From Life to Higher Cognition: Autonomy, Know-How and the Radical Turn.

This paper defends the partial continuities—that are sometimes called "kinks"—in the evolutionary trajectory from biology to cognition and from basic to higher cognition. Building on Radical Enactivism (Hutto and Myin in Radicalizing enactivism: basic minds without content, MIT Press, Cambridge, 201...

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Publicado en:Topoi: An International Review of Philosophy Vol. 45; no. 2; pp. 321 - 330
Autores principales: Rolla, Giovanni, Fernandes, Manoel Abreu, Oliveira, Alexandre Lohmann
Formato: Artículo
Publicado: Springer Nature May2026
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Acceso en línea:Ver este registro en EBSCOhost
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        atl: From Life to Higher Cognition: Autonomy, Know-How and the Radical Turn.
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        au:
          Rolla, Giovanni
          Fernandes, Manoel Abreu
          Oliveira, Alexandre Lohmann
        affil: https://ror.org/03k3p7647 Federal University of Bahia (UFBA), São Lázaro Road, 197, Federação, 40-210730, Salvador, BA, Brazil
      su:
        Autonomy (Psychology)
        Expertise
        Biological evolution
        Autopoiesis
        Cognition
        Sociocultural factors
      sug:
        subj:
          Autonomy (Psychology)
          Expertise
          Biological evolution
          Autopoiesis
          Cognition
          Sociocultural factors
      keyword:
        Biological autonomy
        Emergence
        Higher cognition
        Mind-life continuity thesis
        Philosophy and Religious Studies Philosophy
        Radical enactivism
      ab: This paper defends the partial continuities—that are sometimes called "kinks"—in the evolutionary trajectory from biology to cognition and from basic to higher cognition. Building on Radical Enactivism (Hutto and Myin in Radicalizing enactivism: basic minds without content, MIT Press, Cambridge, 2013; Hutto and Myin in Evolving enactivism: basic minds meet content, The MIT Press, Cambridge, 2017), we reject the view that equates biological processes with cognition, focusing instead on the conceptual bridges needed to connect these domains. The first partial continuity, between life and mind, is explored through Moreno and Mossio's (Biological autonomy: a philosophical and theoretical enquiry, Springer, Dordrecht, 2015) framework of biological autonomy, which updates the enactivist notion of autopoiesis. Autonomy as "closure of constraints" explains how living systems maintain self-organization, distinguishing them from purely physicochemical systems and avoiding reductionism. The second partial continuity we explore addresses the transition from basic to higher cognition, where Radical Enactivism commits to pervasive know-how. This practical, non-representational knowledge links the active exploration of environmental settings and symbolic cognition, offering a unified yet non-reductive account of cognition. We conclude by considering the role of autonomy in sociocultural practices, showing how collective constraints on symbol use mirror biological self-organization. By integrating autonomy and know-how, this account enriches Radical Enactivism, bridging theoretical gaps and providing a robust framework for understanding cognition as a multi-layered phenomenon.
      pubtype: Academic Journal
      doctype: Article
      src: R
    language: English
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