O papel do corpo na emergência da mente (consciente): o problema da percepção-ação na exploração do ambiente a partir das perspectivas ecológicas e teorias enativistas

Abstract

The master’s dissertation I present through this abstract draws its general motivations and purposes from the classic problem of mind-body relations. More specifically, this dissertation focuses on philosophical issues which concern the theoretical and conceptual substrates of the discussion about the origins, nature of consciousness and its place in nature. It is public knowledge that the origins of our debate go back more than 2 millennia, and that, therefore, its history precedes at least 2,000 years what we now call the problem of the relationship between the mind and the brain. Whether in pre-Hellenic times - in the midst of reflections raised by Orientals about the status of consciousness - or among the ancient, medieval, modern and contemporary, there was not a time when the problem of mind-body relations was approached. It is not by chance that investigations about the origin of consciousness impact on issues of existence that are not even trivial. Among these, we can quote: which criteria and / or criteria identifies (or classifies) consciousness? Is consciousness an entity, a substance or a process? Are we a brain, a body or a mind? Until the end of the 19th century, it is true that investigations into the problem of the relationship between the mind and the body were confined to merely conceptual speculations. From the 20th and 21st century onwards, empirical sciences in general, especially those of the brain, began to include new and decisive data in their approach. This technological, conceptual and epistemological contribution of the 20th and 21st centuries has created, within the contemporary philosophy of mind, a great potential for new equations of the millennial issues regarding the explanatory gaps present in the physical-mental dichotomy. Considering this context, and without falling into the dangers of a reductionist approach, my dissertation is structured to cover some of the main discriminating and defining aspects of human consciousness. For that, I will seek a theoretical and conceptual design that will allow me to offer an alternative answer to the dichotomy materialism versus dualism, substantiality of the mind versus cerebral reductionism. The main thesis to be defended here is that, from the point of view of its place in nature, consciousness is at the apex of mental processes that, from the neural point of view, find their origin in overlapping, interwoven and reentrant processes, fruits of inseparable relations of interaction and integration between the body, the brain and the environment. And, in this context, the purpose of addressing the problem of the relationship between the mind and the body is to explore in general the structural and physiological reasons that support the thesis that the body is essential and cannot be neglected in its structuring role of the conscious mind. The dissertation aspires to discuss the general viability of the embodied perspectives associated with contemporary emergentist perspectives and which propose to subsidize theories dedicated to investigating the nature and origin of mental life. The two theoretical fronts present, in their favor, the possibility of an interdisciplinary management of the problem of mind-body relations in its aspects to its conceptual and theoretical dimensions. Based on this orientation towards the problem of the relations between the mind and the body, the assumption is that the defense of a naturalistic perspective does not commit to the reductive agenda that is fundamentally anchored in the cerebralist paradigm. The assumption in question is that consciousness is a biological characteristic of a functioning organism. It is, to be more precise, a systemic property or a process that emerges from the relations of integration and interaction between the body, the brain and the environment. Hence the thesis that each higher level is inextricably dependent on its basic precursors, and that, however, the upper levels contain instances or properties that are not found in the previous levels. Finally, I will deal with the problem of the organism’s perception-action in the exploration of the environment, and of how the examination of the perception-action relations become an important theoretical subsidy provided by the enativistic theories and ecological perspectives, thus contributing to support of the theoretical position based on the perspective of the embodied mind.