On the meeting of minds

Abstract This article explores the notion of the meeting of minds. I give content to the notion, first by removing philosophical obstacles that prevent us from making good sense of the idea, and then by exploring various possibilities: directly discerning what someone is thinking or feeling; learning what they think or feel by hearing what they say; apprehending the same thought; harmony in intelligent action; thinking or acting together in reciprocal recognition of a shared endeavour; and mutually established like-mindedness, serving as the background to moral, practical, or theoretical pursuits. In this, I move from the idea of apprehending or perceiving other minds, through the idea of shared acts of reason, to the concept of shared ethos, and thus from an appreciation of particular episodes in which minds meet to the idea of a mutual affinity of perception and response that can endure notwithstanding the possibility of disagreement. The article draws on Cavell, Frege, Köhler, McDowell, Wiggins, and Wittgenstein, among others, to explore the philosophical and educational implications of these ideas.