Colloquium: Adam Pautz (University of Texas)
Department: Philosophy
Date and Time: June 6, 2014 | 3:00 PM-5:00 PMEvent Location: 55 HIB
Event Details
"Is Consciousness a Brain Process? A New Argument Against Type-Type Identity"
ABSTRACT: The identity theory of experience is making a modest comeback (Block, McLaughlin, Prinz, Papineau). It provides an attractive, reductive theory of experience. I think identity theorists are right about one thing: the biology of the brain makes a big contribution to what our experience of the world is like - a fact not adequately accommodated by some currently popular "externalist" theories of experience (Dretske, Tye, Fish, Campbell). My main aim however is to argue that the identity theory is mistaken. Some experiences, I argue, are necessarily directed at external states of affairs. But neural states are not necessarily so directed. So experiences cannot be (necessarily) identical with neural states.
Professor Adam Pautz
University of Texas