The enactive and ecological approaches to embodied cognitive science, despite sharing roots in psychology and phenomenology, have historically held conflicting views. Early enactivists valued ecological psychology but insisted on keeping the approaches distinct, critiquing that ecological psychology undermined agent autonomy. Conversely, ecological psychologists focused on the organism-environment system, sometimes dismissing enactivism. Both schools now use dynamic systems theory, leading some scholars to propose an ecological-enactive synthesis. This paper argues that such a synthesis risks losing valuable aspects of each approach, analogous to hasty comparisons in early East-West comparative philosophy. Instead, the relationship is best understood as one of complementarity, a concept explored through Japanese Philosophy to illuminate both agent-environment and ecological-enactive complementarities.
Dualisms between mind, body, and nature have shaped cognitive science and AI, but advanced AI systems that create art or music prompt calls for a shift in values toward AI ethics, rights, and personhood. While discussing agency and rights is not wrong in principle, it misdirects attention in current circumstances. Questions about artificial agency can only follow a genuine reconciliation of human interactivity, creativity, and embodiment. The authors contribute to embodied and enactive approaches to AI by exploring interactive and contingent dimensions of machines through Japanese philosophy. A key takeaway is that AI and machine learning systems should be recognized as powerful tools or instruments, not as agents themselves.