Non-Conceptual Content and the Subjectivity of Consciousness

International Journal of Philosophical Studies 19 (3):491 - 520 (2011)
  Copy   BIBTEX

Abstract

Abstract The subjectivity of conscious experience is a central feature of our mental life that puzzles philosophers of mind. Conscious mental representations are presented to me as mine, others remain unconscious. How can we make sense of the difference between them? Some representationalists (e.g. Tye) attempt to explain it in terms of non-conceptual intentional content, i.e. content for which one need not possess the relevant concept required in order to describe it. Hanna claims that Kant purports to explain the subjectivity of conscious experience in this way. This paper examines this claim in some detail in the context of a more general criticism of this kind of attempt to explain subjectivity and proposes a different reading of Kant that also leads to an alternative account of subjectivity independent from content

Similar books and articles

Immediacy - subjectivity - revelation.Ingvar Horgby - 1965 - Inquiry: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Philosophy 8 (1-4):84 – 117.
The neurophilosophy of subjectivity.Pete Mandik - 2009 - In John Bickle (ed.), The Oxford handbook of philosophy and neuroscience. New York: Oxford University Press.
Unconscious subjectivity.Joseph U. Neisser - 2006 - PSYCHE: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Research On Consciousness 12.
Jerry Fodor on Non-conceptual Content.Katalin Balog - 2009 - Synthese 167 (3):311 - 320.
Mental representation and the subjectivity of consciousness.Pete Mandik - 2001 - Philosophical Psychology 14 (2):179-202.
Crane on Intentionality and Consciousness.Ksenija Puškarić - 2004 - Croatian Journal of Philosophy 4 (2):219-222.
Representation and a science of consciousness.Andrew R. Bailey - 2007 - Journal of Consciousness Studies 14 (1):62-76.
Kantian non-conceptualism.Robert Hanna - 2008 - Philosophical Studies 137 (1):41 - 64.
Consciousness and the first person.Itay Shani - 2007 - Journal of Consciousness Studies 14 (12):57-91.
Non-objectal subjectivity.Manfred Frank - 2007 - Journal of Consciousness Studies 14 (5-6):152-173.

Analytics

Added to PP
2011-09-09

Downloads
606 (#28,733)

6 months
100 (#44,756)

Historical graph of downloads
How can I increase my downloads?

Author's Profile

Tobias Schlicht
Ruhr-Universität Bochum

Citations of this work

Phenomenal consciousness, attention and accessibility.Tobias Schlicht - 2012 - Phenomenology and the Cognitive Sciences 11 (3):309-334.
Theories of Consciousness as Reflexivity.Frederic Peters - 2013 - Philosophical Forum 44 (4):341-372.

View all 8 citations / Add more citations

References found in this work

The Varieties of Reference.Gareth Evans - 1982 - Oxford: Oxford University Press. Edited by John Henry McDowell.
Mind in Life: Biology, Phenomenology, and the Sciences of Mind.Evan Thompson - 2007 - Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press.
Mind and World.John Henry McDowell - 1994 - Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Action in Perception.Alva Noë - 2004 - MIT Press.

View all 96 references / Add more references