HOW COULD HUSSERL’S THEORY OF THE BODILY SELF-CONSTITUTION OF THE EGO HELP BRIDGE THE EXPLANATORY GAP?

The main aim of this article is to offer a systematic reconstruction of Husserl’s theory of minimal mind and his ideas pertaining to the lowest level of consciousness in living beings. In this context, the term ‘minimal mind’ refers to the mental sphere and capacities of the simplest conceivable subject. This topic is of significant contemporary interest for philosophy of mind and empirical research into the origins of consciousness. I contend that Husserl’s reflections on minimal mind offer a fruitful contribution to this ongoing debate. For Husserl, the embodied character of subjectivity, or consciousness, is essential for understanding minimal mind. In his view, there is an a priori necessary constitutive connection between the subjective and objective aspects of the body, between Leib and Körper, and this connection is especially important for exploring minimal mind from a phenomenological perspective. Thematically, the essay has three main parts. In Sect. 2, I present an overview of how minimal mind is framed in contemporary philosophy of mind and empirical research. I then analyse Husserl’s conception of embodiment with regard to the problem of minimal mind in Sect. 3. Finally, I present a more detailed investigation into Husserl’s account of minimal mind, highlighting features from his descriptions of animal mind and consciousness in early infancy (Sects. 4 and 5).

In Cognitive science and philosophy of consciousness, the explanatory gap, following Joseph Levine, refers to the unintelligible link between our conscious mental life and its corresponding objective physical explanation; the gap in our understanding of how consciousness is related to a physical or a physiological substrate (Levine in Pac Philos Q 64(4):354–361, 1983). David Chalmers holds the explanatory gap as the evidence for a form of metaphysical dualism between consciousness and physical reality (Chalmers in The conscious mind: in search of a theory of conscious experience. Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1996). On the other hand, McGinn takes it as an epistemic rather than an ontological gap (McGinn in The problem of consciousness: essays towards a resolution. Blackwell Basil, Oxford, 1991). Considering the recent advances in neuroscience, however, the reductionist approaches have become replete, which attempt to reduce consciousness and subjectivity to neurobiological accounts (Crick in The astonishing hypothesis: the scientific search for the soul. Maxwell Macmillan International, New York, 1994; Metzinger in Being no one: the self-model theory of subjectivity. The MIT Press, London, 2006; Eagleman in The brain the story of you. Canongate, Edimbutgh, 2016). On this view, consciousness mirrors the brain mechanisms, and the self is formulated as an illusory product or construct of neuronal processes. Thomas Fuchs, who is committed to embodied and enactive approaches toward cognition, in Ecology of the Brain, espouses an enactive-ecological perspective concerning the problem of the explanatory gap. He develops an account of human’s life in its dual aspects of the living body and lived body which, on the one hand, defies the ontological dualism and, on the other hand, avoids drifting towards any form of reductionism. Often, the ontologically monistic approaches to the explanatory gap have inclined to a form of reductionism because they conceive consciousness as either identical with its physiological substrate or caused by it, where in both cases, consciousness is claimed to be explainable within the framework of physicalism. Fuchs, however, defends an ontological monism which remains irreconcilable with reductionism. In his account of dual aspects, there is no interaction or impact between the sphere of subjectivity and nature; however, these two aspects imply one another. In this essay, I will develop the philosophical justification of the above reformulation of the mind–body problem and employing the analogy of light will canvass the paradoxical relationship between dual aspects in a phenomenological framework.

Philosophy of mind concerns questions about mental phenomena that empirical research alone can't settle, such as the nature of mental states and which sorts of things can have them-only living things, or also machines? Settling them requires reflection on such phenomena as consciousness, rationality, and intentionality; the 'explanatory gaps' that seem to exist between these; and underlying physical phenomena and the different strategies-dualist, eliminativist, physicalist, and functionalist-that have been proposed for dealing with them. Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. For further resources related to this article, please visit the WIREs website.

The ‘Carnap Lectures’ feature a series of lectures by an internationally renowned scholar in philosophy in combination with an international graduate workshop. The lectures are dedicated to Rudolf Carnap, who was born in the Ruhr-Area not far from Bochum (Wuppertal) and began his philosophical career in Germany before emigrating to the United States. The Carnap Lectures were initiated and organized by Albert Newen in 2008, and have become an annual event at the Institute of Philosophy of the Ruhr-University of Bochum. In 2008 the Carnap lectures were presented by Alva Noe (Berkeley/New York), who talked about ‘Perception, Knowledge and Performance’, and in 2009 John Perry (Stanford) discussed various topics related to ‘Meaning and the Self’. The Carnap Lectures 2010 focused on the work of David Papineau, who presented his views on several important topics in the philosophy of mind: (i) the ‘explanatory gap’, (ii) the dualist intuition, (iii) the phenomenal concept strategy, (iv) reductionism and (v) mental causation. His keynote article in this special issue deals in particular with the first two topics: the explanatory gap and the dualist intuition. Many contemporary philosophers of mind believe that science leaves us with an explanatory gap—that even after we know everything that science can tell us about the conscious mind and the brain, their relationship still remains mysterious. In ‘What exactly is the explanatory gap?’, Papineau argues that this view is mistaken. Science does tell us everything there is to know about mental phenomena, and the impression of a gap is due to nothing but an intuitive conviction that dualism is true and materialism false. The question is how we should explain this dualist intuition, and how we can learn to live with it. Papineau’s first aim is to show that a posteriori explanations have no disadvantages vis-a-vis a priori explanations when it comes to explanatory power. He proposes that “given the identity of pain with C-fibre firings, we can use the facts that C-fibre firings are themselves caused by bodily damage and gives rise to avoidance behaviour to explain why pain has those characteristics. [...] a Philosophia (2011) 39:1–3 DOI 10.1007/s11406-010-9272-7

Contrary to certain rumours, the mind-body problem is alive and well. So argues Joseph Levine in Purple Haze: The Puzzle of Consciousness . The main argument is simple enough. Considerations of causal efficacy require us to accept that subjective experiential, or 'phenomenal', properties are realized in basic non-mental, probably physical properties. But no amount of knowledge of those physical properties will allow us conclusively to deduce facts about the existence and nature of phenomenal properties. This failure of deducibility constitutes an explanatory problem - an explanatory gap - but does not imply the existence of immaterial mental properties. Levine introduced this notion of the explanatory gap almost two decades ago. Purple Haze allows Levine to situate the explanatory gap in a broader philosophical context. He engages with those who hold that the explanatory gap is best understood as implying anti-materialist metaphysical conclusions. But he also seeks to distance himself from contemporary naturalistic philosophical theorizing about consciousness by arguing that reductive and eliminative theories of consciousness all fail. Levine's work is best seen as an attempt to firmly establish a definite status for the mind-body problem, i.e. that the mind-body problem is a real, substantive epistemological problem but emphatically not a metaphysical one. Because Levine's work is tightly focused upon contemporary Anglophone analytic philosophy of mind, there is little discussion of the broader conceptual background to the mind-body problem. My aim here is to place Levine's work in a broader conceptual context. In particular, I focus on the relationship between consciousness and intentionality in the belief that doing so will allow us better to understand and evaluate Levine's arguments and their place in contemporary theorizing about mentality and consciousness.

It is widely agreed among contemporary philosophers of mind that science leaves us with an ‘explanatory gap’—that even after we know everything that science can tell us about the conscious mind and the brain, their relationship still remains mysterious. I argue that this agreed view is quite mistaken. The feeling of a ‘explanatory gap’ arises only because we cannot stop ourselves thinking about the mind–brain relation in a dualist way.

This contribution seeks to explicitly articulate two directions of a continuous phenomenal field: (1) the genesis of intersubjectivity in its bodily basis (both organic and phylogenetic); and (2) the re-investment of the organic basis (both bodily and cellular) as a self-transcendence. We hope to recast the debate about the explanatory gap by suggesting a new way to approach the mind-body and Leib/Korper problems: with a heart-centered model instead of a brain-centered model. By asking how the physiological dynamics of heart and breath can become constitutive of a subjective (qua intersubjective) point of view, we give an account of the specific circular and systemic dynamic that we call “the rainbow of emotions.” This dynamic, we argue, is composed of both structural and experiential components and better evidences the seamless, non-dual articulation between the organic and the experiential.

The paper offers a general critique of physicalism and of one variety of nonphysicalism, arguing that such theses are untenable. By distinguishing between the absolute conception of reality and the causal completeness of physics it shows that the ‘explanatory gap’ is not merely epistemic but metaphysical. It defends the essential subjectivity and unity of consciousness and its inseparability from a self-conscious autonomous rational and moral being. Casting a favourable light on dualism freed from misconceptions, it suggests that the only plausible way forward in the search for an understanding of both physical and mental reality is a recognition of the mind as a metaphysically distinct entity.

Three problems concerning the mutual relation of reality and representation are discussed. Although there is no direct access to reality, a structural similarity between reality and representation can be assumed. A holistic account of qualia can help to explain how this structural similarity emerges. On this account, qualia have a relational, not an intrinsic status. A proposal is made how the “explanatory gap” between the first person perspective and neurobiological theories of brain processes could be closed. While corresponding with the PDP-approach in AI, the results contradict the traditional brain/computer analogy. All in all, these considerations may help to dissolve some of the philosophical puzzles around the mind/brain relationship and demonstrate that the relevant questions can be solved by empirical research.

This paper investigates the status of the purported explanatory gap between pain phenomena and natural science, when the “gap” is thought to exist due to the special properties of experience designated by “qualia” or “the pain quale” in the case of pain experiences. The paper questions the existence of such a property in the case of pain by: (1) looking at the history of the conception of pain; (2) raising questions from empirical research and theory in the psychology of pain; (3) considering evidence from the neurophysiological systems of pain; (4) investigating the possible biological role or roles of pain; and (5) considering methodological questions of the comparable status of the results of the sciences of pain in contrast to certain intuitions underpinning “the explanatory gap” in the case of pain. Skepticism concerning the crucial underlying intuitions seems justified by these considerations.

A proposal that the concept of minimal content—a narrow, first-person, non-phenomenal concept—plays a necessary, pivotal, foundational, and unifying role in the philosophy of mind and the philosophy of language. In this highly original monograph, Nicholas Georgalis proposes that the concept of minimal content is fundamental both to the philosophy of mind and to the philosophy of language. He argues that to understand mind and language requires minimal content—a narrow, first-person, non-phenomenal concept that represents the subject of an agent's intentional state as the agent conceives it. Orthodox third-person objective methodology must be supplemented with first-person subjective methodology. Georgalis demonstrates limitations of a strictly third-person methodology in the study of mind and language and argues that these deficiencies can be corrected only by the incorporation of a first-person methodology. Nevertheless, this expanded methodology makes possible an objective understanding of the subjective. Georgalis argues against the conflation of consciousness and subjectivity with phenomenal experience. Consequently, and contrary to common belief, he argues that consciousness without phenomenality is as strongly implicated in intentionality as it is in phenomenal states. He proposes a broader understanding of the "hard problem" of consciousness, arguing that there is an "explanatory gap problem" for both phenomenal and intentional states. His theory provides a framework that renders the vexing relations between mental and brain states comprehensible. Georgalis also argues for novel explanations of the phenomenal and of representation—explanations that follow from the core concept of minimal content. Treating the topics of meaning and reference, he introduces a first-person concept of intended reference derivative from minimal content that resolves various problems in the philosophy of language. Eschewing ontology, Georgalis proposes his theory as a means to make sense of, analyze, and relate issues in the philosophies of mind and language. The concept of minimal content, he argues, plays a necessary, pivotal, unifying, and foundational role in advancing our understanding of these issues. Bradford Books imprint

The Character of Consciousness brings together most of the important papers that Chalmers has written on the topic of consciousness since (and a couple before) the publication of his book, The Conscious Mind. He covers such topics as the identification of neural correlates of consciousness, the modal argument against materialism, the ‘‘phenomenal concepts’’ strategy, representationalism and the nature of color experience, and the unity of consciousness. As I am in agreement with, or at least sympathetic to, a lot of what he has to say on these topics, and since this is supposed to be a critical response to the book, I will limit my remarks to the principal area where we still differ: the modal argument against materialism. Let me begin with a general characterization of how I see the disagreement between us, and then move to the details. Both Chalmers and I see a deep epistemic gap between physical (including functional, or computational) accounts of the mind/ brain and ordinary descriptions of our phenomenally conscious experience. We both maintain that the ‘‘hard problem’’, or ‘‘the explanatory gap’’ constitutes a serious challenge to materialism in the philosophy of mind. But we differ significantly on the nature of that challenge. I have in fact of late come closer to Chalmers in seeing the explanatory gap as a positive argument for non-materialism about consciousness, but where I see the argument as essentially abductive he sees it as demonstrative. I view the inference from the explanatory gap to non-materialism as basically an instance of inference to the best explanation; the best explanation of the epistemic gap is that there is a metaphysical gap (the nature of which I find obscure,

The origin of consciousness and beyond

Embodiment—defined as having, being in, or being associated with a body—is a feature of the existence of many entities, perhaps even of all entities. Why entities should find themselves in this condition is the central concern of the present volume. The problem includes, but also goes beyond, the philosophical problem of body: that is, what the essence of a body is, and how, if at all, it differs from matter. On some understandings there may exist bodies, such as stones or asteroids, that are not the bodies of any particular subjects. To speak of embodiment by contrast is always to speak of a subject that variously inhabits, or captains, or is coextensive with, or even is imprisoned within, a body. The subject may in the end be identical to, or an emergent product of, the body. That is, a materialist account of embodied subjects may be the correct one. But insofar as there is a philosophical problem of embodiment, the identity of the embodied subject with the body stands in need of an argument and cannot simply be assumed. The reasons, nature, and consequences of the embodiment of subjects as conceived in the long history of philosophy in Europe as well as in the broader Mediterranean region and in South and East Asia, with forays into religion, art, medicine, and other domains of culture, form the focus of these essays. More precisely, the contributors to this volume shine light on a number of questions that have driven reflection on embodiment throughout the history of philosophy. What is the historical and conceptual relationship between the idea of embodiment and the idea of subjecthood? Am I who I am principally in virtue of the fact that I have the body I have? Relatedly, what is the relationship of embodiment to being and to individuality? Is embodiment a necessary condition of being? Of being an individual? What are the theological dimensions of embodiment? To what extent has the concept of embodiment been deployed in the history of philosophy to contrast the created world with the state of existence enjoyed by God? What are the normative dimensions of theories of embodiment? To what extent is the problem of embodiment a distinctly western preoccupation? Is it the result of a particular local and contingent history, or does it impose itself as a universal problem, wherever and whenever human beings begin to reflect on the conditions of their existence? Ultimately, to what extent can natural science help us to resolve philosophical questions about embodiment, many of which are vastly older than the particular scientific research programs we now believe to hold the greatest promise for revealing to us the bodily basis, or the ultimate physical causes, of who we really are?

When it comes to philosophy of mind, there is an alternative to the discourse of human specialness and superiority.