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It Must be True – But How Can it Be? Some Remarks on Panpsychism and Mental Composition

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 July 2010

Pierfrancesco Basile
Pierfrancesco Basile
Affiliation:
University of Bern, Switzerland
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Abstract

Although panpsychism has had a very long history, one that goes back to the very origin of western philosophy, its force has only recently been appreciated by analytic philosophers of mind. And even if many still reject the theory as utterly absurd, others have argued that it is the only genuine form of physicalism. This paper examines the case for panpsychism and argues that there are at least good prima facie reasons for taking it seriously. In a second step, the paper discusses the main difficulty the theory has to face, the ‘composition problem’. This is the problem of explaining how the primitive experiences that are supposed to exist at the ultimate level of reality could give rise to the unified experience of a human being. What assumptions as to the nature of experience generate the composition problem? Is mental composition impossible in principle or do we simply lack at present any understanding of phenomenal parts and wholes?

Type
Papers
Information
Royal Institute of Philosophy Supplements , Volume 67 , October 2010 , pp. 93 - 112
Copyright
Copyright © The Royal Institute of Philosophy and the contributors 2010

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References

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36 For a critical assessment of phenomenal holism, see Dainton, B., Stream of Consciousness. Unity and Continuity in Conscious Experience (London and New York: Routledge, 2000), 181–213Google Scholar and see his paper in this volume.

37 T. Nagel, The View from Nowhere, op. cit., 29.

38 T. Nagel, ‘Panpsychism’, op. cit., 193.

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40 I would like to thank Leemon McHenry, Pauline Phemister and Galen Strawson for helpful comments on an earlier version of this paper.