Embodied
cognition as currently understood contends with the emergence of cognition as being
grounded in an organism’s sensorimotor capacities and interaction with the
environment. Wilson (2002) identifies six
aspects of embodiment such that (1) Cognition is situated (2) Cognition is time
pressured (3) Cognitive work is offloaded onto the environment (4) The
environment is part of the cognitive system (5) Cognition is for action (6) Off-line
cognition is body based. The variety of perspectives on embodiment differ
between the degree of influence such sensorimotor interactions have on
cognitive processes from the position of embodied cognition constraining
internal representational cognitive processes to embodiment being treated as a
continual dynamic system without the attribution of any internal representative
structures or processes being required.
Lakoff
(2015) in additional support of the necessity of the embodiment perspective,
offers the assured consideration that if an individual's brain was,
hypothetically, somehow disconnected from all sensorimotor functioning then, in
the absence of such sensorimotor interaction, what would be left to think
about? It is a practically impossible position to argue against and one which
firmly, and quite directly, asserts the vital role which the body essentially
plays in cognition. Each perspective assimilates the influence of embodiment and
interaction in the cognitive process but with particular respect to the
consideration of metaphor the particulars of the environment as being part of
the cognitive system and that off-line cognition is body based may be
particularly addressed.
The
main question with regard to embodiment and metaphor is the question as to how,
if all our concepts are grounded in our sensorimotor and environmental
constraints, then how is the ability to abstract possible (Jamrozik, A,
McQuire, M, Cardillo, E. R &
Chatterjee, A. 2016). For Lakoff and Johnson (1980) abstract concepts are
intensely metaphorical in that they are based on the mapping of sensorimotor
based concepts across and between distinct domains. To clarify, a concept is defined as (1)
something conceived in the mind : thought, notion and (2) :
an abstract or generic idea generalized from particular instances the basic
concepts of psychology the concept of gravity. The definition of a metaphor is (1) a figure
of speech in which a word or phrase literally denoting one kind of object or
idea is used in place of another to suggest a likeness or analogy between them
(as in drowning in money) and (2) an object, activity, or idea
treated as a metaphor.
Lakoff &
Johnson (2003)
state that the evidence for the role and interplay of concept and metaphor is
based on linguistic examples. The “essence of a metaphor is understanding and
experiencing one kind of (conceptual) thing in terms of another, that metaphor
means metaphorical concept”. The crux here is that all of cognition, from the
mundane to the highest of abstractions, may be accounted for in terms of such
blending of sensorimotor conceptual experiences. It has previously been
discussed that it follows from this that abstract concepts as such have no
specific representation but rather are constituted from more direct and
grounded sensorimotor domains (Jamrozik et al 2016). Other commentators have
expressed concern that the history of such abstract metaphors is largely
ignored and which may hold influence over how such abstractions are considered
by successive generations. Bowers (2009) argues that such metaphors would have
originated in earlier times and when passed on they continue to hold the errors
and biases of previous thinkers.
Metaphor
then is more than just a means of communication but rather is a way for
individuals to manage and develop their cognitive and conceptual experiences as
mitigated through their sensorimotor apparatus and environment. Given that
cognition is so embodied there are there inherent limits on what we may cognize
about? I think Lakoff & Johnson (2003) comes from an interesting
philosophical perspective in this regard in that instead of engaging in the
ambitious, but quite possibly fruitless, search for an absolute truth the
focus, for Lakoff, remains on human experience and relative meaning. In this he
is arguably acknowledging the presumed inherent limitation in what may be
engaged with both ontologically and epistemologically given the constraints
placed upon an organism by its physical system and the potential for engagement
within the environment. If, as Lakoff argues, our conceptual system is strictly
reliant on the use of metaphor it may then follow that any such attempt at a
complete account of nature is unattainable. This position would arguably then appear
to follow given the constant state of experiential flux we find ourselves in.
References:
Bowers,
C. A.
(2009) Why the George Lakoff and Mark Johnson Theory of Metaphor is Inadequate
for Addressing Cultural Issues
Related to the Ecological Crises. Language &
Ecology vol.2 no.4 (2009)
Chrisley, R. and Ziemke, T. (2006)
Embodiment. Encyclopedia of Cognitive
Science. . DOI: 10.1002/0470018860.s00172
Dove, G. (2016) Three symbol
ungrounding problems: Abstract concepts and the future of embodied cognition. Psychon Bull Rev (2016) 23: 1109. doi:10.3758/s13423-015-0825-4
Glenberg, A. M. (2010) Embodiment as a unifying perspective for
psychology. WIREs Cogni Sci, 1: 586–596. doi:10.1002/wcs.55
Jamrozik, A, McQuire, M,
Cardillo, E. R & Chatterjee, A. (2016)
Metaphor: Bridging embodiment to
abstraction Psychonomic
Bulletin & Review
10.3758/s13423-015-0861-0
Lakoff, G. (2015) How brains think; the
embodiment hypothesis. Keynote address. International Convention of
Psychological Science , Amsterdam, 2015. Retrieved from
George
Lakoff and Mark Johnsen (2003) Metaphors we live by. London: The University
of Chicago press.
Wilson, M. (2002) Six
views of embodied cognition: Psychonomic Bulletin & Review (2002) 9: 625. doi:10.3758/BF03196322
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