Direct phenomenal beliefs, cognitive significance, and the specious present

Philosophical Studies 168 (2):483-489 (2014)
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Abstract

Chalmers (The character of consciousness, 2010) argues for an acquaintance theory of the justification of direct phenomenal beliefs. A central part of this defense is the claim that direct phenomenal beliefs are cognitively significant. I argue against this. Direct phenomenal beliefs are justified within the specious present, and yet the resources available with the present ‘now’ are so impoverished that it barely constrains the content of a direct phenomenal belief. I argue that Chalmers’s account does not have the resources for explaining how direct phenomenal beliefs support the inference from ‘this E is R’ to ‘that was R.’

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Ted Poston
University of Alabama

Citations of this work

Speckled hens and objects of acquaintance.Richard Fumerton - 2005 - Philosophical Perspectives 19 (1):121–138.

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References found in this work

The character of consciousness.David John Chalmers - 2010 - New York: Oxford University Press.
Self-Knowledge.Brie Gertler - 2010 - New York: Routledge.
An Analysis of Knowledge and Valuation.Clarence Irving Lewis - 1946 - La Salle, IL, USA: Open Court.
Self-Knowledge.Brie Gertler - 2015 - Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.
Self-Knowledge and the Transparency of Belief.Brie Gertler - 2011 - In Anthony Hatzimoysis (ed.), Self-Knowledge. Oxford, GB: Oxford University Press.

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