Synesthesia: A Window on the Hard Problem of Consciousness

The scientific study of consciousness has recently entered experimental laboratories after centuries of philosophical debate. While this empirical approach is accelerating, its fundamental assumption—that research can resolve questions philosophy could not—remains debatable. Accepting this assumption could profoundly impact understanding of human nature, experience's place in the universe, and religious or spiritual questions about the soul, afterlife, and meditation. The methods of natural science operate independently of individual scientists' beliefs, allowing standard approaches to be applied to these questions.

Study at a glance

Abstract

Abstract After millennia of philosophical speculation, the problem of consciousness has entered the experimental laboratory. Though this development is of recent date (just a few decades or so), it is now rapidly gathering speed. The fundamental assumption underlying it—that empirical research has a good chance of resolving the issues that have not yielded to philosophical argument—is open to question. But, if one does accept this assumption (as I do), then progress may have a profound impact on our understanding of human nature, of the place of human experience in the universe, and conceptions of core religious and spiritual issues such as the existence or nature of the soul, the possibility of a nonmaterial afterlife, or the nature of meditative experience. Fortunately, the methods of natural science do not depend on the beliefs held by individual scientists concerning these (or other) issues. One may therefore put such beliefs aside and use standard approaches to see what they can deliver on even this terrain.