Content: A Possible Key to Consciousness
I'll be giving a talk for the upcoming 2023 online conference (November-December) of the International Society for the Philosophy of the Sciences of the Mind and am looking for constructive feedback in advance that will help improve the presentation. Pointers to similar approaches in the literature most appreciated!
The talk is based on this paper of the same title: https://psyarxiv.com/79xg8
- Tom Clark, twclark@brandeis.edu
Reactivity in Charge: On Fischer's Semiretributivism
1. Introduction
Phenomenal Consciousness: Fiction or Reality?
The Fiction of Phenomenality
Keith Frankish comments on Are Feels Real?
Are Feels Real? Reflections on Frankish's Illusionism
Introduction
Causal Responsibility for Addiction
Coming to Terms with Determinism
Talk summary: One common conception of free will has it that if causal determinism is true, we can’t be free, what’s sometimes called the problem of free will and determinism. As a result, determinism – reliable cause and effect relations – is widely viewed as a threat to autonomy and responsibility. In this talk I aim to rehabilitate the reputation of determinism, showing how a pragmatic (not universal) determinism is not only true, but offers a practical and ethical perspective on human agency.
Consciousness, Emergence, and the Limits of Poetic Naturalism
I.
Who’s in Charge? Consciousness and Control in the Waking Up App
In seven brief talks on free will in the Waking Up meditation app, Sam Harris gets it importantly right about the consequences of giving up the myth of libertarian freedom. We are urged to accept causal determinism, plus any indeterminism that might exist, when it comes to understanding ourselves.