Experience and the physical
Journal of Consciousness Studies 13 (10-11):117-28 (2006)
| Abstract | Strawson’s challenging and provocative defence of panpsychism1 begins by sensibly insisting that physicalism, properly understood, must unflinchingly countenance the occurrence of conscious experiences. No view, he urges, will count as ‘real physicalism’ (p. 4) if it seeks to get around or soften that commitment, as versions of socalled physicalism sometimes do. Real physicalism (hereinafter physicalism tout court) must accordingly reject any stark opposition of mental and physical, which is not only invoked by many followers of Descartes, but even countenanced by many recent physicalists. Conscious experiences, Strawson persuasively urges, are a special case of the physical, just as cows are animals. Panpsychism enters the picture because, despite the physical nature of conscious experiences, Strawson maintains that we cannot describe or explain the experiential using the terms of physics or neurophysiology. Since the experiential is nonetheless physical, Strawson concludes that the physical ultimates must, in addition to whatever properties physics and neurophysiology reveal, have experiential properties as well. Strawson argues that we cannot avoid this conclusion by maintaining that combinations of physical ultimates constitute or give rise to experiential properties. Physical ultimates cannot give rise to conscious experience unless those ultimates are themselves in some way ‘intrinsically experiential’ (p. 22). The experiential cannot emerge from nonexperiential ultimates in the way that macroscopic liquidity is standardly held to emerge from molecular properties. Strawson concludes that at least some physical ultimates must be ‘intrinsically experience-involving’ (p. 22); and, since it’s reasonable to see the physical ultimates as homogeneous in nature, we should assume that they all have experiential properties | |||||||||
| Keywords | Emergence Experience Metaphysics Panpsychism Physicalism Strawson, Galen | |||||||||
| Categories | ||||||||||
| Options |
|
|||||||||
Download options| PhilPapers Archive |
Upload a copy of this paper Check publisher's policy on self-archival Papers currently archived: 5,664 |
| External links |
  Try with proxy. |
| Through your library | Configure |
Similar books and articlesFiona Macpherson (2006). Property Dualism and the Merits of Solutions to the Mind-Body Problem: A Reply to Strawson. Journal of Consciousness Studies 13 (s 10-11):72-89.
Anthony Freeman (2006). Consciousness and Its Place in Nature: Does Physicalism Entail Panpsychism? Exeter: Imprint Academic.
Georges Rey (2006). Better to Study Human Than World Psychology - Commentary on Galen Strawson's Realistic Monism: Why Physicalism Entails Panpsychism. Journal of Consciousness Studies 13 (10-11):110-116.
Tim Crane (2001). The Significance of Emergence. In Carl Gillett & Barry M. Loewer (eds.), Physicalism and its Discontents. Cambridge University Press.
Daniel Stoljar (2006). Comments on Galen Strawson - 'Realistic Monism: Why Physicalism Entails Panpsychism. Journal of Consciousness Studies 13 (10-11):170-176.
David J. Chalmers (1995). Absent Qualia, Fading Qualia, Dancing Qualia. In Thomas Metzinger (ed.), Conscious Experience. Ferdinand Schoningh.
Galen Strawson (1999). Realistic Materialist Monism. In S. Hameroff, A. Kaszniak & D. Chalmers (eds.), Towards a Science of Consciousness III.
Colin McGinn (2006). Hard Questions - Comments on Galen Strawson. Journal of Consciousness Studies 13 (10-11):90-99.
David Papineau (2006). Comments on Galen Strawson: Realistic Monism: Why Physicalism Entails Panpsychism. Journal of Consciousness Studies 13 (10-11):100-109.
Analytics
Monthly downloads |
Added to index2009-01-28Total downloads26 ( #47,590 of 549,013 )Recent downloads (6 months)2 ( #37,272 of 549,013 )How can I increase my downloads? |
My notes
Discussion
