Radical Embodied Cognitive Science

Abstract

This paper briefly introduces radical embodied cognitive science (RECS) and places it in historical perspective. Radical embodied cognitive science is an interdisciplinary approach to psychology that combines ideas from the phenomenological tradition with ecological psychology and dynamical systems modeling. It is argued that radical embodied cognitive science has a long history; it is as a direct descendent of the Jamesian functionalist approach to psychology. This approach to psychology is contrasted with the current trend of supplementing standard cognitive psychology with occasional references to the body. In contrast with these trends, radical embodied cognitive science is skeptical of the explanatory usefulness of mental representations. The future prospects of radical embodied cognitive science and the broader functionalist framework are discussed.