Carlos Esteban-Jiménez

Despite the proliferation of articles and edited volumes on EvoDevo (evolutionary developmental biology), only a couple of monographs dealing systematically with the conceptual challenges posed by the reintroduction of development into the structure of evolutionary theory are available (Gould 2002; Amundson 2005). In Requiem for the Centaurus: An Epistemological Approach to Evolutionary Developmental Biology, Footnote1 Gustavo Caponi reorganizes the pieces of work he has been publishing in recent years on different historical and conceptual aspects of evolutionary biology into a long, coherent, elegant, and thought-provoking argument that deserves to be read from beginning to end.

This paper introduces the concept of the functional ambivalence of mental symptoms as a contribution to Enactive Psychiatry. Drawing on the autonomy-centered foundations of the enactive approach, we argue that mental disorders are not purely dysfunctional, but complex, multi-scale patterns of organization that can display functional and dysfunctional aspects at once. Functionality is understood as graded and context-dependent, emerging from interactions among multiple domains of normativity and across temporal scales. In dialogue with Russell’s perspective problem, we argue that the ambiguity of functional evaluation is not a shortcoming but a predictable consequence of plural autonomy. Our proposal is intended to be complementary to related theses developed in other frameworks. These perspectives can help clarify why certain symptoms persist and which meaningful and self-regulatory roles they may serve. Using anorexia, self-harm, and dietary restraint as examples, we show how behaviors typically treated as dysfunctional can play functional roles even as they generate harm. Clinically, the framework supports interventions that identify what symptoms do for the person while fostering alternative and more sustainable forms of regulation. Ethically, it promotes a less pathologising understanding of mental disorder by integrating first-person perspectives that can disclose functional dimensions often missed by third-person evaluation.