The goal of the present paper is to defend against a certain line of attack the view that conscious experience of color is no more fine-grained that the repertoire of non- demonstrative concepts that a perceiver is able to bring to bear in perception. The line of attack in question is an alleged empirical argument - the Diachronic Indistinguishability Argument - based on pairs of colors so similar that they can be discriminated when simultaneously presented but not when presented across (...) a memory delay. My aim here is to show that this argument fails. (shrink)

In this paper, we present new cases of illusion and hallucination that have not heretofore been identified. We argue that such cases show that the traditional accounts of illusion and hallucination are incorrect because they do not identify all of the cases of non-veridical experience that they need to and they elide important differences between cases. In light of this, we present new and exhaustive definitions of illusion and hallucination. First, we explicate the traditional accounts of illusion and hallucination. We (...) then proceed to outline cases of pure property experience—that is, experience as of properties, but not as of objects. We suggest that some might find it to be plausible that olfactory experience is of this kind. We argue that, within instances of such pure property experience, one can identify cases of veridical property perception, illusory property perception and hallucinatory property experience. With these distinctions in hand, we re-examine ordinary cases of experiences as of objects having properties. Drawing on the ideas uncovered by considering pure property experience, we bring to light many new cases of illusion and hallucination within ordinary experience as of objects having properties. These consist in different combinations of veridical perception, illusory perception and hallucination of both objects and properties. In order to accept that these new cases of illusion and hallucination exist in ordinary experience as of objects having properties, nothing turns on accepting the idea that there is pure property experience, or that olfactory experience is an instance of it. Such a conception of experience is simply a tool—a ladder to gain a good vantage point from which one can appreciate that there are these further cases. But this is a ladder that, as Wittgenstein might say, can be thrown away once it is used. Identifying new instances of illusion and hallucination provides much needed, important data for testing theories of experience and perception—theories that are frequently motivated, and should be judged, by their ability to account for cases of illusion and hallucination. (shrink)

It is widely accepted that physicalism faces its most serious challenge when it comes to making room for the phenomenal character of psychological experience, its so-called what-it-is-like aspect. The challenge has surfaced repeatedly over the past two decades in a variety of forms. In a particularly striking one, Frank Jackson considers a situation in which Mary, a brilliant scientist who knows all the physical facts there are to know about psychological experience, has spent the whole of her life in a (...) black and white room. He asks, What will happen when Mary is released from her black and white room or is given a colour television monitor? Will she learn anything or not? It seems just obvious that she will learn something about the world and our visual experience of it. But then it is inescapable that her previous knowledge was incomplete. But she had all the physical information. (Jackson 1986: 130). (shrink)

I propose a counterexample to naturalistic representational theories of phenomenal character. The counterexample is generated by experiences of novel colours reported by Crane and Piantanida. I consider various replies that a representationalist might make, including whether novel colours could be possible colours of objects and whether one can account for novel colours as one would account for binary colours or colour mixtures. I argue that none of these strategies is successful and therefore that one cannot fully explain the nature of (...) the phenomenal character of perceptual experiences using a naturalistic conception of representation. (shrink)

It is widely accepted that knowledge of certain of one’s own mental states is authoritative in being epistemically more secure than knowledge of the mental states of others, and theories of self-knowledge have largely appealed to one or the other of two sources to explain this special epistemic status. The first, ‘detectivist’, position, appeals to an inner perception-like basis, whereas the second, ‘constitutivist’, one, appeals to the view that the special security awarded to certain self-knowledge is a conceptual matter. I (...) argue that there is a fundamental class of cases of authoritative self-knowledge, ones in which subjects are consciously thinking about their current, conscious intentional states, that is best accounted for in terms of a theory that is, broadly speaking, introspectionist and detectivist. The position developed has an intuitive plausibility that has inspired many who work in the Cartesian tradition, and the potential to yield a single treatment of the basis of authoritative self-knowledge for both intentional states and sensation states. (shrink)

In this paper I examine whether representationalism can account for various thought experiments about colour inversions. Representationalism is, at minimum, the view that, necessarily, if two experiences have the same representational content then they have the same phenomenal character. I argue that representationalism ought to be rejected if one holds externalist views about experiential content and one holds traditional exter- nalist views about the nature of the content of propositional attitudes. Thus, colour inver- sion scenarios are more damaging to externalist (...) representationalist views than have been previously thought. More specifically, I argue that representationalists who endorse externalism about experiential content either have to become internalists about the content of propositional attitudes or they have to adopt a novel variety of externalism about the content of propositional attitudes. This novel type of propositional attitude externalism is investigated. It can be seen that adopting it forces one to reject Putnam. (shrink)

A number of theories of consciousness define consciousness by the folk-intuition that consciousness is somehow aware of, or ‘given’ to itself. I attempt to undermine this intuition on phenomenological, conceptual and psychological grounds. An alternative, first-order theory of consciousness, however, faces the task of explaining the possibility of self-awareness for consciousness, as well as the everyday intuition supporting it. I propose that another, weaker kind of givenness, ‘givenness as availability’, is up to both of these tasks, and is therefore sufficient (...) and suitable for first-order theories of consciousness. (shrink)

What does vision represent? What does hearing represent? Smell? Touch? Competing answers to each of these questions have been defended. The present paper argues that the issue of what taste represents is categorically more complicated. In particular, it raises two very difficult dilemmas.

My primary aim in this chapter is to explain in what the traditional mind–body problem consists, what its possible solutions are, and what obstacles lie in the way of a resolution. The discussion will develop in two phases. The first phase, sections 1.2–1.4, will be concerned to get clearer about the import of our initial question as a precondition of developing an account of possible responses to it. The second phase, sections 1.5–1.6, explains how a problem arises in our attempts (...) to answer the question we have characterized, and surveys the various solutions that can be and have been offered. More specifically, sections 1.2–1.4 are concerned with how to understand the basic elements of our initial question – how we should identify the mental, on the one hand, and the physical, on the other – and with what sorts of relations between them we are concerned. Section 1.2 identifies and explains the two traditional marks of the mental, consciousness and intentionality, and discusses how they are related. Section 1.3 gives an account of how we should understand ‘physical’ in our initial question so as not to foreclose any of the traditional positions on the mind–body problem. Section 1.4 then addresses the third element in our initial question, mapping out the basic sorts of relations that may hold between mental and physical phenomena, and identifying some for special attention. Sections 1.5–1.6 are concerned with explaining the source of the difficulty in answering our initial question, and the kinds of solutions that have been offered to it. Section 1.5 explains why our initial question gives rise to a problem, and gives a precise form to the mind–body problem, which is presented as a set of four propositions, each of which, when presented independently, seems compelling, but which are jointly inconsistent. Section 1.6 classifies responses to the mind–body problem on the basis of which of the propositions in our inconsistent set they reject, and provides a brief overview of the main varieties in each category, together with some of the difficulties that arise for each. Section 1.7 is a brief conclusion about the source of our difficulties in understanding the place of mind in the natural world. (shrink)

How are attention and consciousness related? Can we learn what the contents of someone’s consciousness are if we know the targets of their attention? What can we learn about the contents of consciousness if we know the targets of attention? Although introspection might suggest that attention and consciousness are intimately connected, a good body of recent findings in cognitive psychology and cognitive neuroscience brings compelling reasons to believe that they are two separate and independent processes. This paper attempts to bring (...) attention and consciousness back together to make the study of attentional distributions an essential ingredient for the study of the contents of consciousness. My proposal has two main components. First, I introduce a framework for systematizing the relations between attention in its different forms and consciousness in its different forms. Although philosophers and cognitive scientists have repeatedly highlighted the importance of such systematization, most details are still to be worked out. Here I take an initial stab at this project based on the notion of degrees of informational enhancement. Second, I introduce the notion of vicarious attention to account for a kind of additional processing benefit that comes for free when attention is allocated to a target. I then propose that this kind of processing must also be considered when mapping attention targets into contents of consciousness. (shrink)

This paper argues, not that physicalism is wrong, but that it is irrational. The paper defines standards of rationality, both metaphysical and epistemological, that physicalism necessarily inherits from science. Then it assesses physicalist efforts to naturalize consciousness in light of these. It concludes that physicalism allows its metaphysics to outrun its epistemology, in defiance of applicable standards, revealing a fundamental incoherence in the doctrine. The paper also briefly reviews other naturalization programs, to claim that physicalism, unlike the sciences, hasn’t proved (...) fruitful. (shrink)

In this paper I discuss the claim that the successful reduction of qualitative to physical states requires some sort of intelligible connection between our qualitative and physical concepts, which in turn requires a conceptual analysis of our qualitative concepts in causal-functional terms. While I defend this claim against some of its recent critics, I ultimately dispute it, and propose a different way to get the requisite intelligible connection between qualitative and physical concepts.

Bayne and McClelland (2016) raise the matching content challenge for proponents of cognitive phenomenology: if the phenomenal character of thought is determined by its intentional content, why is it that my conscious thought that there is a blue wall before me and my visual perception of a blue wall before me don’t share any phenomenology, despite their matching content? In this paper, I first show that the matching content challenge is not limited to proponents of cognitive phenomenology but extends to (...) cases of cross-modal perception, threatening representationalism about consciousness in general. I then give two responses to the challenge, both of which appeal to intentional modes. The difference in intentional mode between a thought and a visual perception can either explain why we should not expect any phenomenal overlap between the two experiences, or it can make it clear why the phenomenal overlap is easy to overlook. I show that these responses are available to the representationalist about perceptual consciousness, as well as the proponent of cognitive phenomenology. The upshot is that, when it comes to the matching content challenge, both perceptual representationalism and cognitive representationalism stand on equal dialectical footing. (shrink)

ABSTRACT: In a recent article, D. H. Finkelstein offers a new proposal about the distinction between conscious and unconscious belief On his proposal, someone’s belief is conscious if he has an ability to express it simply by self-ascribing it; and someone’s belief is unconscious if he lacks such an ability. In this article, I argue that his proposal is inadequate, and then offer a somewhat different proposal. On my proposal, someone’s belief is conscious if he has self-ascribed this belief without (...) recourse to any evidence about his behaviour; and someone’s belief is unconscious if it is not conscious.RÉSUMÉ: Dans un récent article, D. H. Finkelstein propose une nouvelle distinction entre croyance consciente et inconsciente. Suivant cette proposition, la croyance de quelqu’un est consciente s’il a la capacité de l’exprimer tout simplement en se l’attribuant; sa croyance est inconsciente s’il n’en a pas la capacité. Dans cet article, je fais valoir que cette proposition est inadéquate, et je propose ensuite une nouvelledistinction. Suivant cette distinction, la croyance de quelqu’un est consciente s’il s’attribue cette croyance sans s’appuyer sur aucun élément de preuve au sujet de son comportement; sa croyance est inconsciente si elle n’est pas consciente. (shrink)

How do we know when we have imagined something? How do we distinguish our imaginings from other kinds of mental states we might have? These questions present serious, if often overlooked, challenges for theories of introspection and self-knowledge. This paper looks specifically at the difficulties imagination creates for Neo-Expressivist, outward-looking, and inner sense theories of self-knowledge. A path forward is then charted, by considering the connection between the kinds of situations in which we can reliably say that another person is (...) imagining, and those in which we can say the same about ourselves. This view is a variation on the outward-looking approach, and preserves much of the spirit of Neo-Expressivism. (shrink)

It is widely held that introspection-based self-ascriptions of mental states are immune to error through misidentification , relative to the first person pronoun. Many have taken such errors to be logically impossible, arguing that the immunity holds as an “absolute” necessity. Here I discuss an actual case of craniopagus twins—twins conjoined at the head and brain—as a means to arguing that such errors are logically possible and, for all we know, nomologically possible. An important feature of the example is that (...) it is one where a person may be said to be introspectively aware of a mental state that occurs outside of her own mind. Implications are discussed for views of the relation between introspection and mental state ownership, and between introspection and epistemic criteria for the “mark of the mental.”. (shrink)

The central claim of this paper is that what it is like to see green or any other perceptible property is just the perceptual mode of presentation of that property. Perceptual modes of presentation are important because they help resolve a tension in current work on consciousness. Philosophers are pulled by three mutually inconsistent theses: representational externalism, representationalism, and phenomenal internalism. I throw my hat in with defenders of the first two: the externalist representationalists. We are faced with the problem (...) of explaining away intuitions that favor phenomenal internalism. Perceptual modes of presentation account for what it is like to see properties in a way that accommodates those intuitions without vindicating phenomenal internalism itself. Perceptual MoPs therefore provide a new way of being an externalist representationalist. (shrink)

In this paper, a theoretical account of the functional role of consciousness in the cognitive system of normal subjects is developed. The account is based upon an approach to consciousness that is drawn from the phenomenological tradition. On this approach, consciousness is essentially peripheral self-awareness, in a sense to be duly explained. It will be argued that the functional role of consciousness, so construed, is to provide the subject with just enough information about her ongoing experience to make it possible (...) for her to easily obtain as much information as she may need. The argument for this account of consciousness' functional role will proceed in three main stages. First, the phenomenological approach to consciousness as peripheral self-awareness will be expounded and endorsed. Second, an account of the functional role of peripheral perceptual awareness will be offered. Finally, the account of the functional role of peripheral self-awareness will be obtained by straightforward extension from the functional role of peripheral perceptual awareness. (shrink)

To a first approximation, self-representationalism is the view that a mental state M is phenomenally conscious just in case M represents itself in the appropriate way. Proponents of self-representationalism seem to think that the phenomenology of ordinary conscious experience is on their side, but opponents seem to think the opposite. In this paper, I consider the phenomenological merits and demerits of self-representationalism. I argue that there is phenomenological evidence in favor of self-representationalism, and rather more confidently, that there is no (...) phenomenological evidence against self-representationalism. (shrink)

. When I have a conscious experience of the sky, there is a bluish way it is like for me to have that experience. We may distinguish two aspects of this "bluish way it is like for me": the bluish aspect and the for-me aspect. Let us call the bluish aspect of the experience its qualitative character and the for-me aspect its subjective character . What is this elusive for-me-ness, or subjective character , of conscious experience? In this paper, I (...) examine six different attempts to account for subjective character in terms of the functional and representational properties of conscious experiences. After arguing against the first five, I defend the sixth. (shrink)

It is often assumed thatconsciousness and intentionality are twomutually independent aspects of mental life.When the assumption is denounced, it usuallygives way to the claim that consciousness issomehow dependent upon intentionality. Thepossibility that intentionality may bedependent upon consciousness is rarelyentertained. Recently, however, John Searle andColin McGinn have argued for just suchdependence. In this paper, I reconstruct andevaluate their argumentation. I am in sympathyboth with their view and with the lines ofargument they employ in its defense. UnlikeSearle and McGinn, however, I am (...) quite attachedto a naturalist approach to intentionality. Itwill turn out to be somewhat difficult toreconcile naturalism with the notion thatintentionality is dependent upon consciousness,although, perhaps surprisingly, I will arguethat McGinn's case for such dependence iscompatible with naturalism. (shrink)

Phenomenal consciousness is the property mental states, events, and processes have when, and only when, there is something it is like for their subject to undergo them, or be in them. What it is like to have a conscious experience is customarily referred to as the experience’s phenomenal character. Theories of consciousness attempt to account for this phenomenal character. This article surveys the currently prominent theories, paying special attention to the various attempts to explain a state’s phenomenal character in terms (...) of its representational content. (shrink)

RÉSUMÉ: Les discussions philosophiques actuelles sur le problème de la conscience [consciousness] se concentrent sur la question des qualia, ou qualités sensorielles. Mais les auteurs traditionnels au sujet de la conscience—tels que Kant et William James—s'intéressaient davantage à un autre aspect de l'expérience consciente, à savoir le fait que lorsqu'on est conscient [conscious], on est en même temps, et de façon permanente, conscient de soi-même [aware of oneself] comme sujet de l'expérience. Cet article explore trois modèles représentationnels du phénomène de (...) la conscience permanente de soi [permanent self-awareness]. Chacun d'eux se révèle inadéquat pour une raison ou pour une autre. Ce que la discussion fait ainsi ressortir, c'est le genre d'exigences auxquels devrait satisfaire une bonne théorie de la conscience permanente de soi. (shrink)

When a mental state is conscious – in the sense that there is something it is like for the subject to have it – it instantiates a certain property F in virtue of which it is a conscious state. It is customary to suppose that F is the property of having sensory quality. The paper argues that this supposition is false. The first part of the paper discusses reasons for thinking that unconscious mental states can have a sensory quality, for (...) example in cases of absent-minded perception. If unconscious mental states can have a sensory quality, then sensory quality is an insufficient condition for consciousness. The second part of the paper argues that there are even better reasons to think that sensory quality is an unnecessary condition for consciousness. The idea is that mental states can be conscious even when they lack sensory quality, for example, in the case of certain conscious propositional attitudes. In the third part of the paper, an alternative to the rejected supposition, drawn from the phenomenological tradition, is offered: that consciousness is a matter of implicit self-awareness, rather than of sensory quality. According to this alternative, a mental state is conscious when, and only when, it involves implicit self-awareness. (shrink)

One major problem many hypotheses regarding the neural correlate of consciousness, face is what we might call “the why question”: why would this particular neural feature, rather than another, correlate with consciousness? The purpose of the present paper is to develop an NCC hypothesis that answers this question. The proposed hypothesis is inspired by the cross-order integration theory of consciousness, according to which consciousness arises from the functional integration of a first-order representation of an external stimulus and a second-order representation (...) of that first-order representation. The proposal comes in two steps. The first step concerns the “general shape” of the NCC and can be directly derived from COI theory. The second step is a concrete hypothesis that can be arrived at by combining the general shape with empirical considerations. (shrink)

According to higher-order theories of consciousness, a mental state is conscious only when represented by another mental state. Higher-order theories must predict there to be some brain areas (or networks of areas) such that, because they produce (the right kind of) higher-order states, the disabling of them brings about deficits in consciousness. It is commonly thought that the prefrontal cortex produces these kinds of higher-order states. In this paper, I first argue that this is likely correct, meaning that, if some (...) higher-order theory is true, prefrontal lesions should produce dramatic deficits in visual consciousness. I then survey prefrontal lesion data, looking for evidence of such deficits. I argue that no such deficits are to be found, and that this presents a compelling case against higher-order theories. (shrink)

The idea that attention is necessary for consciousness (the “Necessity Thesis”) is frequently advocated by philosophers and psychologists alike. Experiments involving inattentional and change blindness are thought to support the Necessity Thesis, but they do so only if subjects failing to notice the target stimulus are also not conscious of it. This article uses commonsense phenomenological observations supplemented with empirical data to argue that some subjects failing to notice the target stimulus nonetheless experience its color. Since subjects not noticing the (...) target are commonly assumed to be not attending to it, these scenarios would be instances of consciousness without attention: instead of inattentional and change blindness supporting the Necessity Thesis, they would present counterexamples to it. (shrink)

Situation theory, as developed by Barwise and his collaborators, is used to demonstrate the possibility of defining teleology (and related notions, like that of proper or biological function) in terms of higher order causation, along the lines suggested by Taylor and Wright. This definition avoids the excessive narrowness that results from trying to define teleology in terms of evolutionary history or the effects of natural selection. By legitimating the concept of teleology, this definition also provides promising new avenues for solving (...) long standing problems in the philosophy of mind, such as the problems of intentionality and mental causation. (shrink)

Empirical approaches on topics such as consciousness, self-awareness, or introspective perspective, need a conceptual framework so that the emerging, still unconnected findings can be integrated and put into perspective. We introduce a model of self-consciousness derived from phenomenology, philosophy, the cognitive, and neurosciences. We will then give an overview of research data on one particular aspect of our model, self-agency, trying to link findings from cognitive psychology and neuroscience. Finally, we will expand on pathological aspects of self-agency, and in particular (...) on psychosis in schizophrenia. We show, that a deficient self-monitoring system underlies, in part, hallucinations and formal thought (language) disorder in schizophrenia. We argue, that self-consciousness is a valid construct and can be studied with the instruments of cognitive and neuroscience. (shrink)

Intuitions about the transparency of experience have recently begun to play a key role in the debate about qualia. Specifically, such intuitions have been used by representationalists to support their view that the phenomenal character of our experience can be wholly explained in terms of its intentional content.[i] But what exactly does it mean to say that experience is transparent? In my view, recent discussions of transparency leave matters considerably murkier than one would like. As I will suggest, there is (...) reason to believe that experience is not transparent in the way that representationalism requires. Although there is a sense in which experience can be said to be transparent, transparency in this sense does not give us any particular motivation for representationalism—or at least, not the pure or strong representationalism that it is usually invoked to support. (shrink)

Over the past few decades, as philosophers of mind have begun to rethink the sharp divide that was traditionally drawn between the phenomenal character of an experience (what it’s like to have that experience) and its intentional content (what it represents), representationalist theories of consciousness have become increasingly popular. On this view, phenomenal character is reduced to intentional content. This article explores a key motivation for this theory, namely, considerations of experiential transparency. Experience is said to be transparent in that (...) we ‘look right through it’ to the objects of that experience, and this is supposed to support the representationalist claim that there are no intrinsic aspects of our experience. (shrink)

According to representationalism, the qualitative character of our phenomenal mental states supervenes on the intentional content of such states. Strong representationalism makes a further claim: the qualitative character of our phenomenal mental states _consists in_ the intentional content of such states. Although strong representationalism has greatly increased in popularity over the last decade, I find the view deeply implausible. In what follows, I will attempt to argue against strong representationalism by a two-step argument. First, I suggest that strong representationalism must (...) be _unrestricted_ in order to serve as an adequate theory of qualia, i.e., it must apply to all qualitative mental states. Second, I present considerations to show that an unrestricted form of strong representationalism is problematic. (shrink)

Many philosophers hold one of two extreme views about our capacity to have phenomenally conscious experience : either that inner-sense enables us to know our experience and its properties infallibly or the contrary conviction that inner-sense is utterly fallible and the evidence it provides completely defeasible. Both of these are in error. This paper presents an alternative conception of inner-sense, modeled on disjunctive conceptions of perceptual awareness, that avoids both erroneous extremes, but that builds on the commonsense intuitions that motivate (...) them. (shrink)

The topic of epistemic normativity has come to the fore of recent work in epistemology, and so naturally, theories of knowledge, truth and justification have been increasingly held accountable to preserving normative epistemological platitudes. Central to discussions of epistemic normativity are questions about epistemic agency and epistemic value. Here, our aim is to take up some of these issues as they come to bear on the rather unconventional brand of epistemology that was defended by Richard Rorty. Our purpose is to (...) explore whether Rorty’s epistemology—or perhaps his replacement for epistemology—can preserve these normative platitudes about epistemic agency, responsibility, achievement, and the value of knowledge. Our conclusion is a negative one: that Rorty’s commitments leave him firmly at odds with some of the most plausible assumptions about epistemic agency and epistemic value. (shrink)

Working from a naïve-realist perspective, I examine first-person knowledge of one's perceptual experience. I outline a naive-realist theory of how subjects acquire knowledge of the nature of their experiences, and I argue that naive realism is compatible with moderate, substantial forms of first-person privileged access. A more general moral of my paper is that treating “success” states like seeing as genuine mental states does not break up the dynamics that many philosophers expect from the phenomenon of knowledge of the mind.

Illusionism about phenomenal consciousness is the thesis that phenomenal consciousness does not exist, even though it seems to exist. This thesis is widely judged to be uniquely counterintuitive: the idea that consciousness is an illusion strikes most people as absurd, and seems almost impossible to contemplate in earnest. Defenders of illusionism should be able to explain the apparent absurdity of their own thesis, within their own framework. However, this is no trivial task: arguably, none of the illusionist theories currently on (...) the market is able to do this. I present a new theory of phenomenal introspection and argue that it might deal with the task at hand. (shrink)

I defend a Husserlian account of self-consciousness against representationalist accounts: higher-order representationalism and self-representationalism. Of these, self-representationalism is the harder to refute since, unlike higher-order representationalism, it does not incur a regress of self-conscious acts. However, it incurs a regress of intentional contents. I consider, and reject, five strategies for avoiding this regress of contents. I conclude that the regress is inherent to self-representationalism. I close by showing how this incoherence obtrudes in what must be the self-representationalist’s account of the (...) phenomenology of experience. (shrink)

ABSTRACT This paper offers an account of intending to self-deceive which opposes that provided by standard intentionalist accounts of self-deception. According to my account, self-deception is attained instantaneously: to intend to self-deceive that P is thereby to self-deceive that P. Relating this to the concepts of evidence, belief and self-awareness, I develop an account of self-deception which holds that self-deceivers misrepresent themselves as believing what they profess to believe. I argue that my account yields solutions to the central problems of (...) self-deception – the static problem and the dynamic problem – while remaining faithful to the phenomena of self-deception. (shrink)

The article suggests answers to the questions of how we can arrive at an unambiguous characterization of consciousness, whether conscious states are coextensive with subjective ones, and whether consciousness can be graded and multidimensional at the same time. As regards the first, it is argued that a general characterization of consciousness should be based on its four dimensions: i.e., the phenomenological, semantic, physiological and functional ones. With respect to the second, it is argued that all informational states of a given (...) organism are subjective, but not all are necessarily conscious. Finally, where the third question is concerned, in each of the four dimensions of consciousness a graded element is identified: quality of information in the phenomenological one, abstractness in the semantic one, complexity in the physiological one, and usefulness in the functional one. The article also considers certain consequences of the solutions proposed, as well as some practical applications of the 4D-view of consciousness. (shrink)

Within theoretical and empirical enquiries, many different meanings associated with consciousness have appeared, leaving the term itself quite vague. This makes formulating an abstract and unifying version of the concept of consciousness – the main aim of this article –into an urgent theoretical imperative. It is argued that consciousness, characterized as dually accessible (cognized from the inside and the outside), hierarchically referential (semantically ordered), bodily determined (embedded in the working structures of an organism or conscious system), and useful in action (...) (pragmatically functional), is a graded rather than an all-or-none phenomenon. A gradational approach, however, despite its explanatory advantages, can lead to some counterintuitive consequences and theoretical problems. In most such conceptions consciousness is extended globally (attached to primitive organisms or artificial systems), but also locally (connected to certain lower-level neuronal and bodily processes). For example, according to information integration theory (as introduced recently by Tononi and Koch, 2014), even such simple artificial systems as photodiodes possess miniscule amounts of consciousness. The major challenge for this article, then, is to establish reasonable, empirically justified constraints on how extended the range of a graded consciousness could be. It is argued that conscious systems are limited globally by the ability to individuate information (where individuated information is understood as evolutionarily embedded, socially altered, and private), whereas local limitations should be determined on the basis of a hypothesis about the action-oriented nature of the processes that select states of consciousness. Using these constraints, an abstract concept of consciousness is arrived at, hopefully contributing to a more unified state of play within consciousness studies itself. (shrink)

Representational theorists identify experiences’ phenomenal properties with their representational properties. Qualia theorists reject this identity, insisting that experiences’ phenomenal properties can come apart from and completely outrun their representational properties. Qualia theorists account for phenomenal properties in terms of “qualia,” intrinsic mental properties they allege experiences to instantiate. The debate between representational theorists and qualia theorists has focused on whether phenomenal properties really can come apart from and completely outrun representational properties. As a result, qualia theorists have failed (1) to (...) explain how experiences owe their phenomenal properties to their instantiation of qualia and (2) to clarify the nature of subjects’ epistemic access to qualia. I survey qualia theorists’ options for dealing with each issue and find them all wanting. (shrink)

Maurice Merleau-Ponty’s philosophy of embodiment has been widely adopted by enactivists seeking to provide an account of cognition that is both embodied and embedded. Yet very little attention has been paid to Merleau-Ponty’s later works. This is troubling given that in The Visible and the Invisible Merleau-Ponty revises his conception of embodied subjectivity because he came to the realization that understanding consciousness through the concepts of subject and object imposed a dualistic framework that he was trying to escape. To overcome (...) this dichotomy Merleau-Ponty more fully develops the radically embodied ontology implicit in his earlier work by introducing the concept of flesh. I argue that the enactive account of subjectivity would be improved by “giving flesh” to the enactive subject, given that the enactive account of subjectivity as grounded in pre-reflective bodily self-consciousness is ultimately rooted in accounts of which the later Merleau-Ponty is critical. Incorporating flesh resolves the underlying problems with the enactive account of subjectivity and makes the account more consistent with the ontological commitments to embodiment and embeddedness. (shrink)

According to a currently popular approach to the analysis of phenomenal character, the phenomenal character of an experience is entirely determined by, and is in fact identical with, the experience's representational content. Two underlying assumptions motivate this approach to phenomenal character: (1) that conscious experiences are diaphanous or transparent, in the sense that it is impossible to discern, via introspection, any intrinsic features of an experience of x that are not experienced as features of x, and (2) that the immediate (...) objects of consciousness are not objects per se, but rather properties. This paper explores these assumptions, advancing the thesis that each is rejectable on phenomenological grounds. (shrink)

This article defends two theses: that a mental state is conscious if and only if it has phenomenal character, i.e., if and only if there is something it is like for the subject to be in that state, and that all state consciousness involves self-consciousness, in the sense that a mental state is conscious if and only if its possessor is, in some suitable way, conscious of being in it. Though neither of these theses is novel, there is a dearth (...) of direct arguments for them in the scholarly literature and the relationship between them has so far gone underrecognized. This article attempts to remedy this lack, advancing the claim that if all conscious states have phenomenal character, then all state consciousness involves self-consciousness. (shrink)

In this paper, I draw from Kantian and Husserlian reflections on the self-awareness of thinking for a contribution to the cognitive phenomenology debate. In particular, I draw from Kant’s conceptions of inner sense and apperception, and from Husserl’s notions of lived experience and self-awareness for an inquiry into the nature of our awareness of our own cognitive activity. With particular consideration of activities of attention, I develop what I take to be Kant’s and Husserl’s “agentive” and “proprietary” accounts. These, I (...) believe, augment contemporary discussions in interesting ways and further bolster the case for cognitive phenomenology. Moreover, the historical comparison highlights a number of assumptions made today that were not yet part of the framework at the time of Kant or at the time of Husserl. This helps reflect on the legitimacy of these assumptions. (shrink)

It is common parlance among philosophers who inquire into the nature of consciousness to speak of there being something it is like for the subject of a mental state to be in it. The popularity of the ‘what-it-is-like’ phrase stems, in part, from the assumption that it enables us to distinguish, in an intuitive and illuminating way, between conscious and unconscious mental states: conscious mental states, unlike unconscious mental states, are such that there is something it is like for their (...) subjects to be in them. The ‘what-it-is-like’ phrase, however, has not gone unopposed; some very clever philosophers have vigorously disputed it. Peter Hacker, for example, has argued that the phrase should be abandoned because it is ungrammatical, and Paul Snowdon has argued that it should be abandoned because the propositions expressed by its usage are either trivial or false. This paper mounts a case for the claim that neither of these conclusions is warranted. Against Hacker, it is argued that the arguments he produces for the ungrammaticality of the phrase are unpersuasive, and against Snowdon it is argued that he fails to consider a plausible and independently motivated interpretation of the phrase, and that, on this interpretation, the propositions expressed by its usage are non-trivially true. (shrink)

According to reductive intentionalism, the phenomenal character of a conscious experience is constituted by the experience's intentional (or representational) content. The goal of this article is to show that a phenomenon in visual perception called change blindness poses a problem for this doctrine. It is argued, in particular, that phenomenal character is not sensitive, as it should be if reductive intentionalism is correct, to fine-grained variations in content. The standard anti-intentionalist strategy is to adduce putative cases in which phenomenal character (...) varies despite sameness of content. This paper explores an alternative anti-intentionalist tack, arguing, by way of a specific example involving change blindness, that content can vary despite sameness of phenomenal character. (shrink)