Part V: Philosophy of Mind

Chapter 14

Study questions for What is Consciousness?

  1. Give three examples of approaches to theorising about consciousness, and explain what each approach claims.
  2. Explain, in your own words, why functionalism is thought to be problematic.
  3. What do non-reductionist physicalists claim about consciousness?
  4. What do panpsychists say about phenomenal properties?
  5. How does the Mary argument attempt to undermine physicalism?
  6. What are the premises and conclusions of the zombie argument against physicalism?

Multiple Choice Questions

Weblinks for What is consciousness?

Kirk, Robert (2012). ‘Zombies’. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Summer), ed. Edward N. Zalta, http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/sum2012/entries/zombies/. [An excellent overview of the roles philosophical zombies have played in philosophical arguments.]

Nida-Rümelin, Martine (2010). ‘Qualia: The Knowledge Argument’. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Summer), ed. Edward N. Zalta, http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/sum2010/entries/qualia-knowledge. [An excellent overview of the debate that has surrounded Jackson’s Mary argument.]

Van Gulick, Robert (2011). ‘Consciousness’. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (Summer), ed. Edward N. Zalta, http://plato.stanford.edu/archives/sum2011/entries/consciousness/. [An excellent overview of the issues that have arisen in the philosophical literature on the nature of consciousness.]

Introductory further reading for What is consciousness?

Brogaard, Berit (2013). The Status of Consciousness in Nature. In The Constitution of Consciousness, Volume 2, ed. S. Miller. John Benjamins Publishing. [An evaluative overview of the different forms of physicalism and non-physicalism and the standard arguments for and against these views.]

Gertler, Brie and Shapiro, Lawrence (2007). Arguing about the Mind. Routledge. [A succinct and very readable introduction to philosophy of mind, with a focus on consciousness.]

Advanced further reading for What is consciousness?

Chalmers, David (1995). ‘Facing up to the Problem of Consciousness’. Journal of Consciousness Studies 2: 200–19. [David Chalmers introduced the idea of a hard problem in this article.]

Chalmers, David (1996). The Conscious Mind. Oxford University Press. [A book-length defence of dualism. This is where the zombie argument first appeared.]

Gertler, Brie (1999). ‘A Defense of the Knowledge Argument’. Philosophical Studies 93: 317–36. [A reply to two standard objections to the Mary argument.]

Jackson, Frank (1986). ‘What Mary Didn’t Know’. Journal of Philosophy 83: 291-–5. [Though Frank Jackson had presented the argument previously, this is the article most people refer to when they write about the Mary argument.]

Levine, Joseph (1983). ‘Materialism and Qualia: The Explanatory Gap’. Pacific Philosophical Quarterly 64: 354–61. [Joseph Levine introduced the notion of an explanatory gap in this article.]

Nagel, Thomas (1974). ‘What Is It Like to Be a Bat?’. Philosophical Review 83(4): 435–50. [A classic text arguing that there is a special subjective aspect of consciousness that is not discoverable by standard science.]