is necessary to note, that in Summulae dialectices are jointed together Parisian and Oxfordian

traditions. Alain de Libera notes that Summulae dialectices was written in Oxford in about 1250, although has

elements from the Parisian tradition: “the Summulae dialectices owes much to the Oxfordian tradition. Nothing,

however, prevents thinking that it also reflects Bacon’s teaching in Paris, the culture of the masters at the

University of Paris, his discussions with the Parisian masters of arts of 1245 to 1250” (Libera 1986, 154).

From the Bacon’s point of view, logic is an art and a science at the same time. For him the difference

between them consists in that fact that a science is “the possession of a noble minds which, shared, receives

increment, but refused, [creates] a possessor with excessive desire, and which quickly perishes if not shared”

(Bacon 2009, 3).

An art, in turn, is “a collection of many principles leading to one end […] it prohibits and keeps us from

errors. […] Art differs from science is that science is the very knowledge that rests in the mind and informs it,

whereas art is that same knowledge but as related to some task which it regulates” (Bacon 2009, 3).

Bacon picks (marks) out two kinds of art—mechanical and liberal and similarly, two kinds of science.

“The liberal arts are those through which the intellect of man is perfected when it discovers and judges without

manual labor what is true in signs…” (Bacon 2009, 4).

Liberal arts are so named “either because they liberate man from the cares of this world, or because they

make man free (since temporal things promote the servitude of those who seek them), or because only freeman

or nobles were accustomed to learn them” (Bacon 2009, 4).

Among liberal arts is an art that supports all other arts—this is the art of logic.

Logic as an art is reason attentively discerning, that is “the careful science of disputing” and its task is to

dispute, and from this task, it is called dialectics. Moreover, Bacon defines dialectics itself as three-fold. Firstly,

as logic it is art of arts, the science of sciences, which alone knows how to know, which alone knows how to

make people know, that from which all and without which no science (is perfectly understood). Secondly,

dialectics is a science of disputing and discerning based on probable things taken absolutely. Thirdly, dialectics

proceeds “from probabilities taken absolutely or (from opinions probable) to someone, namely, to a respondent,

and because of this, disputation than examines is said to be a kind of dialectical disputation” (Bacon 2009, 6).

The work of this art, concludes Bacon (2009): “is to not-lie about things it knows and be able to expose

those who do lie” (6).

As a science, logic “is a habit of distinguishing what is true from what is false by means of rules or

maxims or dignities by which we comprehend the truth of a location through our own efforts or with the help of

others […] the science either of reason joined to discourse or of discourse joined to reason” (Bacon 2009, 4).


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I think that it is appropriate here to say about another author, although his works are not in the focus of this

issue—I mean Llull, which also differentiates science and art in his Introdiictoria Arils Demonstrativae. His

distinction in general recalls the Aristotelian Nichomachean Ethics. Llull notes than people sometimes use

“science” and “art” interchangeably because both are usually developed and obtained their status through

repeated appropriate acts. To make the distinction clear, Llull says that science has to do properly with

“speculabilia qua talia,” and art concerns itself with operations or activities. Walter Artus (1990) in his analysis

of the origins of medieval notions of science remarks, that the object of art:

is “operable things”, not in order simply to mirror, or make them present, with our minds but in order to have a cognitive rule of measure suitable for their production. It is precisely this determining or regulative aspect that distinguishes art as such. If one prescinds from it one may indeed consider operations and “operable things” but in a speculative fashion. But of course then instead of art, we have science which looks at the “operable” but simply in order to know it. (137)

2.3. Buridan’s View on Logic in the Frame “Logic-in-Use—Logical Doctrine”

This Bacon’s and Llull’s line of thought was continued by J. Buridan whose monumental work, Summulae

de Dialectica, covers practically all aspects of his logical theory including our theme. Buridan’s works are

mostly, as G. Klima says the by-products of his teaching and in virtue of his students and younger colleagues;

they turned into standard textbook material in the curricula of many universities in late Middle Ages. For

Buridan dialectics (that is logic) plays a central role in philosophy, and accordingly, in teaching and studying.

As he remarks:

… We should note that dialectic (that is, logic) is rightly said to be the art of arts, by reason of a certain superiority it has over other arts, [namely], in virtue of its utility and the generality of its application to all other arts and sciences. Due to this generality, which it shares with metaphysics, it has access to disputations that concern not only the conclusions, but also the principles of all sciences. (Buridan 2001, 6)

Buridan’s point of view on the logic in its different roles and images can be adequately illustrated, if we

reconstruct it in the frame of such oppositions as “science in strict sense—science in broader sense,”

“logic-in-use—logical doctrine” (that is “logica utens and logica docens”), “ars vetus—ars nova” and others.

As it was demonstrated by G. Klima, such dichotomies really have their place in Buridan’s works. Buridan

writes in the comments on Peter of Spain’s opinion:

Concerning the first section, we should note that a certain [other version of our] text has [the formulation]: “dialectic is the art of arts, the science of sciences … etc.”, but it is more correct to say only that it is the art of arts. For the names “art” and “science” are sometimes taken broadly, and sometimes strictly or properly. If they are taken broadly, then we use them interchangeably, as synonyms; hence, taken in this way, in this description it would be sufficient to insert only one of these two names. Indeed, logic should not even be called the science of sciences, for this would indicate a certain excellence of logic with respect to [all] other sciences, which it cannot have with respect to metaphysics; in fact, metaphysics, rather than logic, should more truly be called the science of sciences, having access to the principles of all inquiries. But when the names “art” and “science” are taken strictly, then, in [accordance with] bk. 6 of the Ethics, 22 there are five intellectual habits, or virtues, distinguished from one another, namely, understanding, wisdom, prudence, science (or knowledge: scientia), and art. Therefore, taken in this way, no such habit is at the same time art and science; in fact, logic thus understood is an art, rather than a science. (Buridan 2001)

As for dichotomy “science in strict sense—science in broader sense,” according to Buridan, science in

strict sense is connected with necessary, universal theoretical knowledge, and science in broader sense includes

not only theoretical but also practical knowledge about how we can do something. Logic, as an art or habit, is


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in his words, “practical science, the possession of which guides us in our rational practice of forming and

evaluating arguments.” This difference, it seem to me, is very close to our modern difference between

theoretical and practical logic: the latter is plaited into the man’s ordinary thinking; theoretical logic has not

only descriptive character but also normative, its matter is to reconstruct and rationalize ordinary thinking,

paying attention to rules, maxims, and errors that can to be met. However, Buridan draws more subtle and

refined distinction between logica utens and logica docens, that is logic-in-use and logic as doctrine. It may

seems that logic as doctrine is the same as theoretical logic, but this is not so: logica docens, logical doctrine is

what is called an art or practical science. Logica docens explicits those operative principles that are embodied

into logica utens which, as we can see, is not logical knowledge at all. Logical knowledge is represented only

by means of logical doctrine, logica docens. So, logica docens is an art or practical, but not theoretical, science

and has as its task to teach us how to construct and analyse our reasoning’s (argumentations). Logic is the

practical art of interpreting discourse, as Jack Zupko notes.

2.4. Pointsot’s Ars Logica: Logic as a Liberal Art and Speculative Science

The last (but not the least) clue figure of this issue is John of St. Thomas (it is religious name of John

Poinsot), which taught philosophy and theology for 30 years, the last eleven being professor of Theology of

St.Thomas in the University of Alcala. His pedagogical career partly defines the features of his books. Poinsot’s

philosophical writings were published as a unit under the title Cursus Philosophicus Thomisticus. This book

consists of two parts, one of which is Ars Logica for the purpose to “conduce to an understanding of logical

questions for teachers and students alike.” As to the question about the nature of logic, John of St. Thomas

discusses it in the Introduction to the Entire Work in two prologues, the latter prologue is called “The Division

of the Logical Art, Its Order and Necessity” (Praeludium Secundum: Artis Logicae Divisio, Ordo, Necessitas).

At the very beginning, John of St. Thomas characterizes logic as “a kind of art which has its function the

direction of reason, lest it err in the paths of discoursing and knowing,” and says that “in any art, thought must

be given principally to two things, namely, the matter in which the art works, and the form drawn out of that

matter” (Poinsot 1985, 14).

He demonstrates this difference between form and matter when says that houses are made from stones and

wood, but their form is a composition because these stones and other parts coordinated among themselves in

the single figure and structure of a house. He goes on: “the architect does not supply the material, but

presuppose its reality; what he does supply and draw out is the form…” (Poinsot 1985, 14).

From this point of view, logic is an art, but it is specific art, it is rational art, because: “it exists in the

reasoning mind as in the subject (just as do all arts) … and because the materials it directs are themselves works

of human understanding” (Poinsot 1985, 14).

The word “materials” here signifies, in Poinsot’s words, “things or objects we wish to rightly objectify or

come to know.”

Because logic deals with the form and the latter is specifically internal thing, logic is not a servile, but

liberal art; it is less dependent on external things and therefore, as Wade writes, more free. So, logic is the

liberal rational art.

It also clear that the form regulate the matter by means of strict and exact rules. What these rules regulate

in the case of logic are the operations of mind, the acts of reasoning, which may be correct or erroneous and

fallacious; so the acts of reasoning are subject to regulation. It is the reason why logic is not only an art but also


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a science. The next question is obvious: What kind of science is logic? Poinsot differentiates two kinds of

science—practical and speculative. But his dichotomy “practical—speculative” is not traditional or ordinary.

An architect or house builder has practical knowledge concluding in what tells how to do or make something.

Practical science “tells how to get a particular thing into existence. Its principles are in the line of composition,

of getting being into existence” (John of St. Thomas 1955a, 7). Logic is not formally and in essence practical;

on the contrary, it is speculative science, it is “principles are in line of reduction, not composition.”

Commenting Poinsot’ view, F. C. Wade remarks: “for logic excludes error, and thereby ignorance, from mind’s

operations. True, it directs a doing, but the doing is speculation itself. Logic must therefore be called a

speculative science, for its end is to know” (John of St. Thomas 1955a, 7).

Moreover, were it not speculative, it could not be a liberal art. Therefore, for Poinsot logic is an art and a

science—a liberal art and speculative science.2

I am afraid because space limits now I am forced to stop, noting only that further consideration Poinsot’s

view about logic will lead us to such notions as ens rationis, first and second intention or distinction between

being in nature and being in a mind, being so-called per se and being as known.

So, our historical review or, rather, sketch demonstrates I thing that the question about what logic is—an

art or a science—discussed quite seriously and elaborately during almost thirteen centuries. I can now say that

the interpretation and understanding logic as an art or/and as a science is not only precedent, not simply “façon

de parler,” but a very interesting and complex historical tradition. Moreover, the discussing on scientific or

artistic nature of logic formed the whole conceptual trend that was unfairly forgotten in modern times. Now it is

a time to revive this historical and conceptual tradition.

2.5. Mill vs. Hamilton

Discussion about artistic or scientific nature of logic was continued in modern times. I mean the Mill’s

review of Hamilton’s conception of logic as a science (Mill 1979). From the Hamilton’s point of view, logic is

the science of the laws of thought as thought, and when he says about works of archbishop Whately he notes

that Whately “confuses the distinction of science theoretical and science practical with the distinction of

science and art.” But, Mill (1979) objects: “… if the difference between science and art is not the same as that

between knowledge theoretical and practical, we are entitled to ask, what is it?” (349).

Mill writes that Hamilton’s explanation of this difference is only historical, but this is incorrect view. It is

hard to disagree with him—the distinction between logic as an art and logic as a science is a conceptual one.

According to Mill (1979): “Logic is the Art of Thinking, which means correct thinking, and the Science of the

Conditions of correct thinking. This seems to me a sufficiently accurate definition of it” (361).

And, otherwise, for Mill (1979):

… The real theory of Thought—the laws, in scientific sense of the term, of Thought as Thought—do not belong to Logic, but to Psychology: and it is only the validity of thought which Logic takes cognizance of. It is not with Thought as Thought, but only as Valid thought, that Logic is concerned. There is nothing to prevent us from thinking contrary to the laws of Logic: only, if we do, we shall not think rightly, or well, or conformably to the ends of thinking, but falsely, or inconsistently, or confusedly. This doctrine is at complete variance with the saying of our author (Hamilton—K.S.) in his controversy with Whately, that Logic is, and never could have been doubted to be, in Whately’s sense of the term, both a Science and an Art. For the present definition reduces it to the narrowest conception of an Art—that of a mere system of rules. It leaves Science to Psychology, and represents Logic as merely offering to thinkers a collection of precepts, which they are enjoined to observe, not in order that may think, but that they may think correctly, or validly. (359)


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3. Conclusion

Far from wanting to offer definitive answers, I would merely wish to propose several points that may serve

as starting points. So, the understanding of logic as a science and at the same time as an art is not merely a

precedent occurring in different logical books; this point of view on the logic is the long-standing historical

tradition. Although the definitions of “art” and “science” are changed (see, e.g., corresponding articles in SEF

(Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)), and despite the fact that (modern) logic is undoubtedly a science, it can

be interpreted as an art if we take into account a role of masters (researchers), a possibility to value different

logical techniques from the “aesthetic” point of view, the usage in logic not only concepts, notions and

reasonings, but also a lot of images and metaphors (sometimes fantastic, “intellectual,” and “mental”) and

various applications of logic, formal, and informal, symbolic and natural-language’s. As the evidence one can

remember Frege’s specific logical notation, which was not only linear, but had a vertical character, branching

quantification, and possible (and impossible possible) world—all of these sorts of logical notations and

techniques express the intention to visualize logical investigations. Moreover, the analysis of logic as an art

expands, it seems to me, the researching possibilities in the field of the philosophy of logic at least in better

understanding what is logic, what creates its unity independently from the historical period of its development,

topics, and methods; the analysis of possibilities of the interpretation of the modern logic as an art calls for an

additional efforts and a particular consideration.

Notes

1. It needs to note that sometimes the definition of logic as “the theory of correct reasoning” is considered as “out of date.”

The discussion about this definition would takes us far away; although this theme is not in focus here, I has to say that I (and not only me) completely agree with such definition. The different sorts of reasoning and proof are genuine object of logical investigation; in despite of the existence of a lot of parts of logic, different logical theories and approaches, a variety of sophisticated techniques, the main purpose traditionally was and is the studying of reasoning and argument up to our days. Formal and informal, traditional and modern, standard and non-standard, modal and classic, logic retains the unity of its purpose—to study the human mind as it is expressed in reasoning. I think that D. Bonevac means exactly this goal of logic; it needs to remember, for example, D. Scott’s note in his “Advice of modal logic”: the real aim of logic is the explication of notions.

2. Poinsot regarded his works as the “continuation” of the works of Thomas Aquinas. The review of Aquinas’s point of view on the subject of logic, see, e.g., Ria van der Lecq (2008).

Works Cited

Artus, Walter W. “The Origin of Medieval Notions of Science and the Division of the Sciences.” Knowledge and the Sciences in Medieval Philosophy: Proceedings of the 8th International Congress of Medieval Philosophy, Helsinki. 1990.

Bacon, Roger. The Art and Science of Logic: A Translation of the Summulae Dialectices with Notes and Introduction by Thomas S. Maloney. Toronto: Pontifical Institute of Medieval Studies, 2009.

Buridan, John. Summulae De Dialectica: An Annotated Translation with a Philosophical Introduction by G. Klima. New Haven: Yale UP, 2001.

John of St. Thomas. Outlines of Formal Logic. Translated From the Latin with an Introduction by Francis C. Wade. Miwaukee: Marquette UP, 1955a.

---. The Material Logic of John of St. Thomas: Basic Treatises. Ed. Yves René Simon, John J. Glanville, and George Donald Hollenhorst. Chicago: U of Chicago P, 1955b.

Poinsot, John. Tractatus De Signis: The Semiotic of John Poinsot: Arranged in Bilingual Format by John Deely in Consultation with Ralph A. Powell, Berkeley: U of California P, 1985.


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Isidore of Seville. The Etymologies of Isidore of Seville. Trans. Stephen A. Barney, W. J. Lewis, J. A. Beach, and Oliver Berghof.

Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2006. Belnap, Nuel. Notes on the Art of Logic. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh, 2009a. ---. Notes on the Science of Logic. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh, 2009b. Lecq, van der Ria. “Logic and Theories of Meaning in the Late 13th and Early 14th Century including the Modistae.” Eds. Dov M.

Gabbay, and John Woods. Handbook of the History of Logic: Medieval and Renaissance Logic. Vol. 2. Amsterdam: Elsevier, 2008. 347-88.

McInerny, Dennis Q. Being Logical. A Guide to Good Thinking. New York: Random House, 2004. Kennedy, Rick. A History of Reasonableness: Testimony and Authority in the Art of Thinking. Rochester: the U of Rochester P,

2004. Bonevac, Daniel. The Art and the Science of Logic. Mountain View: Mayfield Publishing Company, 1990. Eco, Umberto. Art and Beauty in the Middle Ages. City of New Haven: Yale UP, 2002. Libera, Alan de, ed. “Les Summulae Dialectics De Roger Bacon. Parts 1-2: De Termino, De Enuntiatione.” Archives D’histoire

Doctrinal Et Litéraire Du Moyen Age 53 (1986): 139-289. Mill, John Stuart. The Collected Works of John Stuart Mill,—A System of Logic Ratiocinative and Inductive, Being a Connected

View of the Principles of Evidence and the Methods of Scientific Investigation (Books I-III). Vol.VII. Ed. John Mercel Robson. Toronto: U of Toronto P; London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1974.

---. An Examination of Sir William Hamilton’s Philosophy and of the Principal Philosophical Questions Discussed in his Writings. Ed. John Mercel Robson, and Alan Ryan intro. Toronto: U of Toronto P; London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1979.


Metaphor in Cinema Revisited

Alberto J. L. Carrillo Canán,

Víctor Gerardo Rivas López,

Benemérita Universidad Autónoma de Puebla

May Zindel

Universidad de las Américas Puebla

The theory of rhetorical figures in cinema is highly problematic, besides it can be considered as outdated as the

semiotic theory of cinema,1 yet it is convenient to reexamine the idea of “cinematographic metaphor” in order to

throw some light on the dominant idea of cinema as narrative medium. In this paper we will examine: (1) the

supposedly existing metaphor of urban and industrial man as sheep at the beginning of Chaplin’s film Modern

Times; and (2) the sequence of the awakening stone lion in Eisenstein’s Battleship Potemkin as metaphor of the

proletarian revolt against czarism. We will arrive to the notion of a purely metaphoric film, which together with

Zavattini’s ideal film showing 90 minutes in the life of a man to whom nothing happens, will helps us draw some

conclusions about montage and narrativity in cinema. Especially interesting in this connection is the fact that

symbolical shots as the mentioned ones are like description in literature, that is, they have nothing to do neither

with the time of the story nor with the time of the discourse.

Keywords: metaphor, mental state, rhetorical figure, illusion

1. The Notion of Rhetorical Figures in Cinema

The first problem to address here is the mere notion of rhetorical figures in cinema.2 From the very

beginning, this idea is very debatable, since rhetorical figures proper are not a visual but a verbal phenomenon.

So the only way to say that there are “rhetorical images” is to postulate that some images generate mental states

corresponding to those ones generated by verbal figures. In the case of a cinematographic sequence purportedly

being rhetorical, one has to demonstrate that the shots constituting the sequence lead the viewer to the same

mental state as a verbal rhetorical figure does, a rhetorical figure proper. We will consider here only the case of

metaphor.

2. The Metaphorical Mental State

The famous metaphor “Achilles is a lion,” can be seen first as a proposition and second as a mental state

corresponding to that proposition.3 Interesting here is the structure of such a mental content, for it does not

correspond to the straightforward predicative structure of a proposition like “Achilles is a brave warrior” or

Alberto J. L. Carrillo Canán, Ph.D., Institute of Philosophy, Freie Universität; full professor, Faculty of Philosophy and

Letters, Benemérita Universidad Autónoma de Puebla, México; main research fields: Aesthetics, Media Theory, and Cognitive Science. Email: [email protected].

Víctor Gerardo Rivas López, Ph.D., Faculty of Philosophy and Letters, Benemérita Universidad Autónoma de Puebla, México; main research fields: Aesthetics, and Philosophy. Email: [email protected].

May Zindel, Ph.D. candidate, Creation and Culture Theory, Universidad de las Américas Puebla, México; main research fields: Aesthetics, and Cultural Theory. Email: [email protected].

DAVID PUBLISHING

D

METAPHOR IN CINEMA REVISITED

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“Kaiser is a dog.” In grasping the metaphor “Achilles is a lion”, one does not believe that Achilles is a lion, yet

one does not simply reject the proposition as a false one. Rejecting a proposition P, that is, not believing that P

is the case, is a completely different mental state. Let us name the mental state corresponding to the

understanding of a metaphor the metaphorical mental state.4 In the case of the proposition “Achilles is a lion,”

one does not believe, that Achilles is a lion, one knows for sure that this is not the case, yet one does not merely

reject the proposition as false. On the contrary one accepts the proposition knowing, believing that it is not the

case that Achilles was a lion. We interpret the situation as follows.

In hearing (reading) that “Achilles is a lion”, one understands the proposition and knows that what it

means is false, but based on experience one finds with ease a translation for it that does make sense. One’s

experience allows almost automatically to find a translation of the proposition which makes sense: “Achilles is

a courageous warrior,” or some paraphrase, a proposition which one does not reject but on the contrary to

which one might agree, that is, one may believe that Achilles is (was) a brave warrior. So the metaphorical

mental state comprises at least three aspects: (1) understanding the metaphorical proposition and knowing that

it is false; (2) almost instantaneously translating that proposition into some other proposition to which one can

agree, and finally; and (3) being somewhat both surprised and more or less delighted by the relationship

between the original, metaphorical proposition and it’s translation to which one agrees. Two propositional

mental contents and at least a feeling constitute the metaphorical mental state. The mental state has the structure

without believing that P is the case, delightfully accepting P because one found the translation Q of P to which

one may agree. Of course, the delight involved can vary greatly but it must exist.

3. The Cinematographic Metaphor

In the case of Modern Times, Christian Metz popularized the idea that the two opening shots of the film

constitute a “cinematographic metaphor,” the metaphor namely that “modern man is a sheep”—or some

paraphrase of the same semantic content.5 According to Metz, the first shot showing a moving herd of sheep

and the second one showing crowded people coming out from the subway constitute a “filmic metaphor,” but

this is impossible without the viewer having a mental state with a content corresponding to the semantic structure of

that proposition. Yet, in this case the “signifiers,” as Metz calls the shots, are not propositions but images.

Nevertheless, if there is a cinematographic metaphor corresponding to whatever filmic sequence, the sequence

must generate the metaphorical mental state, and this supposes some metaphorical proposition or the

corresponding mental state generated in the mind of the viewer not by an utterance or a written sentence but

merely by the shots constituting the sequence.

In this case, the sequence of the two shots may lead a mature viewer to the simile “modern man is like

sheep” or “modern people are like sheep,” but it is implausible that the shots lead to the metaphor “modern man

is a sheep man” since what the viewer does is to grasp a visual similarity on the basis that both shots do have a

clearly common visual pattern. What the viewer could express but merely thinks is, at most, that “modern man

is like sheep,” nothing more.6 The sequence generates a mental content that corresponds to a simile not to a

metaphor, and the modern theory of metaphor clearly distinguishes between simile and metaphor by not

considering metaphor as an elliptic simile. Summarizing, Metz contention that the opening sequence in Modern

Times is a metaphor is a misinterpretation of the situation. The same must be said from most other Metz’

examples of cinematographic metaphor. Nevertheless, there is a special case that must be considered separately.


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4. The Rising Lion in Battleship Potemkin

Metz considers another famous sequence as a metaphoric one.7 It is the sequence showing the attack of

the revolting sailors onto a building, presumably of the czarist government, using the cannons of the battleship,

and in between three consecutive shots showing the sculptures of a sleeping lion, of a lion lying with open eyes,

and, finally, the sculpture of a rising lion. Those three shots generate the illusion of an awakening and rising

stone lion, and this illusion together with the rest of the sequence leads to the mental content with the semantic

structure “a lion is awakening,” where one does not merely think of a lion, be it one of stone nor a real one, but

of the Russian people or Russian working class. In this case, there is no comparison of shots on the basis of

some visual pattern.

First of all, the idea of awakening as liberating from one frame of consciousness to another is already a

verbal metaphor—and the same is true of the idea of “a rising people.” In fact, the situation can be interpreted

as a visual resort to well-known verbal metaphors by means of association of ideas and memory.8 Yet, one

cannot completely discard the case of viewers who do not know the mentioned verbal metaphors at all and for

the very first time arrive to the mental state with the semantic structure “a lion is awakening” or “a lion is

rising.” This case would correspond to true metaphoric mental states. Comparing such propositions with the

metaphor “Achilles is a lion”, a clear difference becomes evident. In the last case one deals with the

metaphorically applied predicate “… is a lion,” whereas in the former case one does metaphorically think of

the subject “lion” instead of the subject “Russian people” or “the Russian working class.” In other words, the

discussed sequence in Battleship Potemkin implies the metaphorical mental state “Russian people are a lion that

awakens” or “Russian people are an awakening lion,” or “Russian people are an awakening and rising lion.”

At any case, the mental state having the semantic structure “a lion is awakening” is very interesting since

the viewer knows that stone lions are just stones: they simply cannot change suddenly, they neither awaken nor

rise. Obviously, that mental content in itself is not a metaphor, it is an illusion—and the viewer knows it.

Already a single stone lion is, like every figurative statue, a cultural plastic object leading the viewer to a

plastic illusion, and the sequence of the three shots leads the viewer to a dynamic illusion of a moving lion. Yet

moving or not, the isolated sequence of the stone lions leads only to an illusion, and has nothing to do with a

metaphorical mental state. It is first the context of the whole sequence including the attack of the battleship

Potemkin on the czarist building that what given the illusion of the moving stone lion leads to the metaphorical

mental state “Russian people are an awakening lion” or, shortly, “a lion awakens,” where “a lion” means

“Russian people.”

5. The Structures of the Mental States in Both Cases

In the case of the opening sequence in Modern Times, the viewer sees first a herd of sheep and then crowded

people; insofar as those shots constitute the very beginning of the film, the viewer does not have elements of an

hypothetical fictitious story “told” by the film, but only two documentary shots, that is, the viewer has the

perceptual beliefs corresponding to the moving herd and to the moving people.9 On this basis, a mature viewer

involuntarily compares the shots grasping the common visual pattern, and arrives to the mental state corresponding

to the simile “modern man is like sheep.” The sequence, thus, implies at least the following mental contents: (1)

the sensory representations corresponding to both shots; (2) the corresponding perceptual beliefs—non sensory

but conceptual representations;10 and (3) the mental state corresponding to the discussed simile.


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In the case of the movie Battleship Potemkin, the viewer sees several shots of the artillery attack onto the

czarist building and in between the three shots showing the lions. In this case, the sequence forms part of a

chain of events imaginarily linked in a causal way. Besides, the shots are not documentary shots but shots

showing a content created on purpose for the camera. Such shots do not lead to the perceptual belief

corresponding to real events but to aesthetical beliefs of the kind proper to any figurative object or

representation of an event, that is, the viewer sees something but he does not believe that what he sees is a real

fact. Such beliefs are aesthetic illusions—not mere deceiving epistemic illusions as are the optical ones.11 By

means of the aesthetic imagination such illusions become part of a fictional causal chain of events—of a story.

So (1) visual stimuli, the shots, lead to (2) aesthetic illusions, and these (3) lead to the aesthetic imagination of a

story—a fragment of a story: the reveling Russian sailors attacking the czarist government, what on its part

belongs to the story of a people’s revolt. Of course, all that does not need the sequence of the lions.

The sequence of the three lion statues does not belong at all in the so-called diegetic or fictional world of

the film. In the story imagined on the basis of the film there are no lions at all. Besides, the viewer is confronted

with “a” moving stone lion, which the viewer knows that it does not exist at all, neither as a single stone lion,

much less as a moving stone lion. So there are additional elements in the whole series of mental states relating

to the sequence: (4) the stimuli corresponding to each stone lion; (5) the aesthetic illusions of three stone

lions—as is normal in observing a figurative sculpture whatever; and (6) the epistemic illusion of a single

moving stone lion. These last three elements by themselves do not have anything to do with the story of the

sailor’s attack and of the people’s revolt, and before we go on to examine the relationship between the elements

(1)-(3), and on the other hand, the elements (4)-(6), it is of interest to examine the element (6), namely the

epistemic illusion of a single moving stone lion.

First of all, it should be clear that a stone lion, moving or not, based on visual stimuli, is an aesthetic

illusion: certainly, it is not real, but neither is it mere imagination, for the viewer sees something instead of

simply imagining it. In fact, there is a complicated relationship between the elements (5) and (6). The three

aesthetic illusions of each one of the lions—one sees a lion, but it is only a sculpted stone, one does not see a

real lion at all—taken together lead to the composed epistemic illusion of a (6.a) single lion (6.b) moving:

awakening and rising. Just the fact that the viewer knows for sure that he sees mere stone lions and that he

suffers a mere (epistemic) illusion, since there is no rising stone lion at all, is basic for generating (7) the mental

state having the semantic content “Russian people are an awakening lion” in its full metaphoric sense, that is, as

the structure delightfully accepting that Russian people are an awakening lion (P), because one found Russian

people begin a revolt (Q) as a translation of P one can agree with.

In this case, there is no comparison of visual patterns, but only the almost instantaneous and automatic

association of positively valued properties symbolized by a lion: force, autonomy, grandeur, power, with the

revolting people. Of course the association is not sequential and full developed, but fleeting and vague, yet in

principle it is there. In this case, the sequence really generates a metaphoric mental state.

6. Conclusion: A Pure Metaphoric Film and Narrative

Both the discussed simile and the metaphor seem to be possible basically because neither the herd of sheep

nor the lions belong to the diegetic world of the corresponding movies. The exteriority of both elements as to

the fictional contexts in which they appear, leads the viewer not to narrative but symbolic mental states. In fact

neither the story in Modern Times nor the one in Battleship Potemkin adds anything to its dramatic—causal or


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logical—structure by showing the sheep and the lions, as is the case of descriptions in literature, even if

descriptions are far from having any symbolic role.

In general, the notoriety of some shots because they fall completely out of the diegetic world of the

corresponding film, is just the contrary of what is called “invisible montage,” a kind of edition which follows a

perfectly understandable logic according to the story and its setting. Contrarily, “figurative” shots lead to

“symbolic” montage (Bazin 2005a, 32). Obviously it belongs to a very special kind of cinema12 in which the

filmmaker takes the story, at least partly, as a pretext for leading the viewer to some reasoning, what is just the

case of both Modern Times and Battleship Potemkin.

Theoretically, a purely metaphorical film would be an assembly of sequences generating in the viewer

mental states corresponding to metaphors (or simile) but lacking any story whatever. One would recognize the

“metaphorical” or “rhetorical” shots in such a film, only because they would be relatively bizarre images,

frequently having non-human contents—natural objects or elements. The whole montage constituting the film

would posses no causal logic and would lack also any narrative. In semiotics terms, it would be no “text,” no

“discourse.” The filmmaker would substitute a succession of reasoning lacking any logic proper to a causal

story for such a story.

Zavattini’s ideal film consisting of a single continuous shot showing 90 minutes in the life of a man, to

whom nothing happens, lacks also any causal logic and thus, any story proper; it would be only a sequence of

incidents (Bazin 2005b, 89 ff.), yet such incidents would involve the same single character and would have thus

a basic unity, if not the logical unity of a casual, dramatic story. Contrarily, the purely metaphoric film would

have no unity at all—at most it would posses a thematic unity in its symbolism. Both extreme forms of film

would be, for quite different reasons, very different from a common, so-called narrative film—and also from a

film dominated by spectacular images without symbolic content but characterized only by things never seen

before.

Notes

1. For an informative exposition about the semiotic theory of cinema see: Bordwell (1989, 369-398). 2. For a previous discussion about the problematic topic of “cinematographic figures,” see Carrillo Canán et al. (2012, 37-51);

See also Carrillo Canán, Alberto J. L. et al. Are There Rhetorical Figures in Cinema? (Forthcoming). 3. See Benzon and Hays (1987, 59-80). 4. For a discussion of the metaphorical mental state see Carrillo Canán et al. (2012). 5. See: Metz, Psychoanalysis and Cinema. The Imaginary Signifier 183-196. 6. About this see Carrillo Canán et al. (2012); See Metz (1997, 189). 7. See Metz (1991, 37). 8. In fact, that could be also the case for the opening sequence in Modern Times if it were plausible that the mental state of

the viewer were corresponding to the proposition “modern men are sheep men” instead of the simile “modern men are like sheep.” 9. Supposing that one sees the situation that P, then the corresponding perceptual belief is just, believing that P (is the case).

In our discussion, the viewer believes, for instance, that there is a herd of sheep. 10. For the concepts of sensory and conceptual representation, see Dretske (1982, 3-39). 11. For a detailed discussion of the concepts aesthetic belief, aesthetic illusion, aesthetic imagination, and epistemic illusion

as deception, see: Carrillo Canán et al. (2012, 677-687). 12. Already Bazin points out that such a “[…] clever device would be unthinkable in any film after 1932.” (2005a, 32)

Works Cited

Bazin, André. What is Cinema? Vol. 1. California: U of California P, 2005a. Print.


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---. What is Cinema? Vol. 2. California: U of California P, 2005b. Print. Benzon, William L., and David Glenn Hays. “Metaphor, Recognition, and Neural Process.” The American Journal of Semiotics

5.1 (1987): 59-80. Web. 30 June. 2013. Bordwell, David. “Historical Poetics of Cinema.” The Cinematic Text. Methods and Approaches. Ed. R. Barton Palmer. New York:

AMS Press, 1989. 369-98.

Carrillo Canán,Alberto J. L. et al. Are There Rhetorical Figures in Cinema? (Forthcoming).

---. “Metz and the Rhetorical Figures in Cinema.” Semiosis VIII.15 (2012): 37-51. Print. ---. “The Tension Between New Media and Narratology. The Case of Cinema.” Philosophy Study Journal 2.9 (2012): 677-87.

Print. Dretske, Fred. Knowledge and the Flow of Information. Cambridge: The MIT Press, 1982.. Metz, Christian. Film Language. A Semiotics of Cinema. Chicago: The U of Chicago P, 1991. ---. Psychoanalysis and Cinema. The Imaginary Signifier. London: McMillan Press, 1997.


Lived Music—Multi-dimensional Musical Experience:

Implications for Music Education

Cecilia Ferm Thorgersen Lulea University of Technology

Within the field of music education, there is a need of approaching the holistic view of musical experience from

different angles. Therefore, the aim of this article is to investigate the phenomenon of multi-dimensional musical

experience from a life-world-phenomenological perspective and indicate its benefits to music education. The

analysis is informed by Dufrenne’s philosophical writings regarding the phenomenology of aesthetic experience

and also draws on Merleau-Ponty, Heidegger, interpreted by Benson and Ford, together with Schutz. These

philosophers provide tools for understanding musical experience from a bodily, existential, and sociological

perspective, and their complementary ideas about being and learning can be applied to musical experience in the

first case and secondly its influences for music educational praxis. Firstly, the concept of lived music is defined

through a discussion of dimensions of musical experience; the phenomenology of aesthetic experience; the use of

several senses; the heard and the hear-able; apperception; and musical dwelling. Then, the sharing of experience in

musical dwelling and its relevance to the concept of imagination is highlighted. I will also emphasize the

importance of the view of human beings as holistic bodily subjects. Finally, the article includes a discussion

regarding the implications of a life-world-phenomenological view of musical experience to music education.

Keywords: Holistic musical experience, musical dwelling, music education

1. Prologue

From the diary of a singer:

Recently, I participated in a small vocal ensemble. A newly created constellation of six people, who had never met before, were about to practice together a few times and then perform Baroque music along with a well-established baroque orchestra in Stockholm. We were all musically educated with a great deal of experience of choir singing but with very little experience of performing baroque music. In the last days before we met, each one of us had striven to learn our parts by reading the music. At the first rehearsal, one of the orchestra members, the cellist, was present. We sat in a circle together with the cellist who was assigned to lead the rehearsal and began to play one of the pieces. After just a few bars he stopped the music and said: “Is it OK if I say something about baroque music straight away? The important aspects are rhythm, dynamics, and diction. If we concentrate on doing this together, the timbre will be much better as well. Make the ends of the phrases short and make room for others. Listen to each other, and to me. I might build on something that you do, and vice versa.” He really loved to play (in a double sense) this kind of music, and he was playing with us. “Let us take just the four bars to get the right feeling.” At times, he would jump up, cello in hand, and yell: “Did you feel it? That is, you did it together now!” During the rehearsal, he also kept stressing that perfect intonation and correct notes were less important: what was important was taking initiative, being daring, and making music together. It was important to be there, to be

Cecilia Ferm Thorgersen, Ph.D., Professor in Music Education, Department of Arts, Communication, and Education, Lulea

University of Technology, Sweden; main research fields: Aesthetic Communication Based on Phenomenological Philosophy, Music Teacher Education, and Assessment of Music Knowledge. Email: [email protected].

DAVID PUBLISHING

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present, to listen, to make and feel the music, to learn and feel the baroque genre, to use our musical knowledge and experience in a new setting, and to come close to a shared sense of “when it worked”. I could have stayed there forever.

2. Introduction

When interacting in the musical world, we experience and learn to handle form, depth, timbre, pitch,

linearity, harmonies, rhythm, and movement in specific genres, contexts or styles (Alerby and Ferm 2005,

177-186; Ford 2010). Aspects of music are not exclusively musical, or artistic, but connected to living in the

world in general (Merleau-Ponty 1960/2000). The combination of the aspects, how they sound and how they

can be experienced, constitutes music as an “aesthetic object.” We experience music through our senses on a

structural, emotional, tensional, existential, bodily, and acoustic level at the same time (Nielsen 1997; Varkøy

2009, 33-48). Depending on our directedness or focus of attention, in turn influenced by a variety of forces,

some dimensions are foregrounded, and others are in the background.

The musical world in which we interact is inter-subjective. In musical experience, we are always

intertwined with other human beings through perception, expression, or both. As bodily beings, we try to make

the world meaningful and manageable. Musical experience can be seen as every-day, non-obligatory, artistic,

and personal ways of being in the world (Ferm Thorgersen 2009, 167-184; Langeveld 1987, 5-10). Hence,

musical experience seems to be a complicated multi-dimensional phenomenon, existing in a changing social

world, in which people create meaning though interaction. It is a big challenge for music education research to

shed light on and offer an understanding of all the dimensions of musical experience. Nevertheless it is

necessary to accept the challenge if we want research to contribute to “expanding the range of fruitful

possibilities for future actions and future decisions” (Bowman 2005, 153-168). If educational research in music

avoids the existential, bodily, emotional, or aesthetic aspects of musical experience, it will hamper future

imaginations of how music education can be organised. We need to approach the holistic view of musical

experience from different angles, and this article is my contribution: the aim is to investigate the phenomenon

of multi-dimensional musical experience from a life-world-phenomenological perspective and indicate its

benefits to music education.

In the following, I intend to examine musical experience as a multidimensional phenomenon of being

through a life-world-phenomenological perspective. The analysis is informed by Dufrenne’s (1953/1973; 1954,

401-410) philosophical writings regarding the phenomenology of aesthetic experience and also draws on

Merleau-Ponty (1960/2000; 1962; 1968; 2004), Heidegger (1987), interpreted by Benson (2003), and Ford

(2010), together with Schutz (1964/1999). These philosophers provide tools for understanding musical

experience as a multidimensional phenomenon. Maurice Merleau-Ponty contributes the view of human beings

as bodily perceptive and expressive subjects, Martin Heidegger1 represents a more existential approach, and

Schutz a more sociological one, and their complementary ideas about being and learning can be applied to

musical experience in the first case and secondly its influences for music educational praxis. Firstly, I will

define the concept of lived music from a life-world-phenomenological perspective by discussing the

dimensions of musical experience, the phenomenology of aesthetic experience, the use of several senses, the

heard and the hear-able, apperception and musical dwelling. Then, I will highlight the sharing of experience in

musical dwelling and its relevance to the concept of imagination. I will also emphasise the importance of the

view of human beings as holistic bodily subjects. Finally, I will discuss the implications of a

life-world-phenomenological view of musical experience to music education. Throughout the article, I will


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relate to the introductory anecdote to exemplify different aspects of the phenomenon of musical experience.

3. Lived Music—Musical Dwelling

3.1. Dimensions of Musical Experience

In this article experience is seen as a verb, an active way of being (Ferm Thorgersen 2010, 35; Giorgi 1999,

68-96). Consequently, musical experience demands active subjects: beholders, or receivers, and performers. The

introductory musical experience anecdote evokes a scene of people who are singing, listening, interacting,

feeling, teaching, learning, sharing, and living. The music is at the centre, between, and at the same within and

around, the subjects, who are trying to make and learn music together. The subjects are not outside the music,

but inside, closely intertwined with each other and the music. They are not simply learning the structure and

optimal performance of the piece they are singing, but they are also feeling that they exist, taking part in the

musical setting, and they are touched by the music, the musical activity and the context. Musical experience can

never be one-dimensional. As I suggested in the introduction there are several forces influencing what dimensions

that fade into the background and what is foregrounded. For example, earlier experiences, openness, and

awareness, as well as cultural structures and “ideas,” determine how the music presents itself and to what extent

it can be experienced at several levels at the same time (Ferm Thorgersen 2009). According to Dufrenne, a

specific kind of directedness, based on presence and openness, enables music to come across as an aesthetic

object. Object, in this text, should not be thought of as a thing, but as a dynamic phenomenon, constituted in

historical, social, spatial, and cultural contexts.

3.2. The Phenomenology of Aesthetic Experience

Intentionality is a basic concept of phenomenology. We are always directed towards something, at the

same time as something appears to us. Aesthetic experience and aesthetic objects are inseparable according to

Dufrenne (1953/1973). Consequently, the aesthetic object exists thanks to the beholder, and vice versa. An

aesthetic object is defined by the perception of it: It can be perceived as an aesthetic object if it presents itself as

such to the beholder while the beholder perceives the object as an aesthetic one. A work of art is not

automatically an aesthetic object. The work of art is a constant, which exists independently of being

experienced by a perceiver. Aesthetically perceived, however, the work of art becomes an aesthetic object. The

work of art requires urgently only perception, “solicits it imperiously if it is aesthetically valuable” (Dufrenne

1954, 404). It is in the other that the work gets its relief, according to Merleau-Ponty (2004). This does not

mean that the object has no meaning of its own, as Dufrenne points out, but without the perceiver it only exists

as a thing, a possible aesthetic object. The bodily subject and the object are closely connected in a musical

setting. The aesthetic object is at the same time in-it-self and for-us. It exists in order to be perceived by us as

its spectators, or beholders (Dufrenne 1954). At the same time, it exists in the expression of the expressers or

performers, in this case the people who make music. In the introductory anecdote the musical work, created by

Buxtehude, is perceived and expressed by the participating subjects and thus made possible to be perceived as

an aesthetic object.

The beholder knows that she has to equal the object that demands mastery of perception, which in turn can

demand practice. “It is necessary for us to learn to perceive well, in order to do justice to it” (Dufrenne 1954,

407). To be able to the object and to be open for and feel the meaning beyond all language, the subject has to be

corporally present to the object, then totally present in the moment of contemplation offered by the object, and


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finally present in a virtual knowledge of the affective meaning which the aesthetic object evokes.

For, if the affective quality that informs the object at its very core is not in some sense already known by it,

the spectator would be incapable of recognizing it, and would remain indifferent or blind (or death) to the

object; in fact certain works are never understood by certain publics (Dufrenne 1954, 407).

Merleau-Ponty (2004) makes the same conclusions using the foreign language metaphor, and comparing it

to a work of art. If a human being does not know a language very well, she cannot understand the nuances, as

she has not made it her own, and does not use it as a tool to understand the world. As regards any language, it is

learnt while being developed through the use of it within specific cultures, genres, and styles (Ford 2010;

Merleau-Ponty 1953/1973). In perceiving the work, human beings are not concerned with the matter as such,

Dufrenne argues, but attention is instead directed towards the work’s matter insofar as it has been transformed

into particular forms constituted by colours, tunes, or sculpted stone. Humans are then no longer concerned

with its matter per se, but with what Dufrenne calls “the sensuous” (le sensible). The sensuous is defined as

what the matter becomes when perceived aesthetically, in other words, the being of a sensuous thing is realized

only in perception. The aesthetic object can be defined as “a coalescence of sensuous elements” (Dufrenne

1953/1973, 13). According to Dufrenne, meaning possible to perceive in interaction with an art work is not

transcendental, nor nonexistent; it is “immanent in the sensuous, being its very organization” (Dufrenne

1953/1973, 12). Merlau-Ponty (2004) states that (aesthetic) meaning is constituted where the elements

approach each other in the flow of expression; in the gaps between the elements in expression, we combine the

elements in conscious ways and create meaning. We perceive our own expression and compare it with our

intentions and agreed aesthetic ideas through the sensuous.

According to Dufrenne (1953/1973), the subject must be active to complete the aesthetic object through

three stages of being, which together allow the perceiver to respond to the depth of the aesthetic object—to its

expressed world—through feeling, as mentioned above. The three phases are presence, representation and

imagination, and finally reflection and feeling. Representation and imagination are activities that demands,

presence, and are in turn required to make feelings and reflection possible. All together the three phases are

needed to constitute aesthetic experience. “The very height of aesthetic perception is found in the feeling which

reveals the expressiveness of the work” (Dufrenne 1953/1973, 42). This feeling is always someone’s feeling, as

Dufrenne maintains. It is not disembodied or impersonal, but is the expression of the depth of a human subject.

The perceiver becomes present in the aesthetic object as well. Through feelings she engages herself in the

expressed world. Dufrenne underlines that depth in an aesthetic feeling is to be measured in terms of what it

discovers in the object. On the other hand, Dufrenne underlines, the depth of the aesthetic object concerns its

ability to surprise and demand habits; to offer new relations to and views of the world.

The act of aesthetic experience is in other words an act of reconciliation of the object and the subject,

“reciprocity of two depths” (Dufrenne 1953/1973, 48); the depth of the expressed world and the depth of the

beholder of this world. “The sensuous is an act common to the person who feels and to what is felt” (Dufrenne

1953/1973, 48). The sensitive dimension of the world constitutes its expressed world; and functions as its

guiding principle (Yates 2006). Man and world belong to the larger unity of being. It is obvious in the example

in the beginning of the text that the participators are present as they use representations and imagination to

create a shared picture of the work, and the cellist encouraged feelings and reflections. The cellist has a specific

role in the group, which includes both power and responsibility. He shares his experiences and thoughts about

Baroque music, but he also creates an environment where all participants are encouraged to take part in the


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three phases of aesthetic experience in the process of making music together. He is open for the expressions of

the participants and opens himself as well.

3.3. Several Senses in Interplay—Something More Than Perception

The concept of the sensuous implies that human beings use a combination of senses in aesthetic

experience. The sensuous as a way of being where subject and object are mutually dependent on each other

supports this view. The aesthetic object is not constituted in the mind of the beholder, but completed through an

active and bodily being-together, or birth together—con-aitre (Merleau-Ponty 1968). The three stages of

experience (or being) presence, representation and imagination, reflection and feeling, which are the same

irrespective of whether the aesthetic object is music, painting or theatre, make clear that perception is not just

about listening, or viewing, but about emotional living. This approach demands the Kantian view that the

senses sight and hearing are highest in the hierarchy of perception, which still dominates education and

educational activities and principles (Elam 2005). To be able to experience aesthetically in the way that

Dufrenne suggests, human beings have to be open in their presence, which in turn makes imagination,

reflection and feeling possible. Even Merleau-Ponty (2004) stresses the same idea, and adds the bodily

dimension. He thinks that presence, gestures, physiognomies, a feeling that something is going to happen, and

an ongoing improvisation, an ongoing trial and error towards improvement, make art true. To be experienced as

lived, the art has to touch us from all directions, he continues. Dufrenne (2004) opened up ways of thinking

about aesthetic experience; also by underlining that all art forms take place in time and space. The art is not just

in front of us, but also around us and within us; we are parts of the art, and make the art possible to be

perceived aesthetically (Bowman and Powell 2007). This is clear in the introductory anecdote, I think. The

rehearsal makes it possible for the work of Buxtehude to show itself to the singers, who use their imagination,

and complete the work through reflection and feelings. The interaction with the music in the inter-subjective

context is a way of being. In a longer perspective, the process aims to make the piece of music perceived and

experienced aesthetically, by others, the audience.

3.4. Uncovering—Making Possible to Experience Aesthetically

So far the focus has been on the experience of works composed, or created by artists, even if the

references to the introduction have implied that perceiving and expression are closely intertwined and

inter-dependent. Dufrenne admits that the artist is also closely connected to the world in its musical form, and

also to other human beings, but still artists have a different task than the spectators, or beholders. Dufrenne was

a product of his time, the 50 seconds, and I believe that if Dufrenne had lived today when creating and

uncovering the world is for most people in the Western world, he would have been open to dissolving the

differences between artist and spectator. Merleau-Ponty (2004) on the other hand thinks that movement

together with perceiving includes the secret of expressive action. Experiences of the world are presented in new

combinations; it is all about reclaiming and making a cadence concrete and specific that has been visible in a

part of an earlier work, or in a moment of experience. The artist himself is not able to say what comes from him

and what comes from the things themselves, what the new piece contributes to the already given, what is his

own, and what is someone else’s. In other words, the operation of expression can be seen as a kind of temporal

eternity. Existing music gives birth to new music through composers’ caretaking, translation, and

transformation of it. To make clear that improvisation and composition not necessarily have to be about making


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something completely “new” could encourage students, and even music teachers, to dare to discover the

musical world more freely. Dufrenne claims that the task of the artist is to uncover, or discover, the phenomena

in the world through creating works that can be presented to potential perceivers and made possible to

experience aesthetically. Merleau-Ponty talks about making the invisible visible, in our case the unheard

hear-able, and that is also what is expected to happen in Langeveld’s (1983) artistic way of experiencing the

world. The visible or the hear-able is not used here in a physiological way, as in Frederick Pio’s (2007, 121-152)

categories of musicality, but rather as capacity to experience aesthetically, as perceiver or creator. Music

experienced aesthetically is what Pio defines as the un-heard, a way of being that includes the dimensions that

are not directly connected to the acoustics of music. Merleau-Ponty (2004) writes about the unspoken, the quiet

parts of a language, or forms of expression, the gaps, the meaning “in-between”—or the spiritual vectors of an

expression. Expression and perceiving which include those vectors is what I call a multi-dimensional

experience of music. Here, perception and expression are valued equally; the artist is also a perceiver, and the

beholder influences the musical, and aesthetic object. The experience also takes place in specific contexts to

which the subjects bring different earlier experiences, just as in the introductory example.

3.5. Musical Dwelling and Apperception

Benson (2003) offers an interesting view of musical being, based on Heidegger’s (1987) view of dwelling,

which seems to be very close to Merlau-Ponty’s concept of inhabiting the world. A piece of art can, from this

perspective, be seen as offering a place for dwelling—or a “space in which to dwell” (Benson 2003, 31). The

author underlines that this place is not just for the artist, but for others as well. Consequently, from a musical

perspective, a work of art can be a world where music-making can take place. Performers, listeners, and

composers, Benson suggests; dwell in the world music-making creates. The dwelling can best be characterised

as “improvisation,” the Benson continues, including the definition of fabricating what is conveniently at hand,

as well as to cultivating—to discover and express at the same time. On this note, he concludes that dwelling

“transforms the space in which one dwells” (Benson 2003, 32). In musical experiences seen as dwelling

performers, composers and audience work together with “the given” to create something new.

What is at hand is musical knowledge and capacity for imagination, which in turn are constituted by

earlier (musical) experiences, and apperception. In a given context or community, there are specific tools,

possibilities, and barriers for musical dwelling. In specific contexts, we constitute the world through interaction.

Earlier experiences are made in specific contexts as well, determining potential expression and experience in

the present situation. Earlier experiences influence what human beings co-experience in a given situation.

Merleau-Ponty (2004) underlines that language in a broad sense, including artistic as well as linguistic

expressions, can be used to illustrate what Benson calls dwelling. He says that a living language, as art, does

not aim to recreate things itself, but allows perspectives upon things and implies discussions. A language does

not contain the ideas, but matrixes for ideas, leading to meanings that we never have paused to consider.

Therefore, human beings’ earlier experiences of things (that show themselves in an experiencing moment), the

apperception, become important in musical dwelling. Earlier experiences are demanded when it comes to use

art language in seeing or approaching phenomena in the world from new perspectives.

Consequently, the earlier experiences of the participants in the Baroque group were important and

necessary in creating the work as an aesthetic object, possible to be perceived as such by others. The individual

construction of the musical elements made the acoustic and the spiritual come together as a whole, which an


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attempt simply to copy the work of Buxtehude would not have achieved.

Dwelling does not take place in a vacuum, as I mentioned in the first part of the text. It happens in an

inter-subjective setting similar to the one described in the introduction. The musicians were directed towards

each other and to the music, and they arrived with different experiences of music, music making, choir singing,

baroque interpretation and so forth. Therefore, the sharing of experience was crucial.

4. Shared Experience and Imagination in the Inter-subjective World

As mentioned before, musical dwelling takes place in specific contexts, communities, or styles in one way

or another connected to genres. Different genres imply different ways of expression, communication, and

perception, as well as different values (Ferm Thorgersen 2006, 237-250; Schutz 1964/1999). Human beings’

earlier experiences of style influence expectations of the symbols used in communication and what they

represent. Composer, performer, and listener create music together in different ways in different contexts

(Benson 2003). The degree of spontaneity of improvisation, the relation between improvisation and

composition, the way a piece of music offers a space for musical dwelling and how that dwelling alters the

piece itself, present dimensions that are connected to genre, and genre influences human beings’ expectations

and capacity to experience multi-dimensionality. The way a teacher approaches and relates to traditions of a

genre varies the possibilities for music making as dwelling. Jazz, Baroque, and Folk music mediate strong

traditions that imply, for example, how boundaries between improvisation and composition are defined.

Possibilities for dwelling within a genre become obvious through questions like; To what extent is it possible to

change the music? What tools can be used and by whom? What melodic or rhythmical patterns are permitted?

How do the perceivers’ expectations of the genre influence the outcome? A task for music education could be to

organize teaching that invites participants, both creators and perceivers, to share experiences in ways that both

maintain and challenge traditions.

Expectations and possible imaginations are constituted by earlier experiences. In sharing the world,

structures are constituted, guiding our lives, and continually reconstructed. The world seen as inter-subjective

implies that the individual being is closely intertwined with other human beings. As the world consists of things

and other human beings, we are also directed towards other human beings at the same time as they show

themselves to us, as mentioned earlier. In musical situations we are directed towards others in specific ways

depending on our earlier experiences of similar situations, which in turn shape the way we view ourselves,

others and what we expect to happen in the situation (Ferm Thorgersen 2009).

A precondition for multi-dimensional experience is that we view ourselves as performers and beholders,

both when it comes to openness to perceiving and awareness of the ability to express ourselves in a social

context. Another precondition is the willingness to share experiences, a kind of express-within-relationship, a

process in which we strive to become engaged with both our own whole-person knowing and the whole-person

knowing of our fellow musicians (Lyle and Kasl 2002, 176-192). The one and only way to develop knowledge

and understanding about the world is through human beings’ experiences, and consequently sharing of

experiences among human beings is crucial for musical multi-dimensional experience. A final precondition is

the possibility to be active and interact, since meaning from a phenomenological point of view is shaped

through interaction with and in the world. Common experiences create the basis for what is possible to imagine,

and what is possible to express (Adams 2001, 203-224; Ferm Thorgersen 2008). Thus, a variety of experience

is important for multi-dimensional musical experience in the forms of expression and perception.


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Music as a form of expression has already been compared to and described as language in a broad sense,

and language in a broad sense is created in as well as creates a context making inter-subjective meaning

production possible (Merleau-Ponty 1960/2000; Alerby and Ferm 2005; Schutz 1964/1999). As bodily subjects,

active in musical activities, we share streams of consciousness through common experiences (Schutz

1964/1999). In playing music together, we share both time and space, we communicate through and use several

senses, share the music, values, and spirituality. It is also in the sharing of experience, where human express

and perceive music, that the combinations of elements, and thereby gaps, are made accessible which make

musical meaning-making and aesthetic experience possible. The musical elements are combined by and

between the individual musicians. In the meeting, or sharing, between the performers and the composer’s, and

the listener(s)’ stream of consciousness even more “in-betweens” or gaps are constituted. The frames of the

context, the earlier experiences together with the expectations and imaginations of the involved individuals

limit, or make multi-dimensional experience and meaning-making possible.

5. Living Bodies—Lived Experience—Lived Music

The underlying assumption of this article is that subjects, and human beings, are constituted as living

bodies (Merleau-Ponty 1962). Interacting with the world with all our bodily senses makes the world meaningful

and manageable. In musical settings we use our whole body in listening, dancing, music-making, composing,

and reflecting. Lived body, lived time, lived room, and lived relations become important admittances to the

world (Manen 1997). Musical meaning is made through bodily experiences, which have a common ground with

others in communication. Music can be seen as a unique way of being in the body, according to Wayne

Bowman (2005) “It draws together knowing, being and doing as nothing else does” (Bowman 2005, 4).

Merleau-Ponty’s phenomenology of the body involves the lived world. As we touch, we are also being touched,

and as we act, we are also being acted upon. “Perception becomes the process that occurs between my own

flesh and the ‘flesh’ of the object or world—as each both perceive, and are perceived by, the other” (Adams

2001, 207). Music and musical instruments are internalised through experience, at the same time as the body is

extended. Thereby the ego is immanent in a structural system (Alerby and Ferm 2005, 203-224). Such a way of

thinking about musical learning or development puts demands on music education at all educational levels.

Teachers need to offer pupils or students interaction with music and musical instruments in active ways. At the

same time, the teacher has to encourage reflection, so that the egos’ being in the structural system becomes

conscious, and thereby possible to change.

The body is extended, at the same time, as the subject gets opportunity to engage in the musical world, to

relate to, or interact with, musical structures and aspects: form, depth, timbre, pitch, linearity, harmonies,

rhythm, and movement, in a personal way. Musical elements are combined and experienced in different

variations, depending on relations to genre, styles, and traditions. In some cases, the outcomes can be defined as

a “Chopin” inspired piece, a “Mozart” interpretation, a “Beatles” groove, or a “Stockhausen” instrumentation,

while in other cases the listener is “on her own” in the process of categorizing the music, if possible at all.

Bowman (2005) underlines the unique potential of (active) musical experience to bring structure and quality

together. The lived body is living music here and now, he points out: Music is an embodied practice. We learn

the form of expression, all its dimensions—structural, emotional, tensional, existential, and bodily—where

musical elements are combined through interacting with the world with whole our body (Bowman 2006; Ferm

2006, 237-250).


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Maybe musical dwelling can be seen as a phenomenological body where the participants are inter-related

and work together as different organs with complementary skills and actions where all actions involve every

participant (Stubley 1998, 93-105). “The body” is closely connected to the world through the life-worlds of the

participants, their experiences, and expectations. The boundaries of the body are changing depending on the

directedness of “the body”. When the vocal ensemble was to sing together with the orchestra, the boundaries of

“the body” had to include both groups of living subjects. New common goals and imaginations had to be settled.

Later when also the audience was included in the “body,” the process evolved and the imagination and meaning

of dwelling changed. All participants constituting the “new” living body had to be present, open and engaged,

all participants had to use representation and be imaginative to reach a common expression, all participants

were able to connect to their feelings and let reflection connect them to their living in the world—they were

offered, and offered multidimensional musical experience in the rehearsal and performing settings.

6. Lived Music as Education

How can music education offer multi-dimensional musical experience? How can music education become

musical dwelling, a way of habit and being in the world? This article has suggested that musical experience

requires practice, ways of learning the form of expression by interacting in the musical world. It has also been

argued that human beings have to be open to make aesthetical or multi-dimensional experience possible.

Thirdly, the importance of the ability to combine musical elements in individual ways in order to create

aesthetical objects that can be experienced as such has been stressed. Finally, the inter-subjective world where

human beings as bodily subjects are closely intertwined has been defined as a precondition for musical

experience as expression and perception. The musical world is socially constituted and offers structures and

concepts, which the individual has to relate to in their learning processes. The question is to what extent

musical dwelling as education should be controlled, guided, and limited by the structures, and to what extent

music education in school should be open to and encourage students’ own dwelling, and their own organisation

based on their earlier experiences and future imaginations regarding music, as well as musical teaching and

learning.

A possible suggestion is to have Langeveld’s (1983, 5-10) four forms of experience in mind when offering

musical experience in educational settings. First, everyday experience, where students interact with agreed

structures, could encourage teachers to consider students’ everyday musical activities and let these constitute

the basis for further learning. One starting point could be to map what traditions, genres and cultures that are

represented by the students’ knowledge and experiences in a class. From that map different ways of treating and

combining different musical parameters could be investigated and compared.

Second, “non-obligatory” experience—play—could give energy to playful activities where students get

the opportunity to go into different roles and experience themselves as different musical beings in various

unfamiliar and familiar settings. One example could be to focus upon the opera genre. What different musical

roles exist there? What themes are common in opera scripts? What specific musical tools are being used?

What are the typical characters expected to express in what ways in an opera piece? Through common playful

activities, the opera genre could be discovered and hopefully internalized.

Third, artistic experience, should underline the importance of letting the students use and develop musical

skills in performing and composing activities to make the unheard hear-able. Through more or less steered

activities children and youngsters could be offered to improvise and compose music in different genres or styles,


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such as romanticism, hip-hop, new-age, or children’s rhymes.

Finally, the fourth form of experience, the personal, should inspire to activities where students get the

chance to find their own musical identities. For example, students could be encouraged to reflect upon music

that they have been exposed to through their lives in different settings. They could have the chance to explore

what musical preferences they have and how these have developed. Additionally they should get the possibility

to think about the relations to music they imagine in their future lives.

I hope this article provides some openings for further visions of how music education can offer students

multi-dimensional musical experience—lived music. I also hope that the message of the text in one way or

another will reach teachers, school-leaders, and people who write policy documents and inspire them to cross

boundaries when it comes to creating spaces for multi-style musical experiences in educational institutions at

all levels, such as ordinary schools, municipal culture schools, NGO’s and higher education.

Note

1. For a more thorough discussion of Heidegger’s thoughts about being and art, based on his later works, see Thorgersen and

Schwieler (2013).

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