The Oxford Handbook of the Philosophy of Consciousness
July 9, 2020
Philippe Chuard
57 citations
Temporal consciousness—how we perceive the timing and order of events—raises three core questions: how sensory experiences convey temporal information, whether the temporal structure of experiences themselves influences how they represent events, and how this appears in conscious awareness. Most theories are distinguished by their answers to these questions. This chapter outlines the main current theories and their assumptions, then critically reviews key arguments in the debate.
The Oxford Handbook of the Philosophy of Consciousness
July 9, 2020
Elizabeth Irvine, Mark Sprevak
36 citations
Eliminativism about consciousness takes two forms: entity eliminativism, which denies that consciousness exists, and discourse eliminativism, which argues that talk of consciousness should be eliminated from science. The chapter examines classic arguments for entity eliminativism, including Dennett's position and recent illusionism, as well as discourse eliminativist arguments from scientific behaviorism and empirical accessibility. It concludes that these positions require serious defense and outlines the strategies used to support each form of eliminativism.
The Oxford Handbook of the Philosophy of Consciousness
July 9, 2020
Angela Mendelovici, David Bourget
28 citations
Mental states have two main features: intentionality (being about something) and phenomenal consciousness (the felt, experiential aspect). For decades these were thought to be separate and independent, but recent philosophy challenges that. This chapter surveys views on their relationship and endorses the phenomenal intentionality theory, which holds that the most basic kind of intentionality originates from phenomenal consciousness.
The Oxford Handbook of the Philosophy of Consciousness
July 9, 2020
Adam Pautz
23 citations
Representationalism holds that sensory consciousness consists in representing the world as being a certain way. Some philosophers argue that this view supports reducing consciousness to physical processes, while others contend that conscious representation resists standard reductive models, making the mind–body problem more difficult. This chapter defines representationalism, presents a key argument for it, reviews common objections, and examines both reductive and nonreductive versions of the theory.
The Oxford Handbook of the Philosophy of Consciousness
July 9, 2020
Tom McClelland
16 citations
Self-Representationalists argue that conscious mental states are conscious because they represent themselves, unlike Higher-Order Representationalists who claim awareness comes from a separate mental state. This chapter examines why Self-Representationalists depart from Higher-Order theories and outlines internal disagreements, such as whether conscious states have separable lower-order and higher-order components and whether the higher-order part is itself represented. Challenges include the risk of collapsing into Higher-Order Representationalism, difficulty naturalizing self-representing states, and failing to capture the intimate access we have to our own consciousness.
The Oxford Handbook of the Philosophy of Consciousness
July 9, 2020
David Papineau
16 citations
Consciousness raises philosophical questions about its relation to reality, its location, and its nature. The chapter focuses on how consciousness relates to other features of reality, a central question in recent philosophy. The difficulty arises from an alleged explanatory gap between consciousness and physical processes. The chapter examines the source of this gap and its philosophical implications.
The Oxford Handbook of the Philosophy of Consciousness
July 9, 2020
Christopher Mole
14 citations
The word 'attention' is often used loosely, but this paper treats it as a term defined by its role in explaining empirical psychological phenomena, particularly those involving reaction-time modulations. Evidence shows that such modulations are linked to processing that stands in various relations to consciousness. The psychological phenomena that explain these modulations should not be identified with the causes of consciousness, nor do they operate exclusively within conscious awareness. If such explanations are to shed light on how and when consciousness occurs, they must do so within a more complex explanatory theory.
The Oxford Handbook of the Philosophy of Consciousness
July 9, 2020
Julien Deonna, Fabrice Teroni
14 citations
Emotions have distinctive felt qualities that may explain key features such as valence (positive or negative), how emotions are individuated from one another, their intentional objects, and their motivational force. Using the example of anger at a nasty remark, the chapter argues that attending to emotional phenomenology supports specific accounts of these four features, suggesting that how an emotion feels is integral to understanding its nature and role.
The Oxford Handbook of the Philosophy of Consciousness
July 9, 2020
Dan Zahavi
9 citations
The debate about selfhood in philosophy of mind has recently shifted from questions of persistence over time (diachronic identity) to the relationship between phenomenal consciousness and selfhood in the present moment (synchronic identity). The central question is whether conscious experiences inherently involve or disclose a self, or whether, as Lichtenberg argued against Descartes, it is enough to say that experiences simply occur without positing an 'I'. The text outlines this shift and frames the disagreement without taking a definitive position.
The Oxford Handbook of the Philosophy of Consciousness
July 9, 2020
Philip Goff, Sam Coleman
4 citations
Russellian monism is a broad philosophical approach to explaining consciousness, with two main variants: panpsychism and panprotopsychism. Panpsychist Russellian monism claims that the fundamental properties of basic physical entities are experiential, meaning consciousness is a basic feature of matter. Panprotopsychist Russellian monism instead holds that these fundamental properties are proto-experiential—not conscious themselves, but essential for producing consciousness. The chapter first examines panpsychist forms, then turns to panprotopsychist forms.
The Oxford Handbook of the Philosophy of Consciousness
July 9, 2020
Joshua Shepherd, Neil Levy
4 citations
Consciousness is relevant to three distinct ethical issues: an entity's moral status, moral responsibility for actions, and the acquisition of moral knowledge. Despite these different connections, it remains unclear what exactly about consciousness makes it intuitively important for each area. The chapter explores whether there might be a common thread linking these issues, concluding that this possibility remains open.
The Oxford Handbook of the Philosophy of Consciousness
July 9, 2020
Uriah Kriegel
3 citations
A chapter from a scientific and philosophical work examines the search for neural correlates of consciousness (NCC). It argues that science aims not just to find correlations but to explain them. The first half presents a menu of possible explanations for why consciousness correlates with neural activity. The second half suggests that, under reasonable assumptions, the choice among these explanations may be in principle underdetermined by scientific evidence alone.
The Oxford Handbook of the Philosophy of Consciousness
July 9, 2020
Tim Bayne
2 citations
Conscious thought, though often neglected, has been the subject of philosophical inquiry centered on three key issues: what types of mental states qualify as conscious thought and how they might be categorized; whether the consciousness of thought is fundamentally different from other forms of consciousness; and whether consciousness is essential to thought or merely an accidental feature. This chapter offers an opinionated introduction to these debates, exploring possible taxonomies, the nature of cognitive consciousness, and the relationship between consciousness and thought.
The Oxford Handbook of the Philosophy of Consciousness
July 9, 2020
Mark Rowlands
2 citations
The question of whether consciousness is embodied has been hindered by not first asking what the body is. The body as object—what you see in the mirror—is distinct from the body as subject, the lived body that cannot be seen. Consciousness is not merely housed in the lived body; it is identical to the lived body. The body as object contains no consciousness. Thus, the debate over embodied consciousness is resolved by recognizing that consciousness and the lived body are one and the same.
The Oxford Handbook of the Philosophy of Consciousness
July 9, 2020
Maja Spener
2 citations
Subjective measures of consciousness, often called introspective measures, are widely used but face criticism due to potential response bias. This chapter reviews the main types of subjective measures in consciousness science and examines whether they truly involve introspection. The author finds no clear answer, as proponents lack a worked-out notion of subjective access, which makes the problem of response bias harder to resolve.
The Oxford Handbook of the Philosophy of Consciousness
July 9, 2020
Farid Masrour
2 citations
The chapter examines philosophical debates about the unity of consciousness, focusing on phenomenal unity—the way experiences feel connected. It critiques the dominant Unity Thesis, which claims all simultaneous experiences of a subject are phenomenally unified. The author argues against understanding unity as a type of oneness or singularity, instead proposing that phenomenal unity arises from connectivity conditions among experiences.
The Oxford Handbook of the Philosophy of Consciousness
July 9, 2020
Benjamin Kozuch
1 citation
This chapter examines two contemporary, empirically based challenges to the idea that conscious mental states causally influence certain actions. The first, from Libet's research, suggests that neural events initiating voluntary actions occur before conscious willing, implying the conscious will does not cause those actions. The second, from Milner and Goodale's studies, shows cases where visual consciousness and motor action dissociate, challenging the intuitive view that visual consciousness guides visually based motor actions. Unlike classical epiphenomenalism, which denies all causal efficacy to conscious mental events, these modern challenges only question their efficacy for specific kinds of actions.
The Oxford Handbook of the Philosophy of Consciousness
July 9, 2020
Brie Gertler
1 citation
Dualism and physicalism are both metaphysical views about consciousness, each grounded in a mix of empirical data and armchair reflection, not just one or the other. Contrary to a common misconception, dualists do not rely solely on conceptual analysis while physicalists lean exclusively on science. Both sides use empirical evidence and conceptual considerations, and both aim for positions that are consistent with but extend beyond scientific findings. This chapter corrects that misunderstanding by emphasizing the overlooked epistemic similarities between the two views.
The Oxford Handbook of the Philosophy of Consciousness
July 9, 2020
Josh Weisberg
Higher-order (HO) theories of consciousness propose that a mental state becomes conscious when it is represented by another mental state—a higher-order state. Two main versions exist: higher-order perception (HOP) theory, which models this representation on perception, and higher-order thought (HOT) theory, which models it on thought. Some HO theories require active representation, while others accept a mere disposition to be represented. The goal is a reductive explanation of conscious states in terms of nonconscious higher-order representation. This chapter outlines the motivation for HO views, contrasts HOP and HOT, considers objections and empirical support, and addresses how the theory tackles the explanatory gap and the hard problem of consciousness.
The Oxford Handbook of the Philosophy of Consciousness
July 9, 2020
Michael Pelczar
Metaphysical idealism holds that physical facts supervene on mental facts, making the mental the fundamental feature of reality. This contrasts with physicalism, which claims the opposite. Idealism is a monist view that does not reduce consciousness to something more basic or identify it with brain states. The chapter argues that idealism is a more attractive position than typically recognized in contemporary philosophy of mind.
The Oxford Handbook of the Philosophy of Consciousness
July 9, 2020
Christopher S. Hill
The chapter explores connections among three forms of consciousness—introspective, access, and phenomenal—and three types of memory: long-term, working, and iconic. It examines how each form of consciousness relates to each memory type, aiming to clarify the interplay between conscious experience and memory processes.
The Oxford Handbook of the Philosophy of Consciousness
July 9, 2020
Berit "brit" Brogaard, Elijah Chudnoff
Perceptual experiences can immediately and prima facie justify certain beliefs about the external world because they have a distinctive phenomenology regarding those contents. This view, a version of phenomenal dogmatism, is explored through several issues: whether immediate justification is possible, the debate between representational and relational theories of perception, how cognitive penetration affects epistemic justification, whether experiences consist of basic sensations and seemings, and whether perceptual content includes high-level properties. The chapter concludes by considering how these ideas might extend beyond perception.
The Oxford Handbook of the Philosophy of Consciousness
July 9, 2020
Daniel Stoljar
The hard problem of consciousness asks why and how physical processes give rise to subjective experience. The epistemic view holds that we are currently ignorant of something important and relevant to solving this problem. This chapter outlines one version of that view, then considers two objections: first, that we are not ignorant of any feature relevant to the hard problem; second, that even if the epistemic approach is true, it does not answer or contribute to the problem. The chapter concludes by reflecting on why the epistemic approach, despite its appeal, remains a minority position in contemporary philosophy of mind.
The Oxford Handbook of the Philosophy of Consciousness
July 9, 2020
Casey O'Callaghan
Philosophers have focused too heavily on vision when studying perceptual consciousness, neglecting other senses like hearing, touch, smell, and taste. This narrow focus risks missing critical features of consciousness and may produce claims that do not generalize to non-visual perception. A comprehensive account of perceptual consciousness requires examining all sensory modalities.
The Oxford Handbook of the Philosophy of Consciousness
July 9, 2020
Myrto Mylopoulos, Joshua Shepherd
This chapter examines the nature and sources of agentive phenomenology—the experiences associated with intentional actions. It reviews pioneering work from the early 1980s in psychology and neuroscience that motivates much current research. The discussion covers the scope of these experiences, their relationship to other types of experiences, how best to characterize different aspects, and the function of various agentive experiences.