I think it's more plausible that Dennett has ideological prejudices so powerful that they can overcome any intuitive evidence whatsoever, than that he has experiential defects. But it's interesting to think about how phenomenological differences could lead to theoretical ones, and whether they have in the past.

Although when Dennett describes qualia to show he gets it he always mentions listening to a string quartet or something. Which is weird, because it implies sees having experience as some quasi-spiritual or artistic experience (a string quartet is like 'real experience'), whereas it's totally mundane and utterly pervasive in waking life.

I didn't mean to imply that all imaginings are visual – surely they aren't. But I took the situation to be one about the visual imagining of a zebra, since the point is about how even in the visual concoction of that zebra, we don't, unless we specifically concentrate on doing it that way, 'see' the zebra with some particular number of stripes. Rather we have the quasi-visual impression of a pattern of stripes as a kind of mass.

It would be nice if I could track down where Dennett said this, if he really did. Someone just told it to me once offhand.

Those are phosphenes. I forget the exact physiological explanation for them – it's like manually stimulating your retina.

I didn't mean to imply that most people visualize a zebra with an exact number of stripes. Personally, when I imagine a zebra, I don't. I suppose I can, if I want to, imagine one with ten stripes along the flank, or whatever.

What I thought was odd about Dennett's explanation was the bizarrely verbal way he'd put it, as if he himself 'imagines' things by repeating words to himself in his head rather than concocting a quasi-visual image.

Who knows? I can't think of a reason to rule it out a priori, though to be clear I'm not advocating epiphenominalism. Maybe qualia are a sort of genetic defect that has slipped through the cracks and stayed with us.

Also, to be clear, I think it would have functional differences at some level – for example, I can totally buy a lot of AP is done without qualia. But someone like, say Franz Brentano, it would be hard to imagine that he was a p-zombie. That is, ability to experience may manifest in extremely different philosophical methods or interests.

I also heard that Dennett claimed the reason when people imagine say a zebra, that they don't imagine it with an exact number of stripes, is because they learn the word 'some' and have the capacity to imagine amounts of thing without an exact numeral attached by thinking about 'a zebra with some stripes.' To anyone who is a good visualizer, of course, this explanation is not only going to sound absurd, but like an alien has said it.

The possibility of p-zombies would be an extreme possibility along the spectrum. Obviously there's no good reason to have a positive belief in them right now. What I claimed in the OP was just that we don't know a priori they're not actual, which most people seem to assume.

Do they, though? Aren't they like beetles-in-boxes? Indeed the machinery of the world seem to have little room for them.

It would mean it is epiphenomenal, as the p-zombies like Dennett seem to operate just as well as those who firmly believe we have qualia. — darthbarracuda

They do until they are explicitly asked questions about consciousness. Then they become noticeably different.

If all you're saying is that there are great variations in phenomenological experience, I do think that's an interesting scientific fact, but I don't know how it matters to this philosophical question any more than the well accepted fact that there are great variations in how well different people's perceptions work as well as their intellect in deciphering the meaning of their experiences. — Hanover

The point is that in conducting philosophy, it seems not to be assumed that people differ in a very basic way as to their experiential capabilities and therefore in their access to certain kinds of intuitive evidence, except in the obvious cases, like blindness.

These differences may be at the heart of the misunderstandings surrounding the existence of, or how to interpret, certain sorts of intuitive evidence.

Yeah, it wouldn't, but I'm not sure how much actual application of moral principles, to the extent people are moral, really has anything to do with conscious experiences. Again, p-zombies behave almost exactly the same as non-p-zombies, so I doubt you'd have to make any change to your moral practices at all.

I think a lot of people say suffering is bad, but then by that they can just mean whatever it is happens to people whether p-zombie or not. Whether they specifically mean the qualitative experience of suffering isn't clear, since people would be repulsed by it anyway.

Actually, a lot of analytic philosophers come strangely close to denying that pain, in this sense, exists – check out Georges Rey and Richard Rorty's stuff. Yet they don't for all that seem to deny that we shouldn't make people suffer. It's like how people disapprove of incest – more of a 'thou shalt not' that for obscure social and biological reasons became traditional.

This is really an over-read of what is occurring. Aphantasiacs most certainly can experience things. — Hanover

Well, I never said they couldn't, so I'm not sure of the relevance.

Dennett in his early career defended the notion that dreams are a coming-to-seem-to-remember upon awakening. That we don't actually experience dreams while asleep, but rather the false memories are creating during awakening. — Marchesk

This can't be tenable with modern scientific evidence. I once read an article by a guy who claimed dreaming was a purely linguistic phenomenon – that there was nothing to dreaming but reporting that one dreamt the next morning. Pretty retarded.



I don't see why it would be – moral intuitions about killing don't center on the suffering of the killed, for obvious reasons. Also, there would only be a sense in which a p-zombie doesn't suffer.

I have an inner dialog going throughout the day. It's hard for me to imagine other people not hearing their own thoughts, outside of meditation. Aphantasics don't hear their thoughts? Do they have memories? Can they tell themselves a story? — Marchesk

I remember a debate on a philosophy forum once in which someone alluded to hearing songs in their head, in the sense of 'having a song stuck in your head.' Someone responded and said this was a bad way of speaking, that it's just thinking about a song, you can't actually 'hear songs in your head' and that this was a philosopher's confusion etc. etc. But the first guy was like, no, you don't get it, people literally have a quasi-auditory experience of music.

Philosophy relies a lot on intuitive evidence – it's interesting that it's remained so uninterested in variation in the power of different people to access that evidence.

The guy in the article says he doesn't dream, but self-reports of dreaming frequency are well-known to be unreliable. I think some aphantasiacs have involuntary visualizations, too, but I can't remember where I heard that.

Presumably, you'd start to think something is fishy if you asked them about something like the hard problem, and they insisted they didn't know what you were talking about, or acted in such a way that made you suspicious they had no qualia.

Actually, in talking about this sort of thing with some people, there responses are often split in just such a way. Some, when they try to get a handle on what's being talked about, start to sound like aliens – their reflections on and descriptions of experience are odd, as if there's a crucial piece missing. Other people just 'get' the thrust of the problem immediately.

That depends on what's in the test. The guy with aphantasia passed the visualization 'Turing Test' for 30 years – none of his friends or loved ones had any inkling he couldn't visualize things, and neither did he.

But of course they would know – they know the sorts of things people say, and say one of those, based on what's happened to them in the past.

Aphantasiacs can't replicate experiences 'internally' in any sensory modality, even when their sensory modalities are perfectly healthy.

It also isn't just an 'example' – we now know that a certain percentage of the population is aphantasiac.

As we get better at sussing out phenomenological differences, more of them may become part of common knowledge. What is so absurd that we might find out that there's a large divide between people, some of whom can experience and some of whom can't?

Note that those who couldn't might not be aware they can't, just like the guy was unaware he couldn't visualize things, because the idea that he should be able to never occurred to him.

A circular argument still isn't a tautology. A tautology is a single sentence that's in some sense 'always true.' An argument relates premises to conclusions and so can't be just a sentence.

Many sports are de facto racially segregated despite not being de jure segregated, as anyone who has watched the Olympics knows. My guess is that if you let things as they are now, there would simply be an overrepresentation of trans women in these sports as compared to the general population. I don't really think this is a problem – there are already these sorts of overrepresentation (e.g. by race).

Also, to get clear on this, an argument can't be a tautology. A conditional with the premise as antecedent and conclusion as consequent can be.

I think A. J. Ayer had an article about this way back in the 50's, about how the premise having a truth value requires the reference of 'I' to be secure, therefore presuppositionally securing the truth of the conclusion. I'm not sure if I'll be able to find it.

There is of course a sense in which 'I think' requires one to exist in order for it to be true – but to criticize the argument on this point is I think to misunderstand. There is no problem with arguing from the stronger case to the weaker, if somehow the stronger case can be directly known. For example, 'Porky is a pig, therefore there is a pig' does the same thing, but it's a good argument, and pointing out that Porky is a pig might very well be a good way to show that pigs exist. In the same way, pointing out that one thinks may be a good way to demonstrate that one exists.

I think the issues between these views arise from a misunderstanding of how tense operates in natural languages. The eternalist makes tensed claims, intending them to be tenseless, and so speaks nonsense – the presentist takes the ordinary mechanics of tense to have bizarre metaphysical consequences that they don't.

Idk, a lot of philosophy is just really shitty linguistics.

So the eternalist view in your opinion, is completely incoherent? You did say that you considered the view to be stupid, so is that the reason why? — Mr Bee

It is a fact about English that things stated in the present tense are anchored to the speech time (for the most part – it's more complicated than that). A theory that denies this cannot be correct. I don't have any views on whether eternalism is committed to such a thing. My guess is they would plead that they are using 'exists,' if they're inclined to do so, in some technical sense that differs form how it's used in ordinary English. I would also be skeptical, however, that they have a coherent notion of the sense in which they are using it. My position on these subjects tends to be that these metaphysical disputes are not actually disputes about anything, but are a performance of verbal confusions (that is, they are not about verbal issues like what words mean, but exist only in the real-time enactment of confusion over words).

My argument, despite its goals, was meant to be expressed in a manner that is neutral to the different views of time. I suspect your disagreement lies in the fact that you don't think that it is possible to do so, because you find one of those views to be internally inconsistent. — Mr Bee

It may be a potentially convincing premise infelicitously worded. But I think any felicitous wording of it would make it mean something like 'Right now, I only find that I have the experiences I have right now.'

When an eternalist says that the Big Bang exists, do they mean that in the present tense? That it is happening now? — Mr Bee

If they are using the English language, that's all that sentence can mean. It's not up to them to decide what it means. "Exists" must mean "exists now," since it's inflected for the present tense as a grammatical fact (that's what that little -s morpheme means). Notice how it's semantically anomalous to say "x exists yesterday." That doesn't make grammatical sense, regardless of your metaphysical position. You might be able to say it "x existed yesterday" or "x will exist tomorrow."

Unless, by now, you do not mean "at the time of this utterance" — Mr Bee

That is what "now" means. It is not a question of what I mean by it. If I mean something other than that by it, then I am not using the word – I am either misusing the English language or trying to speak in some sort of technical jargon, in which case using a word homophonous with the English word "now" should be foregone to avoid confusion.

There is only one sense of the passage of time I know of. — Mr Bee

Because throughout this conversation you have not used English words with their ordinary meanings, so it's difficult to know what you mean.

It's not contingent upon eternalism. The argument is meant to refute a view of eternalism, but the premise in question does not require one to adopt eternalism like I keep saying. — Mr Bee

Good. Then let's drop references to eternalism altogether and just talk about P3. So no more saying "but on an eternalist view..." etc. That is simply irrelevant.

I am talking about the me that exists, not what will exist and has existed (which strictly speaking, no longer exist). — Mr Bee

"The me that exists?" Isn't that just you? It's not "another you." You exist and you will exist. It's not like you won't exist anymore and "another you" will spring into existence instead.

If your "total experiences" include experiences that don't exist (such as experiences that existed or will exist), then that is not the total experience I am talking about. I only mean the experiences that exist. — Mr Bee

I assume that my "total experiences" are all those that happen over the course of my life. Apparently you don't mean this. Apparently you mean only the experiences that exist. Okay, but the word 'exist' is inflected for the present tense, such that for an experience to exist is for it to be happening (or being undergone) now. But you've said this is not what you intend.

Reading P3 naively, it doesn't sound plausible. If you change it to something like "the only experience I am currently having," or "the only experience that exists, by which I mean the only experience occurring now," it does. But you've said this is not what you want to say.

If you are saying that the experience of sitting in your room and the experience of the train do not exist (you reject the above statement) — Mr Bee

They did exist.

then I cannot see how you can say we experience both, other than by saying that they are experienced with the passage of time. — Mr Bee

I experienced both. I have no idea what you mean by 'the passage of time,' if you're using that phrase somehow technically. If you mean in the ordinary sense, of course I believe in the passage of time, because time passes. But if you require this to be an argument contingent on eternalism, as it seems to be in your OP, it seems you can just as easily convert any such notion into there just being distinct times at which things happen. I mean, I think eternalism is stupid, but that isn't my point, I'm just focusing on your argument, which has an unconvincing premise.

It says for the experiences that exist that I am have — Mr Bee

I can't parse this clause.

they are only limited to a single time, because the contents that I find in my total experience are only of a single time.

But again, this is just false. If I think about my total experiences, I find that I have had some, have some now and will have others later. So clearly they aren't limited to a single time. Why would I believe P3, then?

Because you asked me to create a new word to describe what it means to you — Mr Bee

I asked you to use a new word because you were abusing the English word 'now' by using it incorrectly.

Both the experience of sitting in my room and the experience of being on a train exist — Mr Bee

When did they happen? If they both happen in the past, I would say they both existed.

More specifically, do both the experience of sitting in my room and the experience of being on the train exist like we would say that both the events of the big bang and the event of the creation of Earth are said to exist under the Block universe (again, I'm not requiring to you to accept the latter)? — Mr Bee

I think a more sensible thing to say about past events is that they happened. Asking whether they exist seems infelicitous to begin with, but to the extent I can make sense of it, it seems to be a matter of asking whether they're happening, which of course they aren't, but they did happen.

It just means what it says. If something exists, then it is a part of what is NOW. — Mr Bee

So why use the word NOW? Can you just reword your claim using the word 'exists' instead?

Are you asking if I have both experiences while I exist. Of course – I have to exist to have an experience.

What is NOW includes what generally exists. — Mr Bee

What does it mean to generally exist? Is that different from existing?

Is your question, 'Do both of these experiences exist together what generally exists?'

If you don't really understand what the passage of time is, then I don't know if I can really tell you, since to me it's a basic concept. It's that thing that everyone in the philosophy of time talks about. — Mr Bee

I think that there's a time t1 at which I have an experience and then later another time t2 at which I have another. Is that the passage of time?

Do you know what NOW means? — Mr Bee

No.

Does your conception of having multiple experiences require the passage of time (yes/no)? — Mr Bee

What do you mean by the passage of time? It requires that there be different times, with each of the experiences had at different ones.

Do both of these experiences exist together NOW?[/quote]

I really don't know how to answer this question. Is it translatable into English?

One of them happens at some time t1, the other at some other time t2, where t1 precedes t2. I have both of them, one at each respective time.

'Truth' also seems to be a noun predicated of propositions. So we can say that something 'is a truth' just in case it's true. That also seems not to be too mysterious.

What's maybe a little more puzzling is we can use the locution 'the truth,' as in 'tell me the truth' or 'that's the truth.' This seems to function as an ordinary definite description denoting whatever truth is contextually relevant. So for example if we want to know who smashed the vase, and we're interrogating someone who we think knows, we might say 'tell me the truth,' by which we mean, 'tell me that truth which answers the question, "who smashed the vase?"' If there are then two options, p = 'a smashed the vase,' and q = 'b smashed the vase,' this is similar to asking 'tell me who smashed the vase,' or 'if a smashed the vase, tell me p, and if b smashed the vase, tell me q.'

So 'the truth' seems to be an ordinary definite description that holds of individual true propositions. If anyone wants to know what the truth is, you have to ask them, the truth about what?

Then there is the kind-term 'truth,' as in 'I value truth.' This seems akin to 'redness,' which seems to denote the property of being read. Likewise, 'truth' then seems to denote the property of being true. But since we now know that the property of being true is, and when it holds of a proposition, it's not so mysterious what's meant by this, as it's not mysterious to say something like 'I like a little redness in the cheeks.'

I'm not sure they're superfluous, or it depends on what you mean by that. It's more like, certain constructions converge on synonymy. It's the same with 'He is not bald' meaning the same as 'He is non-bald.' 'non-' is an adjectival modifier, while 'not' expresses sentential negation. They don't mean the same thing, but it so happens that in some cases the structures in which they occur make them interchangeable.

Likewise with just saying 'It's raining' and 'it's true that it's raining.'

Here's a plausible account of the semantics of 'true:' it is a predicate of propositions, true of those propositions just in case the proposition is itself true. So for example, modeling a proposition as a function from world-states to values 1 or 0, 1 for truth, 0 for falsehood, 'it is true that p' maps to 1 just in case p maps to 1 (relative to the relevant world-state, usually the actual world). 'It's raining' says that a certain state of affairs holds – a raining event is occurring – while 'It's true that it's raining' says that a certain proposition, expressed by 'that it's raining,' has a certain property. Now it so happens that when you work out both these truth conditions, they end up being the same, like in the 'bald' and 'non-bald' cases. But that doesn't mean 'true' doesn't mean anything, or that it's redundant, in that it has no uses that couldn't be achieved without it.

For example, plausibly this use of 'true' can be used to predicate properties not only of propositions, but derivatively of sentences, statements, or utterances, according as they express a certain proposition, of which the property 'true' holds. And this is something that isn't redundant – for example, if A says, 'I'm a doctor,' and B says, 'that's true,' where that is anaphoric to the proposition expressed by 'I'm a doctor,' this is something that B could not have done by merely repeating the sentence that A said: or if B said, 'I'm a doctor,' he would have said something different. So here, 'true' is used to predicate a property of the proposition expressed by A, which is different from simply saying over again what A said.

And so the predicate increases the expressive power of the language in various ways – or at least, lets us express some things using certain constructions that we couldn't otherwise.

If I have an experience of getting up and going to work, that experience might both involve sitting in my room, and then later being on the train, yes.

What do you mean by 'parts of that experience?' For example, I could describe an experience that takes place over the course of a day, in which I first sit in a room, and then get on a train. And I have had such experiences, and might say that the sitting and being on the train were both part of the same experience.

By 'parts of that experience,' do you mean, do I experience them at the very same instant? Then no.