The Shared Mind

The cognitive and language sciences are increasingly oriented towards the social dimension of human cognition and communication. The hitherto dominant approach in modern cognitive science has viewed “social cognition” through the prism of the traditional philosophical puzzle of how individuals solve the problem of understanding Other Minds. The Shared Mind challenges the conventional “theory of mind” approach, proposing that the human mind is fundamentally based on intersubjectivity: the sharing of affective, conative, intentional and cognitive states and processes between a plurality of subjects. The socially shared, intersubjective foundation of the human mind is manifest in the structure of early interaction and communication, imitation, gestural communication and the normative and argumentative nature of language. In this path breaking volume, leading researchers from psychology, linguistics, philosophy and primatology offer complementary perspectives on the role of intersubjectivity in the context of human development, comparative cognition and evolution, and language and linguistic theory.

Søren Overgaard, Philosophy, University of Hull, United Kingdom, Author of Wittgenstein and Other Minds:
The Shared Mind is a most welcome contribution to the interdisciplinary debates about social cognition. For a long time, these debates were framed by the Theory-of-Mind paradigm and the binary opposition between “theory-theory” and “simulation theory”. In this book leading experts within fields as diverse as neuroscience, developmental psychology, linguistics, primatology, and philosophy, make significant additions to the evidence mounting against the Theory-of-Mind paradigm. The book will be of interest to anyone seeking a deeper understanding of the foundations of human social life.