Gadgets, niches, and distributed cognition: a proposal on the external structures of human mind

In this paper, I approach cognition as a way of being within something (the brain) and with something (the environment), thus exhibiting a dual nature: rooted in interactions with the world, yet not fully reducible to them. I propose expanding the notion of cognitive gadgets by introducing second-order cognitive gadgets - external, material, or symbolic structures that not only support but also shape and transform the conditions of possibility of the cognition. These second-order gadgets function as cognitive structures that actively participate in the architecture of the human mind, influencing its ontogenesis, plasticity, and epistemic regimes. By articulating this proposal with niche construction theory and abductive reasoning, I argue that cognition is not simply distributed across the mind, body, and world but emerges from cognitive agents' continuous shaping of the environment. Finally, I examine the role of artificial intelligence as a contemporary instance of a second-order gadget, whose effects are not limited to cognitive support but involve a profound reconfiguration of thought styles and collective mental ecologies.