Folk psychology as collective imagination. A commentary on Adam Toon’s <i>Mind as Metaphor</i>

In Mind as Metaphor, Adam Toon embarks in an anti-Cartesian project that rejects the assumption that folk psychology is an attempt at explaining the inner machinery of the mind. He defends, instead, a version of mental fictionalism that arises from pretense. In what follows, I argue that we can articulate this proposal in terms of collective imagination understood as a shared or collective practice that can be sedimented in habits, behaviors and various elements of our material environment. The upshot of this articulation is that it helps us understand how various elements of Toon's proposal hang together. Additionally, it allows us to explore some implications related to the heterogeneity of folk psychology and its mysterious success.