The Extended Mind
Richard Menary
Abstract
Where does the mind stop and the rest of the world begin? In their famous 1998 paper “The Extended Mind,” philosophers Andy Clark and David J. Chalmers posed this question and answered it provocatively: cognitive processes “ain’t all in the head.” The environment has an active role in driving cognition; cognition is sometimes made up of neural, bodily, and environmental processes. Clark and Chalmers’ argument excited a vigorous debate among philosophers, both supporters and detractors. This book brings together the best responses to Clark and Chalmers’s bold proposal. These responses, together ... More
Where does the mind stop and the rest of the world begin? In their famous 1998 paper “The Extended Mind,” philosophers Andy Clark and David J. Chalmers posed this question and answered it provocatively: cognitive processes “ain’t all in the head.” The environment has an active role in driving cognition; cognition is sometimes made up of neural, bodily, and environmental processes. Clark and Chalmers’ argument excited a vigorous debate among philosophers, both supporters and detractors. This book brings together the best responses to Clark and Chalmers’s bold proposal. These responses, together with the original paper by Clark and Chalmers, offer an overview of the latest research on the extended mind thesis. The chapters first discuss (and answer) objections raised to Clark and Chalmers’s thesis. Clark himself responds to critics in an essay that uses the movie Memento’s amnesia-aiding notes and tattoos to illustrate the workings of the extended mind. Further chapters then consider the different directions in which the extended mind project might be taken, including the need for an approach that focuses on cognitive activity and practice.
Keywords:
cognitive processes,
environment,
cognition,
environmental processes,
Clark and Chalmers,
extended mind,
Memento,
amnesia,
tattoos,
cognitive activity
Bibliographic Information
| Print publication date: 2010 |
Print ISBN-13: 9780262014038 |
| Published to MIT Press Scholarship Online: August 2013 |
DOI:10.7551/mitpress/9780262014038.001.0001 |
