Dretske's Qualia Externalism
Philosophical Issues 1996 DOI: 10.2307/1522900 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Theoretical or philosophical paper Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Citations | 5 |
| Key points | Argues that Dretske challenges the common assumption that qualia are internal and locally supervene on internal physical states, proposing instead that the individuating properties of experiences are not in the head. The author notes Dretske's cautious claim that accepting content externalism removes any reason to reject phenomenal externalism. |
Abstract
Fred Dretske is surely right when he says that most of those who accept content externalism believe, or simply assume, that qualia internal, or, if you prefer, the In fact, externalists apt to acknowledge that these the only purely internal residues of mentality. And if you a physicalist of any stripe, as most of us are, you would likely believe in the local supervenience of qualia -that is, qualia supervenient on the internal physical/biological states of the subject. In his interesting and thought-provking paper Dretske wants to undermine this widely shared assumption; he wants to promote as he calls it. This is the claim that, although experiences the head, what makes them the experiences they are (p. 144) -that is, the properties or qualities by which we identify and individuate themaren't in the head. (Dretske also puts this by saying that these individuating properties of experiences not properties of experiences, but I think this is needlessly misleading, since on his externalism they turn out to be relational properties of experiences.) Dretske doesn't come flat out and say that phenomenal internalism is false and externalism is true, much less that he has shown this to be true. What he says is more cautious -that if you accept content externalism, there is no reason not to accept phenomenal