Online research in philosophy

In this programmatic paper, I reject the argument from definitional restriction against cognitive phenomenology, reject arguments for the exhaustion of cognitive phenomenology by associated phenomenologies, offer a theory on the nature of cognitive phenomenology (the theory of inferential and associative potentials), and defend the view that cognitive phenomenology is functionally exhausted, since the standard arguments against functionalism (e.g., the inverted spectrum and absent qualia arguments) do not hold for cognitive phenomenology.

The Extended Mind Hypothesis (EMH) needs a defence of phenomenal externalism in order to be consistent with an indispensable condition for attributing extended beliefs, concerning the conscious past endorsement of information. However, it is difficult, if not impossible, to envisage such a defence. Proponents ofthe EMH are thus confronted with a difficult dilemma: they either accept absurd attributions of belief, and thus deflate EMH, or incorporate, for compatibility reasons, the conscious past endorsement condition for extended belief attribution, implying a seemingly (...) unavailable defence of phenomenal externalism, and thus risk inconsistency within EMH. Either way, EMH is threatened. (shrink)