ABSTRACT
Several related though distinct questions have been raised in recent philosophy of mind and cognitive science: what makes an individual’s mind or cognition embodied, situated, grounded, embedded, enactive, and extended? I’ll focus on the first question: what makes an individual’s mind embodied? I’ll argue for the following distinctions: embodiment can be uncontroversial or controversial. Controversial embodiment can be moderate or radical. Controversial radical embodiment can be crude or sophisticated. For the purpose of clarifying this last distinction, I will introduce the doctrine of Cartesian materialism construed as the conjunction of (i) the computational representational approach to the mind and mental processes, (ii) the Fodorian trichotomy and (iii) neurocentrism. I shall examine the respective costs of rejecting each conjunct and examine the question how radical sophisticated embodiment relates to the extended mind.