The notion that human activity can be characterised in terms of dynamic systems is a well-established alternative to motor schema approaches. Key to a dynamic systems approach is the idea that a system seeks to achieve stable states in the face of perturbation. While such an approach can apply to physical activity, it can be challenging to accept that dynamic systems also describe cognitive activity. In this paper, we argue that creativity, which could be construed as a ‘cognitive’ activity par (...) excellence, arises from the dynamic systems involved in jewellery making. Knowing whether an action has been completed to a ‘good’ standard is a significant issue in considering acts in creative disciplines. When making a piece of jewellery, there a several criteria which can define ‘good’. These are not only the aesthetics of the finished piece but also the impact of earlier actions on subsequent ones. This suggests that the manner in which an action is coordinated is influenced by the criteria by which the product is judged. We see these criteria as indicating states for the system, e.g. in terms of a space of ‘good’ outcomes and a complementary space of ‘bad’ outcomes. The skill of the craftworker is to navigate this space of available states in such a way as to minimise risk, effort and other costs and maximise benefit and quality of the outcome. In terms of postphenomonology, this paper explores Ihde’s human-technology relations and relates these to the concepts developed here. (shrink)

Crime scene investigation is a form of Distributed Cognition. The principal concept we explore in this paper is that of `resource for action'. It is proposed that crime scene investigation employs four primary resources-for-action: the environment, or scene itself, which affords particular forms of search and object retrieval; the retrieved objects, which afford translation into evidence; the procedures that guide investigation, which both constrain the search activity and also provide opportunity for additional activity; the narratives that different agents within the (...) system produce to develop explanatory models and formal accounts of the crime. For each aspect of distributed cognition, we consider developments in technology that could support activity. (shrink)

Crime scene investigation is a form of Distributed Cognition. The principal concept we explore in this paper is that of `resource for action'. It is proposed that crime scene investigation employs four primary resources-for-action: the environment, or scene itself, which affords particular forms of search and object retrieval; the retrieved objects, which afford translation into evidence; the procedures that guide investigation, which both constrain the search activity and also provide opportunity for additional activity; the narratives that different agents within the (...) system produce to develop explanatory models and formal accounts of the crime. For each aspect of distributed cognition, we consider developments in technology that could support activity. (shrink)

The examination of a scene of crime provides both an interesting case study and analogy for consideration of Distributed Cognition. In this paper, Distribution is defined by the number of agents involved in the criminal justice process, and in terms of the relationship between a Crime Scene Examiner and the environment being searched.

In this paper, I question the notion that tool-use must be driven by an internal representation which specifies the “motor program” enacted in the behaviour of the tool-user. Rather, it makes more sense to define tool-use in terms of characteristics of the dynamics of this behaviour. As the behaviour needs to be adjusted to suit changes in context, so there is unlikely to be a one-to-one, linear mapping between an action and its effect. Thus, tool-use can best be described using (...) concepts from Nonlinear Dynamics. Such an approach can be used to create a sort of cybernetic model of tool-use. However, there is a danger that such a model can either lead us back to internal representations or could fail to capture cognitive aspects of behaviour. In particular, the question of how the craftworker’s intent can be enacted in the use of tools to produce a specific object seems to be lost in the cybernetic account. My solution is two-fold. First, the “model” is created on-the-fly and adapted through moment-by-moment interactions in the system of tool-user–tool–material–environment. This means that, rather than assuming a pre-defined internal representation that drives behaviour, I propose that cognition involves the selection of salient parameters that characterize the behaviour and the continued monitoring and management of behaviour in terms of these parameters. Second, intent is only loosely defined a priori but crystallizes through the continued interactions between craftworker and object through a process in which the affordances of the object become apparent to, and responded to by, the craftworker. (shrink)

This article presents preliminary considerations and results from a research project designed to investigate the relation between gestures, graphic traces and perceptions. More specifically, the project aims to test the hypothesis that graphic traces, including handwriting, can set up graphetic empathy between writers and readers of traces across long temporal and spatial distances. Insofar as a graphic trace is lawfully related to the gesture by which it came into being, the trace itself will hold information about the gesture, which may (...) resonate with the sensorimotor system of a perceiver, as if they themselves performed the gesture. If this is in fact so, it will have important and hitherto unanticipated implications for our understanding of the embodiment of reading. As part of the article we will present and discuss the results of a neurophenomenological trial study through which we attempt to operationalize the gesture-trace and trace–perception relations respectively. (shrink)