Abstract

Computationalism treats minds as computations. It hasn't explained how our quite similar sensory circuits encode our quite different qualia, nor how these circuits encode the binding of the different qualia into unified perceptions. But there is growing evidence that qualia and binding come from neural electrochemical substances such as sensory detectors and the strong continuous electromagnetic field they create. Qualia may thus be neural substances, not neural computations (though computations may still help modulate qualia). This neuroelectrical view not only avoids computationalism's empirical issues but also its problematic metaphysics.