Physicalism and the Explanatory Gap

Article Sidebar

PDF
Published: Nov 25, 2013
DOI: https://doi.org/10.13153/diam.6.2005.164

Main Article Content

Karol Polcyn

Abstract

The source of the intuition of the explanatory gap has never been well understood. It has not been clear why there should be some troublesome explanatory gap given that we have all the empirical evidence for the truth of psychophysical identity. I argue that there is a very natural intuition which explains why the explanatory gap is real and I defend my account against physicalists who deny that the explanatory gap has any significance. On my account, our inability to explain consciousness in physical terms shows that psychophysical identity, even if justified, is not fully intelligible.

Downloads

Download data is not yet available.

Article Details

How to Cite
Polcyn, Karol. 2013. “Physicalism and the Explanatory Gap”. Diametros, no. 6 (November):49-69. https://doi.org/10.13153/diam.6.2005.164.
Issue
No. 6 (2005)
Section
Articles

By submitting his/her work to the Editorial Board, the author accepts, upon having his/her text recommended for publication, that Diametros applies the Attribution 4.0 International (CC BY 4.0) license to the works we publish. Under this license, authors agree to make articles legally available for reuse, without permission or fees. Anyone may read, download, copy, print, distribute or reuse these articles without asking prior permission from the publisher or the author, as long as the author and original source are properly cited. The author holds the copyright without any other restrictions. Full information about CC-BY: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode.

Author Biography

Karol Polcyn

Karol Polcyn -  absolwent filozofii na Uniwersytecie Warszawskim, uzyskał doktorat z filozofii na Uniwersytecie Temple w Filadelfii w 2003 r., obecnie adiunkt w Instytucie Filozofii Uniwersytetu Szczecińskiego, publikował w „Filozofii Nauki”, „Kwartalniku Filozoficznym” i „Principiach”.
Share |
Crossref
Scopus
Google Scholar
Europe PMC

References

Block and Stalnaker [1999] – N. Block and R. Stalnaker, Conceptual Analysis, Dualism, and the Explanatory Gap, “The Philosophical Review” (108) 1999, p. 1-46.

Chalmers [1996] – D. Chalmers, The Conscious Mind, Oxford University Press, Oxford 1996.

Chalmers [2002] – D. Chalmers, Consciousness and Its Place in Nature, in: Philosophy of Mind, ed. D. Chalmers, Oxford University Press, Oxford 2002.

Gendler and Hawthorne [2002] – T. S. Gendler and J. Hawthorne (eds.), Conceivability and Possibility, Oxford University Press, Oxford 2002.

Levine [1983] – J. Levine, Materialism and Qualia: The Explanatory Gap, “Pacific Philosophical Quarterly” (64) 1983, p. 354-61.

Levine [1993] – J. Levine, On Leaving Out What It Is Like, in: Consciousness, ed. M. Davies and G. Humphreys, Blackwell, Oxford 1993, p. 543-555.

Loar [1997] – B. Loar, Phenomenal states, in: The Nature of Consciousness, ed. N. Block, The MIT Press, Cambridge, Mass. 1997, p. 597-616.

Loar [1999] – B. Loar, David Chalmers’s “The Conscious Mind”, “Philosophy and Phenomenological Research” (59) 1999, p. 465-72.

Loar [2003] – B. Loar, Qualia, Properties, Modality, “Philosophical Issues” (13) 2003, p. 113- 129.

McGinn [1989] – C. McGinn, Can we solve the mind-body problem?, “Mind” (98) 1989, p. 349- 66.

Nagel [2002] – T. Nagel, Psychophysical Nexus, in: Concealment and Exposure, ed. T. Nagel, Oxford University Press, Oxford 2002, p. 194-235.

Papineau [1999] – D. Papineau, Mind the Gap, “Philosophical Perspectives” (12) 1999.

Tye [1999] – M. Tye, Phenomenal Consciousness: the Explanatory Gap as a Cognitive Illusion, “Mind” (108) 1999, p. 705-25.