From a philosopher and a neuropsychologist, a radical rethinking of
certain traditional views about human cognition and behavior.
Plato's Allegory of the Cave trapped us in the illusion that mind is
separate from body and from the natural and physical world. Knowledge
had to be eternal and absolute. Recent scientific advances, however,
show that our bodies shape mind, thought, and language in a deep and
pervasive way. In Out of the Cave, Mark Johnson and Don Tucker--a
philosopher and a neuropsychologist--propose a radical rethinking of
certain traditional views about human cognition and behavior. They argue
for a theory of knowing as embodied, embedded, enactive, and emotionally
based. Knowing is an ongoing process--shaped by our deepest biological
and cultural values.
Johnson and Tucker describe a natural philosophy of mind that is
emerging through the convergence of biology, psychology, computer
science, and philosophy, and they explain recent research showing that
all of our higher-level cognitive activities are rooted in our bodies
through processes of perception, motive control of action, and feeling.
This developing natural philosophy of mind offers a psychological,
philosophical, and neuroscientific account that is at once
scientifically valid and subjectively meaningful--allowing us to know
both ourselves and the world.
