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Book Review: Enactive theory and the problem of non-sense

The purpose of Cappuccio and Froese’s volume is to explore non-sense as a special challenge to enactive theory. What is non-sense and why does it present a challenge? As we will see, just bringing the issue of non-sense into focus is a good part of the difficulty. My judgment is that the volume succeeds in this task and in so doing makes a noteworthy contribution to enactive theory and cognitive science, although it takes some effort on the part of the reader to appreciate this achievement. The perspectives of the various contributors are unusually diverse, and as a result they are not easily integrated into a coherent conversation. However, this somewhat incoherent diversity is consistent with the volume’s theme, and it is not necessarily a bad thing. Less diversity and more coherence would have made the book much easier to review, but probably not better. To preface the following discussion, here is a first approximation of non-sense and the challenge it presents. When cognition is defined as ‘‘sense-making,’’ non-sense is not just what lies beyond understanding: it is also a basic condition for understanding. In the words of Ezequiel Di Paolo, non-sense is the ‘‘pervasive background’’ of cognition (2014, p. xiii): it is ‘‘unfinished sense-making’’ (p. xiv). Non-sense is, in short, what sense is made of. Unlike the standard computational paradigm, for which non-sense results from a failure to process information, enactive theory treats non-sense as the raw material of cognition: to paraphrase one of the contributors to this volume, sensemaking subsists on a steady diet of non-sense (Cuffari, 2014, p. 219). However, it seems that whatever is nonsense for a particular cognitive process cannot be understood as such from within that process, because to understand non-sense as such is thereby to make sense of it, which seems paradoxical. Moreover, this way of defining the boundaries of cognition raises questions about the capacity of enactive theory to account for the growth of cognition through learning, discovery, and creative exploration (e.g., play) as intentional processes. The plot thickens when we consider that for many enactive theorists just to experience something is already to understand it in some way (Beaton, 2014; O’Regan and Noë, 2001; but see González, 2014). The linking of experience to understanding implies that we cannot have rudimentary experiences of non-sense that extend just beyond the edge of sense-making. Yet most of the contributors to this volume attest that we do have experiences of non-sense. And so, as pointed out by Cappuccio and Froese, this possibility presents a dilemma for enactive theory (2014, p. 22): either we must deny such experiences or we must admit that cognition extends beyond sense-making. Perhaps this dilemma can be resolved, but sorting through the difficulty requires that we assess the ‘‘very foundations’’ of enactive theory (ibid.). It is true that both horns of the dilemma are highly problematic for enactive theory—the choice seems to be between phenomenological adequacy, on the one hand, and the applicability of enactive theory to all forms of cognition, on the other. Even so, the overall impression of the state of enactive theory as presented in the volume is very encouraging: individually the contributions are very fine, indicating the high level of talent and creativity that is currently drawn to enactive theory; and together the chapters present a picture of an emerging paradigm engaged in critical reflection on its most basic presuppositions. There is no surer sign of intellectual vitality! Before launching into further discussion, it will help to place this volume within the broader context of enactive theory. Twenty-five years after the seminal work of Francisco Varela, Evan Thompson, and Eleanor Rosch (1991), enactive theory has blossomed into a diverse and thriving family of non-functionalist