The Embodied Philosopher : Living in Pursuit of Boundary Questions

The book is the first formulation of a meta-philosophical scheme rooted in the embodied cognition paradigm. The latter views subjects capable of cognition and experience as living, embodied creatures coupled with their environments. On the other hand, the emergence of experimental philosophy has given rise to a new context in which philosophers have begun to search for a more thorough definition of philosophical competence. The time is ripe for these two trends to join their efforts. Therefore, the book discusses what it means for a human being thought of as a living subject to pursue philosophy. In this context, in contrast to the existing literature, __philosophical__ competence must not be conflated with competence __in philosophy__. The former is a skill or attitude. The book refers to this peculiar attitude as the __recognition of one’s epistemic position__. Contents 1: Introduction: Philosophizing as a Peculiar Pursuit 1.1 What Is It Like to Philosophize? Toward a Bottom-Up Meta-philosophy 1.2 Troubles with Philosophy: The Strategy of Escaping Forward 1.3 Challenging the Institutional Approach to Philosophy 1.4 Chapter to-Go References 2: Questioning the Comparability of (Philosophical) Beliefs 2.1 The Puzzle of Comparability 2.2 Comparability in Practice: Some Initial Concerns 2.3 Expertise Defense, Reflection Defense, and the Like 2.4 Different Embodiments of the Subject 2.5 Against the Philosophers vs. Non-philosophers Dichotomy 2.6 Beliefs and Questions 2.7 Different Embodiments of “Philosophical” Acts of Believing 2.8 Two Kinds of Commitment 2.9 Against the Institutional Approach 2.10 Expertise Defense Revisited 2.11 Conclusion References 3: Erotetic Intuition: Toward a Logic of Questions, and Beyond 3.1 Questioning Questions 3.2 On Posing Questions: Preliminary Remarks on Erotetics 3.3 Questions, Desiderata, and Knowledge 3.4 Nicholas Rescher’s Approach 3.5 Expanding Rescher’s Approach: Desiderata and Possible Worlds 3.6 Desideratum–Saturata Pairs 3.7 The “Logic” Behind the Emergence of Questions 3.8 How Do We Know What We Want to Know? 3.9 Intuitions: Percepts or Beliefs? 3.10 The Erotetic Capacity Is Not Propositional Machinery: The Assumptions Underlying the Main Argument 3.11 Arguments for Assumption 1 3.12 The Argument for Assumption 2 3.13 Erotetic Intuition in Response to Erotetic Skepticism 3.14 The Puzzle of Directness: Stepping Out of Our Heads 3.15 Conclusion: What’s Next References 4: Philosophy as Recognition: Thinking from Inside the Cave 4.1 Assessing the Current State of the Investigation 4.2 Russell and Carnap on the Troubling Nature of Philosophizing 4.3 The Apparent Banality of Philosophical Questions (and Beliefs) 4.4 The Idea of a Radical Beginning 4.5 “The World Is My World” Beyond Wittgenstein: The Recognition of One’s Epistemic Position 4.6 Philosophical Desiderata: Toward the De-banalization of Philosophical Utterances 4.7 Thinking from Within 4.8 Floating Categories 4.9 Machery on the Method of Cases: The Problem of Comparability Reconsidered 4.10 Philosophical Cases and Two Kinds of Desiderata 4.11 Conclusion: Erotetic Intuition Out of Our Heads References 5: The Embodied Philosopher 5.1 From Erotetic Intuition to Embodied Action: An Overview 5.2 Mind and World: A Boundary-Conceptual Perspective 5.3 Being-in-the-World: Rejecting the Cartesian Dichotomy 5.4 The Need for Embodied Erotetics 5.5 Cognition as a Biological Phenomenon: The Life–Mind Continuity Thesis 5.6 The Niche 5.7 The Cognitive Niche 5.8 Cognitive Niche: Troubles with the Base 5.9 The Cognitive Niche: Introducing the Sensorimotor Base 5.10 Cognitive Niche Construction: A Need for an Ontology 5.11 Cognitive Niche Construction: In Search of a Medium 5.12 From Cognitive Niches to Problem Spaces: An Introduction to Embodied Erotetics 5.13 Philosophical Problematization 5.14 The Struggle for Marginal Transgressions: Philosophy as Form and Training References 6: Epilogue: Spandrels and Philosophy 6.1 What Was This Book About? Questions and Answers 6.2 Toward an Anti-reductionist Naturalism About Philosophy References Index The book is the first formulation of a meta-philosophical scheme rooted in the embodied cognition paradigm. The emergence of experimental philosophy has given rise to a new context in which philosophers have begun to search for a more thorough definition of philosophical competence. On the other hand, a new paradigm known as embodied cognition has been proposed in the philosophy of mind. It views subjects capable of cognition and experience as living, embodied creatures coupled with their environments. The time is ripe for these two trends to join their efforts. Therefore, the book discusses what it means for a human being thought of as an living subject to pursue philosophy. In this context, in contrast to the existing literature, philosophical competence must not be conflated with competence in philosophy. The former is a skill or attitude. The book refers to this peculiar attitude as the recognition of one's epistemic position. "In The Embodied Philosopher, Konrad Werner courageously blazes a new trail in metaphilosophy. His approach is bottom-up and seeks to clear up our confusion over the role that intuitions play in philosophical argumentation. In this groundbreaking work, the reader takes delivery of not only how to contend with deep philosophical problems but how to generate the right sort of questions to ask for one to be "doing" philosophy. Anyone from undergraduate to specialist with an interest in metaphilosophy will benefit from Werner's discussion." Joseph Ulatowski, University of Waikato, New Zealand The book is the first formulation of a meta-philosophical scheme rooted in the embodied cognition paradigm. The latter views subjects capable of cognition and experience as living, embodied creatures coupled with their environments. On the other hand, the emergence of experimental philosophy has given rise to a new context in which philosophers have begun to search for a more thorough definition of philosophical competence. The time is ripe for these two trends to join their efforts. Therefore, the book discusses what it means for a human being thought of as a living subject to pursue philosophy. In this context, in contrast to the existing literature, philosophical competence must not be conflated with competence in philosophy . The former is a skill or attitude. The book refers to this peculiar attitude as the recognition of one’s epistemic position .