Being-in-the-Flow: Expert Coping as Beyond Both Thought and Automaticity

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Abstract

Hubert Dreyfus argues that explicit thought disrupts smooth coping at both the level of everyday tasks and of highly-refined skills. However, Barbara Montero criticises Dreyfus for extending what she calls the ‘principle of automaticity’ from our everyday actions to those of trained experts. In this paper, I defend Dreyfus’ account while refining his phenomenology. I examine the phenomenology of what I call ‘esoteric’ (as opposed to ‘everyday’) expertise to argue that the explicit thought Montero invokes belongs rather to ‘gaps’ between or above moments of reflexive coping. However, I agree that the ‘principle of automaticity’ does not adequately capture the experience of performing such skills. Drawing on examples of expert performance in sport and improvised music and dance, I argue that esoteric action, at its best, is marked by a distinct state of non-conceptual awareness- an experience of spontaneity, flow and ‘owned-ness’- that distinguishes it from the automaticity of everyday actions.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)403-424
Number of pages22
JournalPhenomenology and the Cognitive Sciences
Volume16
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 1 Jul 2017

Austrian Fields of Science 2012

  • 603112 Phenomenology
  • 603114 Philosophy of mind

Keywords

  • Authenticity
  • Coping
  • Dreyfus
  • Expertise
  • Flow
  • Heidegger
  • Improvisation
  • Montero

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