Integr Psych Behav (2011) 45:132–153 DOI 10.1007/s12124-010-9125-8 R E G U L A R A RT I C L E

Ecological Psychology and Social Psychology: It is Holt, or Nothing! Eric P. Charles

Published online: 4 May 2010 # Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2010

Abstract What is the greatest contribution that ecological psychologists can offer social psychology? Ideally, ecological psychologists could explain how people directly perceive the unique properties of their social partners. But social partners are distinguished from mundane objects because they possess mental traits, and tradition tells us that minds cannot be seen. When considering the ideal possibility, we reject that doctrine and posit minds as perceivable. For ecological psychology, this entails asserting that minds are the types of things able to structure ambient energy. Contemporary research and theory suggests distinctly ecological ways of attacking this problem, but the problem is not new. Almost 100 years ago, Holt argued for the visibility of minds. Thus when considering these ideas, ecological psychologists face a choice that is at once about their future and their past. Extending ecological psychology’s first principles into the social realm, we come to the point where we must either accept or reject Holt’s arguments, and the wider context they bring. In doing so, we accept or reject our ability to study the uniquely social. Keywords Ecological psychology . Social psychology . Edwin Bissell Holt . James J. Gibson . New realism . Direct perception . Embodied cognition Ecological psychology, founded through the work of James J. Gibson, can be viewed as a development and extension of the work of Edwin Bissell Holt (Gibson 1967a; Heft 2001).1 A reexamination of this historical legacy may provide insights for ecological psychology, including hints at what will be necessary to make a deep 1 Both Holt and Gibson produced a large body of work, and so any comparison must either demarcate the specific points in their careers being focused on, or discuss their views in a more general sense. Here I will focus on the work produced in the middle of Holt’s career, from approximately 1910 to 1916, and the “ecological” phase of Gibson’s career, from 1961 onward.

E. P. Charles (*) Division of Education, Humanities, and Social Sciences, The Pennsylvania State University, Altoona, 3000 Ivyside Dr., Altoona, PA 16601, USA e-mail: [email protected]

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contribution to social psychology (Charles 2009). Previous work towards that contribution has been quite successful, but I think there may be value in starting the conversation afresh by asking, “What is the best possible contribution that ecological psychology can make to social psychology?” The answer is, I suspect, that ecological psychology could provide a theory of how we see other people’s minds, and act based upon those perceptions. Fulfilling this potential, especially while staying true to ecological psychology’s first principles, would require a radical reconceptualization of mind. Such a stance would put ecological psychology further at odds (if it can be imagined) with classic approaches to the mind, including those represented in cognitive psychology. One of the few psychological theorists such a stance would make ecological psychologists aligned with is Holt. In an effort to lay these issues out with as little distraction as possible, I first present the proposed approach, and then compare and contrast it with approaches offered by other ecological psychologists. In a previous paper, I made the restrained conclusion that “I believe that Ecological Psychology’s best hope of making a coherent transition to dealing experimentally with interpersonal and cultural phenomenon will be to extend ecological theory back towards [Holt’s] New Realist approach.” (Charles 2009, p. 59) Here, treating ecological psychology and social psychology in their most distinctive forms, I will defend an even stronger claim. For ecological psychologists hoping to give insight into uniquely social phenomenon: It is Holt or nothing! & &

If ecological psychologists have anything to offer regarding the unique concerns of social psychology, their contribution will develop and extend the ideas of Holt. If ecological psychologists will not accept Holt’s basic premises, then they can contribute nothing to solving the unique concerns of social psychology.

From Ecological Psychology to Social Psychology There is no definitive set of first principles for ecological psychology; rather, the basic tennents are represented by the canonical works in the field. Though ecological psychology has developed much in the last few decades, there is still a bias towards principles embodied in the books of James and Eleanor Gibson. The discussion below will start with those works, differing slightly from the principles suggested by others (e.g., Richardson et al. 2008; Turvey 1992), but not contradicting them. In so doing, I will highlight the principles relevant to the present discussion, not create a definitive or exhaustive list. A Brief Summary of the Ecological Approach At its heart, ecological psychology is a theory of direct perception, a theory of how active organisms come to know the world around them. Ecological psychology holds that perceptual development is a process of increasing discrimination; that is, things which were previously perceived as the same come to be perceived as distinct (Gibson and Gibson 1955; Gibson 1969). If this is true, then three other things must

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be true: First, the things to be distinguished must be different; that is, we learn to detect reality in ever greater detail. Second, some physical intermediary, something physically between the organism and the object, must specify the things to be distinguished. Third, the organism must be sensitive to the physical intermediary (Gibson 1961, 1966, 1979, 1986). From this single principle of development and two principles of mechanism, we get a theory of direct perception; it is “direct” in at least the narrow sense that it does not include mediation by many of the boogey-men present in past theories of perception.2 The theory is as follows: We perceive objects and events in the world by extracting information from ambient energy arrays that specify our surroundings (sometimes referred to as resonating with the structure of the arrays). This process requires that we move around in, and often interact with, things around us. Because physical movement, ambient energy, object, and organism, are all essential parts of the perceptual process, perception is not thought of as “in the head”, but rather as a property of a larger system. Further, perceiving organisms must be sensitive to patterns extended over time and space, as that is a requisite for detecting the specifying information spread over time and space. Further, because perception has evolved and does develop in the context of action, there is reason to believe that organisms specifically distinguish situations based on their own possibilities for action, i.e., organisms distinguish what the situation affords them, i.e., they perceive affordances. Such is, for our purposes, the fundamental formula of ecological psychology, with parts of the theory listed in rough order of importance. The Social Situation as Seen from the Ecological Approach Gibson’s books on perception are unusual for the genera, in that they begin with long discussions about what exists to be seen. This flows directly from the principles discussed above, as we must establish what is out there for organisms to discriminate, or more particularly we must establish which of the many things out there we would expect organisms (due to evolutionary and developmental pressures) to discriminate. Taking that as a hint, I believe the first step in determining what ecological psychologists can contribute to social psychology must be to determine what can be seen in social situations.3 Trying to make this determination, the immediately critical question is whether social situations contain aspects making them distinct from mundane physical situations, and how we should conceive of any such difference. In answering this question we must admit three possibilities, defined solely in terms of ecological psychology’s potential to contribute to social psychology: One possibility is relatively neutral, one is ideal, and one is discouraging. It may be the case that (A) nothing unique exists in the social situations from the ecological point of view. This would be rather dull. True, ecological psychology 2

Much controversy regarding the theoretical basis of ecological psychology regards both whether its theory of perception is truly “direct” in this limited sense, and whether it can be considered “direct” in any more general senses (e.g., Hamlyn 1977). Those arguments are beyond the scope of the present paper which, for the sake of brevity and clarity, will take ecological psychology’s claims at face value. 3 Whenever the language of vision (i.e. “see,” “seen,” “visible”) is used, it should be clear that the statements are intended to apply to all perceptual systems.

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could contribute to social psychology, but doing so requires no innovation by either side. The amount of heady discussion generated in this endeavor suggests that this possibility is unlikely. Alternatively, it may be the case that (B) there are things unique to the social situation, and they are perceivable. This would be ideal— standard ecological theory may require some adjustment to accommodate the phenomenon in question, but such adjustment is possible. Ecological psychology can make a contribution to social psychology, and such an extension might benefit ecological psychology as well. Finally, it may be the case that (C) there are things unique to the social situation, but they are not perceivable. This would be unfortunate; ecological psychology would never be able to contribute significantly to social psychology proper. As stated above, the focus here will be on developing the ideal case: Let us examine the consequences of thinking that there is something unique about social situations from an ecological point of view, and that we can see it. Gibson’s last book (1979, 1986) only briefly discussed the unique affordances of interacting with other animals. Gibson clearly thought that animate objects possessed unique properties, because what is afforded by other organisms depends on properties not present in inanimate objects: “[Animals] may be temporarily asleep or awake, receptive or unreceptive, hungry or satiated. What the other animal affords is specified by its permanent features and its temporary state...” (p. 42). Turning Gibson’s statement to the present purposes, we might observe that the “temporary states” Gibson alludes to, would be traditionally classified as “mental states.” This confirms that ecological psychology is at least loosely compatible with the lay intuition that interacting with people and other animals poses distinct challenges because social partners have minds. That is, social partners are different from inanimate objects in that they can be hungry, be receptive, want, think, believe, etc. Gibson is pointing out that the opportunities afforded by our social partners are determined by their intentions, creating phenomenon not present in our dealings with baseballs or coffee cups. Thus, if ecological psychology is to claim that there is something unique about social situations, it should begin by invoking some theory of mental states. The Cartesian Trap This line of reasoning, if followed, leads ecological psychology into another conflict with traditional approaches to psychology. In line with mainstream philosophical trends over the past several centuries, most modern approaches to psychology declare as a first principle that one mind can never be directly visible to another mind. The standard Cartesian model tells us that a mind is transparent to itself, but opaque to other minds. In the most extreme form of this argument, it is claimed that we have perfect knowledge of ourselves, but can never have real knowledge about others. In less extreme forms of this “argument from the ego-centric predicament”, we may have only limited knowledge about ourselves, but it is still held that we absolutely cannot know about the minds of others (as discussed by Perry 1910). According to these theories, what are we doing when we think we know someone else’s mind? At best, the answer is that we guessed or inferred what the other person was thinking, perhaps by building a mental model of the other person’s mind. This

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creates a problem for any ecological psychologist interested in contributing to social psychology; traditional lines of thinking lead us to believe that if we posit mental states as the unique elements in social situations, then we are stuck in the unfortunate, third possibility listed above: Following the Cartesian system, or any of its descendents, in these regards would force ecological psychologists to declare that social situations are unique, but unique in the manner that specifically bars the mechanisms of direct perception from providing insight into the phenomenon. Such a dead end is unacceptable. As we are striving to understand the ideal case, we must go another route. Let us reject this traditional view of minds, and declare that people do not have unique access to their own mental states. Let us assert that people can, under the right conditions, know other minds. Such a declaration provides, I assert, the only viable starting point from which a theory of directly perception can contribute insight into the uniquely social. That is, if ecological psychologists want to explore the possibility of a significant contribution to social psychology, then they must begin by rejecting the Cartesian view of mind, and positing direct perception of other minds. Minds “Out There” Gibson’s last two books include long lists of cherished philosophical and psychological notions to be discarded or significantly revised. It is not inconceivable, then, that the cherished notion of mental states as “private events” may end up on the rubbish heap as well. Quite notably, this new approach would require that we reject the view that the mind is “in the head.” Minds must be “out there” like the coffee cup is out there. The principles of ecological psychology further require that the mind be “out there” in a form that is visible, in a form that structures ambient energy such that an attuned organism can detect and respond to it. In all the ways essential for ecological psychology, the process of seeing minds must be similar in form to the process of seeing coffee cups. The most challenging part of this thesis is to determine how minds can be seen. The outline of an answer to that challenge is obvious, as we are working within the context of ecological psychology: Mental states are composed of perceivable elements, objects taking part in particular events, arranged in some manner. These elements structure the energy array in a manner not only specific to themselves individually, but also in a manner specific to the relation between the parts. An organism can thus perceive the mental state of another organism if it is sensitive to the higher-order information that specifies the mental state. Q.E.D. As always, the devil is in the details. In this case, the primary challenge is to identify what mental states are made up of.

Perceiving Mental States Though the suggestion that mental states are not in the head may seem jarring, it should be less jarring for ecological psychologists. I argue that there is already a basis within ecological psychology to talk about mental states as perceivable. We

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can see this if we carefully examine the basic tennents of ecological psychology presented above, and if we examine further developments in ecological theory. Seeing Perception Ecological psychologists hold, as a basic tennent, that perception is not “in the head”. Perception is a specific type of relation between an organism and its surroundings.4 All elements of the relation are potentially visible to an outside observer, as informational specificity in the ambient array is redundant. There is no reason to think that a third party could not detect the object being perceived, the organism doing the perceiving, and the relationship of attunement between them. If each part can be seen individually, then all can be seen as a whole, as a higher-order structure. Thus, we can directly perceive that another organism is (or is not) perceiving something. Of course, we sometimes have no idea what others are seeing, and we are sometimes wrong about what we think others are seeing. Ecological psychologists must try to explain such mistakes using the same arguments they use to explain mistaken perception of non-social circumstances. Our frequent lack of knowledge about other’s perception is due to limited opportunity to observe all three elements of a perceptual event, in exactly the same ways that perception of any mundane object or event can be limited—for example, if movement is restricted, or the time needed to observe an extended pattern is limited. Similarly, our inaccuracies about what we think another person sees can be explained by the same circumstances that sometimes lead to errors in mundane perception—for example, attunement to the wrong information. It is unclear what the general stance of ecological psychologists would be on the argument that perception is a public event. It seems to flow logically from the first principles of ecological psychology, but I have never seen it argued explicitly elsewhere. In any case, even if we assume for the moment that perception would be accepted as a public event, ecological psychologists could still consider it to be a special case, the one visible mental phenomenon. Still chasing the ideal circumstances for ecological psychology to contribute to social psychology, I argue that perception is not a special case. Further, I argue that ecological psychologists are already pursuing the task of understanding other mental traits as visible properties of organism-environment interaction. Seeing Intentionality The quintessential mental trait is intentionality. Two ecological psychologists, David Lee and Robert Shaw, and those inspired by their works, have developed sophisticated approaches for understanding how organisms perform intentional behavior. The basic idea underlying their work is that intending organisms couple 4

Previously I suggested that ecological psychologists might want to consider their approach as an explanation for perception, rather than a description of perception (Charles 2009). As either interpretation fits within the current argument, I will use the more standard presentation of the ecological views in this example.

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their behaviors with the movements of physical objects in very particular and distinct ways. Lee’s work focuses on “tau-coupling”. While this approach has been highly generalized, in simple examples, tau (τ) is the rate at which a motion gap is closing (roughly, time to impact with an object), and when the tau of different activities are matched together (coupled) then actions occur when they need to (see examples in Pepping and Grealy 2007). That is, Lee provides a explanation for how intending organisms connect perception and action in ways that keep certain informational elements constant, thereby synchronizing their behavior with environmental events. For example moving to control rate of optic expansion controls the rate of approach to an object. The way that different behaviors are coordinated with the time to impact with an object is the difference between a hawk, say, intending to land on a branch, or intending to crash through it (compare Lee et al. 2007, with Lee and Redish 1981). Of note, though tau-coupling is not often explicitly discussed in this way, everything about such a coupling is visible! As in the case of perception, a third party could determine whether or not an organism is coupling its behavior in the proper way, and thereby determine whether the organism is doing intentionality. Shaw’s work on intentional dynamics is typically framed in terms of explaining what an intending organism should do to reach its goal, given certain constraints (e.g., Shaw and Kinsella-Shaw 1988; Shaw et al. 1995); however, this work could also be presented as describing what intending entails. Shaw’s work spans not only intentionality as a coupling between behavior and environment, it also looks at the coordination of parts within the body responsible for producing the desired behavior. For example, the way in which the stiffness of different body joints controls walking speeds to allow for a soft arrival at a destination. Within a parameter space, Shaw’s models determine the paths that will lead to successful task performance, and find ways to approximate a least-action path, which an organism “should” follow if they intend to fulfill the task. As with Lee’s work, we can invert the formula. Doing so, we assert that when we see that an organism’s actions approximate the “least action path” for a given goal, we see the intention. Shaw believes that these models are accurate to the extent that we properly understand the constraints and the organism intends to perform its task efficiently (personal communication, 2/8/10). The first part I agree with completely: We cannot see intentions unless we understand the environment in which the organism is acting. For the second part, however, I offer Holt’s (1915) reply that: To the degree an organism’s behavior varies from the leastaction path in a controlled manner, we see the result of multiple intentions, which is to say that we have a measure of the influence of the intention we are interested in relative to the influence of other intentions.5 Shaw et al. (1995) specifically talk about “extending physical similarity theory to include intentional dynamic similarity” (p. 312). Discussing navigation, they give an example of the latter similarity, wherein we compare how a “path ought to be generated to conform to an intended final condition (reaching the intended target in 5 Holt (1915) provides many examples of this type of behavior. For example, when walking through the woods you may see a mushroom you suspects is edible, but are worried is poisonous (circa p. 127). Were you sure it was edible, you would move straight to it and consume it. Were you sure it was not edible, you would walk by. As it stands, whether your intention to eat or intention to avoid is stronger, your behavior will be a noticeable combination of both intentions. Thus, as is many times the case in science, what is “error” to one person may be the object of study for another.

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the manner intended)... [which is] determined prospectively by the actor’s control law being provided with (perceptual) information about how the observed future states of the system reckon with those intended.” (p. 311–312) Again, Shaw presents the work in terms of what path an intending organism will take, but the logic can equally be applied in reverse: By observing the paths organisms take through their environments, we can see what is prospectively controlling their behavior; we can visually determine the goal(s) with respect to which their behavior is controlled; we can see what they do or do not intend to do. (See also his discussion of the more general phenomenon of ‘aboutness,’ Shaw 2001.) If ecological psychologists were willing to say that intentionality (or at least one important type of intentionality) is coupling your behavior in a particular way, they will have articulated a theory of mind in which intentionality is a public phenomenon. This would provide a powerful foundation for contributing to social psychology proper. Seeing Intentionality in Combat Let us examine the possibility of this line of thinking in the context of martial combat. This context is especially suitable for such discussion, as it involves situations in which proper perception-action coupling is crucial, and in which most people seem to find it easy to think of intentions as embodied. This can be shown at different time scales. First, we can show the virtues of a tau-coupling approach to intentionality by comparing styles of martial arts that emphasize injuring opponents, with those that emphasize “coming into harmony” with opponents. Second, we can show the virtues of a more dynamic approach to intentionality by comparing experienced boxers, with children playing with sticks. The Tau (Coupling) of Aikido There are many forms of martial arts, but the most well known in America are the “Eastern” martial arts, originating in Japan, China, and Korea. Within the Japanese varieties, some martial arts emphasize placing physical forces in opposition to your opponent’s movements, while other systems emphasize moving in conjunction with your opponent’s movements. The art that emphasizes the latter approach to the greatest extent, even when variation between schools is accounted for, is aikido. While discussion of aikido often takes a mystical form, concepts such as “projecting chi” or “blending with your opponent” can be considered in non-mystical ways as intentional stances embodied in the relative movement patterns of the defender (e.g., Friedman 2005). When a person punches at us, stepping towards us with a karate-style straight punch, there are several opportunities afforded. The martial arts that emphasize opposing forces might provide a strong lateral strike to the extended arm—adding to the forward momentum already present to produce extreme torque at the point of impact, in an attempt to fracture the puncher’s forearm. Alternatively, they might try to evade, while returning a straight punch of their own—adding the opponent’s forward momentum to the force of their own strike. In both cases, the opponent’s force is met with a strong counterforce. The typical aikido approach, in contrast, is

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Fig. 1 Demonstration of the intention to blend with your opponent’s movement. The combatants start at the locations indicated. The individual in all white on the right is the attacker; the individual on the left in the black pants (a ‘hakama’) is the defender. (1) The attacker steps forward, punching with his right hand. (2) The defender has slid forward and to the side. Grabbing the punching hand, the defender continues the attacker’s forward movement, off balancing him. (3) The attacker’s own force, his movement straight forward, has been amplified until he is falling forward into the spot where the defender began. Illustrations modified from Westbook and Ratti (1970)

that if the opponent wants to move forward, we should keep him moving forward. This can be done, for example, through a “tenkan” side-step, while pushing the opponent’s fist forward to off-balance him, then still further forward to start him falling in the direction of his original movement. In this way, the force added by the defender is literally aligned with the force of the attacker (Fig. 1). The difference between the intention to oppose and the intention to align is not subtle. To further demonstrate the contrast, a typical follow up to that move in aikido would be “kote gaeshi,” a wrist manipulation common to many martial arts (Fig. 2a). However, the application of the technique varies between arts, consistent with the different intentions they cultivate in their practitioners. For example, the manipulation can be held relatively statically with one hand, while the second hand delivers a strong impact to the back of the opponents hand in order to break the wrist (Fig. 2b). In contrast, in Aikido, the wrist manipulation is used to force the opponent to the ground, where they can be held safely. This forced fall, or throw, is achieved by rotating the opponent’s wrist outward. Proper execution of this technique requires putting the proper amount of force on the opponent’s hand so that their wrist, arm,

Fig. 2 Contrast between the intention to harm and the intention to neutralize without permanent injury, illustrated by contrasting two applications of a basic wrist manipulation. a The basic wrist manipulation (kote gaeshi), in which the victim’s hand is bent backwards, putting intense pressure on the wrist. b A fullforce strike to the top of the victim’s hand will break the wrist. c A controlled-force push to the top of the victim’s hand, circling the victim’s wrist outward, will cause the victim to fall to the ground. Illustrations modified from Westbook and Ratti (1970)

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and shoulder are all forced to twist. Not enough force and they will not turn, too much force and you will break their wrist (Fig. 2c). Again, the intention to break the wrist or not—to injure the opponent or merely off balance them—is clearly visible to a trained observer. In both cases the intention to harm the opponent is clearly visible in the application of the technique—it is embodied, or it is not there at all. In fact, a standard aspiration of students is to not think in the course of combat, to merely react in the appropriate ways; and yet, they still discuss their actions as intentioned. That is the reason you need significant, repetitious physical training in aikido, so that over time the body simply “does” the harmony—to intend to be in harmony, no thinking, no additional consciousness of the intention, nor any ability to articulate the intention, is anywhere required. Brining us back to ecological psychology, the difference between the hard and soft techniques described is nothing other than a careful regulation of approach to contact. Doing harmony is regulating tau in specifiable ways! The Dynamics of Boxing and Dueling Light Sabers Looking at the dynamics of combat on a different time scale, Hristovski et al. (2006) analyzed experienced boxers using dynamic systems modeling. They found that, “Affordances of different hitting actions [jab, uppercut, etc.] emerge in martial arts such as boxing, constrained by the scaling of athlete positioning and arm segment dimensions with reference to the target.” (p. 413). They showed that the probability of different types of punches depended upon the distance between puncher and target (punching bag), and that the probability correlated highly with the perceived efficiency of the different punches at those distances. That the range of distances at which each punch was actually used was narrower than the range at which each punch could be physically performed, further supports the hypothesis that trained boxers use punches at distances that maximized their effectiveness, as has been shown in other martial arts. Further, the researchers showed that the boxers effectively randomized their attacks at ranges that allowed multiple strikes, making their actions difficult to predict. In this case one can objectively see that the boxer intends to impact maximal force into the punching bag and intends to be deceptive with regards to the form of the next strike in a sequence of punches. Inexperienced boxers presumably demonstrate other intentions, such as merely punching the opponent, regardless of whether the punches are hard (i.e., they frequently strike outside of ideal range) or taking advantage of their stronger punches or special “tricky” combinations (i.e., they have highly predictable punching patterns). To make the contrast with inexperienced fighters more vivid, imagine how the above analysis might compare to a similar study of children who, with sticks in hand, are pretending to “fight” with light-sabers or swords. In such a situation, the intentionality of the “combatants” is different. A casual analysis similar to that offered for the boxing would typically reveal that the children are, in fact, merely trying to hit the sticks together. The sequences of attacks will be highly predictable, with the most common pattern being a simple right-left-right-left sequence of swings, with the sticks banging in the middle each time. These strikes will not vary in accordance to the distance between the participants, and certainly will not be

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limited to distances at which you could maximize the force of such strikes. Further, to the degree that the forces are maximized, they will be maximized with respect to the distance to the other child’s stick, not the other child’s body. The intention to bang sticks together is easily distinguished from the intention to hit your opponent. Comparing the two situations, the intention of the boxers or the playing children is clearly nothing more that the actions themselves in context. Intention is not some incorporeal mental thing happening before the actions, nor in parallel with the actions. The intention is fully embodied, and no amount of objection by the actor, if justified merely by their purportedly privileged introspection, can counter the evidence visible to anyone with the vantage point and discriminative expertise to observe it. All this, I claim, is completely in line with established ways of thinking in ecological psychology, and all that remains is for its implications to be acknowledged and explored.

Some Obvious Objections and Their Counters Given the history of arguments for and against introspective privilege into mental states, and the arguments for and against the basic principles of ecological psychology, several objections to the above proposal can be anticipated and dealt with. Objection 1—Perception is Only of the Here and Now Someone will object: Dr. Charles, as you have proposed it, seeing combatants’ intentions required seeing many things, which are spread out over space and time. Because those have to be integrated together, there is clearly no possibility of direct perception of intentions. To this I reply: Such is not a problem for Ecological Psychology. Many traits of objects that ecological psychologists study can only be perceived through extended observation. For the ecological psychologist, it is not the case that disparate and separate bits of sensation are stored and put together in some computational fashion, but rather that patterns are responded to holistically. In fact, it is a fundamental tennent of Ecological Psychology that perception occurs over extended periods of time. Objection 2—Intentions are Only Revealed Under Particular Circumstances Someone will object: As you have proposed it, some of the combatants’ intentions were only revealed in the interaction. That is, even if we allow that the aikido-ists intentions are clear when she responded to her opponent’s strike, the intention was not visible before that point, and hence was not visible in any general sense. To this I reply: Such is not a problem for Ecological Psychology. Many traits of objects that ecological psychologists study are not perceivable until one is interacting with the object. The length of a rod is perceived by wielding it, the distance an object can be throw is perceived by hefting it, the straightness of a stick half-immersed in water is perceived by rotating it, etc. In fact, it is a fundamental

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tennent of Ecological Psychology that both action and interaction may be required for accurate perception. Objection 3—Intentions Exist Prior to Behavior Someone will object: As you have proposed it, the combatants’ intentions existed before their behavior and hence cannot be their behavior. That is, even if we allow that the combatant’s intentions were clear in her response to the strike, the intention surely existed before those actions took place. To this I reply: Such is not a problem for Ecological Psychology. There have been many attempts to deal with similar problems involving the perception of purely physical affordances. We may, for example, invoke the notion of dispositional properties. We are comfortable saying that we can perceive an object’s breakability (fragility) without it breaking. That is, we can perceive that if a heavy object hit the glass, then it would break. Why should it be more problematic to see that if you punch at the combatant, then she will respond harmoniously? That is, so long as the current properties of the respondent make her intentions visible, it is not problematic that we do not see any particular behaviors of interest until later. Objection 4—Intentions are Often Concealed or Faked Someone will object: But what if the combatants are trying to deceive you? The current actions could be subservient to some broader intention. For example, a boxer’s intention could be to forfeit the match in a later round. To this I reply: Such is not a problem for Ecological Psychology. All information is embedded into a larger context. Information specifying that an object is grab-able, which the organism picks up from one set of locations, does not in any way assure that the object will be (or will appear) grab-able from another set of locations. Information indicating that something is a coffee cup, and hence grab-able, may well be trumped if a larger pattern of information indicates that the cup is encased in glass. Similarly, a boxer’s intention to effectively strike an opponent (visible within a narrow context) may well be part of an intention to convincingly and deliberately throw a fight (visible within a wider context). Similarly, while many fight scenes in movies are quite convincing, if one were present at their filming, and able to view the actors from alternative angles, and without the added sound effects, it would be obvious that no one involved had the intention of injuring anyone else. In any case, all that is being identified is an existing pattern of behavior. This way of describing events sounds quite strange when talking about minds, but it is a logical extension of ecological theory.

How is This Exactly What Holt was Saying?

A volition is a law, a genetic [developmental] formula, and is stable, discutable, and open to the gaze of all who care to take cognizance of it. If one person has a purpose that another does not know, it is equally true and important that the

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first person has a spinal column, a parlour and a bank account that the second may not have seen. But the latter can take action to make good this deficiency, and there is no principle that makes the former’s purpose more inscrutable than his parlour or his bank account. (Holt 1914, p. 291–292) Holt was one of the 20th century’s most aggressive proponents of psychological and perceptual realism. A major thrust of his argument was that the “mental” and “physical” were not two different types of stuff (contra philosophical idealists and mind-body dualists). He went through great lengths, most approachably in The Freudian Wish (Holt 1915), to demonstrate how genuinely psychological phenomenon (attention, desire, etc.) could be built up through the integration of simple “reflex arcs”, and how even such complex functions as suppression and dissociation could be talked about without a hint of dualism. As the organism’s responses become more integrated, they ceased to be functions of simple “stimulation”, and become a function of external circumstance. This is the “recession of the stimulus” in which the sensory stimulation recedes in importance as an explanation of the organism’s behavior (see Heft 2010). An accurate description of an organism’s behavior thus requires an accurate description of what the organism is responding to. That is, by observing the behavior of the organism you could know what the organism was intending, what it was perceiving, etc., without any stipulation of an inner life. As he emphasized in The Concept of Consciousness (Holt 1914), consciousness is merely a label for those things of which one is aware, and awareness is nothing other than a form of response. Not only did he argue that we “could” define mental traits in behavioral terms, he argued that each and every one of us act in accordance with his approach in our day to day activities—Holt argues that we believe what he is saying, as evidenced by our everyday actions (Holt 1912; and see Thompson 2010).6 To deal with cases in which overt, large scale behavior did not occur, Holt invoked the concept of a “motor attitude.” This is compatible with the dispositional language used to address Objection 3 (intentions exist prior to behavior). For example, cat owner’s quickly become good at recognizing certain intentions in their cat, particularly the intention to pounce on a toy or jump up on a high object. These are recognized even when the pounce or jump does not occur. Indeed, in such cases the intention may be present well before the final behavior. But notice also, that we must allow that people readily perceive such intentions, or this entire example is incoherent. As such, Holt claims that we are sensitive to the “muscle tonus” of the cat—the particular, stereotypical stance that is “prepared to pounce.” (In this example, I assume the stance seen is that which is stereotypical for most cats, but all that is required is that it be stereotypical for the particular cat in question.) By retreating into the physical body, but not fully into the nervous system, we still have a visible property of the cat. If we further want to see that the cat intends to pounce on a feather, we must be sensitive to still higher-order patterns of the cat’s motor attitude in context, i.e., as part of a larger situation (see Heft 2010). 6

Also, lest people dismiss Holt for disagreeing with anything I have said above, let me state again: Holt said many things that psychologists in general and ecological psychologists in particular should consider seriously. This topic warrants the clarification I am attempting here, by virtue of it being the part of my previous article that garnered the most reaction from reviewers and commentators.

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Throughout all this, in various ways, Holt argues that when properly attuned people observe an organism closely, they see the organism’s mind. Whether or not we consider Holt’s work due to its historic connection to Gibson’s work: The necessary consequence of aggressively applying the basic formula of ecological psychology to the social domain is Holt’s position. How is This Not Exactly What Holt was Saying? Details of the examples taken from ecological psychology in sketching the above approach differ from the details Holt offered. For example, though Holt talked about behavior patterns and about motor attitudes, he did not explicitly refer to them as dispositional properties, and it is unclear whether he would have been happy about granting reality to “dispositions” as object properties. Similarly, the ecological research discussed above differs from the positions of others who have followed Holt’s lead. Tolman argued that purposes were visible because a purpose was a “doing until.” For example, Tolman claims that we see that the rat’s purpose in running the maze was to find the food when we see that finding the food stopped the rat’s activities. Similarly, you can tell that a child’s goal is to get out of sight of another individual if he continues to hide in different places until that particular person can no longer see him (Tolman 1926). In a separate attempt at pushing in a Holtian direction, Thompson has suggested that we view mental traits as higherorder matchings between behavior and circumstance. Mental traits analyzed from this approach include intentionality, communication, deception, and motivation, all of which Thompson considers examples of “natural design.” (e.g., Thompson 1997) Neither Holt, Tolman, nor Thompson’s views match Lee or Shaw’s analysis offered above, though Thompson’s analysis shares crucial similarities with Hristovski’s analysis of boxing. My preference would be to argue that these three approaches (Holt’s, Tolman’s, and Thompson’s) are complementary with each other, and with the approach indigenous to ecological psychology; they each illustrate different ways in which we see intentionality. However, the purposes here is not to unify these approaches, but merely to illustrate that there are several lines of argument by which we might consider mental traits to be composed entirely of perceivable elements. It is also worth noting that, especially later in life, Holt seemed very brain centric, talking about ‘specific reference’ as neuronal activity, when he could just as easily have made reference to bodily activity more generally. Ecological psychology holds a long-standing suspicion of brain-centric approaches.7 An alternative read of Holt is that he was merely emphasizing the important recent discoveries relevant to his thesis, things which were exciting at the time, but are mundane now. As Holt was an early epigeneticist, it is not hard to imagine that he would embrace a much more 7

Kelso (2008), in his tribute to Iberall, provides a very brain centric model of mental states, using dynamic principles with which many ecological psychologists are sympathetic (i.e., those of Iberall’s homeokinetics). It is my intuition that most ecological psychologists would find any exclusive focus on neural mechanisms off putting, however that does not argue against Kelso’s (or Holt’s) approach in the more general sense, with a more inclusive treatment of physiology.

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inclusive psycho-biological approach if alive today, and he certainly would have been amenable to perceptual-systems thinking. Finally, Holt lacked many of the philosophical innovations that make Gibson’s work distinctive as a form of realism. In particular, Gibson solves many of the problems that daunted Holt and his fellow new realists through the careful study of optical information and other forms of invariance (Shaw 2010). Thus, while the approach proposed here is for ecological psychology to embrace Holt, it is not for them to lose themselves in the process. Ecological psychologists will soon need to make a choice as to whether or not they wish to treat mental phenomenon as directly perceivable, and they are headed towards this decision largely on their own accord.

How is This Approach Different from Others Work on Ecological and Social Psychology? Many ecological psychologists have recently re-doubled their efforts in a conscious push to make a significant, though yet undetermined, contribution to social psychology. There is a long history of theoretical and empirical efforts exploring various aspects of that potential contribution, and results have appeared in piecemeal fashion throughout the psychological literature, as well as in two special issues of Ecological Psychology (May, 1996 and May 2007; for an overview of the work, see also Good 2007; Kono 2009; and McArthur and Baron 1983). Unlike the approach proposed here, past attempts at integrating ecological and social psychology have typically started with principles related to the affordance concept. This can be seen in the titles of many of the important articles on the subject including: “Social Affordances and Interaction” (Part I by Valenti and Good 1991; Part II by Loveland 1991), “Perception of Social Affordances by Children with Mild Handicapping Conditions” (Van Acker and Valenti 1989), “Situating Action II: Affordances for Interaction” (Gaver 1996), “The Affordances of the Animate Environment” (Reed 1998), and “Socializing Affordances” (Costall 1995). Several other articles explicitly prioritize the affordance concept in their text, as can be seen in the historic summary Hodges and Baron (2007) provide to introduce the most recent special issue of Ecological Psychology. Though I believe any attempt to merge social and ecological psychology will eventually lead to the challenge posed above, it is not as obvious if we start with the affordance concept.8 Much of the work on socializing affordances does not draw a sharp line between when social situations or social upbringing effect the actual presence of affordances in the environment, versus when these social factors ‘merely’ effect the perception of affordances. (This leads, for example, to the confounding apparent to any 5 year old in the oft repeated claim that slides “afford” going down, but not up.) Also, this work seldom critically examines how the 8

Reed’s (1998) paper is a good example of the point. It deals with many of the issues discussed here, and many other points on which Reed seems to agree with Holt. Then, midway through the article it moves away from these issues to focus on the potential of the affordance concept. Especially given his interest in Holt (Gibson to Reed, July 18, 1979), one suspects Reed would have returned to these issues full force, had he had the opportunity.

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perception of socially determined affordances relate to direct perception. Thus the proposal here should be seen as somewhat neutral with respect to this past work; it deals with a fundamentally different aspect of the problem. A full review of past work is clearly beyond the scope of the present paper, but it is worth highlighting the similarity with a few past works: Knowles and Smith (1982) Discussing social perception, Knowles and Smith (1982) lean heavily on the notions of specificity and perceptual picking up of information extended over space and time. They contrast between cognition as understood by the cognitive psychologist and perception as understood by the ecological psychologist. Echoing Holt, they urge researchers to determine what, exactly, their participants respond to. Adding Gibson’s theoretical advancements to that, they urge social psychologists to determine the information their participants are responding to, and the environmental conditions specified thereby. Knowles and Smith also point out, and reject, social psychologists’ historic bias towards analyzing introspective self-report, rather than directly analyzing the effects of environmental variables. They emphasize the role in perception of active exploration and interaction with the environment, and argue that in social situations we directly perceive action patterns extended over time. Thus, while Knowles and Smith do not discuss the perception of mental traits per se, they also reject the common Objections discussed above. McArthur and Baron (1983) McArthur and Baron (1983) discuss many issues developed here, and generally come to similar conclusions. Explaining what ecological psychology can offer social psychology, they state: The person who is first perceived as industrious and then as stubborn will often be judged more positively than one who is first perceived as stubborn. But, what information (other than a verbal label) communicates industry or stubbornness? This we do not know.... we must ultimately identify the nature of the stimulus information that reveals industry, hostility, and the other attributes that we perceive in people. (p. 215) Later they state, We would expect social stimulus information to specify benevolence versus malevolence, in-group versus out-group, and gender and sexual receptivity.... physical strength and illness, mental astuteness and insanity, and social dominance and dependency (p. 222). So far as I can tell, their position on the points presented above differs from the current proposal primarily in my hard-nosed insistence that ecological realism requires that information specifies the properties of objects and events because those properties of objects and events are capable of structuring energy. McArthur and Baron seem to agree with this in the case of mundane objects, but when discussing mental traits they seem to endorse a less hard-nosed approach.

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Though it is not directly stated in their article, they seem to treat much of social perception in a manner similar to that sometimes proposed for ecological psychology’s treatment of picture perception—by claiming that some parts of the perceptual experience are direct while others are mediated, i.e., “there can be a direct perception of a man’s portrait accompanied by an indirect perception of the man himself” (Gibson 1972, p. 227). Similarly, McArthur and Baron seem to argue that we can directly perceive many things going on in a social situation, and by virtue of that we can have mediated experience of the mental traits of our social partners. If this is true, then the core of ecological psychology, the theory of direct perception, cannot benefit social psychology. Good and Still (1989), Still and Good (1992), Good (2007) In a relatively short paper, Good and Still (1989) place ecological psychology within the context of American philosophy (e.g. the pragmatism of James, Dewey, Mead, etc.) and they discuss the special problems of social affordances. Especially in their discussion of point-light displays, they seem to propose an approach similar to that proposed here. They report observers perceiving intentionality within the display movements, and lament our lack of knowledge about the specific patterns in the movement that specify the intentions. They also discuss the manner in which social affordances may require interaction with others. Though they do not come out and say it, one suspects they have in mind something like the present proposal. Supporting my interpretation of that past paper, is the authors’ further discussion of the “dilemma of social affordances” (Good 2007; Still and Good 1992): The more a theory focuses on abstract invariances, the more remote it comes from the flow of interaction, the more it concentrates on the minutiae of meaningful interaction in the flow, and the more one is weighed down by ponderous descriptions.... As the parts of a sequence of sub-actions become integrated and proceed more smoothly, so affordances punctuating the global action can be described and merged into a single affordance. (Good 2007, p. 276–277) This seems to invoke (Holt 1915) concept of the recession of the stimuli. This is the diminishing importance of the immediate sensory stimulation as behavior becomes more integrated, and the organism comes to respond to ever more global aspects of the environment. As “reflex arcs” become integrated, we soon find that descriptions of the sensory stimuli that set off individual reflexes do not help us describe the organism’s behavior. They must be replaced by reference to the external objects that organisms are responding to, and as further integration occurs they must be replaced by descriptions of the complex situations that organisms are responded to. Noting the tension between Gibson’s pragmatist and realist tendencies, Good prioritizes the affordance concept in his paper. However, one again gets the sense that if he prioritized the realist aspects he would find that: As our social sub-actions become more integrate, they become a response to more global aspects of our social partners, not to individual actions they make; that is, we come to respond to the structure of a social partner’s behavior, not the individual behaviors themselves— rather than responding to individual behaviors, such as a request for food or a longing look, we respond to a social partner’s hunger.

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What do we see when we see a social affordance? To the extent that what we see is uniquely present in the social situation, we see our social partner’s minds. Other Past Work To talk about other past work quickly, we might begin by dividing it, as Hodges and Lindhiem (2006) do into A) work aimed at making social psychology more ecological and B) work aimed at expanding ecological psychology’s sophistication in dealing with social situations. Both lines of thinking have had success. The first case (A) is less interesting for the present purposes, and it is sufficient to simply restate Hodges and Baron’s summary that, “The study of social psychology has profited from ecological enrichment involving application of ecological concepts such as effectivities and affordances and the idea of perceiving-acting cycles that lead to embodied epistemic processes.” (p. 81) The second case (B) deserves at least a little elaboration. Ecological psychologists continue to analyze social situations in complex ways, and have established their ability to continue such efforts into the distant future. We are beginning to understand how people synchronize their behaviors together (e.g., Schmidt and O’Brien 1997; Turvey and Schmidt 1994; Lopresti-Goodman et al. 2008).9 We are beginning to understand how people perceive what things afford others (see Mark 2007). We are beginning to understand how others regulate our behavior by virtue of being social partners rather than mere physical objects (e.g. Hodges and Lindhiem 2006). We are also beginning to understand how people are affected if they do not properly perceive social affordances, which offers a new way of understanding some developmental disorders (e.g., Loveland 1991). This work all contributes to social psychology, but to what extent does it address the uniquely social? We frequently synchronize our behavior with non-social partners; we perceive things afforded to inanimate objects (will the grocery cart fit through the aisle?); we regulate our behavior based on the fragility, or spill-able nature, of physical objects we carry. Only the example of thinking of autism in terms of perceptual deficits gets at the uniquely social; however, it does so by begging the question posed here: What happenings are socially impaired children not responding to properly, when they fail to perceive the mental states of those around them? What patterns in the ambient energy specify those happenings? Many seem unconcerned with what I claim to be a serious limitation of these efforts. Presumably, this is because there is obviously so much good work to do regardless. Given the obvious successes of past work, one might easily pose the objection, as Watson did almost 100 years ago, that there is more than enough good work to keep us busy in (ecological) psychology without that pesky mind or its mental states; so why waste efforts worrying about them? (Watson 1913) The only

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It is worth noting that what I see as the other major issue regarding the extent to which ecological and social psychology can relate is very well articulated in Schmidt’s (2007) contribution to the recent special issue of Ecological Psychology. The article discusses the practical difficulties in applying the ecological formula to situations in which meanings of objects seem defined primarily by social convention, opportunity for social use, or idiosyncratic past history, rather than by the physical properties that the objects would retain in a world containing only a single potential user.

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reason I can offer is that we are deeply interested in empirical phenomenon that demand we address the problem of mind. The in-progress push to contribute to social psychology (based on the idea that social psychology is a unique thing to contribute to) demonstrates such a deep interest. We need to continue doing the work that has lead to past successes, and simultaneously see what happens if we push the ecological principles further—One thing that happens if we push further is that we face the question of whether to accept or reject the same issues that Holt wrestled with 100 years before. If we reject Holt’s solution to those issues, then our ecological principles can go no further.

Conclusion Past attempts to merge ecological and social psychology have, for the most part, done what they attempted to do quite well; nonetheless, there are aspects of social psychology that the existing literature simply does not address. This will not come as news to anyone, as ecological psychology is just beginning what will assuredly be a long process of contributing to social psychology; of course there are things yet unaddressed. However, the primary assertion made here is that the aspects of social psychology most neglected are exactly those that make social psychology such a unique endeavor! As ecological psychology rapidly expands its foray into the social realm, it is headed towards a glass ceiling. When it gets there, it will either smash through to its own radical approach to social psychology, or find that it cannot continue beyond that point. The crucial question is: How will ecological psychology deal with mental states, with the minds that make social partners distinct from mundane objects? This question is crucial because, most approaches to psychology, and to the philosophy of the mind, treat mental attributes in a manner that a priori renders them inaccessible to ecological analysis. If ecological psychologists are to be able to contribute to social psychology through and through, they must assert that minds are directly perceivable, and begin exploring the options thus produced. How can I possibly sit here with a straight face and suggest that mental traits are directly perceivable? Because Holt said it, and made it work. I believe that a serious consideration of these issues will reveal that ecological psychologists completely ignorant of Holt’s work would be necessitated to recreate it in an effort to stay true to their first principles. That said, it is certainly not the case that resurrecting Holt will leave the work finished. Holt’s approach will need to be updated in the light of innovations advanced by Gibson and others. The difficulty of empirical investigation starting from Holt’s assumptions can seem daunting. However, I believe that any efforts to come to terms with Holt will result in a large return on investment, whereas the cost of denying Holt’s relevance would be high. If at heart ecological psychology provides a “New Reason for Realism,” that realism must be seen through, with the most radical possibilities explored (Gibson 1967b; Reed and Jones 1982; Shaw 2002). If there is one strength and one weakness for which ecological psychologists should be known, it is having a passion for pushing the ecological formula to its limits. The suggestion made here, that ecological psychologists should treat minds as directly perceivable, is offered in that spirit.

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Postscript Some of this article is unnecessarily abrasive. It is that way because my academic heritage leads me to believe that progress occurs best when people firmly take different positions and try them against each other. I feel more comfortable than usual adopting the extremist tone in this publication, because Integrative Psychological and Behavioral Science allows for, and encourages dialog.10 It is not my hope that readers will either take or leave the views presented here as they stand, but that they will accept this paper as a challenge: If I am wrong, what other option will allow us to contribute to studying the full range of social phenomenon, while staying true to the first principles of Ecological Psychology? If I am right, how can we best proceed in this crazy endeavor? Acknowledgments Alas, all of my thanks must go out amorphously, rather than specifically: The authors who are contributing to my edited volume on Holt (coming out this Fall) have made me evermore firm in my convictions that much good would come of resurrecting this almost-forgotten man, who was once a giant. This article was spurred directly as a result of wonderful personal conversations at meetings of the International Society of Ecological Psychology, and by the published commentaries on my previous work. Regarding the latter, I must thank Jaan Valsinar and his editorial staff for creating a venue in which discussions of this type can take place. IPBS has a long history, but the diversity of ideas it has been home to, following the recent changes in leadership and format, are admirable. One can be braver when saying daring things, if he knows others will have the chance to respond.

References Charles, E. P. (2009). The (old) new realism: what Holt has to offer for ecological psychology. Integrated and Psychological Behavioral Science, 43, 53–66. Costall, A. (1995). Socializing affordances. Theory and Psychology, 5, 467–481. Friedman, H. (2005). Problems of romanticism in transpersonal psychology: a case study of Aikido. The Humanistic Psychologist, 33, 3–24. Gaver, W. W. (1996). Situating action II: affordances for interaction: the social is material for design. Ecological Psychology, 8, 111–129. Gibson, J. J. (1961). Ecological optics. Visual Research, 1, 253–262. Gibson, J. J. (1966). The senses considered as perceptual systems. Boston: Houghton Mifflin. Gibson, J. J. (1967a). James J. Gibson. In G. Lindzey (Ed.), A history of psychology in autobiography, vol. 5 (pp. 125–143). New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts. Gibson, J. J. (1967b). New reasons for realism. Synthese, 17, 162–172. Gibson, E. J. (1969). Perceptual learning and development. New York: Appleton-Century-Crofts.

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Indeed, my original publication seems already to have inspired two other articles. Travieso and Jacobs (2009) argue that ecological psychologists would lose much of their uniqueness by returning to Holt as I have suggested. I gather from their paper first, that they do not appreciate just how extreme Holt’s position is, and second, that they would happily sacrifice a connection with social psychology proper, if it were necessary to maintain consistency within the ecological approach. The first point is likely due to the cursory nature of my original presentation, the second point I am in complete sympathy with. Hopefully at least some of their concerns have been addressed here. Kono (2009), while not explicitly agreeing or disagreeing with my thesis regarding Holt, rightly points out that ecological psychology has the potential to broaden social psychology, by placing its traditional domain of inquiry within a much broader context. Kono points out the interpersonal and social nature of many affordances, and emphasizes the need for ecological psychology to try, in the long term, to tackle the problem of language. A striking difference between these two well articulated positions is that Travieso and Jacobs seems to argue that I push things too far with this talk of observing minds, while Kono seems to think I do not push far enough!

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Schmidt, R. C. (2007). Scaffolds for social meaning. Ecological Psychology, 19, 137–152. Schmidt, R. C., & O’Brien, B. (1997). Evaluating the dynamics of unintended interpersonal coordination. Ecological Psychology, 9, 189–206. Shaw, R. (2001). Processes, acts, and experiences: three stances on the problem of intentionality. Ecological Psychology, 13, 275–314. Shaw, R. (2002). Theoretical hubris and the willingness to be radical: an open letter to James J. Gibson. Ecological Psychology, 14, 235–247. Shaw, R. (2010). Ecological realism as a reaction to new realism: Holt’s legacy to Gibson. In E. P. Charles (Ed.), A new look at new realism: E. B. Holt reconsidered. Edison: Transactions. Shaw, R., & Kinsella-Shaw, J. (1988). Ecological mechanics: a physical geometry for intentional constraints. Human Movement Science, 7, 155–200. Shaw, R., Flascher, O., & Kadar, E. (1995). Dimensionless invariants for intentional systems: measuring the fit of vehicular activities to environmental layout. In J. Flach, P. Hancock, J. Caird, & K. Vicente (Eds.), Global perspectives on the ecology of human—Machine systems. Vol. 1 (pp. 293–357). Hillsdale: Erlbaum. Still, A. W., & Good, J. M. M. (1992). Mutualism in the human science: towards the implementation of a theory. Journal for the Theory of Social Behaviour, 22, 105–128. Thompson, N. S. (1997). Communication and natural design. In N. S. Thompson, (Series Ed.), D. Owings & M. Beecher (Vol. Eds.), Perspectives in ethology, Vol. 12: Communication. New York: Plenum. Thompson, N. S. (2010). Interview with an old new realist. In E. P. Charles (Ed.), A new look at new realism: E. B. Holt reconsidered. Edison: Transactions. Tolman, E. C. (1926). A behavioristic theory of ideas. Psychological Review, 33, 352–369. Travieso, D., & Jacobs, D. M. (2009). The ecological level of analysis: can neogibsonian principles be applied beyond perception and action? Integrated Psychological and Behavioral Science, 43, 393– 405. Turvey, M. T. (1992). Affordances and prospective control: an outline of the ontology. Ecological Psychology, 4, 173–187. Turvey, M. T., & Schmidt, R. C. (1994). A low-dimensional nonlinear dynamic governing interlimb rhythmic coordination. In S. P. Swinnen, H. Heuer, J. Massion, & P. Casaer (Eds.), Interlimb coordination: Neural, dynamical, and cognitive constraints (pp. 277–300). San Diego: Academic. Valenti, S. S., & Good, J. M. (1991). Social affordances and interaction: I. Introduction. Ecological Psychology, 3, 77–98. Van Acker, R., & Valenti, S. S. (1989). Perception of social affordances by children with mild handicapping conditions: implications for social skills research and training. Ecological Psychology, 1, 383–405. Watson, J. B. (1913). Psychology as the behaviorist views it. Psychological Review, 20, 158–277. Westbook, A., & Ratti, O. (1970). Aikido and the dynamic sphere: An illustrated introduction. North Clarendon: Tuttle. Eric P. Charles While being trained as an animal behaviorist, Dr. Charles learned that Lorenz and Tinbergen won Nobel Prizes for answering Kant’s question about phenomena. Kant asked if we ever know the way that other beings experience the world. The ethologoists demonstrated that we can, if we properly observe behavior. After becoming obsessed with Gibson’s ecological psychology, Dr. Charles discovered that Holt had made similar arguments regarding the observability of minds. Dr. Charles now focuses on the empirical and theoretical implications of Holt’s work.