Four clarifications on the soft problem of ‘Qualia as illusions’
Human Affairs July 1, 2022 DOI: 10.1515/humaff-2022-0026 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Commentary Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Key points | Argues that an illusionist version of eliminativism about qualia and other 'abstract things' repeats a long-established gesture of eliminating puzzling entities, but does so by proposing they are in principle explainable by purely physical means rather than by Galileo-style thought experiments. The author contends this maneuver converts a thoroughly dualistic position into one that can present itself as physically monistic or anti-dualistic. |
Abstract
things. Physical things and qualia. Because he frames the world in these wellestablished dualistic terms, these spooky metaphysical ‘abstract things’ leave him puzzled. His illusionist version of eliminativism repeats the long-established gesture of eliminating these puzzling things that to seem to him undeniably to exist and yet do not fit the materialist picture (because they seem to him not to exist in time and space). But he doesn’t eliminate them after Galileo’s fashion (a thought experiment involving removing ears, tongue, eyes etc). Rather, the supposed ‘non-physical’ things assumed to exist are presented as in principle (if not in practice) explainable by purely physical means, and hence the thoroughly dualistic position is magically transformed (via the hypothetical scientific elimination) into a position that can think of itself as physically monistic or anti-dualistic.