Does the Explanatory Gap Rest on a Fallacy?

Abstract

Many philosophers have tried to defend physicalism concerning phenomenal consciousness, by explaining dualist intuitions within a purely physicalist framework. One of the most common strategies to do so consists in interpreting the alleged "explanatory gap" between phenomenal states and physical states as resulting from a fallacy, or a cognitive illusion.In this paper, I argue that we should not interpret the explanatory gap as the result of a fallacy. The explanatory gap does not arise from a fallacy or a cognitive illusion, even though it may very well arise from another kind of illusion (for example, a perceptual-like illusion). This does not imply the falsity of physicalism, but it has consequences on the kind of physicalism we should embrace.

Does the Intuition of Distinctness Result from Valid Reasoning? – Reply to Kammerer

“…The Fallacy Account seems to be an attractive physicalist explanation of why the intuition of dualism is an illusion. According to Kammerer (2019), however, the above account is psychologically implausible. Kammerer argues, on general grounds, that it is psychologically implausible that the intuition of distinctness results from a fallacy: there are psychological reasons to think that the intuition results from valid reasoning.…”

Different aspects of consciousness explained by distinct biophysical processes.

“…Kammerer attempted to prove that, indeed, there are alternative descriptions of the intuition of the distinctness of states that do not interpret this intuition as a result of an error and yet retain physicalism in relation to the human mind. (Kammerer, 2019). He indicates at least two severe alternatives for philosophers who want to account for the existence of a robust intuition of distinctness while endorsing physicalism: Introspective Illusion Accounts and Lack of Understanding Accounts.…”

How Rich is the Illusion of Consciousness?

“…We are never able to see clearly, no matter how hard we try, how this (thought when focused introspectively on our internal states) can be of a physico-functional nature. All we can do is accept that introspection is illusory, that there is nothing that fits what 14 For an argument that such rich-illusion views in which the rich illusion is a doxastic illusion (for example, a cognitive illusion or a fallacy akin to the fallacies studied by psychologists of reasoning (Fisk, 2004;Pohl, 2004;Tversky & Kahneman, 1983;Wason & Johnson-Laird, 1972)) should be rejected, because they are not psychologically plausible, see (Kammerer, 2019a). is presented to us in introspection, and that our cognitive processes are entirely physicofunctional processes.…”