The Criterion of Structural Fundamentality and Its Application to David Chalmers' Philosophy of Mind.
Zenodo (CERN European Organization for Nuclear Research) June 6, 2026 Vitalii Kablukov
A criterion for structural fundamentality is proposed: a term is fundamental if it cannot be derived from previously defined concepts and is necessary for building further structure. Four tests—necessity, independence, localization, and generative—are applied to physical primitives like mass and charge, which pass all. Applied to David Chalmers’ terms experience, phenomenal consciousness, and qualia, the analysis finds that Chalmers accepts their fundamentality based on failed reductive explanation, but that impossibility of reduction does not prove ontological fundamentality. All three terms can be decomposed using a minimal seven-definition system. The zombie argument relies on an internal contradiction. The hard problem is relocated from why phenomenal experience exists to under what conditions being gives rise to consciousness as the capacity to perceive one’s own reflection.