Extended Mind is a 1998 thesis by Andy Clark and David Chalmers presenting the idea of “active externalism,” in which objects in the environment function as part of the mind. Because external objects play a significant role in supporting cognitive processes, the mind and the environment act as a “coupled system” that can be viewed as a complete cognitive system in its own right. In this way, the mind extends into the physical world. According to Clark and Chalmers, the concept of Extended Mind predicts that external objects must function with the same purpose as internal processes. The example cited is an experiment in which two fictional characters are both simultaneously traveling to a museum. One is suffering from Alzheimer’s disease and has jotted down all his directions in a notebook that serves as a memory. The other is able to recall the internal directions in his memory. The thesis is that the only difference between the two cases is that in one case the memory is managed by the notebook, while in the other it is processed internally by the brain.
This thesis is interesting because, when applied to Artificial Intelligence, it interprets it as a prosthesis of the human mind, on par with other tools such as books or notebooks.
The concept of extended mind is not to be confused with the concept of Extended Intelligence, which instead describes the extension of human intellectual faculties interacting with AI, but offers an interesting key to the relationship between mind and external artificial tools.
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