The genuine problem of consciousness
Abstract
Those who are optimistic about the prospects of a science of consciousness, and those who believe that it lies beyond the reach of standard scientific methods, have something in common: both groups view consciousness as posing a special challenge for science. In this paper, we take a close look at the nature of this challenge. We show that popular conceptions of the problem of consciousness, epitomized by David Chalmers’ formulation of the ‘hard problem’, can be best explained as a cognitive illusion, which arises as a by-product of our cognitive architecture. We present evidence from numerous sources to support our claim that we have a specialized system for thinking about phenomenal states, and that an inhibitory relationship exists between this system and the system we use to think about physical mechanisms. Even though the ‘hard problem’ is an illusion, unfortunately it appears that our cognitive architecture forces a closely related problem upon us. The ‘genuine problem’ of consciousness shares many features with the hard problem, and it also represents a special challenge for psychology. Nonetheless, researchers should be careful not to mistake the hard problem for the genuine problem, since the strategies appropriate for dealing with these problems differ in important respects.Author's Profile
My notes
Similar books and articles
Giving up on the hard problem of consciousness.Eugene Mills - 1996 - Journal of Consciousness Studies 3 (1):26-32.
Rethinking nature: A hard problem within the hard problem.Gregg H. Rosenberg - 1996 - Journal of Consciousness Studies 3 (1):76-88.
What would it "be like" to solve the hard problem?: Cognition, consciousness, and qualia zombies.Greg P. Hodes - 2005 - Neuroquantology 3 (1):43-58.
The philosophical issue in machine consciousness.Piotr Boltuc - 2009 - International Journal of Machine Consciousness 1 (1):155-176.
Colour and Consciousness: Untying the Metaphysical Knot.Pär Sundström - 2007 - Philosophical Studies 136 (2):123 - 165.
There is no hard problem of consciousness.Kieron O'Hara & Tom Scutt - 1996 - Journal of Consciousness Studies 3 (4):290-302.
The hard problem: Closing the empirical gap.Jonathan Shear - 1996 - Journal of Consciousness Studies 3 (1):54-68.
A Neurofunctional Theory of Consciousness.Jesse J. Prinz - 2005 - In Andrew Brook & Kathleen Akins (eds.), Cognition and the Brain: The Philosophy and Neuroscience Movement. Cambridge University Press. pp. 381-396.
On The Infinitely Hard Problem Of Consciousness.Bernard Molyneux - 2011 - Australasian Journal of Philosophy 89 (2):211 - 228.
Analytics
Added to PP
2009-01-28
Downloads
0
6 months
0
2009-01-28
Downloads
0
6 months
0
Historical graph of downloads
Sorry, there are not enough data points to plot this chart.
Author's Profile
Citations of this work
Intuitions about consciousness: Experimental studies.Joshua Knobe & Jesse Prinz - 2008 - Phenomenology and the Cognitive Sciences 7 (1):67-83.