Abstract
Neuroaesthetic research tends to support a form of Cartesian dichotomy between conscious and nonconscious processes. I propose that some artworks, considered in art contexts, can produce embodied forms of aesthetic knowledge that are inaccessible in the epistemological context of the fMRI lab. In my critical approach to neuroaesthetics, I trouble hierarchical dichotomies between conscious and nonconscious processes, positioning mind as a physiological process that is not isolated in a brain, but fully embodied and co-constitutive with worldly, social in-teractions. In this essay, I examine the neuroscientific literature on mirror neurons as it informs a critical neuroaesthetic analysis of Fast’s Talk Show, which in itself facilitates embodied forms of knowledge through reflexive, mimetic engagement.
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Notes
- 1.
Even neuroscientist Antonio Damasio—who troubles the neuroscientific convention that mind is a product of the brain alone by examining the significant role of the rest of the body in formulating mental processes—operates on the premise that “mind depends on brain-body interactions,” firmly asserting the physiological dimension of mental activity. [Antonio Damasio, Descartes’ Error, (International: Penguin Books, c. 1994, 2006), 225.]
- 2.
Barbara Maria Stafford made a similar complaint about the limitations of mirror neuron theory, when she suggests that the real problem is that of ‘determining the very nature of intention itself—not just its where and when. In affective ingestion we do no just repeat another’s actions, we grapple with them’ ([22], p. 89). See also [12].
- 3.
At the time of writing, an essay co-authored by Corrado Sinigaglia and Vittorio Gallese, “How the Body (in Action) shapes the Self,” is pending publication in the Journal of Consciousness Studies. I am delighted to see that mirror neuron scientists Rizzolatti and Gallese are extending the scope of their inquiry by working across disciplines with a philosopher of science, and I think Sinigaglia brings a great deal of valuable insight to the discourse.
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McKay, S. (2015). No Neuron Is an Island: A Neuroaesthetic Inquiry into Omer Fast’s Mimetic Interactions. In: Scarinzi, A. (eds) Aesthetics and the Embodied Mind: Beyond Art Theory and the Cartesian Mind-Body Dichotomy. Contributions To Phenomenology, vol 73. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-9379-7_19
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