-
34Replies to critics: Explaining subjectivityPSYCHE: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Research On Consciousness 6. 2000.This article replies to the main objections raised by the commentators on Carruthers . It discusses the question of what evidence is relevant to the assessment of dispositional higher-order thought theory; it explains how the actual properties of phenomenal consciousness can be dispositionally constituted; it discusses the case of pains and other bodily sensations in non-human animals and young children; it sketches the case for preferring higher-order to first-order theories of phenomenal consc…Read more
-
47Review of Shaun Nichols, Stephen Stich, Mindreading: An Integrated Account of Pretence, Self-Awareness, and Understanding of Other Minds (review)Notre Dame Philosophical Reviews 2004 (8). 2004.
-
124Ruling-out realismPhilosophia 15 (1-2): 61-78. 1985.The case for anti-realism in the theory of meaning, as presented by Dummen and Wright, 1 is only partly convincing. There is, I shall suggest, a crucial lacuna in the argument, that can only be filled by the later Wittgenstein's following-a-rule considerations. So it is the latter that provides the strongest argument for the rejection of semantic realism.
By 'realism', throughout, I should be taken as referring to any conception of meaning that leaves open the possibility that a sentence may have…Read more -
Reductive Explanation and the ‘Explanatory Gap’In Consciousness: Essays From a Higher-Order Perspective, Oxford University Press Uk. 2005.Exponents of an ‘explanatory gap’ between physical, functional, and intentional facts, on the one hand, and the facts of phenomenal consciousness, on the other, argue that there are reasons of principle why phenomenal consciousness cannot be reductively explained. Some writers claim that the existence of such a gap warrants a belief in some form of ontological dualism, whereas others argue that no such entailment holds. In the other main camp, there are people who argue that a reductive explanat…Read more
-
16Robert Cummins, "Meaning and Mental Representation" (review)Philosophical Quarterly 40 (61): 527. 1990.
-
99Practical reasoning in a modular mindMind and Language 19 (3): 259-278. 2004.This paper starts from an assumption defended in the author's previous work. This is that distinctivelyhuman flexible and creative theoretical thinking can be explained in terms of the interactions of a variety of modular systems, with the addition of just a few amodular components and dispositions. On the basis of that assumption it is argued that distinctively human practical reasoning, too, can be understood in modular terms. The upshot is that there is nothing in the human psyche that requ…Read more
-
48Reductive Explanation and the 'Explanatory Gap'Canadian Journal of Philosophy 34 (2): 153-173. 2004.Can phenomenal consciousness be given a reductive natural explanation? Exponents of an ‘explanatory gap’ between physical, functional and intentional facts, on the one hand, and the facts of phenomenal consciousness, on the other, argue that there are reasons of principle why phenomenal consciousness cannot be reductively explained: Jackson (1982), (1986); Levine (1983), (1993), (2001); McGinn (1991); Sturgeon (1994), (2000); Chalmers (1996), (1999). Some of these writers claim that the existenc…Read more
-
11Review of Peter Carruthers and Andrew Chamberlain: Evolution and the Human Mind: Modularity, Language and Meta-Cognition (review)British Journal for the Philosophy of Science 52 (3): 623-628. 2001.
-
35Precis of "Phenomenal Consciousness: A Naturalistic Theory"SWIF Philosophy of Mind Review 2 (1). 2001.
-
12Phenomenal Concepts and Higher‐Order ExperiencesPhilosophy and Phenomenological Research 68 (2): 316-336. 2004.Relying on a range of now‐familiar thought‐experiments, it has seemed to many philosophers that phenomenal consciousness is beyond the scope of reductive explanation. (Phenomenal consciousness is a form of state‐consciousness, which contrasts with creature‐consciousness, or perceptual ‐consciousness. The different forms of state‐consciousness include various kinds of access‐consciousness, both first‐order and higher‐order–see Rosenthal, 1986; Block, 1995; Lycan, 1996; Carruthers, 2000. Phenomena…Read more
-
Phenomenal Concepts and Higher-Order ExperiencesIn Consciousness: Essays From a Higher-Order Perspective, Oxford University Press Uk. 2005.Argues for the need to recognise higher-order perceptual experiences and briefly argues for the superiority of the author’s own dispositional HOT version of higher-order perception theory. But its main focus is on purely recognitional concepts of experience. There is an emerging consensus amongst naturalistically minded philosophers that the existence of such concepts is the key to blocking the zombie-style arguments of both dualist mysterians like Chalmers and physicalist mysterians like McGinn…Read more
-
91This article outlines the main themes and motivations of Carruthers (2006). Its purpose is to provide some background for the critical commentaries of Cowie, Machery, and Wilson (this volume).
-
83Précis of the architecture of the mind: Massive modularity and the flexibility of thoughtMind and Language 23 (3). 2008.This article outlines the main themes and motivations of Carruthers, 2006. Its purpose is to provide some background for the critical commentaries of Cowie, Machery, and Wilson (this volume).
-
213Phenomenal concepts and higher-order experiencesPhilosophy and Phenomenological Research 68 (2): 316-336. 2004.Relying on a range of now-familiar thought-experiments, it has seemed to many philosophers that phenomenal consciousness is beyond the scope of reductive explanation. (Phenomenal consciousness is a form of state-consciousness, which contrasts with creature-consciousness, or perceptual-consciousness. The different forms of state-consciousness include various kinds of access-consciousness, both first-order and higher-order--see Rosenthal, 1986; Block, 1995; Lycan, 1996; Carruthers, 2000. Phenomena…Read more
-
87On Fodor-fixation, flexibility, and human uniqueness: A reply to Cowie, Machery, and WilsonMind and Language 23 (3). 2008.This paper argues that two of my critics (Cowie and Wilson) have become fixated on Fodor’s notion of modularity, both to their own detriment and to the detriment of their understanding of Carruthers, 2006. The paper then focuses on the supposed inadequacies of the latter’s explanations of both content flexibility and human uniqueness, alleged by Machery and Cowie respectively.
-
On Being Simple-MindedIn Consciousness: Essays From a Higher-Order Perspective, Oxford University Press Uk. 2005.Argues that belief/desire psychology – and with it a form of first-order access-consciousness – are very widely distributed in the animal kingdom, being shared even by navigating insects. Although the main topic of this chapter is not mental-state consciousness, it serves both to underscore the argument of the previous chapter, and to emphasise how wide is the phylogenetic distance separating mentality per se from phenomenally conscious mentality. On some views, these things are intimately conne…Read more
-
99On Fodor's problemMind and Language 18 (5): 502-523. 2003.This paper sketches a solution to a problem which has been emphasized by Fodor. This is the problem of how to explain distinctively-human flexible cognition in modular terms. There are three aspects to the proposed account. First, it is suggested that natural language sentences might serve to integrate the outputs of a number of conceptual modules. Second, a creative sentence-generator, or supposer, is postulated. And third, it is argued that a set of principles of inference to the best explanat…Read more
-
157Phenomenal Consciousness: A Naturalistic TheoryCambridge University Press. 2000.How can phenomenal consciousness exist as an integral part of a physical universe? How can the technicolour phenomenology of our inner lives be created out of the complex neural activities of our brains? Many have despaired of finding answers to these questions; and many have claimed that human consciousness is inherently mysterious. Peter Carruthers argues, on the contrary, that the subjective feel of our experience is fully explicable in naturalistic terms. Drawing on a variety of interdiscipl…Read more
-
172On central cognitionPhilosophical Studies 170 (1): 143-162. 2014.This article examines what is known about the cognitive science of working memory, and brings the findings to bear in evaluating philosophical accounts of central cognitive processes of thinking and reasoning. It is argued that central cognition is sensory based, depending on the activation and deployment of sensory images of various sorts. Contrary to a broad spectrum of philosophical opinion, the central mind does not contain any workspace within which goals, decisions, intentions, or non-sens…Read more