According to David Chalmers, the hard problem of consciousness consists of explaining how and why qualitative experience arises from physical states. Moreover, Chalmers argues that materialist and reductive explanations of mentality are incapable of addressing the hard problem. In this chapter, I suggest that Chalmers’ hard problem can be usefully distinguished into a ‘how question’ and ‘why question,’ and I argue that evolutionary biology has the resources to address the question of why qualitative experience arises from brain states. From this (...) perspective, I discuss the different kinds of evolutionary explanations (e.g., adaptationist, exaptationist, spandrel) that can explain the origins of the qualitative aspects of various conscious states. This argument is intended to clarify which parts of Chalmers’ hard problem are amenable to scientific analysis. (shrink)

Experiences tend to be followed by states for which they provide normative reasons. Such harmonious correlations cry out for explanation. Theories that answer or diminish these cries thereby achieve an advantage over theories that do neither. I argue that the main lines of response to these cries that are available to biological theorists—theorists who hold (roughly) that conscious subjects are generally biological entities—are problematic. And I argue that panpsychism—which holds (roughly) that conscious subjects are ubiquitous in nature—provides an attractive response (...) to these explanatory cries. Taken together, these considerations underwrite a kind of ‘psychophysical fine-tuning’ argument in support of panpsychism, one that is reminiscent of cosmological fine-tuning arguments in favor of multiverse hypotheses. (shrink)

This paper develops a new argument from consciousness to theism: the argument from psychophysical harmony. Roughly, psychophysical harmony consists in the fact that phenomenal states are correlated with physical states and with one another in strikingly fortunate ways. For example, phenomenal states are correlated with behavior and functioning that is justified or rationalized by those very phenomenal states, and phenomenal states are correlated with verbal reports and judgments that are made true by those very phenomenal states. We argue that psychophysical (...) harmony is strong evidence for theism (or, at least, strong evidence against atheism in its standard naturalistic form). (shrink)

James developed an evolutionary objection to epiphenomenalism that is still discussed today. Epiphenomenalists have offered responses that do not grasp its full depth. I thus offer a new reading and assessment of James’s objection. Our life-essential, phenomenal pleasures and pains have three features that suggest that they were shaped by selection, according to James: they are natively patterned, those patterns are systematically linked with antecedent brain states, and the patterns are “universal” among humans. If epiphenomenalism were true, phenomenal patterns could (...) not have been selected (because epiphenomenalism precludes phenomenal consciousness affecting reproductive success). So epiphenomenalism is likely false. (shrink)

Epiphenomenalism is the view that phenomenal properties – which characterize what it is like, or how it feels, for a subject to be in conscious states – have no physical effects. One of the earliest arguments against epiphenomenalism is the evolutionary argument (James 1890/1981; Eccles and Popper 1977; Popper 1978), which starts from the following problem: why is pain correlated with stimuli detrimental to survival and reproduction – such as suffocation, hunger and burning? And why is pleasure correlated with stimuli (...) beneficial to survival and reproduction – such as eating and breathing? According to the argument, the fact that we have these particular correlations and not other ones must have an evolutionary explanation. But given epiphenomenalism, differences in phenomenal properties could not cause differences in fitness, so natural selection would not be expected to favor these correlations over any other ones. Epiphenomenalism thus renders these correlations an inexplicable coincidence, and should therefore be rejected. The evolutionary argument has been widely criticized and few have deemed it cogent (Broad 1925; Jackson 1982; Robinson 2007; Corabi 2014). In this paper, I will consider previous and potential criticisms and conclude some of them are indeed fatal to the argument if it is understood, as it traditionally has been, as an argument for any standard version of non-epiphenomenalism such as physicalism and interactionism. I will then offer a new and improved version of the argument, as an argument for a particular non-epiphenomenalist view, which I will call the phenomenal powers view. This is the view that phenomenal properties produce and thereby (metaphysically) necessitate their effects in virtue of how they feel, or in virtue of their intrinsic, phenomenal character alone – along the lines of C. B. Martin and John Heil’s powerful qualities view (Martin and Heil 1999; Heil 2003). I will argue that the phenomenal powers view explains the correlations given natural selection far better than any other view. It follows that if (and only if) understood as an argument for the phenomenal powers view, the evolutionary argument is far stronger than it is usually thought to be. (shrink)

Timothy Williamson’s Knowledge and its Limits has been highly influential since the beginning of this century. It can be read as a systematic response to scepticism. One of the most important notions in this response is the notion of «evidence,» which will be the focus of the present paper. I attempt to show primarily two things. First, the notion of evidence invoked by Williamson does not address the sceptical worry: he stipulates an objective notion of evidence, but this begs the (...) question against his opponent. Second, his related thesis «Evidence equals Knowledge» does not sit well with his own content externalism: he promises to relate epistemology to philosophy of mind, but he fails to live up to this commitment in his crucial chapter on scepticism. Other minor problems concerning evidence will also be discussed in due course. (shrink)

According to the dominant tradition in Christianity and many other religions, human beings are both knowers and actors: beings with conscious beliefs about the world who sometimes act intentionally guided by these beliefs. According to philosopher of mind Robert Cummins the “received view” among philosophers of mind is epiphenomenalism, according to which mental causation does not exist: neural events are the underlying causes of both behavior and belief which explains the correlation (not causation) between belief and behavior. Beliefs do not, (...) in virtue of their semantic content, enter the causal chain leading to action, beliefs are always the endpoint of a causal chain. If that is true the theological anthropology of many religious traditions is false. JP Moreland draws attention to two different ways of doing metaphysics: serious metaphysics and shopping-list metaphysics. The difference is that the former involves not only the attempt to describe the phenomena one encounter, it also involves the attempt of locating them, that is explaining how the phenomena is possible and came to be given the constraints of a certain worldview. For a physicalist these constraints include the atomic theory of matter and the theories of physical, chemical and biological evolution. Mental properties are challenging phenomena to locate within a physicalist worldview, and some physicalists involved in “serious metaphysics” have therefore eliminated them from their worldview. Most however accept them, advocating “non-reductive physicalism” according to which mental properties supervene on physical processes. Even if one allow mental properties to supervene on physical processes, the problem of mental causation remains. If mental properties are irreducible to and therefore distinct from physical properties, as the non-reductive physicalists claim, they cannot exert causal powers if one accepts the causal closure of the physical domain – which one must, if one is a “serious physicalist” according to physicalist philosopher of mind Jaegwon Kim. Alvin Plantinga, in his Evolutionary Argument against Naturalism, shows that if mental properties, such as the propositional content of beliefs, are causally inefficacious, then evolution has not been selecting cognitive faculties that are reliable, in the sense of being conducive to true beliefs. If the content of our beliefs does not affect our behavior, the content of our belief is irrelevant from an evolutionary standpoint, and so the content-producing part of our cognitive faculties are irrelevant from an evolutionary standpoint. The “reliability” – truth-conduciveness – of our cognitive faculties can therefore not be explained by evolution, and therefore not located within the physicalist worldview. The only way in which the reliability of our cognitive faculties can be located is if propositional content is relevant for behavior. If we however eliminate or deny the reliability of our cognitive faculties, then we have abandoned any chance of making a rational case for our position, as that would presuppose the reliability that we are denying. But if propositional content is causally efficacious, then that either – if we are non-reductive physicalists and mental properties are taken to be irreducible to physical properties – implies that the causal closure of the physical domain is false or - if we are reductive physicalists and not eliminativists regarding mental properties - it shows that matter qua matter can govern itself by rational argumentation, in which we have a pan-/localpsychistic view of matter. Either way, we have essentially abandoned physicalism in the process of locating the reliability of our cognitive faculties within a physicalist worldview. We have also affirmed the theological anthropology of Christianity, in so far as the capacity for knowledge and rational action is concerned. Keywords: Philosophy of mind, mental causation, reductionism, physicalism, the evolutionary argument against naturalism, the myth of nonreductive materialism, Alvin Plantinga, Jaegwon Kim. (shrink)

Epiphenomenalism is the view that mental events are caused by physical events in the brain, but have no effects upon any physical events. Behavior is caused by muscles that contract upon receiving neural impulses, and neural impulses are generated by input from other neurons or from sense organs. On the epiphenomenalist view, mental events play no causal role in this process. Huxley (1874), who held the view, compared mental events to a steam whistle that contributes nothing to the work of (...) a locomotive. James (1879), who rejected the view, characterized epiphenomenalists' mental events as not affecting the brain activity that produces them "any more than a shadow reacts upon the steps of the traveller whom it accompanies". (shrink)

This research is an investigation of whether consciousness—one's ongoing experience—influences one's behavior and, if so, how. Analysis of the components, structure, properties, and temporal sequences of consciousness has established that, (1) contrary to one's intuitive understanding, consciousness does not have an active, executive role in determining behavior; (2) consciousness does have a biological function; and (3) consciousness is solely information in various forms. Consciousness is associated with a flexible response mechanism (FRM) for decision-making, planning, and generally responding in nonautomatic ways. (...) The FRM generates responses by manipulating information and, to function effectively, its data input must be restricted to task-relevant information. The properties of consciousness correspond to the various input requirements of the FRM; and when important information is missing from consciousness, functions of the FRM are adversely affected; both of which indicate that consciousness is the input data to the FRM. Qualitative and quantitative information (shape, size, location, etc.) are incorporated into the input data by a qualia array of colors, sounds, and so on, which makes the input conscious. This view of the biological function of consciousness provides an explanation why we have experiences; why we have emotional and other feelings, and why their loss is associated with poor decision-making; why blindsight patients do not spontaneously initiate responses to events in their blind field; why counter-habitual actions are only possible when the intended action is in mind; and the reason for inattentional blindness. (shrink)

Recently several prominent biologists and philosophers, including Feinberg and Mallatt, and Godfrey-Smith, have proposed evolutionary accounts of consciousness. Despite disagreements regarding the specifics, they all focused on the “primitive” form of consciousness and argued that its origin is much more ancient than previously believed. In this study, we examine these accounts based on their methodological grounds. Specifically, we examine whether one methodological criticism leveled against evolutionary psychology on the completeness of its explanations can be applied to Feinberg and Mallatt’s adaptation (...) explanations. We conclude that their explanations fall short of being complete, but fare better than those advanced by evolutionary psychologists. (shrink)

Some physicalists (Balog 2012, Howell 2013), and most dualists, endorse the acquaintance response to the Knowledge Argument. This is the claim that Mary gains substantial new knowledge, upon leaving the room, because phenomenal knowledge requires direct acquaintance with phenomenal properties. The acquaintance response is an especially promising way to make sense of the Mary case. I argue that it casts doubt on two claims often made on behalf of physicalism, regarding parsimony and mental causation. I show that those who endorse (...) the acquaintance response face special obstacles to invoking parsimony in an argument for physicalism. And I show how acknowledging the phenomenon of acquaintance can ease the dualist’s problems with mental causation, by dispelling three key objections to epiphenomenalism. The most challenging of these objections is that epiphenomenalism blocks an evolutionary explanation of the so-called “hedonic/utility match”. I propose that pleasures and pains, while themselves epiphenomenal, can nonetheless explain positive and negative associations with stimuli, associations that can contribute to fitness. (shrink)

The evolutionary argument is an argument against epiphenomenalism, designed to show that some mind-body theory that allows for the efficacy of qualia is true. First developed by Herbert Spencer and William James, the argument has gone through numerous incarnations and it has been criticized in a number of different ways. Yet many have found the criticisms of the argument in the literature unconvincing. Bearing this in mind, I examine two primary issues: first, whether the alleged insights employed in traditional versions (...) of the argument have been correctly and consistently applied, and second, whether the alleged insights can withstand critical scrutiny. With respect to the first issue, I conclude that the proponents of the argument have tended to grossly oversimplify the considerations involved, incorrectly supposing that the evolutionary argument is properly conceived as a non-specific argument for the disjunction of physicalism and interactionist dualism and against epiphenomenalism. With respect to the second issue, I offer a new criticism that decisively refutes all arguments along the lines of the one I present. Finally, I draw positive lessons about the use of empirical considerations in debates over the mind-body problem. (shrink)

As part of a defense of a physicalist view of experiences, David Papineau has offered an explanation for the intuition that properties found in experiences are distinct from neural properties. After providing some necessary background, I argue that Papineau’s explanation is not the best explanation of the distinctness intuition. An alternative explanation that is compatible with dualism is offered. Unlike Papineau’s explanation, this alternative does not require us to suppose that the distinctness intuition rests on fallacious reasoning. Relations of the (...) alternative explanation to representationalism and to cases of genuine property identity are discussed. (shrink)

Feinberg and Mallatt, in their presentation of neurobiological naturalism, have suggested that visual consciousness was acquired by early vertebrates and inherited by a wide range of descendants, and that its neural basis has shifted to nonhomologous nervous structures during evolution. However, their evolutionary scenario of visual consciousness relies on the assumption that visual consciousness is closely linked with survival, which is not commonly accepted in current consciousness research. We suggest an alternative idea that visual consciousness is linked to a specific (...) class of agency, consequently justifying their phylogenetic claim. We also examine the implication of their phylogenetic claim: visual consciousness is homologous across vertebrates, but its neural basis is not. This apparent incongruence illustrates a general phenomenon of homology, and that the resulting hierarchical view of visual consciousness and its neural basis can be straightforwardly accommodated by neurobiological naturalism. Throughout these discussions, we aim to address the potential theoretical issues in neurobiological naturalism and refine the picture illustrated by Feinberg and Mallatt regarding phylogenetic distribution and trajectories of visual consciousness. (shrink)

One argument against epiphenomenalism arises from the theory of evolution. A particularly powerful form of this argument was developed by William James. James argued against epiphenomenalism on the grounds that, if it were correct, it would be inexplicable why the things that we find pleasurable are mostly beneficial to us while the things we find painful are mostly harmful. The aim of the present paper is to defend and extend James’s argument. James’s argument is here defended against criticisms due to (...) Karl Popper, John Eccles and William Robinson. Recently, an argument similar to James’s has been developed by Hedda Hassel Mørch. Mørch argues that the phenomena to which James drew our attention can be explained if we say pleasure and pain have phenomenal powers. In the present paper it is argued that, as it stands, the argument developed by Mørch is not satisfactory. It is argued that Mørch’s account needs to be supplemented with the thesis that the self has certain causal powers. A similar addition, it is argued, needs to be made to a position defended by Bradford Saad. The paper argues that, supplemented with the appropriate attributions of causal powers to the self, James’s argument against epiphenomenalism is effective. (shrink)

Défendant le point de vue physicaliste de l’expérience, David Papineau propose une explication à l’intuition que les propriétés contenues dans les expériences se distinguent des propriétés nerveuses. Après avoir présenté quelques éléments de contexte, je soutiens que l’hypothèse de Papineau n’est pas la meilleure pour expliquer l’intuition de la distinction. Il existe une explication alternative, compatible avec le dualisme. A la différence de celle de Papineau, cette explication ne demande pas de supposer que l’intuition de la distinction soit fondée sur (...) un raisonnement fallacieux. Le débat porte sur les rapports de cette explication alternative avec le représentationalisme et les cas de l’identité des propriétés innées. (shrink)