[Xmca-l] Re: mediate perception and direct perception

[David H Kirshner]

Thanks for replies. 
I'm recalling several years ago Jim Greeno decided to stop talking about situated cognition because the pragmatics of adjectival use implies there has to be a contrasting non-situated cognition. He now speaks of situativity theory. It seems, with the exception of physical reflexes (and perhaps pre-conscious infant activity), all human action is mediated (and perhaps a lot of non-human action, as well). So, it's worth noting that "mediated action" doesn't specify a kind of action, but rather a theoretical assumption about all human action; though there seems to be some variation in interpretation of what that assumption entails. 
David


-----Original Message-----
From: xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu [mailto:xmca-l-bounces@mailman.ucsd.edu] On Behalf Of Rod Parker-Rees
Sent: Saturday, September 13, 2014 12:51 PM
To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
Subject: [Xmca-l] Re: mediate perception and direct perception

Many thanks for this Michael but I would (humbly) want to take issue with Gibson's apparent assumption here, that children attribute meaning or information to words, images etc. as context-independent 'objects'. I was particularly interested in Shotter's emphasis on 'withness thinking' because I had come to the conclusion that babies' first awareness is of their interactions (with people and with whatever they can get hold of in their environment) rather than of people or things as objects. This also fitted well with Vasu Reddy's distinction between the 'third person perspective' adopted in many developmental psychology studies and the 'second person perspective' which is characteristic of social interactions (especially the more playful, 'full-on' kind). Gibson wants to use 'mediated perception' to refer only to representations but I think we also need to acknowledge the role of mediation in giving meaning to attention itself (the sharing of meaning that is afforded by shared attention). I am not convinced that babies simply or directly relate pictures of things (or 'names' of things) with context-free, ideal concepts of those things. I think it is much more likely that the association is with past (inter) actions WITH similar things, interactions which are heavily mediated by the values and meanings which others attach to the infant's actions. We 'soak up' intuitive or not consciously noticed information about other people's responses to our actions and this social information becomes part of the meaning of these actions.

Rod

-----Original Message-----
From: xmca-l-bounces+rod.parker-rees=plymouth.ac.uk@mailman.ucsd.edu [mailto:xmca-l-bounces+rod.parker-rees=plymouth.ac.uk@mailman.ucsd.edu] On Behalf Of Glassman, Michael
Sent: 13 September 2014 18:20
To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
Subject: [Xmca-l] mediate perception and direct perception


Mike, David, whoever

Tried to find the original message to respond to but this mail program has become too mediated.

Here is a short essay by (speaking of) Gibson, I guess related to what I was saying,

http://www.trincoll.edu/depts/ecopsyc/perils/folder3/mediated.html

I wonder if it challenges Shotters idea.

Michael

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