Phenom Cogn Sci (2010) 9:561578 DOI 10.

1007/s11097-010-9186-7

Dimensions of mind
Richard Menary

Published online: 10 November 2010 # Springer Science+Business Media B.V. 2010

Abstract In their papers for this issue, Sterelny and Sutton provide a dimensional analysis of some of the ways in which mental and cognitive activities take place in the world. I add two further dimensions, a dimension of manipulation and of transformation. I also discuss the explanatory dimensions that we might use to explain these cases. Keywords Cognition . Integration . Manipulation thesis . Cognitive transformation . Body schema . Epistemic action . Cognitive practices . Cognitive niche In this issue, John Sutton and Kim Sterelny provide a dimensional analysis of some of the ways in which mental and cognitive activities take place in the world. For example in discussing the ways we interact with artefacts and representations in the local cognitive niche, we might move along a dimension from trusting a notebook implicitly to distrust of an environmental resource, from relationships that are enduring to those that are fleeting, from individual interactions to collective interactions and information sources that range from the easily transferable to the individually entrenched.1 I will add some dimensions of my own: firstly along an axis of manipulation from direct bodily manipulations that alter the informational and physical structure of the environment, to manipulations of public representations in the local environment. There is also a dimension of cognitive transformation ranging from the transformation of body schemas for tool use to the transformation of representational and cognitive capacities.
1

Thanks to John Sutton for clarifying these dimensions by personal communication.

The research for this paper was conducted whilst on research leave awarded by the Faculty of Arts. It is supported by the Australian Research Council Discovery grant: Embodied Virtues and Expertise. Thanks to John Sutton for comments. R. Menary (*) Department of Philosophy, The University of Wollongong, New South Wales, Australia e-mail: rmenary@uow.edu.au

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How should we understand these variations in dimensions of mind? One way is through looking at the variations in the world in terms of cases, as above. However, there are also theoretical dimensions at work, in terms of how we explain the variations in dimensional cases as described above. So, for example, one can take a weakly embodied view that cognition is embodied only by the brain and not the wider body. One can also take a weakly embedded view which is that brains are embodied and embedded in an environment which is the location of inputs and outputs. In which case one would need to explain, case-by-case, how the brain is doing all the cognitive work and how the environment is simply the location of inputs and outputs. A moderate version of embodiment and embedding might take cognition to be at least dependent upon the activity of the body and the embedding environment, such that some of the relevant explanatory factors will be located beyond the bounds of the skull in a way that is richer and more detailed than a simple inputoutput story.2 A strongly embodied and embedded position would view cognition as, at least sometimes, involving more than neural activity but also bodily activity in the embedding environment. Such a position would need to show how cognitive processes involve bodily manipulations and other forms of interaction with the environment.

Embodied mind & & & Embodied mind weak: the brain is embodied (internalism/individualism) Embodied mind moderate: some of our mental and cognitive processes and states depend upon our non-neural body Embodied mind strong: some of our mental and cognitive processes and states involve processes of the body acting in and on the environment (enactivism)

Embedded mind & & & Embedded mind weak: the inputs to and outputs from mental and cognitive processes and states are found in the environment (internalism/individualism) Embedded mind moderate: mental and cognitive processes and states are scaffolded by/depend upon the environment. Embedded mind strong: mental and cognitive processes and states are integrated with states and processes found in the environment (extended mind)

Depending upon the case, we might move back and forth across these explanatory dimensions. Some examples might call for a weakly embodied and embedded explanation and others for a strongly embodied and embedded explanation. However, there will of course be those who deny that we can ever successfully provide a strongly embodied and embedded explanation of cognition (Adams and Aizawa 2008; Rupert 2009). Then there are those who would be likely to claim that
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Sterelny (this issue) holds a moderate position.

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cognitive explanations are mostly moderate and only rarely of the strong variety. For Sterelny (2010), this turns out to be the case because of the very rare conditions under which a strongly embodied or embedded explanation would become active. We are likely to find that certain dimensions go together; for example, it is unlikely that a position located on the strongly embedded dimension will not also be located on the strongly embodied dimension. This is mainly because most proponents of the extended mind take mental states and processes to be composed of environmental as well as brain and bodily states and processeshence, the oftstated slogan, the mind is extended or distributed across brain, body and environment. Similarly, individualists who think that the mind is constituted or realized only by the brain will also, sometimes, hold to a weak embeddingwe sometimes lean on or use props and tools to supplement our neurally realised cognitive capacities. It should also be noted that some positions, by occupying several dimensions at once, absorb examples of the more restricted dimensions. Thus, strongly embedded views can quite happily allow that there are examples of moderate and even weak embedding. The question that holders of such views must address, and which is raised by Sterelny 2010, is: how often is the strongly embedded dimension occupied? My answer is: often, but only if we correctly understand what is meant by strong embedding. I understand strong embedding in terms of integration (Menary 2006, 2007a, b, 2009, 2010). One way to understand integration is as follows: cognition is the coordination of bodily processes of the organism with salient features of the environment, often created or maintained by the organism. A coordinated process allows the organism to perform cognitive tasks that it otherwise would be unable to; or allows it to perform tasks in a way that is distinctively different and is an improvement upon the way that the organism performs those tasks via neural processes alone. Integrationists think that some cognitive processes turn out to be coordinated. It is important to note that integrationists are not committed to the view that artefacts and tools are themselves cognitive or mental, nor that a simple causal interaction between two states X and Y makes X part of Y (see Adams and Aizawa 2008). The key to understanding coordinated processes is the manipulation thesis (Rowlands 1999; Menary 2007a). We create, maintain and manipulate cognitive niches (see Sterelny 2010) and we can give a causal or co-ordination dynamics style explanation of these manipulations, but that is just to establish the physicalist credentials of the explanations. There is no magic at work here (see the muggle constraint in Wheeler 2005). These explanations must be located within the normative, social and semantic structure of the cognitive niche. Cognitive manipulations are bodily engagements with the niche that are regulated by norms. The norms and social systems and structures of the environment regulate the coordination in two ways: firstly by transformation of our basic cognitive capacities and secondly by restructuring the informational and physical structure of the environment. In the next section, I provide examples of the dimension of manipulation (and of the structuring of the informational and physical environment); in the second, of transformation. During the discussion, I locate the examples on the theoretical/ explanatory dimensions of strength of embodiment and embedding.

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The manipulation thesis A strongly embedded formulation of the manipulation thesis is due to Mark Rowlands: [C]ognitive processes are not located exclusively in the skin of cognising organisms because such processes are, in part, made up of physical or bodily manipulation of structures in the environments of such organisms. (Rowlands 1999, 23) This early formulation of the manipulation thesis is insufficient on its own. The manipulation thesis concerns our embodied engagements with the world, but it is not simply a causal relation, bodily manipulations are also normativethey are embodied practices developed through enculturation, learning and training (in ontogeny). I will outline four different classes3 of bodily manipulation of the environment and look at examples of three4 of them. 1. Biological couplingorganismenvironment relations. 2. Epistemic actionsdirectly manipulating the environment to make the completion of a cognitive task simpler. 3. Self-correcting actionsthe use of language and props to direct and structure practical actions in completing tasks. 4. Cognitive practicesmanipulations of external representational and notational systems regulated by cognitive norms. Examples of biological coupling run from non-cognitive cases such as phonotaxis in crickets (Webb 1994) and bee dances (Millikan 1993, 2004) up to sensorimotor contingencies (ORegan and No 2001) and animate vision (Ballard 1991). Kirsh and Maglio (1994) have dubbed the second class of manipulations epistemic actions. Epistemic actions are direct manipulations of the environment that alter the informational state of the environment, resulting in a better state in a problem solving/planning task. Epistemic actions are performed as part of the cognitive processing of a problem and are to be contrasted with an internalist account of problem solving where all of the processing takes place in the brain. I shall be looking at epistemic actions in detail in the next sub-section. An example of a self-correcting action is the role of spoken language in structuring an activity. In these kinds of cases, we use speech as a corrective tool. Self-correcting actions are to be distinguished from epistemic actions because they do not involve a direct physical manipulation of the environment. It might be thought that this is not really a case of manipulation, for we might ask what exactly is being manipulated? The sense of manipulation at work in these cases should not be understood exclusively as a manual operation using the hands. It might involve a saccade or a re-orientation of the body to better be able to see. Similarly we can think of the creation of speech and gesture, or the integration of speech and action
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The classes should be thought of as being broad with shifting and overlapping boundaries, rather than too fixed. 4 I will focus on the final three classes of manipulation, because they better suit the argument of this paper. For a detailed account of the first class, see Menary 2007a.

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as, broadly speaking, a manipulation of the environment. In the self-corrective cases, we create linguistic structures which control and direct future action. We might narrate the sequence of actions to ourselves in our heads, or out loud or we might write them down. The linguistic sequencing might be exclusively for our own use, or it might be designed for use by others. We might structure a sequence of actions collectively as well as individually, by jointly creating linguistic control structures. I shall look at a linguistic example of a self-correcting action. The classic example of a cognitive practice is McClelland et al.s (1986) example of using pen and paper to complete a mathematical algorithm. Performing long multiplication involves mastery over a notational system. Humans very often create and manipulate external representational vehicles to complete a cognitive task. In doing so, they are carrying out a cognitive practice which is governed by its own normswhich I dub cognitive norms. The norms are cognitive because they are aimed at completing cognitive tasks. I give an example of writing as a cognitive practice. The dimension of manipulation therefore runs from our direct biological interactions with the environment, to actions that alter the informational structure of the environment, through to the construction and manipulation of public systems of representation, including natural languages and notational systems. I will now look at examples of epistemic actions, self-corrective practices and cognitive practices in more detail. Epistemic action Epistemic actions involve a tight coordination between body and world. They are part of a coordinated process spanning environment, body and brain, which, when taken together, provide the processing required for the completion of a cognitive task. I will argue for this strongly embodied and embedded account of epistemic actions against a weak internalist account, by reference to the work of Kirsch and Maglio on epistemic actions. Kirsh and Maglio (1994), henceforth K&M, are interested in a class of actions which they call epistemic actions, which make mental computation (processing) easier, faster, or more reliable. (1994, 513) These are physical actions which the agent performs in order to alter their own computational state. They wish to shift the emphasis from internal planning to performing actions which simplify the processing required to achieve that goal. Instead of thinking of an agent internally processing various plans and choosing an action which will most efficiently bring about the desired goal, K&M want us to think of agents directly manipulating their environment so as to reduce the need for such internal processing.5 Epistemic actions alter the physical and informational structure of the environment, in doing so they are taking the cognitive agent a step closer to a solution; they are an integral part of the agents processing of the problem. An example of such a task can be found in their studies of expert Tetris players. In the game, falling geometric shapes, or zoids, have to be directed to available slots
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The initial focus is on this simplifying process, but epistemic actions are moves in the problem solving routines of epistemic agents.

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in a continually emerging structure. A rotation button can be used to orient the shapes relative to the slotsso that discrimination of fit can be judged. Classically, we might think that the rotation of the zoids would first happen in the brain and would then result in action in the world. However, K&M say that: the clearest reason to doubt that deciding where to place a zoid involves mental rotation is that zoids can be physically rotated 90 in as few as 100 ms. whereas we estimate that it takes in the neighbourhood of 8001,200 ms to mentally rotate a zoid 90. (Kirsh and Maglio 1994, 514) Even allowing for an extra 200 ms for subjects to select the rotate button, the timesaving benefits of physical over mental rotation are obvious; however, time is not the only benefit. The cost on working memory and attention to produce and sustain mental images of zoids would harm performancephysically rotating the zoid is less demanding than mental rotation. Classically, we might think of problem solving as involving a series of classical computations (processes) leading to an output (an action). However, epistemic actions are taking up some of the processing duties required to reach a solution to the problem, they are not simply outputs. As Kirsh puts it: the skills we have developed for dealing with the external world go beyond those we have for dealing with the internal world. (Kirsh 1995, 64) The actions that Tetris players perform are directly altering the informational structure of the environment. They often perform actions that are not directly tied to the pragmatic goal of dropping the zoids into the correctly shaped slots. Expert players regularly performed actions that helped them to recognise pieces, verify the goodness of potential placements, and test plans (e.g. dropping a piece from high up on the board). (Kirsh 2009, 283) The actions are indirect; they often take the zoid away from the optimal dropping point, by lining the piece up with a wall for example. Whether or not we consider epistemic actions to be part of our cognitive processing depends, partly, upon how seriously we take K&Ms distinction between epistemic and pragmatic actions. Pragmatic actions are aimed at achieving a noncognitive goal, like a full stomach. Epistemic actions are aimed at achieving a cognitive goal, like solving a problem, by manipulating the environment. The distinction is interestingly illustrated as follows: one significant consequence of recognising epistemic action as a category of activity is that if we continue to view planning as state space search, we must redefine the state space in which planning occurs. That is, instead of interpreting the nodes of a state space graph to be physical states, we have to interpret them as representing both physical and informational states. (Kirsh and Maglio 1994, 515) Classically we might think of a plan and actions which implement the plan as distinct; however, K&Ms point is that epistemic actions are part of strategy creation and problem solving. Clearly, problem solving is cognitive. So if epistemic actions are part of that problem-solving process, and not merely the result of problem solving or the physical means by which plans are implemented, then we have a very good reason for claiming that epistemic actions are part of the problem solving

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process.6 Accepting this depends upon taking seriously the distinction between epistemic and pragmatic action and seeing a tighter integration between external epistemic actions and internal processes. K&M themselves say of their approach that: its chief novelty lies in allowing individual functional units inside the agent to be in closed-loop interaction with the outside world.7 (Kirsh and Maglio 1994, 542) Epistemic actions are coordinated with processes such as working memory and attention and epistemic action plus internal processing jointly govern pragmatic action. Therefore, the coordinated and interactive process that spans physical manipulations and attention is the process that is causally responsible for the pragmatic action. This is the reason why I prefer a strongly embedded interpretation of cases of epistemic action. K&M give us a way of thinking about the role of action such that we can unify physical space and information processing space. A weakly embedded explanation of these cases would distinguish between a realm of internal computations upon inputted information and a realm of outputted physical behaviours, but this is precisely the explanation that K&M are rejecting. The information-processing space includes both processes in the head, and processes outside of the head. All of the processing takes place within the same state space. This state space is the problem solving state space. Consequently, epistemic actions (as bodily manipulations of vehicles in the environment) are processes to be found in that state space. However, the internalist thinks that there is an easy way of demonstrating how this division works: the only restructuring of the environment which is relevant to the problem solving/planning agent occurs inside the agents head. In other words, The structure of the environment which matters to cognition is the structure the agent represents (or at least presupposes in the way it manipulates its representations). (Kirsh and Maglio 1994, 545) If all the relevant structure is in the head, this obviates the need for epistemic action, where the world is structured in such a way as to negate the need for all of the structured representations being located in the head. But K&M have established that there is such a class of actions as epistemic actions and now the internalist is at a loss to account for them. If we were to agree with the internalist that all the relevant structure, all the relevant states and processes, are in the head, then we cannot explain the performance of Tetris players. If we explain their performance by making reference to external manipulations as part of their cognitive processing (the problem solving), then we can explain their performance. The weak embedding strategy is blocked by the inability to explain the Tetris players performance by internal cognitive resources alone. The internalist is forced into this position because of the difference between epistemic actions and pragmatic actionsepistemic actions are aimed at making a move in the problem solving state space, pragmatic actions are not. Kirsh has recently made this very clear: The challenge epistemic actions pose to the classical approach is that without an analysis of the possible epistemic functions of an action it may be nearly

6 7

Remembering that epistemic action is a term used to label a class of manipulations of the environment. As opposed to simply being outputs of internal processes.

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impossible to identify the primary function of an action and so label it correctly. (Kirsh 2009, 284) K&Ms focus is on epistemic actions as interactions with the environment where an internal representation is not required. Many complex cognitive behaviours arise without the need for the processing of internal representations; because we can always manipulate the environment instead. Cognitive integrationists avoid the pitfall of the weak embedding strategy by locating epistemic actions in the problem solving state space, not just as a clever strategy for off-loading complexity onto the environment. Epistemic actions show that interaction with the environment replaces the need for the processing of internal representations of the environment; nonetheless, these classes of manipulations are still part of our cognitive economy. Self-correcting actions Verbal self-guidance or self-controlled action (Menary 2007a) has an important cognitive function. This is clearly evident in the responses of children to the verbal commands of adults in controlling and directing their actions (Morin 2005). They are able to perform actions with the verbal and physical support of adult caregivers. They are scaffolded by adults during their cognitive development. Eventually, they learn how to deploy language without the scaffolding of caregiver directions. Instead they auto-generate verbal commands, cues and interventions to control and direct activity. The creation of linguistic structures that control and direct action, like epistemic actions, can have a cognitive function. For example, Kendall and Hollon (1981) give us four categories of the regulatory use of speech for problem solving: (1) the precise definition of the problem; (2) the effective approach to the problem; (3) the focus on the problem; (4) the progress evaluation that includes praise or strategy readjustment (Morin 2005). Vygotsky has an account of the internalisation of egocentric speech and the kind of cognitive functions such speech has. I shall use a core example from his work to illustrate the kind of function that inner speech has as outlined by Kendall and Hollon. From a Vygotskian developmental point of view, higher cognition, for example reasoning and memory, appears first on the intermental plane, in other words, in social interaction. Obvious examples would be language learning and joint adult child problem solving activities. Cognition, then, is primarily a social phenomenon. However, Vygotsky did claim that higher cognition appears on the intramental plane (individual), but only as it is shaped by and derived from intermental cognition.8 It is crucial, then, to understand how intermental cognition works, for we will be at a loss to understand cognition at the level of the individual. One typical example of this phenomenon is the internalisation of speech. Piaget labelled the speech that young children engage in when problem solving or engaging in pretend play egocentric speech. Vygotsky does not view this form of speech as a manifestation of a childs egocentricity, rather, Vygotsky argues (based
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Of course, this does not preclude the possibility that there are inherited cognitive structures in the brain. See for example Dehaenes work below. Think also of the work of Meltzoff and Moore (1977) on early infant imitation. The point here is that these kind of cognitive mechanisms are very basic and require development by being scaffolded in the cognitive niche.

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on empirical studies of infants' speech) that this form of speech is merely the internalisation of speech. It does not disappear with age, it becomes an internal monologue. The intermental development of cognition is understood in terms of the zone of proximal development. The zone of proximal development is the distance between the actual level of development of an individual, what the individual can actually do, and the potential level of development, which is what the individual can potentially do, with guidance and collaboration from a tutor. It follows that the individual level of development should not be the exclusive focus of interest. Intermental cognition as mediated through language allows us to understand the intramental capabilities of an individual. In cases where the child must act in such a way as to bring about a goal, the activity is accompanied by egocentric speech. As the child gains mastery of egocentric and then inner speech, she gains access to self-controlled behaviour, which helps her to complete cognitive tasks such as problem solving. As an example of this development, Vygotsky cites an experiment (by a colleague Levina) where a childs speech arises spontaneously in a problem-solving situation. The speech is continuous throughout the experiment as observed. Levinas experiments posed problems to 4- and 5-year olds, such as obtaining candy/sweets from a cupboard. The candy was placed out of reach so that the child could not reach it directly. Vygotsky describes the concurrent roles of speech and action (including tool use) in the child in the following way: As the child got more and more involved in trying to obtain the candy, egocentric speech began to manifest itself as part of her active striving. At first this speech consisted of a description and analysis of the situation, but it gradually took on the planful character, reflecting possible paths to a solution of the problem. Finally it was included as part of the solution. (Vygotsky 1978, 25) A four-and-a-half-year-old girl was asked to get candy from a cupboard with a stool and a stick as tools. The experiment was described by Levina in the following way (his descriptions are in parentheses, the girls speech is in quotation marks): (Stands on a stool, quietly looking, feeling along a shelf with stick). On the stool. (Glances at experimenter. Puts stick in other hand) Is that really the candy? (Hesitates) I can get it from that other stool, stand and get it. (Gets second stool) No that doesnt get it. I could use the stick. (Takes stick, knocks at the candy) It will move now. (knocks candy) It moved, I couldnt get it with the stool, but the, but the stick worked. Vygotsky claims that activity is not just accompanied by speech in children, but that speech plays a specific role in such activity. He claims that the experiments show two important facts: 1. A childs speech is as important as the role of action in attaining the goal. Children not only speak about what they are doing; their speech and action are part of one and the same complex psychological function, directed toward the solution of the problem at hand.

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2. The more complex the action demanded by the situation and the less direct its solution, the greater the importance played by speech in the operation as a whole. Sometimes speech becomes of such vital importance that, if not permitted to use it, young children cannot accomplish the given task (Vygotsky 1978, 26). We should note that the childs speech gives a cognitive structuring to the activity. The girl verbally structures a sequence of actions, searching for a solution and controlling the actions that will reach the solution. Children gradually gain mastery over language as part of their cognitive as well as communicative resources. Self-corrective speech, whether private or public, is used to structure, direct and correct actions that lead to the completion of cognitive tasks. Again, like epistemic actions, there can be moves made in problem solving space. They are an example of one of the ways in which the internalisation of public language transforms our cognitive capacities. Cognitive practices When we manipulate a public representation to complete a cognitive task, we are performing a cognitive practice. We are able to manipulate public representational vehicles because we acquire manipulative abilities that are governed by cognitive norms. Public vehicles, such as written language and mathematical symbols, are tokens of representational systems. Such systems have their own norms governing how we are to manipulate token representational vehicles. These norms are cognitive as opposed to moral or social norms; they are directly tied to the completion of cognitive tasks. There is a great variety of public representational systems, which mirrors the great variety of tasks to which we put them. Examples of such tasks include: solving problems, making inferences, planning, working out answers to questions and so on (these are cognitive tasks). Public representational systems structure our cognitive niches. The childs cognitive development takes place in a representationally structured niche and the child is trained and scaffolded by caregivers who have already gained mastery over these systems. The child learns a practice that is an established method of manipulating representations to produce an end. For example, we write down the intermediate stages in problem solving, which can function as part of the working memory space, making information available for further manipulation. Plans are often written down and then transformed, updated and shared. Lists and diaries allow us to retrieve information that require long-term storage and are easily and conveniently accessible. The representational properties of maps enable easy and shared navigation. Public representational systems allow for the storage and manipulation of detailed content, trusted sources of information, shared information and the structuring of thought that internal representations alone cannot provide. The implementation of a cognitive practice depends on cognitive norms that guide that practice; these norms also structure, in part, our cognitive niches. So, for example, there are: 1. Purposive norms. The activity is engaged in for a purpose, or end. 2. Corrective norms. These are norms for using representations to correct activity in pursuit of an end.

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3. Manipulative norms. These are norms for manipulating inscriptions of a representational system. 4. Interpretative norms. These are norms for interpreting inscriptions of a representational system as having some wider significance, not just within the representational system itself but also with regard to the wider world and interests of others. 5. Creative norms. Norms that govern the creation of public representations. We will need an account of how we learn cognitive practices. This will, in part, involve the acquisition of capacities to manipulate representations and thereby transform our cognitive abilities. However, acquiring these capacities should be understood in the context of the cognitive practices required to complete cognitive tasks. As such, a cognitive practice is essentially the embodying of norms in an activity. Writing is such an activity: the crucial elements of writing, or typing, are the ability to manipulate tools to create external vehicles: words, sentences and paragraphs. The pen and paper or the CPU, keyboard and monitor are not themselves cognitive, but the creation and manipulation of the external vehicles and the coordination of internal and external vehicles are. For example, my reading and rereading what I have written gives me new ideas about what I should write next. Though it is true that tools such as keyboards and pens enable me to write, it is the process of manipulating the written vehicles that is the cognitive processing. The sentences can be rewritten, erased, moved to another paragraph and so on. It is, moreover, precisely these kinds of manipulations that are not easily, if ever, achieved in the head. Therefore, writing as an active and creative process is enabled by tools such as pen and paper or word processors, but it is the bodily manipulation of the external vehicles themselves that is where the cognitive work gets done. Once written, the vehicles are then available for further manipulations such as restructuring, revising and redrafting. Manipulating written vehicles is a kind of problem solving where a particular cognitive task must be completed: for example, how do I make this piece of writing clearer? Completing these kinds of goals without external media would be made more difficult by their absence. Without them, behavioural competence will drop and the completion of the cognitive task be made more difficult. Hence, cognitive integrationists are inclined to think that those external manipulations play an important role in the processing of the task, one different from the enabling role of tools. What kinds of processes do external manipulations afford that purely internal manipulations will not? If, for example, I tried to compose an essay in my head, the likelihood of retaining much of the argument and structure would become very limited. Making revisions and corrections would be almost impossible. Stable and enduring external written sentences allow for manipulations, transformations, reorderings, comparisons and deletions of text that are not available to neural processes. Bodily manipulations of external vehicles are different from, but complementary to, internal processes (Sutton 2010). The coordination of internal and external processes in one extended dynamic process enables the completion of complex cognitive tasks such as composition. I turn now to the dimension of cognitive transformation.

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Cognitive transformations Cognitive transformations occur when the development of the cognitive capacities of an individual are sculpted by the cognitive and social niche of that individual. During the learning and training of a skill, such as a shot in tennis or cricket, we are guided by norms. As I will show below, body schemas are governed by norms and the norms have an organising function which results in new sensorimotor programmes. During development, the individual also gains mastery over the cognitive norms by which external representations are manipulated. Vygotsky expresses this in the claim that children, "master the rules in accordance with which external signs must be used." (Vygotsky 1981, 1845) The child masters the creation and deployment of signs (and later public systems of representation) by being scaffolded by parents and care givers. Vygotsky gives the following example of how such mastery of the creation and deployment of signs may begin to develop in the child: At first the indicatory gesture is simply an unsuccessful grasping movement directed at an object and designating a forthcoming action. The child tries to grasp an object that is too far away. The childs hands, reaching toward the object, stop and hover in mid air. Here we have a childs movements that do nothing more than objectively indicate an object. When the mother comes to the aid of the child and comprehends the movement as an indicator, the situation changes in an important way. The indicatory gesture becomes a gesture for others. In response to the childs unsuccessful grasping movement, a response emerges not on the part of the object, but on the part of another human. Thus, other people introduce the primary sense into this unsuccessful grasping movement. Eventually, the child grasps the indicatory import of the gesture for themselves, thereby producing the gestures as communicative signs. The functions of the movement itself have undergone an important change: from a movement directed toward an object it has become a movement directed toward another human being. The grasping is converted into an indication this movement does not become a gesture for oneself except by first being an indication, that is, functioning objectively as an indication and gesture for others, being comprehended and understood by surrounding people as an indicator. Thus the child is the last to become conscious of the gesture. (Vygotsky 1981, 1601) The childs behaviour is shaped by the normative environment in which she acts. Gesturing becomes indicating once it is interpreted as being so by another, thus the child is brought into the practice of a social norm. It is in this way that the higher cognitive capacities of the individual are sculpted, by interactions with the social/ representational environment. In the next two subsections, I look at how the normative and social structure of the environment, mediated by learning and training histories, has a direct transformatory effect on the body. In particular, I look at how the development of a body schema leads to its integration with the environment. Then I look at empirical research which shows how our mathematical cognitive capacities are transformed by

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the internalisation of public symbolic representations of numerals and number words.

The transformation of the body schema Gallagher (2005) gives a historical overview of the development of the concepts of body image and body schema, respectively. A body image consists of a system of perceptions, attitudes, and beliefs pertaining to ones own body. (2005, 24) A body schema is a system of sensory-motor capacities that function without awareness or the necessity of perceptual monitoring. (2005, 24) So the difference between body image and body schema is like the difference between a perception (or conscious monitoring) of movement and the actual accomplishment of ones own movement (2005, 24) I will concentrate on the body schema. Body schemas are subpersonal processes that dynamically govern posture and movement and Gallagher claims that they do this in a close to automatic way (Gallagher 2005, 26). Repertoires of body schemas function together as motor programmes (Gallagher 2005). Some motor programmes are learned such as riding a bike and writing and some are innate such as swallowing. They are only close to automatic, because they can be part of a goal-directed activity, such as catching a ball in a game of cricket or baseball. There are higher level goals and intentions involved in this action, but our consciousness is not directed at the movements of our body, but at the ball. Hence, we are not aware of the functions of the body schema in governing our posture and movement, in so far as these are part of a goal-directed activity. Consequently, the body schemas that control my bodily actions cannot be understood in purely physiological terms. The physical environment, the size and shape of the ball, along with the effects of all my previous practice (or lack thereof), and even the rules of the game as they are habitually expressed in the practiced movements of my body, may define how I jump to make a catch. Without a certain amount of selectivity, built up by practice and the cultivation of habitual movements, the body might move in any one of multiple ways, since the possibilities allowed by physiology are much greater than the particular movements necessary to catch the ball in the proper way. Thus the body schema is much more selectively attuned to its environment than what physiology on its own will specify. (Gallagher 2005, 143) The selective tuning of the body schema to its environment is developed through habituation, practice and training. In the first instance one learns how to catch a ball and then one trains to perfect the technique, one might do so by imitating the movements of a teacher. The learned movements are practised until one is habituated to make the right moves appropriate to the situation. Learning and training require us to learn the right movements and to apply them in the right ways, to do so in conformity with the rules and laws of the game. The cultural and social

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sedimentation of our body schemas fundamentally shape the ways that we move, intentionally act and come to communicate with others. There is a clear and fundamental sense in which body schemas become integrated with the environment and it is to this that I next turn. One of the important things about schemas and motor programmes is that they can exhibit a high degree of integration with the environment. In these cases, the body schema incorporates parts of the environment that are not incorporated into the body image9such as the hammer in the carpenters hand (Gallagher 2005, 37). The integration has a phenomenological aspect, where a part of the environment can feel like an extension to the body; in these cases, the body schema goes beyond the narrow boundary that is apparent from the body image. It also has a neural aspect: This extension of the body schema into its surrounding environment is reflected in its neural representations. Not only do bimodal premotor, parietal, and putaminal neuronal areas that represent a given limb or body area also respond to visual stimulation in the environmental space nearby, for some of these neurons the visual receptive field remains anchored to the body part when it moves (Fogassi et al. 1996; Graziano and Gross 1998; Graziano et al. 1994). (Gallagher 2005, 37) A clear example of this is the work by Maravita and Iriki (2004) on training Japanese Macaques in tool use. The Macaques were trained to use a rake to pull food placed on a table towards them. Maravita and Iriki (2004) report that several changes to the receptive field of bimodal neurons were observed in Macaques who were trained to use the rake. These changes in the properties of bimodal neurons occurred only after active, intentional usage of the tool, not its mere grasping by the hand. (Maravita and Iriki 2004, 81) The vRFs of these bimodal neurons now extends to include the hand and entire tool, the tool is now incorporated into the body schema.10 Body schemas do not just initiate behaviour they are fully integrated with the environment. They are constrained by the environment because they often require its perceptual navigation and the manipulation of environmental objects. Therefore, the body shapes itself to meet the environment, to hold a glass in hand or grip a pencil between fingers and thumb for writing. Body schemas are attuned to environmental affordances for action (Gibson 1979), the glass affords drinking and the pencil writing. It is in the fluid manipulation of objects in the environment and in fluent skilled activities that we are most likely to find the unconscious integration of the body schema with the environment. Experienced drivers will understand the nature of this integration which involves the seamless co-ordination of body and car, sometimes to such an extent that one cannot recall the details of the journey when the destination is reached (Gallagher 2005). Although the body image involves conscious experience of our own bodies and that experience is of a bounded body the body schema has no such boundary, it directs our primary embodied engagements with the world and it is because of this that we feel ourselves to be both in and part of the
9

10

The body image ends at the periphery of the body. See also Clark 2008 p.38, see Gallagher 2005 and Menary 2007a, b for earlier discussions.

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world. Furthermore, it is constitutive of our first cognitive engagements with the world, our perceptual navigation, our imitation of others and our manipulation of the environment. The expert Tetris players in K&Ms study have developed motor programmes for manipulating the buttons that transform the zoids on the screen. As experts, their well-trained body schemas result in fluent and fluid actions, they do not need to consciously rehearse the next action. Note though, that the manipulation of the buttons is itself a normative practice, something that is learned and habituated. In Vygotskys example of indication, the child develops a habit of gesturing and reaching, which comes to have a communicative functionfirst for others, but then also for the child itself. The body is also transformed to be able to write and draw and create representational structures. It does so by incorporating the tools for manipulating representations into the body schema, but also by mastery of the norms which regulate those manipulations. In the next section, I look at the transformation of our capacity to think mathematically by the internalisation of number systems.

The transformation of mathematical thinking Stanislas Dehaene (a cognitive neuroscientist) and colleagues have produced stunning results and a compelling model that shows that we think in an internalised conventional representational system. Dehaene argues that we have a basic analogical and nonlinguistic capacity to recognise quantity and number located in the inferior parietal lobe of the brain. However, that biological sense of number is not the whole of the story because there is also an acquired ability to think in terms of discrete numbers in the left frontal lobe. What we have here is the difference between a non-linguistic continuous representation of quantities and an acquired, discrete and linguistic representation of individual numbers from our numeral system, including individual words for numbers. The two capacities work together but the internalisation of the public numeral system allows us to perform the kind of digital mathematical operations that are required for most arithmetic and mathematical operations (Nieder and Dehaene 2009, 197). Our cognitive capacities for mathematical thinking are thereby transformed. The public numeral system and its internalisation allow for new representational formats and new operationsor manipulations of those representations. In Vygotskys sense, digital or precise mathematical thinking occurs first on the intermental plane and only secondarily on the intramental plane. The model that emerges suggests that we all possess an intuition about numbers and a sense of quantities and of their additive nature. Upon this central kernel of understanding are grafted the arbitrary cultural symbols of words and numbers. The arithmetic intuition that we inherit through evolution is continuous and approximate. The learning of words and numbers makes it digital and precise. Symbols give us access to sequential algorithms for exact calculations. (Dehaene 2007, 41) Dehaenes well-known experiments to establish the difference between the inexact continuous and analogical part of our thinking and the exact discrete and digital part were based around behavioural evidence and imaging data. In the first

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series of experiments (Dehaene et al. 1999), RussianEnglish bilinguals were taught a set of exact and approximate sums of two digit numbers in one of their languages (1999, 970). Their tasks were split into giving exact answers to additions and giving an approximate answer to the addition task. The interesting result was that When tested on trained exact addition problems, subjects performed faster in the teaching language than in the untrained language, whether they were trained in Russian or English. (Dehaene et al. 1999, p. 971) This provided evidence that knowledge of arithmetic was being stored in a linguistic format, and that there was a switching cost between the trained and untrained languages. By contrast, there was equivalent performance in the approximation task, and no switching cost between the trained and untrained languages. Dehaene et al. conclude that this provides evidence that the knowledge acquired by exposure to approximate problems was stored in a language-independent form. (1999, p. 971) The second set of studies used fMRI scans of the brain. The scans revealed greater activation in the bilateral parietal lobes for the approximation tasks than for the exact calculation (Dehaene et al. 1999, p. 971). The areas of the brain activated during the approximation tasks are networks responsible for visuo-spatial representations. During exact calculation tasks, the scans revealed a large and strictly leftlateralized activation in the left inferior frontal lobe. (Dehaene et al. 1999, p. 972) These areas have been found to be activated in word-association tasks indicating that for the exact calculations, there was a network involved in the language-dependent coding of exact addition facts as verbal associations. (1999, p. 972) The deeply transformative power of our learning histories in the cognitive niche is one that reformats the representational capacities of the brain in terms of public symbol systems. We internalise public symbol systems in the way Dehaene suggests, but we also learn techniques for manipulating those symbol systems in public space. In learning the manipulative techniques, the first transformation is one of sensory motor abilities for creating and manipulating public symbols, we learn algorithms like: carry the two and this is an example of the application of the cognitive norms (outlined above). This is something we learn to do on the page, in public space, before we do it in our heads. We might argue that this is a case of scaffolding or augmentation, but it looks clear that our capacities to think have been transformed, but in this instance they are capacities to manipulate symbols in public space. This is a way of showing that the transformation of our cognitive capacities has publicly recognisable features. This ought not to be a surprise given that the cognitive niche is socially constructed. There are several explanatory options available at this point: 1. The only really cognitive elements are in the brain and although the brain is transformed by public symbol systems nevertheless thats where cognition takes place, 2. The capacities to manipulate public symbols are mere scaffolds for our limited online capacities. 3. Is quite differentthat development in the cognitive niche results in an integrated cognitive system (a position I have argued for elsewhere, Menary 2007a)the integrated cognitive system is the system which has been through the dual component process of transformation where one gains mastery over the

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symbol system in public space and that leads to a transformation of our limited cognitive capacities such that one can complete cognitive tasks either by manipulating symbols in public space or by manipulating symbols in neural space or very possibly by a combination of both sets of resources. That is not to say that notebooks, pieces of paper and so on are parts of the organism, it is simply to say that certain cognitive capacities have both their inner and outer manifestations and that seems to me to go beyond Sterelnys scaffolding position (2010) and not fall prey to the constitutive error which is so often levelled at the extended mind (Adams and Aizawa 2008).

Conclusion Mental capacities work across a multitude of dimensions. There is an increasing abundance of evidence that some of those dimensions involve processes that are composed of bodily manipulations of the environment. Against this evidence, one can persist in denying the importance of the cognitive niche both for actual cases of thinking and for our explanatory models of how we think. I have argued that we should be willing to give a strongly embodied and embedded explanation of cases of manipulation of the cognitive niche. The transformation of our cognitive capacities by development in the niche also shows that when we think in our heads we are also thinking with the representational resources of the cognitive niche. Furthermore, when we manipulate those same representational forms publically, in the niche, we are still thinking. References
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