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abstract: "Can phenomenal consciousness be given a reductive natural explanation? Many people argue not. They claim that there is an 'explanatory gap' between physical and/or intentional states and processes, on the one hand, and phenomenal consciousness, on the other. I reply that, since we have purely recognitional concepts of experience, there is indeed a sort of gap at the level of concepts; but this need not mean that the properties picked out by those concepts are inexplicable. I show how dispositionalist higher-order thought (HOT) theory can reductively explain the subjective feel of experience by deploying a form of 'consumer semantics'. First-order perceptual contents become transformed, acquiring a dimension of subjectivity, by virtue to their availability to a mind-reading (HOT generating) consumer system."
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creators_name:
  - family: Carruthers
    given: Peter
    honourific: ''
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date: 2002
date_type: published
datestamp: 2002-06-07
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editors_name:
  - family: Walsh
    given: Denis
    honourific: ''
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eprintid: 2235
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keywords: |-
  phenomenal consciousness
  higher-order experience
  consciousness
  higher-order thought
lastmod: 2011-03-11 08:54:56
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pagerange: 61-85
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publication: 'Naturalism, Evolution and Mind.'
publisher: Cambridge University Press
refereed: TRUE
referencetext: |
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status_changed: 2007-09-12 16:43:33
subjects:
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  - phil-mind
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title: 'Consciousness: explaining the phenomena.'
type: bookchapter
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