Mental States, Conscious and Nonconscious

Philosophy Compass 9 (6):392-401 (2014)
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Abstract

I discuss here the nature of nonconscious mental states and the ways in which they may differ from their conscious counterparts. I first survey reasons to think that mental states can and often do occur without being conscious. Then, insofar as the nature of nonconscious mentality depends on how we understand the nature of consciousness, I review some of the major theories of consciousness and explore what restrictions they may place on the kinds of states that can occur nonconsciously. I close with a discussion of what makes a state mental, if consciousness is not the mark of the mental.

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Jacob Berger
Lycoming College

Citations of this work

Unconscious perceptual justification.Jacob Berger, Bence Nanay & Jake Quilty-Dunn - 2018 - Inquiry: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Philosophy 61 (5-6):569-589.
Two dogmas of empirical justification.Jack C. Lyons - 2020 - Philosophical Issues 30 (1):221-237.

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References found in this work

Naming and Necessity: Lectures Given to the Princeton University Philosophy Colloquium.Saul A. Kripke - 1980 - Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Edited by Darragh Byrne & Max Kölbel.
What is it like to be a bat?Thomas Nagel - 1974 - Philosophical Review 83 (October):435-50.
A Materialist Theory of the Mind.D. M. Armstrong - 1968 - New York: Routledge. Edited by Ted Honderich.

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