Cognitive Science Below the Neck: Toward an Integrative Account of Consciousness in the Body
Cognitive Sciences March 1, 2023 Leonardo Christov-Moore, Alex Jinich-Diamant, A. Safron et al.
The text argues that culture and science need a holistic characterization of mind and body, noting phenomena like open-label placebo effects on chronic pain and the role of gut microbiomes in mood. It claims that vestiges of Cartesian thinking treat systems from the brainstem downward as mere implementation layers for computational processes, rather than as complementary loci of information processing. This perspective frames belief-driven phenomena such as placebo, ritual, and psychosomatic disorders as mysterious obstacles rather than potential sources of insight.