Search Results
Page:12
Author:
Abstract
It is widely believed that the phenomenal character of conscious mental states is composed of two different components: its qualitative character and its subjective character, with the latter also being referred to as ‘mineness’, ‘for-me-ness’ or ‘me-ishness’. While many researchers agree that the subjective character is an essential part of conscious life, there is great disagreement about what the metaphysical nature of this component of experience has to be like. One answer to this question, originally presented in Smith (1986), conceptualizes the subjective character as being part of the modality of experience rather than as a constituent of its representational content. I call the branch of theories developed along these lines ‘the self-mode approach to the subjective character of experience’. This self-mode approach to the metaphysics underlying the subjective character appears to be promising, yet it can still be developed in a number of different ways – some of which are fraught with problems, while others less so. Here I will introduce three different approaches to the idea that the subjective character is grounded in the modality of experience. I name these distinct accounts ‘evaluatism’ (Musholt 2015; Pereira 2018; Recanati 2007, 2012), ‘adverbialism’ (Thomasson 2000), and ‘relationalism’. I am going to argue for relationalism, and explore how this position relates to a general representational theory of consciousness and different views about the metaphysics of the subjects of experiences, i.e. the entities in relation to which experiences are instantiated. Relationalism consists of the very simple idea that the subjective character is grounded in a sui generis mental relation that holds between a conscious mental state and the subject of experience having this state. In contrast to most of the existing accounts of subjective character, relationalism aims to account for the subjective character not by introducing something additional to our ontology of the mind and consciousness (such as a self-representational content or a higher-order state), but by adopting a different view on the grounding or basing relation holding between the representational structure of a conscious mental state and its phenomenal character.
Author:
Action, Identification and Experience
Author:
The book offers new answers to two central questions that have been heavily debated, especially in recent years, in the debate on so-called de se skepticism: Is there something special about first-person thinking? And how does it relate to other forms of self-consciousness? The answer to the first question is a resounding "yes." This assertion is justified by the double-reflexive structure, motivational force, and specific concern that first-personal thinking involves. Regarding the second question, the book concludes that there are non-linguistic forms of self-consciousness. However, these should not be understood as representational contents or non-relational properties, but as mental relations that, without themselves being represented, can contribute to the phenomenal character of conscious states. In this respect, the book also provides a justification for the rarely considered impure intentionalism.
Action, Identification and Experience
Author:
The book offers new answers to two central questions that have been heavily debated, especially in recent years, in the debate on so-called de se skepticism: Is there something special about first-person thinking? And how does it relate to other forms of self-consciousness? The answer to the first question is a resounding "yes." This assertion is justified by the double-reflexive structure, motivational force, and specific concern that first-personal thinking involves. Regarding the second question, the book concludes that there are non-linguistic forms of self-consciousness. However, these should not be understood as representational contents or non-relational properties, but as mental relations that, without themselves being represented, can contribute to the phenomenal character of conscious states. In this respect, the book also provides a justification for the rarely considered impure intentionalism.
Page:12