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9 - Clarifying the Character of Habits

Understanding What and How They Explain

from Part II - The Enactment of Habits in Mind and World

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  24 November 2020

By
Daniel D. Hutto  and
Ian Robertson
Edited by
Fausto Caruana  and
Italo Testa
Fausto Caruana
Affiliation:
Institute of Neuroscience (Parma), Italian National Research Council
Italo Testa
Affiliation:
Università degli Studi, Parma
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Summary

This chapter aims to set the record straight about a special sort of intelligence exhibited by habitual doings. It defends an enactivist account of habitual doings which, at its core, depicts habits as flexible and adjustable modes of response that are world directed and context sensitive. So understood, habits are wholly unlike the exercise of blind mechanisms or mindless reflexes. Nevertheless, we resist the familiar forced choice of thereby understanding habits in standard cognitivist terms. Our proposal aims to avoid the twin mistakes of either underintellectualizing or overintellectualizing habits. In tune with our enactivist elucidation of the core character of habits, the chapter also explicates how habits, so conceived, can support and thwart our larger projects.

Keywords

habitsbehaviorismcognitivismintentional actionnonintentional actionreason explanations
Type
Chapter
Information
Habits
Pragmatist Approaches from Cognitive Science, Neuroscience, and Social Theory
 , pp. 204 - 222
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2020

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