A quote from Dennett’s article, on the topic of consciousness:
‘One central problem,’ Chalmers tells us, ‘is that consciousness seems to be a further fact about conscious systems’ (p. 43) over and above all the facts about their structure, internal processes and hence behavioral competences and weaknesses. He is right, so long as we put the emphasis on ‘seems’. There does seem to be a further fact to be determined, one way or another, about whether or not anybody is actually conscious or a perfect (philosopher’s) zombie. This is what I have called the Zombic Hunch (Dennett, 2005). I can feel it just as vividly as anybody; I just don’t credit it, any more than I credit the sometimes well-nigh irresistible hunch that the sun goes around the earth; it surely does seem to go around the earth.
This reminds me of the time I took shrooms and my intuition about whether or not Mary acquires knowledge when she is given a color TV turned out to be different when high than when sober. This was interesting, but it didn’t change my judgment on qualia because I had never credited my intuitions on the matter, anyway. (Because, you know, science.)
A quote from Dennett’s article, on the topic of consciousness:
This reminds me of the time I took shrooms and my intuition about whether or not Mary acquires knowledge when she is given a color TV turned out to be different when high than when sober. This was interesting, but it didn’t change my judgment on qualia because I had never credited my intuitions on the matter, anyway. (Because, you know, science.)