The Obvious Argument for the Inconceivability of Zombies

Abstract

Zombies are hypothetical creatures identical to us in behavior and internal functionality, but lacking experience. When the concept of zombie is examined in careful detail, it is found that the attempt to keep experience out does not work. So the concept of zombie is the same as the concept of person. Because they are only trivially conceivable, zombies are in a sense inconceivable.

Categories

Keywords

Reprint years

Links

PhilArchive

External links

  • This entry has no external links. Add one.
Setup an account with your affiliations in order to access resources via your University's proxy server

Through your library

  • Only published works are available at libraries.

My notes

Similar books and articles

Zombies on the web.David Chalmers - manuscript
Imagining subjective absence: Marcus on zombies.Torin Alter - 2007 - Disputatio 2 (22):91-101.
Access denied to zombies.Gualtiero Piccinini - 2008 - Unpublished (1):1-13.
Why zombies are inconceivable.Eric Marcus - 2004 - Australasian Journal of Philosophy 82 (3):477-90.
Zombies from Below.David Robb - 2008 - In Simone Gozzano Francesco Orilia (ed.), Tropes, Universals, and the Philosophy of Mind: Essays at the Boundary of Ontology and Philosophical Psychology. Ontos Verlag.
Revenge of the zombies.Larry Hauser - manuscript
Conceivability and Coherence: A Skeptical View of Zombies.Heimir Geirsson - 2014 - Erkenntnis 79 (1):211-225.
Why the argument from zombies against physicalism is question-begging.Moti Mizrahi - 2013 - The Reasoner 7 (8):94-95.
Twilight of the zombies.Dan Lloyd - 1997
Zombie killer.Nigel J. T. Thomas - 1998 - In Stuart R. Hameroff, Alfred W. Kaszniak & A. C. Scott (eds.), Toward a Science of Consciousness Ii. MIT Press.
Review of Kirk's Zombies and consciousness. [REVIEW]Yujin Nagasawa - 2008 - Philosophical Books 49 (2):170-171.
Are Phenomenal Zombies Really Conceivable?Murat Aydede - manuscript
The inconceivability of zombies.Robert Kirk - 2008 - Philosophical Studies 139 (1):73-89.

Analytics

Added to PP
2013-06-25

Downloads
985 (#13,246)

6 months
141 (#22,450)

Historical graph of downloads
How can I increase my downloads?

Author's Profile

Drew McDermott
Yale University

Citations of this work

No citations found.

Add more citations

References found in this work

Does conceivability entail possibility.David J. Chalmers - 2002 - In Tamar Szabo Gendler & John Hawthorne (eds.), Conceivability and Possibility. Oxford University Press. pp. 145--200.
Epiphenomenal qualia.Frank Jackson - 1982 - Philosophical Quarterly 32 (April):127-136.
Consciousness Explained.Daniel C. Dennett - 1993 - Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 53 (4):905-910.

View all 31 references / Add more references