Abstract

This paper considers the contemporary relevance of John Dewey’s ideas concerning mind, the mind-body debate, and the mind-world debate. Adequately laid out, a Deweyan conception of mind will reveal features that challenge three of the most persistent implications of current theories of mind, namely, that the mind is disembodied, passive, and disconnected from the world. As an alternative, I identify three features implicit in Dewey’s writing that present the mind as embodied, actively focused, and fluid in relation to the world. I also briefly consider past attempts to outline a Deweyan conception of mind. This consideration shows that none of these accounts adequately addresses all three of the features targeted here and thus that there is a possibility for a better account of the Deweyanconception of mind.