Positing a space mirror mechanism: intentional understanding without action?
Recent evidence regarding a novel functionality of the mirror neuron system (MNS), a so-called 'space mirror mechanism', seems to reinforce the central role of the MNS in social cognition. According to the space mirror hypothesis, neural mirroring accounts for understanding not just what a...
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| Tipo de recurso: | artículo |
| Estado: | Versión aceptada para publicación |
| Fecha de publicación: | 2013 |
| País: | España |
| Institución: | Varias* (Consorci de Biblioteques Universitáries de Catalunya, Centre de Serveis Científics i Acadèmics de Catalunya) |
| Repositorio: | Recercat. Dipósit de la Recerca de Catalunya |
| OAI Identifier: | oai:recercat.cat:2445/164782 |
| Acceso en línea: | https://hdl.handle.net/2445/164782 |
| Access Level: | acceso abierto |
| Palabra clave: | Teoria de l'acció Neurones mirall Neurociència cognitiva Action theory Mirror neurons Cognitive neuroscience |
| Sumario: | Recent evidence regarding a novel functionality of the mirror neuron system (MNS), a so-called 'space mirror mechanism', seems to reinforce the central role of the MNS in social cognition. According to the space mirror hypothesis, neural mirroring accounts for understanding not just what an observed agent is doing, but also the range of potential actions that a suitably located object affords an observed agent in the absence of any motor behaviour. This paper aims to show that the advocate of this space mirror hypothesis faces a crippling dilemma. Either what observed agents can do remains underdetermined by space mirror representations, and no proper understanding of action potentiality is gained; or, if it is just understanding of potential motor acts that is achieved through the sensorimotor representations generated by shared object-related affordances, the very explanatory role of space mirroring is compromised. |
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