Powerful Qualities, Phenomenal Concepts, and the New Challenge to Physicalism

Abstract

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A Powerful New Anomalous Monism

“…In response to this, I say that the additional machinery added here can help the identity theorist deal with these arguments. I do not have space to explain how, but elsewhere I have argued that if we accept that mental properties can be referred to using dispositional and non-dispositional concepts, then the knowledge and zombie arguments can be satisfactorily answered (Taylor 2017). So, these arguments pose no threat to the position developed in this paper.…”

“…That is to say, when we pick out entities using physical predicates, we are picking them out in terms of their dispositional profile (at least sometimes). As Chalmers 8 I develop this view of mental and physical predicates further in Taylor (2017).…”

“…For this explanation to work, we need to accept that properties can be picked out using dispositional and non-dispositional descriptions. For more on this idea (and for more information about dispositional and non-dispositional predicates) seeTaylor (2017) and (forthcoming: §2.4).…”

The relation between subjects and their conscious experiences

“…7. For some work applying ontology to the question of physicalism, seeCarruth (2015) andTaylor (2017Taylor ( , 2018.3 This has of course been noted before (e.g.Tye 1995, ch. 3).3494H.Taylor…”

Powerful Problems for Powerful Qualities

“…The points about the collapse argument made just now apply to all of these. Both the pure powers theorist and the identity theorist will accept that there are a variety of concepts and descriptions that we can use to think about and refer to properties (Taylor 2017(Taylor , 2018(Taylor , pp. 1428(Taylor -1429.…”