Panpsychism and the mind-body problem in contemporary analytic philosophy

Panpsychism, the view that consciousness is a fundamental feature of all physical matter, has gained traction among analytic philosophers in recent decades. This paper traces the history of the mind–body problem since the 1960s, explaining how debates between physicalist and dualist theories reached an impasse that has led many philosophers to consider panpsychism as a promising alternative. The author reviews several versions of panpsychism that have emerged, discusses its prospects as a scientific theory, and notes how some scientists view it. While panpsychism is not presented as unproblematic, it is offered as a way to break the deadlock between standard positions.

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Abstract

ABSTRACT Not so long ago, the idea that analytic philosophers would be taking panpsychism seriously would have been hard to believe. That is because in its early, logical positivist, stage, the analytic movement earned the reputation of being militantly anti-metaphysical. But analytic philosophy has come a long way since the heyday of logical positivism; and, in fact, the dialectic of recent debates on the mind–body problem among analytic philosophers has pushed many of them in the direction of panpsychism. In this paper, I want to explain how this has come about and take a look at some of the versions of panpsychism that have emerged. This will involve running through a quick history of debates on the mind–body problem since about 1960, focusing on how panpsychism has been proposed as a promising, though not unproblematic, way of breaking an apparent impasse that has emerged between more standard physicalist and dualist theories of mind. Along the way, I will also have occasion to comment on the prospects of panpsychism as a respectable scientific theory and how a number of scientists stand on this.