PhD Thesis: Mental Life, a naturalized approach to the autonomy of cognitive agents

Recent advances in modelling complex adaptive systems through computer simulation have reconfigured the way in which mechanistic explanations can conceptualize the mind. The goal of the thesis is to make explicit the construction of a model for Minds as a complex generative organization. For doing so, and under the difficulties of current approaches to specify cognitive systems as distinct from generic computational or dynamical ones, the construction of a model for minds departs from a minimalist, universal and naturalized conception of agency. Three conditions are state to provide a satisfactory account of agency: self-generated individuality, normativity and causal-asymmetry. A morphophylogenetic approach is proposed whereby increasingly complex models of agency are generated from the bottom-up. The morphophylogenetic reconstruction starts with the origins of life as the emergence of a self-encapsulated chemical network capable to maintain and repair itself. The autonomous organization of living organisms is shown to be capable to satisfy the three conditions for agency. Taking biological autonomy as a departure point the thesis covers the main organizational evolutionary transitions of agency that lead to bilaterian organisms. A number of case studies (E. coli, A. digitale and C. elegans) are provided to illustrate different aspects of such transitions until adaptive behaviour (made possible by multicellular organisms endowed with a nervous systems and mechanically articulated bodies) is precisely defined and its modelling process made explicit. The mechanisms underlying biologically adaptive behaviour are evaluated to test whether they are capable to provide a satisfactory model for minds. A number of problems are found and made explicit for the project of grounding intentionality in biological (metabolic) organization. An alternative research avenue is proposed in which it is the autonomy of behaviour (and not that of its underlying infrastructure) what serves to naturalize intentional agency. It is argued that under certain body and environmental conditions the nervous system will evolve making possible more plastic, flexible and integrated (i.e. more complex) behaviour. In turn, complex behaviour makes possible the emergence of a new level of normativity and functionality in living beings, that provided by the developmental history of neural organization, leading to a progressive autonomy of sensorimotor interactions and generating what might be called Mental Life. To characterize it we introduce the notion of neurodynamic sensorimotor structures as the main components of cognitive organization. Mental life is an open process by which dynamic structures appear nested on a self-sustaining web of stability dependencies. The mind has a life of its own: a self-maintaining dynamic organization that remains open to its world in order to maintain its coherency and identity. We defend that the appearance of an open process of sensorimotor interactions sustained by the nervous system and normatively regulated by its bioregulatory embodiment (an emotional world) gives rise to cognitive phenomena, embedded on but distinct from biological organization. Metal life constitutes a mechanistic generative model for minds and provides a number of new insights on the way in which cognitive and mindful properties could be conceptualized and modelled in contemporary cognitive science and philosophy of mind.