Advaita Vedanta and the Mind Extension Hypothesis: Panpsychism and Perception

Journal of Consciousness Studies 22 (7-8):201-225 (2015)
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Abstract

In 1998, Clark and Chalmers articulated and defended the extended mind hypothesis. They argued, against the backdrop of functionalism about the mind, and for the specific case of the mental state type belief, that it is possible for a person's mind to extend out-side the boundary of their body. Departing from the framework of Indo-analytic comparative philosophy, we show that the Advaita Vedanta School of classical Indian philosophy, against the backdrop of a specific form of panpsychism, defended an account on which a person's conscious experience, during an act of perceptual knowledge, is located outside the boundary of their body. Using the work of Adams and Maher on how to respond to Adams and Aizawa's coupling-constitution fallacy, we argue that the Advaita Vedanta account of mind can be taken to generate what we call the mind extension hypothesis -- the view that consciousness can extend outside of the body in perception. Recognizing the problematic nature of panpsychism as a metaphysical view about consciousness, we close by following work by Itay Shani on the real combination problem. We argue that the Advaita Vedanta account of panpsychism, as a kind of cosmopsychism, allows for a response to the so-called real combination problem proposed by Coleman.

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