I don't know how many of us you've spoken to, but my views fall within the scope of the kinds of views you're referring to. I've also written a reply to you, which you can see here:
The one comment I'll make a point of drawing attention to here is this. You say:
"They’ll point out how introspection is often wrong and we’re often wrong about what we’re aware of. That is of course true. But then they use that to show that conscious experience is, in some sense, an illusion"
They do appeal to these facts, but they also appeal to other facts. You give the misleading impression that this is the only fact they appeal to. You do this again here:
"The fact that we’re sometimes wrong about what we’re aware of doesn’t show that we’re not actually conscious. "
I agree. But proponents of illusionism don't merely appeal to the fact that we're sometimes wrong about what we're aware of to argue against phenomenal consciousness. They appeal to a variety of other empirical findings and philosophical considerations. I think your remarks give the impression that illusionists think introspective error alone is sufficient. Some may think this, but stronger versions of illusionism don't.
Personally, there is no confusion. There is physical matter that can cause subjective experience without the need for a non-physical/panpsychic substance.
Back when we knew much less about biology, there was a similar confusion regarding life. How can physical matter create self-sustaining organisms? It was argued that there must be some elan vital beyond matter that is responsible for producing biological life.
This turned out to be false as we discovered how satisfactorily the physical world explained complex organisms. I expect the same to be true for subjective experience, especially as we continue to discover physical markers of consciousness. We've discovered so much about consciousness that I'm not sure if solving the "hard" problem would produce anything of significant value.
Chalmers is of course brilliant and worth reading, but zombies are conceptually impossible without a belief in the supernatural and my thermostat is not conscious.
I don't know how many of us you've spoken to, but my views fall within the scope of the kinds of views you're referring to. I've also written a reply to you, which you can see here:
https://www.lanceindependent.com/post/zombies-see-red
The one comment I'll make a point of drawing attention to here is this. You say:
"They’ll point out how introspection is often wrong and we’re often wrong about what we’re aware of. That is of course true. But then they use that to show that conscious experience is, in some sense, an illusion"
They do appeal to these facts, but they also appeal to other facts. You give the misleading impression that this is the only fact they appeal to. You do this again here:
"The fact that we’re sometimes wrong about what we’re aware of doesn’t show that we’re not actually conscious. "
I agree. But proponents of illusionism don't merely appeal to the fact that we're sometimes wrong about what we're aware of to argue against phenomenal consciousness. They appeal to a variety of other empirical findings and philosophical considerations. I think your remarks give the impression that illusionists think introspective error alone is sufficient. Some may think this, but stronger versions of illusionism don't.
Physicalist here.
Personally, there is no confusion. There is physical matter that can cause subjective experience without the need for a non-physical/panpsychic substance.
Back when we knew much less about biology, there was a similar confusion regarding life. How can physical matter create self-sustaining organisms? It was argued that there must be some elan vital beyond matter that is responsible for producing biological life.
This turned out to be false as we discovered how satisfactorily the physical world explained complex organisms. I expect the same to be true for subjective experience, especially as we continue to discover physical markers of consciousness. We've discovered so much about consciousness that I'm not sure if solving the "hard" problem would produce anything of significant value.
Chalmers is of course brilliant and worth reading, but zombies are conceptually impossible without a belief in the supernatural and my thermostat is not conscious.