ABSTRACT

Approaches to the mind considered thus far are ‘realist’ in character. All assume that minds and their contents are bona de features of the world, features taking their place alongside stones, tables, trees, electrons, and elds. But perhaps this is a mistake. Perhaps our unfailing realism has been the source of errors and confusions that characterize much of our theorizing about the mind. Might we do better to regard minds as constructs? Might the ascription of thoughts and feelings to agents resemble the ascription of a latitude and longitude to a locale on the surface of the Earth? Latitudes and longitudes are not kinds of entity, not components of the planet alongside rivers, canyons, and mountain ranges. A child who, looking at a globe, mistook the equator for a feature on the Earth’s surface would be confusing a characteristic of our descriptive apparatus with a characteristic of the planet. Maybe this is how it is with us when we attempt to situate minds in a world of material bodies.