On Embodied Cognition

In recent years, phenomenology's contribution to cognitive science has become a research hot in phenomenology study of America and Europe. Though this problem is very important, there are no relevant articles and books in China. In this case, it is very necessary and valuable to study this problem in order to advance work on both phenomenology and cognitive science. And that brings about the thesis of the dissertation. There is a paradigm shift from disembodied cognition to embodied cognition in cognitive science, and the thesis commits itself to discussing phenomenology's contribution in this paradigm shift including criticizing disembodied cognition and accounting for how embodied cognition can benefit from phenomenology's theory on the body.In introduction, the paper puts forward that the paradigm shift from disembodied cognition to embodied cognition in cognitive science is similar to the development from Husserl's transcendental phenomenology to Merleau-Ponty's and others' body phenomenology, or they are isomorphic. It means Heidegger's, Merleau-Ponty's and other phenomenologists' critics of the limits of traditional philosophy and Husserl can apply to disembodied cognition. Moreover, most of cognitive scientists don't understand the body properly, and phenomenology's theory on the body can help them to comprehend the body and how body plays a critic role in cognitive activities.In the Chapter 1, it seeks to criticize embodied cognition which is the dominant paradigm in the cognitive science from a phenomenological perspective. According to the central hypothesis of embodied cognition, cognition is the manipulation of representations and the body can be ignored. The artificial intelligence which reflectsdisembodied cognition attitudes has three unexamined philosophical assumptions------psychological assumption, epistemological assumption and ontological assumption. At the root of the philosophy of embodied cognition, it is noted that Husserl's intentionality theory has the similar idea and limitations as disembodied cognition, because they all try to base meaning and intelligibility on the abstract mental structure. Moreover, Heidegger is a critical bridge between disembodied cognition and embodied cognition since his criticism of Husserl and the whole traditional philosophy is just criticism of disembodied cognition.In the following Chapter 2, it holds that according to phenomenology's theory on...