Précis of The Metaphysics of Sensory Experience

Abstract

Abstract My book defends the qualitative view that conscious sensory experiences are intrinsic states of people that are not essentially related to any further objects or properties. My view thus diverges, not only from explicitly relational views like naïve realism and sense datum theories, but also from the representationalist view that experiences are essentially representational. The first two of the book’s four chapters set out the issues and criticizes the alternative views, with a particular focus on representationalism. The third chapter explores the internal structure of sensory experience and argues that it is confusion, albeit a tempting one, to suppose that experience is intrinsically directed beyond itself. In the final chapter of the book I explore the implications of my qualitative view for a range of issues in the philosophy of perception.