Habits: plasticity, learning and freedom

Habits: plasticity, learning and freedom

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  • Author: Javier Bernacer
  • Publisher: Frontiers Media SA
  • ISBN: 2889196739
  • Category : Electronic book
  • Languages : en
  • Pages : 150

In present times, certain fields of science are becoming aware of the necessity to go beyond a restrictive specialization, and establish an open dialogue with other disciplines. Such is the case of the approach that neuroscience and philosophy are performing in the last decade. However, this increasing interest in a multidisciplinary perspective should not be understood, in our opinion, as a new phenomenon, but rather as a return to a classical standpoint: a proper understanding of human features –organic, cognitive, volitional, motor or behavioral, for example– requires a context that includes the global dimension of the human being. We believe that grand neuroscientific conclusions about the mind should take into account what philosophical reflection has said about it; likewise, philosophers should consider the organic constitution of the brain to draw inferences about the mind. Thus, both neuroscience and philosophy would benefit from each other’s achievements through a fruitful dialogue. One of the main problems a multidisciplinary group encounters is terminology: the same term has a different scope in various fields, sometimes even contradictory. Such is the case of habits: from a neuroscientific perspective, a habit is a mere automation of an action. It is, therefore, linked to rigidity and limitation. However, from a classical philosophical account, a habit is an enabling capacity acquired through practice, which facilitates, improves and reinforces the performance of certain kind of actions. From neuroscience, habit acquisition restricts a subject’s action to the learnt habit; from philosophy, habit acquisition allows the subject to set a distance from the simple motor performance to cognitively enrich the action. For example, playing piano is a technical habit; considering the neuroscientific account, a pianist would just play those sequences of keystrokes that had been repeatedly practiced in the past. However, according to the philosophical perspective, it would allow the pianist to improvise and, moreover, go beyond the movements of their hands to concentrate in other features of musical interpretation. In other words, a holistic view of habits focuses on the subject’s disposition when facing both known and novel situations. We believe neuroscience could contribute to achieve a deeper understanding of the neural bases of habits, whose complexity could be deciphered by a philosophical reflection. Thus, we propose this Research Topic to increase our understanding on habits from a wide point of view. This collection of new experimental research, empirical and theoretical reviews, general commentaries and opinion articles covers the following subjects: habit learning; implicit memory; computational and complex dynamical accounts of habit formation; practical, cognitive, perceptual and motor habits; early learning; intentionality; consciousness in habits performance; neurological and psychiatric disorders related to habits, such as obsessive-compulsive disorder, stereotypies or addiction; habits as enabling or limiting capacities for the agent


Habits

Habits

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  • Author: Fausto Caruana
  • Publisher: Cambridge University Press
  • ISBN: 1108498442
  • Category : Philosophy
  • Languages : en
  • Pages : 479

This pragmatist interpretation of habits provides a unifying concept for 4E cognitive science, neuroscience, philosophy, and social theory.


Experiential Learning and Outdoor Education

Experiential Learning and Outdoor Education

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  • Author: Jim Parry
  • Publisher: Routledge
  • ISBN: 1000693155
  • Category : Education
  • Languages : en
  • Pages : 204

This book adds to the theoretical development of the emerging fields of experiential learning and outdoor education by examining the central concept, 'experience', and interrogating a central claim of experiential learning: whether, and if so how, a short-term singular experience can transform a participant’s life as a whole and in a permanent way. While such a possibility has been corroborated by the personal testimonies of participants, and the activities of instructors over many years, the book argues that we must go beyond this kind of ‘evidence’. In comparing Anglophone and continental approaches and drawing on the work of Dewey, Dilthey and Merleau-Ponty in the philosophy of experience, Experiential Learning and Outdoor Education presents the first detailed review of the concept of ‘experience’ in European philosophy, as applied to outdoor experiential learning. A vital insight into the field, this is important reading for students and researchers working in the philosophy of sport, and pedagogical theory, especially in areas relating to the outdoors, but also to experiential education more generally.


Computational Intelligence

Computational Intelligence

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  • Author: Christophe Sabourin
  • Publisher: Springer
  • ISBN: 3030164691
  • Category : Technology & Engineering
  • Languages : en
  • Pages : 355

This book presents revised and extended versions of the best papers presented at the 9th International Joint Conference on Computational Intelligence (IJCCI 2017), held in Funchal, Madeira, from 1 to 3 November 2017. It focuses on four of the main fields of computational intelligence: evolutionary computation, fuzzy computation, neural computation, and cognitive and hybrid systems. As well as presenting the recent advances of these areas, it provides new and innovative solutions for established researchers and a source of information and/or inspiration those new to the field. Discussing innovative techniques in various application areas, it is a useful resource for individual researchers and a valuable addition to academic libraries (of universities and engineering schools).


Psycholinguistic Approaches to Instructed Second Language Acquisition

Psycholinguistic Approaches to Instructed Second Language Acquisition

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  • Author: Daniel R. Walter
  • Publisher: Channel View Publications
  • ISBN: 1788928776
  • Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
  • Languages : en
  • Pages : 163

This book applies a psycholinguistic perspective to instructed second language acquisition, seeking to bridge the gap between second language acquisition research and language teaching practices. It challenges the traditional divide between conscious and unconscious processes, or explicit and implicit learning, and re-envisions this as a continuum of the varying levels of consciousness which can be applied by learners to different language behaviors in the second language classroom. It applies this model to learner development and the classroom context, discussing pedagogical applications for instructors at all levels. This book will be of interest to researchers and graduate students in second language acquisition, psycholinguistics and language pedagogy. The accessible discussion of research findings, pedagogical approaches and classroom tasks and activities make this book particularly relevant for language teachers, providing the tools needed to apply second language acquisition research in their classroom.


You Are Not Your Brain

You Are Not Your Brain

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  • Author: Jeffrey Schwartz MD
  • Publisher: Penguin
  • ISBN: 1583334831
  • Category : Psychology
  • Languages : en
  • Pages : 385

Two neuroscience experts explain how their 4-Step Method can help identify negative thoughts and change bad habits for good. A leading neuroplasticity researcher and the coauthor of the groundbreaking books Brain Lock and The Mind and the Brain, Jeffrey M. Schwartz has spent his career studying the human brain. He pioneered the first mindfulness-based treatment program for people suffering from OCD, teaching patients how to achieve long-term relief from their compulsions. Schwartz works with psychiatrist Rebecca Gladding to refine a program that successfully explains how the brain works and why we often feel besieged by overactive brain circuits (i.e. bad habits, social anxieties, etc.) the key to making life changes that you want—to make your brain work for you—is to consciously choose to “starve” these circuits of focused attention, thereby decreasing their influence and strength. You Are Not Your Brain carefully outlines their program, showing readers how to identify negative impulses, channel them through the power of focused attention, and ultimately lead more fulfilling and empowered lives.


Animal Choice and Human Freedom

Animal Choice and Human Freedom

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  • Author: Michael Yudanin
  • Publisher: Lexington Books
  • ISBN: 1793620199
  • Category : Philosophy
  • Languages : en
  • Pages : 291

In Animal Choice and Human Freedom: On the Genealogy of Self-Determined Action, Michael Yudanin argues that describing freedom conceptually is impossible without explaining how it can exist in the world. Yudanin develops an account of freedom’s instantiation in biological agents and provides several prerequisites that are necessary for its exercise. He demonstrates that freedom is linked to the form of life and distinguishes between choice in non-verbal animals and human freedom, where the latter is enabled by the development of language and thus possesses a distinct character. Following this descriptive account, Yudanin explores freedom’s evolutionary history, explaining how it developed in the course of the evolution of species.


John Dewey's Democracy and Education

John Dewey's Democracy and Education

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  • Author: Leonard J. Waks
  • Publisher: Cambridge University Press
  • ISBN: 1108210864
  • Category : Education
  • Languages : en
  • Pages : 691

John Dewey's Democracy and Education is the touchstone for a great deal of modern educational theory. It covers a wide range of themes and issues relating to education, including teaching, learning, educational environments, subject matter, values, and the nature of work and play. This Handbook is designed to help experts and non-experts to navigate Dewey's text. The authors are specialists in the fields of philosophy and education; their chapters offer readers expert insight into areas of Dewey work that they know well and have returned to time and time again throughout their careers. The Handbook is divided into two parts. Part I features short companion chapters corresponding to each of Dewey's chapters in Democracy and Education. These serve to guide readers through the complex arguments developed in the book. Part II features general articles placing the book into historical, philosophical and practical contexts and highlighting its relevance today.


Brain Plasticity and Learning

Brain Plasticity and Learning

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  • Author: Jennifer Anne Hawkins
  • Publisher: Springer Nature
  • ISBN: 3030835308
  • Category : Education
  • Languages : en
  • Pages : 354

This book synthesizes the latest findings on neuroplasticity and learning, drawing on rich phenomenological research carried out with teachers, psychologists, parents and students from around the world to examine the implications for current teaching and for the advancement of learning methods. Building on the author’s previous work in this area, the volume considers in depth the function of feelings and emotions in neuroplastic cognition, and provides an analysis of curriculum debates and assessment systems in the light of neuroplasticity. The final chapters explore the implications of brain plasticity outside of structured learning environments and in society at large. The book will appeal to students and scholars of psychology and education, as well as to educational psychologists, coaches, teachers and educational leaders.


On Habit

On Habit

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  • Author: Clare Carlisle
  • Publisher: Routledge
  • ISBN: 1136725709
  • Category : Philosophy
  • Languages : en
  • Pages : 168

For Aristotle, excellence is not an act but a habit, and Hume regards habit as ‘the great guide of life’. However, for Proust habit is problematic: ‘if habit is a second nature, it prevents us from knowing our first.’ What is habit? Do habits turn us into machines or free us to do more creative things? Should religious faith be habitual? Does habit help or hinder the practice of philosophy? Why do Luther, Spinoza, Kant, Kierkegaard and Bergson all criticise habit? If habit is both a blessing and a curse, how can we live well in our habits? In this thought-provoking book Clare Carlisle examines habit from a philosophical standpoint. Beginning with a lucid appraisal of habit’s philosophical history she suggests that both receptivity and resistance to change are basic principles of habit-formation. Carlisle shows how the philosophy of habit not only anticipates the discoveries of recent neuroscience but illuminates their ethical significance. She asks whether habit is a reliable form of knowledge by examining the contrasting interpretations of habitual thinking offered by Spinoza and Hume. She then turns to the role of habit in the good life, tracing Aristotle’s legacy through the ideas of Joseph Butler, Hegel, and Félix Ravaisson, and assessing the ambivalent attitudes to habit expressed by Nietzsche and Proust. She argues that a distinction between habit and practice helps to clarify this ambivalence, particularly in the context of habit and religion, where she examines both the theology of habit and the repetitions of religious life. She concludes by considering how philosophy itself is a practice of learning to live well with habit.