Experience, Dreaming, and the Phenomenology of Wakeful Consciousness

Crowther, Thomas

doi:10.1093/oso/9780199666416.003.0011

Cited by 6 publications

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“…1 Variations on this claim can be found, for example, in Sartre (1940), Walton (1990), O'Shaughnessy (2002) McGinn (2004, Sosa (2005Sosa ( , 2007Sosa ( , 2009, Ichikawa (2009Ichikawa ( , 2016, Thompson and Batchelor (2014), Soteriou (2013Soteriou ( , 2017, Crowther (2018). The assumptions that dreams (a) are phenomenally conscious experiences that occur during sleep and (b) that these are reported accurately upon waking have not gone unquestioned- Malcolm (1956), Dennett (1976), Rosen (2013)-however they are now widely accepted, and I do not press them here.…”

Section: The Imagination Model Of Dreamingmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Thus far, the imagination model has been discussed primarily within the context of (ii) imaginings, and its epistemological consequences in relation to Cartesian dream skepticism. 8 However, recent discussion has concerned the potential of the imagination model of dreaming as an available contrast case to illuminate and motivate an analysis of the metaphysical constitution and epistemic function of wakeful consciousness, as a crucial, relatively neglected topic in the philosophy of mind (O'Shaughnessy 2002(O'Shaughnessy , 2008Soteriou 2017;Crowther 2018). This, along with the potential of the imagination model to serve as a guide to empirical research in the science of dreaming (providing the much-needed conceptual clarification of the target phenomenon of this research) offers a strong mandate for discussion into the viability of the imagination model that Ichikawa presents and the success of the arguments offered in support of it.…”

Section: Andmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…26 Motivated by the need to provide a philosophical analysis of the state of wakeful consciousness, as an explanatorily preeminent condition relative to non-wake states, the alternative account of dreaming receiving attention in recent literature starts from an analysis of the wakeful condition as necessitating a kind of practical self-knowledge which results from the exercise of autonomous mental agency (O'Shaughnessy 2000(O'Shaughnessy , 2002. 27 According to this analysis, the constitutive difference between wakeful and non-wakeful conditions (in this case, dreaming) is given in terms of the (in)capacity to exercise agency over our mental lives-that is, a capacity or ability to perform mental actions-which, it is claimed, is responsible for enabling the distinctive and immediate sort of self-knowledge (knowledge of 'what we are up to') characteristic of wakeful consciousness (Soteriou 2017, Crowther 2018. 28 In O'Shaughnessy's words (2002;426, see also Soteriou 2017) the suggestion here is that ''Consciousness [wakeful consciousness] necessitates an overall mental activeness, for the reason that the conscious [i.e.…”

Section: The Case Against Ichikawa's Imagination Modelmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Given that on this model, the capacity to imagine 27 See O'Shaughnessy (2000), Crowther (2018) for an explanation of this connection in terms of the 'internal intelligibility' of the stream of consciousness. 28 This is meant to be neutral with regard to whether this claim is to be accounted for solely in terms of dispositions of agency or broadly in terms of differences in general capacitation not limited to mental agency (Crowther 2018). The latter claim is all that is required.…”

Section: The Case Against Ichikawa's Imagination Modelmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The aphantasia studies notably suggest a strong neurophysiological dissociation between voluntary and involuntary forms of mental imagery, with only the capacity for the former being lost by the majority of aphantasic subjects. I argue that the strongest response available to the imagination theorist is to take up the recent calls for adoption of a variation of the imagination model according to which non-lucid dreams essentially involve involuntary, passive or inactive forms of imagination (O'Shaughnessy 2002;Soteriou 2017;Crowther 2018). I conclude in Sect.…”

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confidence: 96%

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Aphantasia, imagination and dreaming

Whiteley

2020

Philos Stud

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Aphantasia is a recently discovered disorder characterised by the total incapacity to generate visual forms of mental imagery. This paper proposes that aphantasia raises important theoretical concerns for the ongoing debate in the philosophy and science of consciousness over the nature of dreams. Recent studies of aphantasia and its neurobehavioral correlates reveal that the majority of aphantasics, whilst unable to produce visual imagery while awake, nevertheless retain the capacity to experience rich visual dreams. This finding constitutes a novel explanandum for theories of dreaming. Specifically, I argue that the recent dream reports of aphantasics constitute an empirical challenge to the emerging family of views which claim that dreams are essentially imaginative experiences, constitutively involving the kinds of mental imagery which aphantasics, ex-hypothesi, lack. After presenting this challenge in the context of Jonathan Ichikawa’s recent arguments for this view, I argue that this empirical challenge may be overcome if the imagination theorist abandons Ichikawa’s account of dreaming in favour of a modified version. This involves the claim that dreams are essentially inactive and constitutively involve non voluntary forms of imagination. I conclude with a suggestion for further research which can test the viability of this alternative hypothesis, and move the debate forward.

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Section: The Imagination Model Of Dreamingmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Andmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: The Case Against Ichikawa's Imagination Modelmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: The Case Against Ichikawa's Imagination Modelmentioning

confidence: 99%

mentioning

confidence: 96%

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Aphantasia, imagination and dreaming

Whiteley

2020

Philos Stud

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Imagining a Way Out of Dream Skepticism

Gregory

2023

Erkenn

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The problem of dream skepticism – i.e., the problem of what can justify one’s belief that they are not dreaming – is one of the most famous problems in philosophy. I propose a way of responding to the problem which is available if one subscribes to the theory that the sensory experiences that we have in dreams consist of images (as opposed to false percepts). The response exploits a particular feature of imagination, viz., that it is not possible to simultaneously have two separate imagistic experiences in the same modality.

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Safety and dream scepticism in Sosa’s epistemology

Carter,

Cowan

2024

Synthese

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A common objection to Sosa’s epistemology is that it countenances, in an objectionable way, unsafe knowledge. This objection, under closer inspection, turns out to be in far worse shape than Sosa’s critics have realised. Sosa and his defenders have offered two central response types to the idea that allowing unsafe knowledge is problematic: one response type adverts to the animal/reflective knowledge distinction that is characteristic of bi-level virtue epistemology. The other less-discussed response type appeals to the threat of dream scepticism, and in particular, to the idea that many of our everyday perceptual beliefs are unsafe through the nearness of the dream possibility. The latter dreaming response to the safety objection to Sosa’s virtue epistemology has largely flown under the radar in contemporary discussions of safety and knowledge. We think that, suitably articulated in view of research in the philosophy and science of dreaming, it has much more going for it than has been appreciated. This paper further develops, beyond what Sosa does himself, the dreaming argument in response to those who think safety (as traditionally understood) is a condition on knowledge and who object to Sosa’s account on the grounds that it fails this condition. The payoffs of further developing this argument will be not only a better understanding of the importance of insights about dreaming against safety as a condition on knowledge, but also some reason to think a weaker safety condition, one that is relativised to SSS (i.e., skill/shape/situation) conditions for competence exercise, gets better results all things considered as an anti-luck codicil on knowledge.

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Experience, Dreaming, and the Phenomenology of Wakeful Consciousness

Cited by 6 publications

References 0 publications

Aphantasia, imagination and dreaming

Aphantasia, imagination and dreaming

Imagining a Way Out of Dream Skepticism

Safety and dream scepticism in Sosa’s epistemology

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