Conscious Experience ANIL GUPTA Conscious Experience a logical inquiry Cambridge, Massachusetts, and London, England 2019 Copyright © 2019 by the President and Fellows of Harvard College All rights reserved Printed in the United States of Amer i ca First printing Jacket design: Jill Breitbarth Jacket photo: iStock/Getty Images Plus 9780674239593 (EPUB) 9780674239609 (MOBI) 9780674239586 (PDF) The Library of Congress has cataloged the printed edition as follows: Names: Gupta, Anil, 1949– author. Title: Conscious experience : a logical inquiry / Anil Gupta. Description: Cambridge, Mas sa chu setts : Harvard University Press, 2019. | Includes bibliographical references and index. Identifiers: LCCN 2018023301 | ISBN 9780674987784 (alk. paper) Subjects: LCSH: Empiricism. | Consciousness. | Logic. | Perception (Philosophy) Classification: LCC B816 .G87 2018 | DDC 128/.4— dc23 LC rec ord available at https:// lccn . loc . gov / 2018023301 To Donna Beloved, beautiful, brilliant Contents Preface xi Précis xix 1 The Prob lem of Conscious Experience 1 1A. Logical and Naturalist Inquiries 1 1B. Skepticism and Russell’s Acquaintance Model of Experience 13 2 A Coherence Theory of Perceptual Judgments 33 2A. Sellars’s Theory of Experience 34 2B. Sellars on the Reasonableness of Perceptual Judgments 45 2C. Critical Observations I 51 2D. Critical Observations II 53 3 Simple Theories of Perceptual Judgments 63 3A. Characterization of Simple Theories 63 3B. Simple Relational Theories 67 viii CoNTeNTs 3C. Simple Informational Theories 72 3D. Simple Intentional Theories 76 3E. Prob lems with the Simple Given 84 4 The Hy po thet i cal Given 92 4A. Rational Transitions 93 4B. General Remarks on Logical Interdependence 105 4C. On Convergence 109 4D. Logical Interdependence and Holism 121 5 Pre sen ta tion and the Transparency of Experience 126 5A. Pre sen ta tion without Acquaintance 127 5B. Moore on the Transparency of Experience 130 5C. Mind- Independence and Externality 137 5D. Phenomenology and Introspection 143 6 Appearances 155 6A. Subjective Identity and Appearances 155 6B. Illusions and Hallucinations 166 6C. Intentionalist Objections 174 7 The Role of Appearances in Cognition 185 7A. The Equivalence Princi ple 185 7B. Connotation and Denotation 197 7C. The Skeptical Meditation 201 7D. Summary of the Account of Experience 211 8 Experience and Concept 218 8A. Historical Introduction 219 8B. Ostensive Definition: Denotation 228 8C. Ostensive Definition: Connotation, Symbol, Concept 242 8D. Conceptual Criticism 252 9 Empirical Transformations 264 9A. Ontology, Logical and Proper 265 9B. Specks, Images, Clouds 276 9C. Conceptions of Color 287 9D. A Sketch of the Dialectical Situation 293 CoNTeNTs ix 10 Empirical Dialectic and Empirical Proofs 299 10A. Empirical and Mathematical Dialectic Compared 300 10B. Some Features of Empirical Proofs 312 10C. Compelling Empirical Proofs 323 11 The General Logic of Empirical Dialectic 333 11A. Rationality and Dialectical Power 333 11B. Ur- Convergence 341 11C. Summary of the Main Features of Empirical Dialectic 344 12 Physicalism from the Logical Point of View 355 12A. Kripke’s Argument against Mental- Physical Identity 356 12B. Types of Physicalism 370 12C. Physicalism within the Bounds of Reason 378 References 385 Index 403