The Dispositional Nature of Phenomenal Properties
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The Dispositional Nature of Phenomenal Properties Simone Gozzano1
© Springer Nature B.V. 2018
Abstract According to non-reductive physicalism, mental properties of the phenomenal sort are essentially different from physical properties, and cannot be reduced to them. This being a quarrel about properties, I draw on the categorical / dispositional distinction to discuss this non-reductive claim. Typically, non-reductionism entails a categorical view of phenomenal properties. Contrary to this, I will argue that phenomenal properties, usually characterized by what it is like to have them, are mainly the manifestation of dispositional properties. This paper is thus divided into two parts. In the first part, after tracing a working distinction between categorical and dispositional properties, I argue that there is a form of incoherence looming behind the idea of taking phenomenal properties as categorical. In the second part, I argue in favor of the view that phenomenal properties are dispositional properties with an essential manifestation. This interpretation allows us to broaden dispositionalism so as to include the sciences of mind, thus ultimately favoring a physicalist view on the mind. Keywords Dispositional properties · Categorical properties · Phenomenal properties · Quidditism · Ramseyan humility
1 Introduction In his influential The Conscious Mind, David Chalmers has argued that our mental life can be characterized by the occurrence of two kinds of properties. On the one hand, we have mental properties of the phenomenal sort, those typically captured by the expression “what it is like to have x” (Nagel 1974); on the other hand, we have psychological properties, generally framed in functional terms, such as reasoning or memorizing. Chalmers (1996, p. 21) thinks that these two kinds of properties exhaust the mental, with the proviso of some relational properties, those that connect mental properties to environmental conditions.1 In metaphysics, a distinction between two kinds of properties has also been advanced: dispositional properties are contrasted with categorical properties. This distinction, however, is more difficult to trace. Broadly speaking, dispositional properties are caught by their causal roles while categorical properties are what they are independently of the relations they are involved in. David Armstrong’s way of casting this distinction is to hold that the nature of categorical properties is distinct from the powers these contingently * Simone Gozzano [email protected] 1
Università degli Studi dell’Aquila, L’Aquila, Italy
bestow, while the nature of dispositional properties is given by their interactions, actual or potential (see Armstrong 1989). This latter distinction intersects with the former one in that those who favor Chalmers’ approach, take phenomenal properties to be categorical. However, it is my contention that phenomenal properties cannot be conceived as categorical properties. Rather, these properties should be viewed as the manifestation of dispositions, ther
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