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Traces and artefacts of physical intelligence

Version 2 2024-06-17, 09:22
Version 1 2014-10-28, 10:33
chapter
posted on 2024-06-17, 09:22 authored by RS Delahunta
This essay picks up on observations made by the late evolutionary biologist and baseball enthusiast Stephen J. Gould. Writing for the New York Times in an essay titled ‘The Brain of Brawn’ (2000), Gould reflects on the sports fan’s tendency to characterise the ‘mental skill of athletes as an intuitive grasp of bodily movement and position — a “physical intelligence”’. This, he claims, is a ‘fallacious belief, a misconception that contributes to the persistent view that bodily achievements constitute a lesser form of intellect as compared with ‘scholarly performance’. Beliefs about where a mind reaches its limits and the body takes over tend to overlook their deep entanglement, and how each shapes the other while simultaneously being ‘dependent on the situation or context’ (Robbins and Aydede 2008, 3).

History

Chapter number

13

Pagination

220-231

ISBN-13

978-1-349-68364-2

Language

eng

Publication classification

B1.1 Book chapter, B Book chapter

Copyright notice

2015, Scott de Lahunta

Extent

13

Editor/Contributor(s)

Causey M, Meehan M, O'Dwyer N

Publisher

Palgrave Macmillan

Place of publication

London, Eng.

Title of book

The performing subject in the spaces of technology

Series

Palgrave studies in performance and technology