Manoj Panda

Presidency University
  •  15
    Placing Mind in the Natural World: In Search of an Alternative Naturalism
    Journal of the Indian Council of Philosophical Research 1-22. forthcoming.
    In contemporary philosophy, various attempts have been made in relation to placing our minds or mental states in the natural world or nature. In this context, there is a clear divide between naturalism and anti-naturalism, materialism and immaterialism, etc. Driven by the influence of naturalistic turn in philosophy and scientism, many philosophers have tried to put forth various naturalistic accounts of the relationship between mind and natural world. However, many of these accounts are natural…Read more
  •  107
    Phenomenal and Representational Character of Conscious Experience
    Sandhān : Journal of Centre for Studies in Civilizations (1 & 2): 59-92. 2017.
    My aim in this paper is to critically evaluate the debate surrounding the distinction between phenomenal and representational character of conscious experience which is one of the important debates in contemporary philosophy of mind and consciousness studies. The main objective of this paper is to seek an answer to the question- whether the content of conscious experience is phenomenal or intentional, or both? In the introduction, I will introduce the phenomenal and representational as two signi…Read more
  •  124
    Experience, Knowledge and Space of Reasons
    Journal of Foundational Research 28 421-450. 2020.
    Philosophers throughout the ages have struggled to explain the way or ways by which we can acquire knowledge about the external world. With an aim to meet the skeptical challenges regarding the possibility of knowledge, various accounts of knowledge have been developed across philosophical traditions. The worry to meet skeptical challenges is implicitly or explicitly present in almost every philosophical account of knowledge. Many philosophers, while explaining about the nature and the possibili…Read more
  •  307
    Gadamer, McDowell, and the Phenomenology of Understanding
    In Jyotsna Saha, Jhadeswar Ghosh & Purbayan Jha (eds.), Language, Reality and Culture: Philosophical Discourses on Language, Religion and Culture, . 2020.
    My aim in this paper is to critically evaluate the debate between John McDowell and Michael Friedman on the nature of understanding and relativism. McDowell in his magnum opus Mind and World, has argued in favour of the view that the way we are open to reality is constituted by concepts. According to him, our openness to reality is placed in the space of reasons which is nothing but space of concepts. Friedman in his critical and detail review of McDowell’s book has taken McDowell’s project in …Read more
  •  141
    Experience, Thought and External World: Davidson and McDowell
    Indian Philosophical Quarterly (3-4): 43-64. 2019.
    The relationship between experience and thought is one of the distinctive problems in contemporary philosophy and has significant implications for both philosophy of mind and epistemology. John McDowell in his Magnum Opus Mind and World has argued in favour of a rational and conceptual relationship between experience and thought. In our understanding of the relationship between experience and thought, in his opinion, we fall into an “intolerable oscillation” between Myth of the Given and Cohere…Read more