Items related to The Problem of Consciousness: Essays Towards a Resolution

The Problem of Consciousness: Essays Towards a Resolution - Softcover

McGinn, Colin

 
9780631188032: The Problem of Consciousness: Essays Towards a Resolution
Softcover
ISBN 10: 0631188037 ISBN 13: 9780631188032
Publisher: Wiley-Blackwell, 1992

Synopsis

Can consciousness be fitted into a naturalistic worldview or is it inherently mysterious? In virtue of what does a physical organism come to have an inner conscious life? This book argues that we are not equipped to understand the workings of conciousness, despite its objective naturalness. Introspection does not reveal the hiddent structure of consciousness and it is this that joins experience to the material world.

"synopsis" may belong to another edition of this title.

About the Author

Colin McGinn was formerly Wilde Reader in Mental Philosophy, Oxford University. He is the author of The Character of Mind (1981), The Subjective View (1982), Wittgenstein on Meaning (Blackwell, 1984) and Mental Content (Blackwell, 1989).

From the Back Cover

The existence of consciousness in a material world has long seemed mysterious. This book attempts to account for the mystery in a new way. It is not a matter of the world containing an objective miracle or a metaphysical enigma. Consciousness does not undermine atheistic naturalism. Nor is it that we are in the grip of a philosophical mistake - that there is nothing in reality to worry about. Consciousness does exist, and it cannot be explained by the physical sciences. The mystery arises, rather, from our modes of concept-formation: we cannot in principle arrive at a theory that would render the nature of consciousness explicable to us, despite its inherent naturalness.

The Problem of Consciousness develops this point of view by considering subjectivity, intentionality, the limits of introspection, mental causation, and the hidden structure of consciousness. It also includes chapters on philosophical laws, mental kinds, functionalism and machine consciousness.

Overall, the book aims to confront the problem of consciousness in all its difficulty while refusing to be overawed by it.

From the Inside Flap

The existence of consciousness in a material world has long seemed mysterious. This book attempts to account for the mystery in a new way. It is not a matter of the world containing an objective miracle or a metaphysical enigma. Consciousness does not undermine atheistic naturalism. Nor is it that we are in the grip of a philosophical mistake - that there is nothing in reality to worry about. Consciousness does exist, and it cannot be explained by the physical sciences. The mystery arises, rather, from our modes of concept-formation: we cannot in principle arrive at a theory that would render the nature of consciousness explicable to us, despite its inherent naturalness.

The Problem of Consciousness develops this point of view by considering subjectivity, intentionality, the limits of introspection, mental causation, and the hidden structure of consciousness. It also includes chapters on philosophical laws, mental kinds, functionalism and machine consciousness.

Overall, the book aims to confront the problem of consciousness in all its difficulty while refusing to be overawed by it.

"About this title" may belong to another edition of this title.

Publisher
Wiley-Blackwell
Publication date
1992
Language
English
ISBN 10 
0631188037
ISBN 13 
9780631188032
Binding
Paperback
Edition number
1
Number of pages
227