WHERE should we look for the mind? This might sound like an odd question: surely, thinking takes place inside people's heads. Nowadays, we even have sophisticated neuroimaging techniques to prove it. As deeply intuitive as this assumption about the boundaries of the mind may be, I think it is quite mistaken.
I see no compelling reason why the study of the mind should stop at the skin or the skull. Quite the contrary. There is an abundance of evidence, ranging from earliest prehistory to the present, to testify that things, as well as neurons, participate in human cognitive life. From the viewpoint of archaeology, it is clear that stone objects, body ornaments, engravings, clay tokens and writing systems play an active role in human evolution and the making of the human mind. Consequently, I suggest that what is outside the head may not necessarily be outside the mind. In ...
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