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PHIL2005 Task 3 Nthabeleng Mokgaetse Phahlane 1849695 Due: 21 May 2021 1. Phenomenal consciousness essentially poses the question of what it like for a human being, thing or even a mental state to have experiences. What makes a human being, thing or even a mental state conscious. If someone is looking at the stars at night, phenomenal consciousness claims that there have to be something it feels like to have that experience (looking at the stars at night). 2. “[F]fundamentally an organism has conscious mental states if and only if there is something it is like to be that organism- something it is like for the organism” (Nagel, 1974, p.436) 3. The subjective nature of phenomenal consciousness- “[t]here is something it is like for me to see the color red, and there is something it is like for me to hear the sound of a bell (and what it is like differs across the two experiences)” (Drayson, 2015, p.276). The private nature of phenomenal consciousness- “You might be able to imagine the experiences of other human beings (in the way you can’t imagine what it’s like to be a bat) but verification is a different matter.” (Drayson, 2015, p.277) The special access we have with our conscious states- “[t]he existence of my pain isn’t something I infer from anything else: when I know that I’m in pain, I know it directly, in way that doesn’t seem accessible to anyone else.” (Drayson, 2015, p.278) 4. Nagel (1974) essentially presents an argument against reductive physicalism (which claims that the mental states can be reduced to the physical) based on the nature of the subjective experience of phenomenal consciousness. In this excerpt Nagel (1974) is

making the argument that if the subjective character of an experience was to be reduced to something physical (the brain) then it would be known from multiple points of view. “[T]hey are observable from the point of view but external to it; hence they can be comprehended from other points of view” (Nagel, 1974, p.443). In this case “they” is the lightning, rainbow and the clouds. The Martian scientist and human beings are both able to access and understand the clouds, lightning, and rainbow from their own different points of view and will most likely have different experiences. With that said it does not mean that these things are not there because there is still an objective nature of the clouds, rainbow and lightning that they both (human and Martian) might come to know if experience/information were to be shared or discussed among themselves. These things have an objective nature that is not depleted by either the Martian or a human beings experience of it and it is accessible from different points of view (Nagel, 1974). The main point I think Nagel (1974) is trying to make is that we could all have our different subjective experiences towards a particular thing, but we could also study what that thing is and come to a synonymous conclusion of that thing is. 5. The excerpt discussed in the question 4 is that of an objective nature of experience. Nagel (1974) argues that this differs from the subjective character of experience in his paper, “It is difficult to understand to what could be meant by the objective character of an experience, apart from the particular point of view from which the subject apprehends it” (Nagel, 1974, p,443). An objective character of experience can still be studied if different points of view were removed because the basis of the knowledge and understanding would be the lightning, rainbow and clouds themselves. With the subjective experience, the character of that phenomena is the very same thing we are trying to study so removing it means there is nothing left to study since the target

explanation would be what is like to be the Martian scientist or human experiencing/feeling the clouds. Removing the single point of view of a human or the Martian, which is connected to phenomenal consciousness, we are removing the very thing we are trying to understand which is the experience of either of the two (human and Martian). Nagel (1974) emphasizes this in his paper “[w]hat is an analogue in this case to pursing a more objective understanding of the same phenomena by abandoning the initial subjective viewpoint…” (Nagel, 1974, p.444).

REFERENCES Drayson, Z. (2015). The Philosophy of Phenomenal Consciousness. In S. Miller (Ed). The Constitution of Phenomenal Consciousness (pp 273-292). John Benjamins. Nagel, T. (1974). What is it like to be a bat? The Philosophical Review 83 (4), 435-450. http://www.jstor.org/stable/2183914...