Mind vs mined

Photo of author

Grammarist

Mind and mined are two commonly confused words that are pronounced in the same way but are spelled differently and have different meanings, which makes them homophones. We will examine the different meanings of the homophonic words mind and mined, the word origin of the terms, and some examples of their English usage in sentences.

The noun mind means the consciousness that allows a human to think, feel, and process his experience of the world. The mind is the person’s memory, intellect, attention, reason, opinion, intention, or level of determination. Mind may also be used as a verb to mean to object to, to feel concerned about, to pay attention to or to behave. Related words are minds, minded, minding, minder. The word mind is derived from the Old English word gemynd, which means thought or memory.

Mined is the past tense of mine, a verb that means to dig in the ground for minerals or other precious items or to dig for something in a figurative manner, as in doing research or an investigation. The word mined is derived from the fourteenth century word minen, which means to dig. Related words are mine, mines, mining.

Examples

And that, in turn, brings to mind the biblical argument for veneration of human beings, or what has been translated into English 22 times in the RSV as obeisance. (The National Catholic Register)

Today we tend to regard the mind not as a mill but as a computer, but, otherwise, the problem exists in much the same way that Leibniz formulated it three hundred years ago. (The New Yorker)

Virgil Griffith, the US cryptocurrency expert arrested last week on suspicion of helping North Korea evade US sanctions, reportedly said it’d be “really cool” if North Korea mined ether. (The Business Insider)

SEPTA is asking its own questions about the use of mica mined by children, the agency said in a statement Thursday. (The Philadelphia Inquirer)