[Xmca-l] Re: Dynamics of Developmental Change

[Rod Parker-Rees]

It seems odd that we talk about 'theory' developing, since this tends to imply  an unfolding process (though I am well aware that it doesn't have so much of this connotation to xmca people). The shift from a life in which meaning inheres in contexts to one in which meaning is understood through concepts can be seen as internalisation of the actions and reactions of other people. We don't UNDERSTAND a concept unless we know something about how it is used by other people so even the events which happen inside an 'individual' head are products of earlier intra/interactions with others.

So it takes more than one brain to make a mind.

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 Lplarry
Sent: 11 September 2015 16:01
To: eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity
Subject: [Xmca-l] Re: Dynamics of Developmental Change

Rod,
The notion *theory* as projection  of adults ways of orienting within beliefs develops.

The notion of "mind" within "events" is a further question? Does mind exist prior to activities (which are invisible). The first principle of activity theory is that activities can never be observed or focused upon or approached DIRECTLY.
Or are mental (events) expressed actions that can be directly observed (as gestures) and are animated phenomena and we have the potential capacity to enter into reciprocal inter (or intra) subjective mental (events) A third notion of mental (events) is that they are not invisible activities nor inter/intra ACTIONS which express invisible activities but mental (events) actually reside within the interior of each person guiding our actions and tool use.
In other words are mental (events) emergent phenomena that emerge through invisible activities observed within our animated actions.
Or are mental (events) the  inter (or intra) ACTIONS which express the actual invisible activities.
Or are mental (events) orienting within interior places (inside our head or body).

I am not clear where mental (events) are located? It seems to depend on where we locate animating phenomena.
My bias appreciates Rod and Mike speculating that primary intersubjevtivity as a place to enter the development of mental (events) Larry

-----Original Message-----
From: "Huw Lloyd" <huw.softdesigns@gmail.com>
Sent: ‎2015-‎09-‎11 7:11 AM
To: "eXtended Mind, Culture, Activity" <xmca-l@mailman.ucsd.edu>
Subject: [Xmca-l] Re: Dynamics of Developmental Change

Martin,

What does it mean to state that a developmental being lacks some faculty that is potentially available to them?  It seems to me it either means that this faculty lacks sophistication (and that it is then technically incorrect to say that they lack the faculty per se) or that the claimant is making a logical fallacy by applying idioms of formal logic to a genetic or developmental domain.

Why should a nascent, genetically conceived ToM be something that is interior?

Best,
Huw




On 11 September 2015 at 14:20, Martin John Packer <mpacker@uniandes.edu.co>
wrote:

> David, Carol,
>
> Why not attribute a theory of mind to infants?
>
> First, because it seems extraordinary to suggest that infants are
> capable of forming theories. Piaget certainly never suggested that
> sensorimotor intelligence involved the forming of theories. Vygotsky
> argued that infants are incapable of verbal thinking, which would also
> seem to rule out the ability to form theories.
>
> Second, because there is no reason to think that infants know anything
> at all about mental states such as beliefs and desires. Piaget didn't
> attribute such knowledge to infants. Vygotsky argued that children are
> not aware of their own 'interiority' until around school age, and if
> this is the case it is hard to see how they could know about the
> interiority of other people.
>
> Third, the researcher responsible for identifying the phenomena of
> primary intersubjectivity, Colwyn Trevarthen, does not explain it in
> terms of theory of mind.
>
> Martin
>
>
>
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