University of Sussex
Department of Philosophy
DPhil, 2009
Leioa, Biscay, Spain
  •  64
    Neurophenomenology – A Special Issue
    Constructivist Foundations 8 (3): 265-268. 2013.
    Context: Seventeen years ago Francisco Varela introduced neurophenomenology. He proposed the integration of phenomenological approaches to first-person experience – in the tradition of Husserl, Heidegger and Merleau-Ponty – with a neuro-dynamical, scientific approach to the study of the situated brain and body. Problem: It is time for a re-appraisal of this field. Has neurophenomenology already contributed to the sciences of the mind? If so, how? How should it best do so in future? Additionally,…Read more
  • Learning to perceive is faced with a classical paradox: if understanding is required for perception, how can we learn to perceive something new, something we do not yet understand? According to the sensorimotor approach, perception involves mastery of regular sensorimotor co-variations that depend on the agent and the environment, also known as the “laws” of sensorimotor contingencies (SMCs). In this sense, perception involves enacting relevant sensorimotor skills in each situation. It is import…Read more
  •  34
    World-related integrated information: Enactivist and phenomenal perspectives
    with Igor Aleksander
    International Journal of Machine Consciousness 4 (2): 439-455. 2012.
  •  12
    Response to de Quincey
    Journal of Consciousness Studies 13 (4): 13-36. 2006.
  •  105
    Phenomenology and Embodied Action
    Constructivist Foundations 8 (3): 298-313. 2013.
    Context: The enactivist tradition, out of which neurophenomenology arose, rejects various internalisms – including the representationalist and information-processing metaphors – but remains wedded to one further internalism: the claim that the structure of perceptual experience is directly, constitutively linked only to internal, brain-based dynamics. Problem: I aim to reject this internalism and defend an alternative analysis. Method: The paper presents a direct-realist, externalist, sensorimot…Read more
  •  77
    Sensorimotor Direct Realism: How We Enact Our World
    Constructivist Foundations 11 (2): 265-276. 2016.
    Context: Direct realism is a non-reductive, anti-representationalist theory of perception lying at the heart of mainstream analytic philosophy, where it is currently generating a lot of interest. For all that, it is widely held to be both controversial and anti-scientific. On the other hand, the sensorimotor theory of perception initially generated a lot of interest within enactive philosophy of cognitive science, but has arguably not yet delivered on its initial promise. Problem: I aim to show …Read more
  • Peer Commentary on de Quincey
    Journal of Consciousness Studies 13 (4): 13. 2006.
  •  317
    What RoboDennett still doesn't know
    Journal of Consciousness Studies 12 (12): 3-25. 2005.
    The explicit aim of Daniel Dennett’s new paper ‘What RoboMary Knows’ is to show that Mary will necessarily be able to come to know what it is like to see in colour, if she fully understands all the physical facts about colour vision. I believe we can establish that Dennett’s line of reasoning is flawed, but the flaw is not as simple as an equivocation on ‘knows’. Rather, it goes to the heart of functionalism and hinges on whether or not Dennett is correct to claim that there is ‘no fact of the m…Read more
  •  19
    Author’s Response: The Personal Level in Sensorimotor Theory
    Constructivist Foundations 11 (2): 289-297. 2016.
    Upshot: I offer responses to the commentaries on my target article in five short sections. The first section, about the plurality of lived worlds, concerns issues of quite general interest to readers of this journal. The second section presents some reasons for rejecting “enabling” as well as “constitutive” representational approaches to understanding the mind. In the remaining three sections, I clarify aspects of sensorimotor direct realism relating to the self, qualia, counterfactuals, and the…Read more
  •  1671
    Qualia and Introspection
    Journal of Consciousness Studies 16 (5): 88-110. 2009.
    The claim that behaviourally undetectable inverted spectra are possible has been endorsed by many physicalists. I explain why this starting point rules out standard forms of scientific explanation for qualia. The modern ‘phenomenal concept strategy’ is an updated way of defending problematic intuitions like these, but I show that it cannot help to recover standard scientific explanation. I argue that Chalmers is right: we should accept the falsity of physicalism if we accept this problematic sta…Read more
  •  19
    Book Reviews (review)
    with John McCrone and Athar Yawar
    Journal of Consciousness Studies 13 (4): 113-127. 2006.
  •  23
    Crossing the Explanatory Gap by Legwork, not by Fiat
    Constructivist Foundations 11 (2): 364-366. 2016.
    Open peer commentary on the article “Never Mind the Gap: Neurophenomenology, Radical Enactivism, and the Hard Problem of Consciousness” by Michael D. Kirchhoff & Daniel D. Hutto. Upshot: I strongly agree with Kirchhoff and Hutto that consciousness and embodied action are one and the same, but I disagree when they say this identity cannot be fully explained and must simply be posited. Here I attempt to sketch the outlines of just such an explanation.