Direct Reference and Dancing Qualia
Phenomenal Concepts and Phenomenal Knowledge January 1, 2007 Peer reviewed DOI: 10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195171655.003.0010
Summary
Some antiphysicalist philosophers hold inconsistent semantic views: they accept Fregean arguments that ordinary proper names have both sense and reference, but they claim that phenomenal concepts (concepts of conscious experiences) refer directly. This chapter argues against that combination by showing that the same thought experiments used to motivate a sense-reference distinction for names like 'Hesperus' and 'Phosphorus' can be replicated for phenomenal concepts. Just as one can rationally believe Hesperus is visible and Phosphorus is not, one can have analogous beliefs about phenomenal concepts, undermining the claim that they refer directly.
Study at a glance
| Design | theoretical or philosophical paper |
|---|---|
| Key finding | The thought experiments that motivate a sense-reference distinction for ordinary proper names can be replicated for phenomenal concepts, undermining the antiphysicalist semantic package that accepts Fregean arguments for names but claims phenomenal concepts refer directly. |
Abstract
AbstractThis chapter argues that there is a tension in the semantic views held by certain antiphysicalists. These philosophers accept Fregean arguments against direct-reference theories of ordinary proper names but maintain that phenomenal concepts refer directly. Against this semantic package, it is argued that the thought experiments that motivate a sense-reference distinction for ordinary proper names — roughly, Hesperus-Phosphorus stories — can be replicated at the level of direct phenomenal concepts. (A Hesperus-Phosphorus story is one in which one rationally believes both that object a has a property P and that object b lacks P, even though a = b.)