Radically Embodied Introspection (accepted in Topoi)

Introspection is often intuitively conceptualized as a “purely inner” activity, whereby the introspector temporarily breaks their coupling with the external world to focus on their “inner environment”. In this paper, we put forth a substantially different picture of introspection. Inspired by radically embodied cognitive science, we argue that introspective processes delivering substantial self-knowledge consist of embodied, world-involving activities wherein the introspector remains coupled with the world in specific, controlled ways. Our argument unfolds as follows: after a brief introduction, we provide a minimal - and hopefully uncontroversial - account of introspection (§2) followed by a brief introduction to radically embodied views of the mind (§3). Then, in (§4), we will present in detail a case of radical embodied introspection (§4.1), argue that that case is indeed a case of introspection (§4.2), and defend the claim from some foreseeable objections (§4.3). In (§5) we will provide further cases of radically embodied introspection, showing that it is in fact a widespread and varied phenomenon. Lastly, (§6) concludes the paper sketching some morals to be drawn from our examples.