ABSTRACT
This chapter offers an innovative reading of epic descriptions of automata by interpreting Hephaestus’ tripods, bellows, helper-maidens, and Pandora as forms of extended cognition. This is a theory of mind that posits that human cognitive processes rely on interactions with physical environs and objects, forming a coupled system in which the boundary between mind and world is fluid and permeable. Nowhere is this interactivity more apparent than in products of technology like those crafted by Hephaestus, which are designed to function in concert with the god’s mind. As this chapter demonstrates in its study of the different cognitive properties embodied in each of these automata, it is possible to discern in these portrayals a reflection of how the archaic Greeks conceptualized the human mind and mental activity writ large.
