Ned Block

Journal of Philosophy, Inc.
The Harder Problem of Consciousness

Author(s): Ned Block
Source: The Journal of Philosophy, Vol. 99, No. 8 (Aug., 2002), pp. 391-425
Published by: Journal of Philosophy, Inc.
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THE JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPHY
VOLUME XCIX, NO. 8, AUGUST 2002
THE HARDER PROBLEM OF CONSCIOUSNESS*
T. H. Huxley'
markablefamously said:
as a state of "How it iscomes
consciousness thatabout
anything so re-
as a result of
irritating nervous tissue, is just as unaccountable as the ap-
pearance of Djin when Aladdin rubbed his lamp" (ibid., p. 19). We do
not see how to explain a state of consciousness in terms of its
neurological basis. This is the hard problem of consciousness.2
My aim here is to present another problem of consciousness. The
harder problem, as I shall call it, is more epistemological than the hard
problem. A second difference: the hard problem could arise for
* I would like to thank David Barnett, Paul Boghossian, Tyler Burge, Alex Byrne,
David Chalmers, Hartry Field, Jerry Fodor, Paul Horwich, Brian Loar, Tom Nagel,
Georges Rey, Stephen Schiffer, and Stephen White for comments on earlier drafts.
I am also grateful to Alex Byrne and Jaegwon Kim for reactions when an ancestor
of this paper was delivered at a Central APA meeting in 1998. My thanks to the
Colloquium on Language and Mind at New York University at which an earlier
version of this paper was discussed in 2000, and especially to Tom Nagel as the chief
inquisitor. I am also grateful to the audience at the 2001 meeting of Sociedad
Filosofica Ibero Americana (SOFIA) and especially to my respondents, Brian
McLaughlin and Martine Nida-Rfimelin. And I would also like to thank my graduate
class at NYU for their comments, especially Declan Smithies. In addition, I am
grateful for discussion at a number of venues where earlier versions of this article
were delivered, beginning with the Society for Philosophy and Psychology meeting,
June 1997.
1 Lessons in Elementary Physiology (New York: Macmillan, 1866); see Gfiven Gfizel-
dere, "The Many Faces of Consciousness: A Field Guide," in Block, Owen Flanagan
and Gfizeldere, eds., The Nature of Consciousness: Philosophical Debates (Cambridge:
MIT, 1997), pp. 1-67, footnote 6.
2 See Thomas Nagel, "What Is It Like to Be a Bat?" The Philosophical Review,
LXXXIII (1974): 435-50. Joseph Levine introduced the "explanatory gap" terminol-
ogy (to be used later)--"Materialism and Qualia: The Explanatory Gap," Pacific
Philosophical Quarterly, LxIv (1983): 354-61. David Chalmers and Galen Strawson
distinguished between the hard problem and various "easy problems" of how
consciousness functions-Chalmers, The Conscious Mind (New York: Oxford, 1996),
pp. xxii-xxiii; Strawson, Mental Reality (Cambridge: MIT, 1994), pp. 93-96.
0022-362X/02/9908/391-425 ? 2002 The Journal of Philosophy, Inc.

391
392 THE JOURNAL OF PHILOSOPHY
someone who has no conception of another person, wherea

harder problem is tied closely to the problem of other minds. F
the harder problem reveals an epistemic tension or at least di
fort in our ordinary conception of consciousness which is not
gested by the hard problem, and so in one respect is harder. Pe
the harder problem includes the hard problem and is best thoug
as an epistemic add-on to it. Or perhaps they are in some other
facets of a single problem. Then my point is that this single pr
breaks into two parts, one of which is more epistemic, involves
minds, and involves an epistemic tension.
I. PRELIMINARIES
I believe that the major ontological disputes about

consciousness rest on an opposition between two per
(1) Deflationism about consciousness, in which a priori or at

analyses of consciousness (or at least armchair sufficien
are given in nonphenomenal terms, most prominently
representation, thought, or function.
(2) Phenomenal realism, which consists in the denial of defl
the claim that consciousness is something real. Phenom
is metaphysical realism about consciousness and thus
possibility that there may be facts about the distribut
sciousness which are not accessible to us even though t
functional, cognitive, and representational facts are acc
nomenal realism is based on one's first-person grasp o
ness. An opponent might prefer to call phenomen
"inflationism," but I reject the suggestion of somethin
In its most straightforward version, deflationism

priori conceptual analysis, most prominently analysis of
in functional terms. As David Lewis,3 a well-known defla
this view is the heir of logical behaviorism. Phen
rejects these armchair, philosophical-reductive analy
nomenal realists have no brief against scientific red
sciousness. Of course, there is no sharp line here
distinction is epistemic, one and the same metaphysic
be held both as a philosophical-reductionist and as a s
tionist thesis.4
3 "An Argument for the Identity Theory," this JOURNAL, LXIII, 1 (January 6, 1966):
17-25.
4 Deflationism with respect to truth is the view that the utility of the concept of
truth can be explained disquotationally and that there can be no scientific reduc-
tion of truth-Paul Horwich, Truth (Cambridge: Blackwell, 1990; second edition,
New York: Oxford, 1998); Hartry Field, "Deflationist Views of Meaning and Con-
THE HARDER PROBLEM OF CONSCIOUSNESS 393
I apologize for all the "isms" (deflationism, phenomenal realism,

and one more to come), but they are unavoidable since my point
here is that there is some tension between two of them. The tension
is between phenomenal realism ("inflationism") and (scientific) nat-

uralism, the epistemological perspective according to which the de-
fault view is that consciousness has a scientific nature-where this is
taken to include the idea that conscious similarities have scientific
natures. (A view on a given subject is the default if it is the only o

for which background considerations give rational ground for ten
tive belief.) I argue for a conditional in which specifications
phenomenal realism and scientific naturalism (and a few other rel
tively uncontroversial items-including, notably, a rejection of a ske
tical perspective) appear on the left-hand side. On the right-hand
side, we have a specification of the epistemic tension which I me
tioned. Deflationists who accept the argument may opt for modu
tollens, giving them a reason to reject phenomenal realism. Phenom
enal-realist naturalists may want to weaken their commitment t
naturalism or to phenomenal realism. To put the point witho
explicit "isms": many of us are committed to the idea that consciou
ness is both real and can be assumed to have a scientific nature, but
it turns out that these commitments do not fit together comfortably.
Modern phenomenal realism has often been strongly naturalist
(for example,Joseph Levine, Brian Loar, Colin McGinn, Christophe
Peacocke, John Perry, Sydney Shoemaker, John Searle, and myself
Daniel Dennett6 has often accused phenomenal realists of clos
dualism. Georges Rey7 has argued that the concept of consciousn
tent," Mind, CIII (1994): 249-85. Deflationism with respect to consciousness in

most influential form is, confusingly, a kind of reductionism-albeit armcha
reductionism rather than substantive scientific reductionism-and thus the termi-
nology I am following can be misleading. I may have introduced this confusing
terminology in my review of Daniel Dennett's Consciousness Explained in this JOUR-
NAL, XC, 4 (April 1993): 181-93.
5 Levine; Loar, "Phenomenal States," in Block, Flanagan, and Gfizeldere, eds., pp.
597-616; McGinn, The Problem of Consciousness (Cambridge: Blackwell, 1991); Pea-
cocke, Sense and Content (New York: Oxford, 1983); Perry, Knowledge, Possibility and
Consciousness (Cambridge: MIT, 2001); Shoemaker, "The Inverted Spectrum," this
JOURNAL, LXXIX, 7 (July 1982): 357-81; Searle, The Rediscovery of the Mind (Cam-
bridge: MIT, 1992).
6 Consciousness Explained (Boston: Little Brown, 1991).
7 "A Reason for Doubting the Existence of Consciousness," in R. Davidson, G.
Schwartz, D. Shapiro, eds., Consciousness and Self-Regulation, Volume 3 (New York:
Plenum, 1983), pp. 1-39. In previous publications-"On a Confusion about a
Function of Consciousness," The Behavioral and Brain Sciences, xviII, 2 (1995):
227-47-I have argued that Rey's alleged incoherence derives from his failure to
distinguish between phenomenal consciousness and other forms of consciousness
is incoherent. The upshot here is that there is a grain of truth in t

accusations.
Before I go on, I must make a terminological comment. Imag

two persons both of whom are in pain, but only one of whom
introspecting his pain state and is, in that sense, conscious of it
could say that only one of the two has a conscious pain. This is not
sense of 'conscious' used here. In the sense of 'conscious' used here,
just in virtue of having pain, both have conscious states. To avoid verbal
disputes, we could call the sense of 'consciousness' used here phenom-
enality. Pains are intrinsically phenomenal and in that sense are intrin-
sically conscious. In that sense-but not in some other senses-there
cannot be an unconscious pain.
My plan here is this: first, I shall briefly characterize the hard
problem, mainly in order to distinguish it from the harder problem.
I shall argue that the hard problem can be dissolved, only to reappear
in a somewhat different form, but that in this different form we can
see a glimmer of hope for how a solution might one day be found. I
shall then move on to the harder problem, its significance and a
comparison between the hard and harder problems. I shall conclude
with some reflections on what options there are for the naturalistic-
phenomenal realist.
II. MIND-BODY IDENTITY AND THE APPARENT DISSOLUTION
OF THE HARD PROBLEM
The hard problem is one of explaining why the

phenomenal quality is the neural basis of that ph
rather than another phenomenal quality or no ph
at all. In other terms, there is an explanatory gap
basis of a phenomenal quality and the phenome
Suppose (to replace the neurologically ridiculous e
stimulation, which is often used by philosophers
posed as a theory of visual experience by Francis C
Koch8) that cortico-thalamic oscillation (of a ce
neural basis of an experience with phenomenal qua
is a simple (over-simple) physicalist dissolution to
which is based on mind-body identity: phenom
cortico thalamic oscillation (of a certain sort). Her
the solution:
(what I call access consciousness and reflexive consciousness). The incoherence that is
the subject of this article, by contrast, is an incoherence in phenomenal conscious-
ness itself.
8 "Towards a Neurobiological Theory of Consciousness," Seminars in the Neuro-
sciences, 11 (1990): 263-75.
The hard problem is illusory. One might as well ask why H20 is the
chemical basis of water rather than gasoline or nothing at all. Just as
water is its chemical basis, so Q just is its neural basis (cortico-thalamic
oscillation), and that shows the original question is wrongheaded.
I think there is something right about this answer, but it is nonethe-

less unsatisfactory. What is right about it is that, if Q = cortico-
thalamic oscillation, that identity itself, like all genuine identities, is
inexplicable.9 What is wrong about it is that we are in a completely
different epistemic position with respect to such a mind-body identity
claim than we are with respect to 'water =H20'. The claim that Q is
identical to cortico-thalamic oscillation is just as puzzling-maybe
more puzzling-than the claim that the physical basis of Q is cortico-
thalamic oscillation. We have no idea how it could be that one
property could be identical both to Q and cortico-thalamic o

tion. How could one property be both subjective and obje
Although no one can explain an identity, we can remove puzz
by explaining how an identity can be true, most obviously, h
that the two concepts involved can pick out the same thing. T
what we need in the case of subjective/objective identities, suc
putative identity that Q = cortico-thalamic oscillation.
III. HOW TO APPROACH THE HARD PROBLEM
The standard arguments against physicalism (most r

Jackson, Saul Kripke, and David Chalmers1o) mak
understand how mind-body identity could be true, s
it could be true requires undermining those argum
attempt such a large task here, especially since the role
discussion of the hard problem is mainly to contrast it
problem to come. So I shall limit my efforts in this dir
discussion of Jackson's famous "knowledge" argume
argument not because I think it is the most challen
against mind-body identity, but rather because it m
ratus that gives us some insight into what makes th
9 We can reasonably wonder how it is that Mark Twain an

married women with the same name, lived in the same city
cannot reasonably wonder how it is that Mark Twain is Samuel
is made in my "Reductionism," Encyclopedia ofBioethics (NewYo
pp. 1419-24. See also Block and Robert Stalnaker, "Conceptua
Explanatory Gap," The Philosophical Review, cvIII (January 19
Papineau, "Physicalism, Consciousness, and the Antipathetic F
Journal of Philosophy, LXXI (1993): 169-83. For a statement of
Chalmers.
10Jackson, "What Mary Didn't Know," and Kripke, "The Identity Thesis," in
Block, Flanagan, and Giizeldere, eds., pp. 567-70, and pp. 445-50; and Chalmers.
hard. Jackson imagined a neuroscientist of the distant future (

who is raised in a black and white room and who knows every
physical and functional that there is to know about color and
experience of it. But when she steps outside the room for the
time, she learns what it is like to see red.Jackson argued that since
physical and functional facts do not encompass the new fact that M
learns, dualism is true.
The key to what is wrong with Jackson's argument (and to re
ing one kind of puzzlement about how a subjective property co
identical to an objective property) is the concept/property di
tion.11 Any account of this distinction as it applies to phenom
concepts is bound to be controversial. I shall use one such acco
without defending it, but nothing in what follows here will be
on this account.
The expressions 'this sudden involuntary muscle contraction' and

'this [experience] thing in my leg' are two expressions that pick out
the cramp I am now having in my leg. (These are versions of exam-
ples from Loar.) In 'this [experience] thing in my leg', attention to
an experience of the cramp functions so as to pick out the referent,
the cramp. (That is the meaning of the bracket notation. The 'this' in
'this [experience] thing in my leg' refers to the thing in my leg, not
the experience.) The first way of thinking about the cramp is an
objective concept of the cramp. The second is a subjective concept of
the same thing-subjective in that there is a phenomenal mode of
access to the thing picked out. Just as we can have both objective and
subjective concepts of a cramp, we can also have objective and
subjective concepts of a cramp feeling. Assuming physicalism, we could
have an objective neurological concept of a cramp feeling, for exam-
ple, 'the phased locked 40 Hz oscillation that is occurring now'. And
we could have a subjective concept of the same thing, 'this [experi-
ence] feeling'. Importantly, the same experience type could be part
of-though function differently-in both subjective concepts, the sub-
jective concept of the cramp and the subjective concept of the cramp
feeling. Further, we could have both a subjective and objective con-
cept of a single color. And we could have both a subjective and an
objective concept of the experience of that color, and the same
11The articles in Block, Flanagan, and Gfizeldere, eds., by Paul Churchland

("Knowing Qualia: A Reply to Jackson," pp. 571-77), Loar, William Lycan ("Con-
sciousness as Internal Monitoring," pp. 775-71), and Robert van Gulick ("Under-
standing the Phenomenal Mind: Are We All Just Armadillos? Part One,
Phenomenal Knowledge and Explanatory Gaps," pp. 559-66) all take something
like this line; as does Scott Sturgeon, "The Epistemic View of Subjectivity," this
JOURNAL, XCI, 5 (May 1994): 221-35; and Perry.
experience or mental image could function-albeit differently-in

the two subjective concepts, one of the color, the other of the
experience of the color.
Deflationists will not like this apparatus, but they should be inter-
ested in the upshot since it may be of use to them in rejecting the
phenomenal realism in the antecedent of the conditional for which
I am arguing here.
Concepts in the sense used here are mental representations. For
our purposes, we may as well suppose a system of representation that
includes both quasilinguistic elements as well as phenomenal ele-
ments, such as experiences or mental images. Stretching terminol-
ogy, we could call it a language of thought.12
In these terms, then, we can remove one type of puzzlement that is
connected with the hard problem as follows: there is no problem
about how a subjective property can be identical to an objective
property. Subjectivity and objectivity are better seen as properties of
concepts rather than of properties. The claim that an objective property
is identical to a subjective property would be more revealingly ex-
pressed as the claim that an objective concept of a property picks out
the same property as a subjective concept of that property. So we can
substitute a dualism of concepts for a dualism of properties.
The same distinction helps us to solve the Mary problem. In the
room, Mary knew about the subjective experience of red via the
objective concept cortico-thalamic oscillation. On leaving the room, she
acquires a subjective concept this [mental image] phenomenal property of
the same subjective experience. In learning what it is like to see red,
she does not learn a new fact. She knew about that fact in the room
under an objective concept, and she learns a new concept of that very
fact. One can acquire new knowledge about old facts by acquiring
new concepts of those facts. New knowledge acquired in this way does
not show that there are any facts beyond the physical facts. Of course,
it does require that there are concepts that are not physicalistic
concepts, but that is not a form of dualism. (For present purposes, we
can think of physicalistic concepts as concepts couched in the vocab-
ulary of physics. A physicalist can allow nonphysicalistic vocabulary,
for example, the vocabulary of economics. Of course, physicalists say
12 Note that my account of subjective concepts allows for subjective concepts of

many more colors or pitches than we can recognize, and thus my account differs
from accounts of phenomenal concepts as recognitional concepts (such as that of
Loar). On my view, one can have a phenomenal concept without being able to
reidentify the same experience again. For arguments that experience outruns
recognition, see Sean Kelly, "Demonstrative Concepts and Experience," The Philo-
sophical Review, cx, 3 (2001): 397-420.
that everything is physical, including vocabulary. But the vocabula

of economics can be physical in that sense without being physicali
tistic in the sense of couched in the vocabulary of physics.)
Where are we? The hard problem in one form was: How can an
objective property be identical to a subjective property? We now ha
a dissolution of one aspect of the problem, appealing to the fact th
objectivity and subjectivity are best seen as properties of concepts. But
that is no help in getting a sense of what sorts of objective concep
and subjective concepts could pick out the same property, and so
brings us no closer to actually getting such concepts. As Nagel (o
cit.) noted, we have no idea how there could be causal chains from a
objective concept and a subjective concept leading back to the sam
phenomenon in the world. We are in something like the position o
pre-Einsteinians who had no way of understanding how a concept
mass and a concept of energy could pick out the same thing.
IV. PRELIMINARIES BEFORE INTRODUCING THE HARDER PROBLEM
(A) Naturalism. Naturalism is the view that it is a def

sciousness has a scientific nature (and that similarities
ness have scientific natures). I shall assume that the re
include physics, chemistry, biology, computational the
of psychology that do not explicitly involve consciousn
of the last condition is to avoid the trivialization of naturalism that
would result if we allowed the scientific nature of consciousness to
be...consciousness.) I shall lump these sciences together under the

heading 'physical', thinking of naturalism as the view that it is a
default that consciousness is physical (and that similarities in con-
sciousness are physical). So naturalism = default physicalism, and is
thus a partly epistemic thesis. Naturalism in my sense recognizes that,
although the indirect evidence for physicalism is impressive, there i
little direct evidence for it. My naturalist is not a "die-hard" naturalist,
but rather one who takes physicalism as a default, a default that can
be challenged. My rationale for defining 'naturalism' in this way i
that this version of the doctrine is plausible, widely held, and leads to
the epistemic tension that I am expositing. Some other doctrines tha
could be called 'naturalism' do not, but this one does. I think that my
naturalism is close to what Perry calls "antecedent physicalism" (op.
cit.).
(B) Functionalism. Functionalism and physicalism are usually con-
sidered competing theories of mind. For present purposes, however,
the phenomenal realism/deflationism distinction is more important,
and this distinction cross-cuts the distinction between functionalism
and physicalism. In the terms used above, one type of functionalism
is deflationist, the other phenomenal realist. The latter is psychofunc-

tionalism, the identification of phenomenality with a role property
specified in terms of a psychological or neuropsychological theory.'3
At the beginning, I pointed to the somewhat vague distinction be-
tween philosophical and scientific reduction. Deflationist functional-
ism is a philosophical-reductionist view whereas phenomenal-realist
psychofunctionalism is a scientific-reductionist view.
I will be making use of the notion of a superficial functional
isomorph, a creature that is functionally isomorphic to us with re-
spect to those causal relations among mental states, inputs, and
outputs that are specified by "folk psychology." Those who are skep-
tical about these notions should note that the point here is that a
nexus of standard views leads to a tension. This conceptual apparatus
may be part of what should be rejected.14
As I mentioned at the outset, I am arguing for a conditional. On
the left side of the conditional are phenomenal realism and natural-
ism (plus conceptual apparatus of the sort just mentioned). My
current point is that I am including psychofunctionalism in the class
of phenomenal-realist naturalist theories. Thus, one kind of function-
alism-the deflationist variety-is excluded by the antecedent of my
conditional, and another-the phenomenal-realist variety-is in the
class of open options.
(C) Antiskeptical perspective. In what follows, I shall be adopting a
point of view that sets skepticism aside. "Undoubtedly, humans are
conscious and rocks and laptops are not." (Further, bats are undoubt-
edly conscious.) Of course, the antiskeptical point of view I shall be
adopting is the one appropriate to a naturalist phenomenal-realist.
Notably, from the naturalist-phenomenal realist perspective, the con-
cept of a functional isomorph of us with no consciousness is not
incoherent and the claim of bare possibility of such a zombie-so
long as it is not alleged to be us-is not a form of skepticism.
(D) Multiple realization/multiple constitution. Putnam, Jerry Fodor,
and Block and Fodor'5 argued that, if functionalism about the mind
13 See my "Troubles with Functionalism," in C. W. Savage, ed., Minnesota Studies in

the Philosophy of Science, Volume IX (Minneapolis: Minnesota UP, 1978), pp. 261-325.
14 Those who would like to see more on functionalism should consult any of the
standard reference works such as the Routledge Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Or see
http://www.nyu.edu/gsas/dept/philo/faculty/block/papers/functionalism.html.
15 Putnam, "Psychological Predicates," later titled "The Nature of Mental States,"
in W. H. Capitan and D. D. Merrill, eds., Art, Mind, and Religion (Pittsburgh:
University Press, 1967), pp. 37-48; Fodor, "Materialism," in Psychological Explanation
(New York: Random House, 1968), chapter 3, pp. 90-120; Block and Fodor, "What
Psychological States Are Not," The Philosophical Review, LXXXI (1972): 159-81.
is true, physicalism is false. The line of argument assumes that

tional organizations are often-maybe even always-multiply re
able. The state of adding 2 cannot be identical to an electronic
if a nonelectronic device (for example, a brain) can add 2.
This "multiple-realizability" argument has become controver
lately,16 for reasons that I cannot go into here. The argument
be giving is a version of the traditional multiple-realizability argum
(albeit an epistemic version), so I had better say a bit about w
realization is. One of the many notions of realization that wo
for present purposes is the following. A functional state is a k
second-order property, one that consists in having certain first
properties that have certain causes and effects.17 For example,
mitivity in one sense of the term is the property a pill has of h
some (first-order) property that causes sleep. Provocativity is
property of having some (first-order) property or other that
bulls angry. We can speak of the first-order property of bein
barbiturate as being one realizer of dormitivity, or of red as being
realizer of provocativity.18
If we understand realization, we can define constitution in terms
it. Suppose that mental state M has a functional role that is rea
by neural state N. Then N constitutes M-relative to M's playin
M-role. The point of the last condition is that ersatz M-a
functionally like M but missing something essential to M as ph
enality is to pain-would also have the M-role, but N would
16 See Jaegwon Kim, "Multiple Realization and the Metaphysics of Reduc

Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, LII (1992): 1-26; and Mind in a Ph
World: An Essay on the Mind-Body Problem and Mental Causation (Cambridg
1998).
17 The restriction to first order properties is unnecessary. See my "Can the
Change the World?" in George Boolos, ed., Meaning and Method: Essays in Ho
Hilary Putnam (New York: Cambridge, 1990), pp. 137-70.
18 An alternative notion of realization appeals to the notions of superve
and explanation. The realized property supervenes on the realizer and the
explains the presence of the realized property. Possessing the realizer is one
which a thing can possess the realized property. See Ernest Lepore and
Loewer, "Mind Matters," this JOURNAL, LXXXIV, 11 (November 1987): 630-4
Lenny Clapp, "Disjunctive Properties: Multiple Realizations," this JOURNAL,
3 (March 2001): 111-36.
Dormitivity in the sense mentioned is a second-order property, the proper
having some property that causes sleep. But one could also define dormitivit
first-order property, the property of causing sleep. That is, on this different d
tion, F is dormitive just in case F causes sleep. But if we want to ascribe dorm
to pills, we shall have to use the second-order sense. What it is for a pill
dormitive is to have some property or other that causes sleep. Similarly, if w
a notion of functional property that applies to properties, the first-order varian
do. But if we want to ascribe those properties to people, we need second-
properties.
constitute ersatz M merely in virtue of constituting M. So the M-role

can be multiply realized even if M is not multiply constituted.
There is an obvious obscurity in what counts as multiple realization
(or constitution). We can agree that neural property X is distinct
from neural property Y and that both realize a single functiona
property without agreeing on whether Xand Yare variants of a single
property or two substantially different properties, so we shall not
agree on whether there is genuinely multiple realization. And even if
we agree that X and Y are substantially different, we may still not
agree on whether the functional property is multiply realized since we
may not agree on whether there is a single disjunctive realization.
These issues will be discussed further in section x.
V. INTRODUCING THE HARDER PROBLEM
My strategy will be to start with the epistemic possi

realization and use it to argue for the epistemic possi
constitution of mentality. I shall then argue that
bility of multiple constitution of phenomenal pro
atic. I shall use a science-fiction example of a
functionally the same as us but physically differe
science fiction should note that the same issue arises-in more
complicated forms-with respect to real creatures, such as t

pus, which differ from us both physically and functionally.
(Cl): We have no reason to believe that there is any deep ph

property in common to all and only the possible realization
our superficial functional organization.
Moreover-and this goes beyond what is needed for (C1), but

make (C1) more vivid-we have no reason to believe that we
find or make a merely superficial isomorph of ourselves. By
superficial isomorph," I mean an isomorph with respect
psychology and whatever is logically or nomologically entailed
psychological isomorphism, but that is all. For example, the f
pains cause us to moan (in circumstances that we have some
ciation of but no one has ever precisely stated) is known to
sense, but the fact that just-noticeable differences in stimuli
with increasing intensity of the stimuli (the Weber-Fechner law
So the merely superficial isomorph would be governed by the
but not necessarily the latter. The television series Star Trek: Th
Generation includes an episode ("The Measure of a Man," br
2/26/89) in which there is a trial in which it is decided whet
human-like android, Commander Data, may legally be turned
taken apart by someone who does not know whether he can
parts together again. (The technology that allowed the andro
built has been lost.19) Let us take Commander Data to be a me

superficial isomorph of us (ignoring his superior reasonin
inferior emotions). Then (C1) can be taken to be that we have
reason to believe that Commander Data is not nomological
otherwise metaphysically possible. Note that I am not mak
strong a claim as made in Block and Fodor (op. cit.)-that th
empirical reason to suppose that our functional organization is
tiply realizable-but only that we have no reason to doubt it.
The strategy of the argument, you recall, is to move from
epistemic possibility of multiple realization to the epistemic pos
ity of multiple constitution. (C1) is the epistemic possibility of
tiple realization.
(C2): Superficial functional equivalence to us is a defeasible reason

attributing consciousness; that is, superficial functional equiva
lence to us provides a reason for thinking a being is conscious, bu
that reason can be disarmed or unmasked, its evidential value
cancelled.
(C2) consists of two claims, that superficial functional equivalence

to us is a reason for attributing consciousness and that that reason is
defeasible. The first claim is obvious enough. I am not claiming that
the warrant is a priori,just that there is warrant. I doubt that there will
be disagreement with such a minimal claim.
What is controversial about (C2) is that the reason is claimed to be
defeasible. Certainly, deflationary functionalists will deny the defea-
sibility. Of course, even deflationary functionalists would allow that
evidence for thinking something is functionally equivalent to us can be
defeated. For example, that something emits English sounds is a
reason to attribute consciousness, but if we find the sound is re-
corded, the epistemic value of the evidence is cancelled. But (C2)
does not merely say that functional or behavioral evidence for con-
sciousness can be defeated. (C2) says that, even if we know that
something is functionally equivalent to us, there are things we can
find out that cancel the reason we have to ascribe consciousness
(without challenging our knowledge of the functional equivalen

A creature's consciousness can be unmasked without unmasking
functional equivalence to us.
Here is a case in which the epistemic value of functional isom
phism is cancelled: the case involves a partial physical overlap bet
the functional isomorph and humans. Suppose that there are re
19 There is a synopsis by Timothy Lynch at http://www.ugcs.caltech.edu/st-

episodes/135.html.
neurophysiological differences of kind-not just complexity-be-

tween our conscious processes and our unconscious-that is, non-
phenomenal-processes. Nonphenomenal neural process include,
for example, those which regulate body temperature, blood pressure,
heart rate, and sugar in the blood-brain processes that can operate
in people in irreversible vegetative coma. Suppose (but only temporar-
ily-this assumption will be dispensed with later) that we find out that
all of the merely superfical isomorph's brain states are ones that-in
us-are the neural bases only of phenomenally unconscious states. For
example, the neural basis of the functional analog of pain in the
merely superficial isomorph is the neural state that regulates the
pituitary gland in us. This would not prove that the isomorph is not
phenomenally conscious (since the contexts of the neural realizers
are different), but it would cancel or at least weaken the force of the
reason for attributing consciousness provided by its functional iso-
morphism to us.
The role of this case is to motivate a further refining of our
characterization of Commander Data and to justify (C2) by exhibit-
ing the epistemic role of a defeater.
Let us narrow down Commander Data's physical specification to
rule out the cases just mentioned as defeaters for attribution of
consciousness to him. Here is a first shot:
(i) Commander Data is a superficial isomorph of us.

(ii) Commander Data is a merely superficial isomorph. So we have no
reason to suppose there are any shared physical properties between
our conscious states and Commander Data's functional analogs of
them that could be the physical basis of any phenomenal overlap
between the two, since we have no reason to think that such shared
properties are required by the superficial overlap. Further, one
could imagine this discussion taking place at a stage of science
where we could have rational ground for believing that there are no
shared nondisjunctive physical properties (or more generally sci-
entific properties) that could be the physical basis of a phenomenal
overlap. Note that no stipulation can rule out certain shared phys-
ical properties-for example, the disjunctive property of having
the physical realizer of the functional role of one of our conscious
states or Commander Data's functional analog of it.
(iii) The physical realizers of Commander Data's functional analogs of
conscious states do not overlap with any of our brain mechanisms
in any properties that we do not also share with inorganic entities
that are uncontroversially mindless, for example, toasters. So we
can share properties with Commander Data like having molecules.
But none of the realizers of Commander Data's analogs of con-
scious states are the same as realizers of, for example, our states th
regulate our blood sugar-since these are organic.
(iv) Commander Data does not have any part which itself is a functi
isomorph of us and whose activities are crucial to maintaining th
functional organization of the whole.20
The point of the last two conditions is to specify that Comma

Data has a realization that cannot be seen to defeat the attribution of
consciousness to him either a priori or on the basis of a theory of

human consciousness. (For example, the last condition rules out a
"homunculi-headed" realization.) It would help if I could think of all
the realizations that have these kinds of significance. If you tell me
about one I have not thought of, I shall add a condition to rule it out.
Objection: we are entitled to reason from same effects to same
causes. Since our phenomenal states play a role in causing our
behavior, we can infer that the functionally identical behavioral states
of Commander Data are produced in the same way. The only other
option, the objection goes on, is epiphenomenalism.
Reply: consider two computationally identical computers, one that
works via electronic mechanisms, the other that works via hydraulic
mechanisms. (Suppose that the fluid in one does the same job that
the electricity does in the other.) We are not entitled to infer from
the causal efficacy of the fluid in the hydraulic machine that the
electrical machine also has fluid. One need not be an epiphenom-
enalist to take seriously the hypothesis that there are alternative
realizations of the functional roles of our phenomenal states that are
phenomenally blank.21
We might suppose, just to get an example on the table, that the
physical basis of Commander Data's brain is to be found in etched
silicon chips rather than the organic carbon basis of our brains.
The reader could be forgiven for wondering at this point whether
I have not assembled stipulations that close off the question of
Commander Data's consciousness. Naturalism includes the doctrine
that it is the default that a conscious overlap requires a physical bas

and it may seem that I have in effect stipulated that Commander D
does not have any physical commonality with us that could be th
20 Following Putnam. This stipulation needs further refinement, which it wou

be digressive to try to provide here.
21 See Shoemaker; he makes assumptions that would dictate that Command
Data overlaps with us in the most general phenomenal property, having pheno
enality-in virtue of his functional likeness to us. But in virtue of his lack of phys
overlap to us, there are no shared phenomenal states other than phenomenal
itself. So on Shoemaker's view, phenomenality is a functional state, but m
specific phenomenal states have a partly physical nature.
basis of any shared phenomenality. The objection ignores the optio

of a shared disjunctive basis and certain other shared bases to
discussed below.
(C3): Fundamentally different physical realization from us per se is not

a ground of rational belief in lack of consciousness. So the fact
that Commander Data's control mechanisms are fundamentally
different is not a ground of rational belief that he has no phe-
nomenal states. Note that I do not say that finding out that
Commander Data has a silicon-based brain is not a reason for
regarding him as lacking consciousness. Rather, I say that the

reason falls below the epistemic level of a ground for rational
belief.
(C4): We have no conception of a ground of rational belief to the effect

that a realization of our superficial functional organization that is
physically fundamentally different along the lines I have specified
for Commander Data is or is not conscious. To use a term sug-
gested by Martine Nida-Rilmelin in commenting on this paper,
Commander Data's consciousness is meta-inaccessible. Not only
do we lack a ground of belief, but we lack a conception of any
ground of belief. This meta-inaccessibility is a premise rather than
a lemma or a conclusion because the line of thought I have been
presenting leads up to it without anything that I am happy to
think of as an argument for it. My hope is that this way of leading
up to it will allow the reader to see it as obvious.
We can see the rationale for meta-inaccessibility by considering

Searle's chinese room argument.22 He famously argued that even if
we are computational creatures, we are not either sentient or sapient
merely in virtue of that computational organization. In reply to his
critics,23 he says repeatedly that a machine that shares our computa-
tional organization and is therefore behaviorally and functionally
equivalent to us-and therefore passes the Turing Test-need not be
an intentional system (or a conscious being). What would make it an
intentional system-and for Searle, intentionality is engendered by
and requires consciousness-is not the functional organization but
rather the way that functional organization is implemented in the
biology of the organism. But, to take an example that Searle uses, how
would we know whether something made out of beer cans is sentient
or sapient? He says: "It is an empirical question whether any given
machine [that shares our superficial functional organization] has
22 "Minds, Brains, and Programs," Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 111 (1980): 417-24;
see also The Rediscovery of the Mind.
23 "Author's Response," The Behavioral and Brain Sciences, n111 (1980): 450-57.
causal powers equivalent to the brain" (ibid., p. 452). "I think

evident that all sorts of substances in the world, like water pip
toilet paper, are going to lack those powers, but that is an emp
claim on my part. On my account it is a testable empirical claim wh
in repairing a damaged brain," we could duplicate these c
powers (ibid., p. 453). "I offer no a priori proof that a syst
integrated circuit chips could not have intentionality. That is, a
repeatedly, an empirical question. What I do argue is that in ord
produce intentionality the system would have to duplicate the
powers of the brain and that simply instantiating a formal pr
would not be sufficient for that" (ibid., p. 453; emphasis adde
I do not deny that one day the question of whether a creatur
Commander Data is phenomenally conscious may become a tes
empirical question. But it is obvious that we do not now have
conception of how it could be tested. Searle has suggested (in
versation) that the question is an empirical one in that, if I we
device, I would know from the first-person point of view if I
conscious. But even if we were to accept such a counterfactua
could not take it as showing that the claim is testable or empir
any ordinary sense of the term.
Although I am tweaking Searle's flamboyant way of putting
point, my naturalist phenomenal-realist view is not that diff
from his. I agree that whether physically different realizatio
human functional organization are conscious is not an a priori m
and could be said to depend on whether their brains have "equi
causal powers" to ours-in the sense of having the power to be
physical basis of conscious states. (But I do not agree with Sea
view that the neural bases of conscious states "cause" the conscious
states in any normal sense of 'cause'.) I agree with him that conscious-
ness is a matter of the biology of the organism, not (just) its infor-
mation processing. The issue that I am raising here for naturalist
phenomenal-realism affects my view as much as his.
I am not denying that we might some day come to have the
conception we now do not have. (So I am not claiming-as McGinn
does (op. cit.)-that this knowledge can be known now to be beyond
our ken.) I am merely saying that, at this point, we have no idea of
evidence that would ground rational belief, even a hypothetical or
speculative conception. Of course, those who meet Commander Data
will reasonably be sure that he is conscious. But finding out that he is
not human cancels that ground of rational belief.
Perhaps we shall discover the nature of human consciousness and
find that it applies to other creatures. For example, the nature of
human consciousness may involve certain kinds of oscillatory pro-
cesses that can apply to silicon creatures as well. But the problem I am
raising will arise in connection with realizations of our functional
organization that lack those oscillatory processes. The root of the
epistemic problem is that the example of a conscious creature on
which the science of consciousness is inevitably based is us (where
"us" can be construed to include nonhuman creatures that are neu-
rologically similar to humans). But how can science based on us
generalize to creatures that do not share our physical properties? It
would seem that a form of physicalism that could embrace other
creatures would have to be based at least in part on them in the first
place, but that cannot be done unless we already know whether they
are conscious.
I have left a number of aspects of the story unspecified. What w

the aim of Commander Data's designer? Just how fine grained is
functional isomorphism? I hope that for each of my readers ther
some way of filling in the story for which that reader will agree that
have no ground of rational belief either way.
I keep using the phrase 'ground of rational belief'. What does i
mean? I take this to be an epistemic level that is stronger than 'reason
for believing' and weaker than 'rational certainty'. I take it that
ground of rational belief that p allows knowledge that p but me
reason for believing p does not.
VI. DISJUNCTIVISM AND THE EPISTEMIC PROBLEM
I now move to the conditional that I advertised earlier. Let us start by
supposing, but only temporarily, that physicalism requires a deep
(nonsuperficial) unitary (nondisjunctive) scientific (physical) prop-
erty shared by all and only conscious beings. This version of physi-
calism seems at first glance to be incompatible with Commander
Data's being conscious, and the corresponding version of naturalism
(which says that physicalism is the default) seems at first glance to be
epistemically incompatible with phenomenal realism. That is, natu-
ralism says the default is that Commander Data is not conscious, but
phenomenal realism says that the issue is open in the sense of no
rational ground for belief either way. This is a first pass at saying what
the harder problem is.
If this strong kind of physicalism really is incompatible with Com-
mander Data's being conscious, we might wonder whether the rea-
sons we have for believing physicalism will support this weight. I shall
pursue a weaker version of physicalism (and corresponding version of
naturalism) which does not rule out consciousness having a physical
basis that is disjunctive according to the standards of physics. As we
shall see, however, the stronger version of physicalism is not actually
incompatible with Commander Data's being conscious, and the

ference between the stronger and weaker versions makes no im
tant difference with respect to our epistemic situation concer
Commander Data's consciousness.
Disjunctivism is a form of physicalism that allows that consciousnes

is a physical state that is disjunctive by the standards of physics
applied to the current issue, disjunctivism allows that if Comman
Data is conscious, the shared phenomenality is constituted by th
property of having Commander Data's electronic realization of
shared functional state or our electrochemical realization.
In footnote 16, I mentioned Jaegwon Kim's critique of the multi-

ple-realizability argument against physicalism. He argues that, if men-
tal property M is nomically equivalent to a heterogeneous disjunctio
N, we should regard M as non-nomic and non- "real" because Nis. H
argues that, if human thought can be realized by very different
physical mechanisms from, say, Martian or robot thought, then th
real sciences of thought will be the sciences of the separate realiz
tions of it. To call them all 'thought' is simply to apply a superfici
verbal concept to all of them, but the laws of human thought will b
different from the laws of Martian thought. The real kinds are not at
the level of the application of verbal concepts.24
Even those who are sympathetic to this picture of thought mus
make an exception for consciousness (in the sense, as always in th
article, of phenomenality). We can be happy with the view that ther
is a science of human thought and another science of machine
thought, but no science of thought per se. But we should not b
happy with the idea that there is a science of human phenomenality
another of machine phenomenality, and so on. For since the overla
of these phenomenalities, phenomenality, is something real and no
merely nominal as in the case of thought, it must have a scientif
basis. If a phenomenal property is nomically coextensive with
heterogeneous neural disjunction, it would not be at all obvious tha
we should conclude that the phenomenal property is non-nomic and
non-"real" because the disjunction is. The phenomenal-realist natu
ralist point of view would be more friendly to the opposite, that th
disjunction is nomic and "real" because the phenomenal property is
The real problem with disjunctivism is that whether it is true or not,
we could have no good reason to believe it. To see this, we shall hav
to have a brief incursion into the epistemology of reductive identity
24 See my replies to Kim, "Anti-reductionism Slaps Back," Mind, Causation, Worl

Philosophical Perspectives, xI (1997): 107-33; and "Do Causal Powers Drain Away
forthcoming in Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, with a reply by Kim.
VII. THE EPISTEMOLOGY OF THEORETICAL IDENTITY
Why do we think that water = H20, temperature =

kinetic energy and freezing = lattice formation?25 Th
with the fact that water, temperature, freezing, and oth
form a family of causally interrelated "macro"-propertie
corresponds to a family of "micro"-properties: H20,
kinetic energy, formation of a lattice of H20 molec
causal relations among the macroproperties can be e
suppose the following relations between the familie
H20, temperature = mean molecular kinetic energy,
lattice formation. For example, as water is cooled, it
about 4 degrees (F) above freezing, at which point it
Why does ice float on water? Here is a sketch of the e
oxygen atom in the H20 molecule has two pairs of
trons, which attract the hydrogen atoms on other H
Temperature = mean molecular kinetic energy. Whe
ture (namely, kinetic energy) is high, the kinetic
molecules is high enough to break these hydrogen bo
kinetic energy of the molecules decreases, each oxyge
attract two hydrogen atoms on the ends of two other
When this process is complete, the result is a lattice
oxygen atom is attached to four hydrogen atoms. Ice is t
freezing is the formation of such a lattice. Because of th
the bonds, the lattice has an open, less dense structu
phously structured H20 (namely, liquid water)-wh
(solid water) floats on liquid water. The lattice forms
ning about 4 degrees above freezing. (The exact tem
calculated on the basis of the numerical values of the
needed to break or prevent the bonds.) The formatio
lattice elements is what accounts for the expansion o
way to freezing. (Water contracts in the earlier
decreasing kinetic energy allows more bonding, and u
ing reaches a stage in which there are full lattice elem
of the increased bonding is make the water more de
Suppose we reject the assumption that temperature
mean molecular kinetic energy, in favor of the a
temperature is merely correlated with mean molecu
25 The temperature identity is oversimplified, applying in this f

Paul Churchland raises doubts about whether there is a more a
Matter and Consciousness (Cambridge: MIT, 1984). I think those d
in Simon Blackburn's "Losing Your Mind: Physics, Identity and
vention," in Essays in Quasi-Realism (New York: Oxford, 1993), c
ergy. And suppose we reject the claim that freezing is lattice fo

tion, in favor of a correlation thesis; and likewise for water/
Then we would have an explanation for how something th
correlated with decreasing temperature causes something that is co
lated with frozen water to float on something correlated with
water, which is not all that we want. Further, if we assume identit
we can explain why certain macroproperties are spatiotempor
coincident with certain microproperties. The reason to think th
identities are true is that assuming them gives us explanations that
would not otherwise have and does not deprive us of explanat
that we already have or raise explanatory puzzles that wou
otherwise arise. The idea is not that our reason for thinking
identities are true is that it would be nice if they were true. Rathe
is that assuming that they are true yields the most explanatory ov
picture. In other words, the epistemology of theoretical identity is
a special case of inference to the best explanation.
Some suppose that substance identities such as 'water = H20'
on a different footing from "property" identities, and that sub
identities can be established on purely spatiotemporal grounds.2
deciding that water and H20 are spatiotemporally coincident is p
the same package as having decided that they are one and the s
For example, the air above a glass of water buzzes with bits of
in constant exchange with water in the atmosphere, a fact that we
acknowledge only if we are willing to suppose that those H20 m
cules are bits of water. The claim that water is H20 and that water
H20 are spatiotemporally coincident stand or fall together as pa
one explanatory package. And once we conclude that the subs
liquid water = amorphous H20 and that the substance froze
ter = lattice-structured H20, we would be hard pressed to deny
freezing = lattice formation, since the difference between liqu
frozen water is that the former has an amorphous structure an
latter a lattice structure. Substance identities and property iden
often form a single explanatory package.
VIII. BACK TO DISJUNCTIVISM
With the epistemology of identity in place, we can now ask whether
there could be an argument from inference to the best explanation
26 Kim gave a paper at Columbia University in December 1999 making this

suggestion, and Tim Maudlin argued that all theoretical identities are established
on spatiotemporal grounds when I gave this paper at Rutgers.
to the conclusion that consciousness is a heterogeneous physical

disjunction, the disjunction of our realization of the consciousness
role and Commander Data's corresponding realization. Of course
without a prior decision as to whether Commander Data's states are
actually conscious, there could be no such argument. Putting this
point aside, let us suppose, temporarily, that Commander Data is
conscious. Even so, the prospects for an argument from inference to
the best explanation to the identity of a phenomenal property with a
disjunctive physical property are dubious. Molten glass hardens into
an amorphous solid-like substance. (If there are absolutely no impu-
rities, fast continuous cooling of water can make it harden without
lattice formation in a similar manner.) We could give a disjunctive
explanation of solid-like formation that included both freezing and
this kind of continuous hardening. And if we preferred that disjunc-
tive explanation to two distinct explanations, we would regard the
hardening of glass as a kind of freezing and glass as a kind of solid.
We do not regard amorphous hardening as freezing. But we do not
take the disjunctive explanation seriously and so we regard glass as
(strictly speaking) a super-cooled liquid rather than a solid. We have
an important though vague notion of "fundamentally different" that
governs our willingness to regard some differences in realization as
variants of the same basic type and others as fundamentally different.
Without going into the difficult issue of what it is that makes two
realizations fundamentally different, we can stipulate that our physi-
cal realizations of our conscious states are fundamentally different
from Commander Data's physical realizations of his analogs of these
states. And this fundamental difference precludes an argument to the
best explanation of the sort I have been considering.
One of the epistemic factors relevant to our acceptance of a
theoretical identity is what questions it rules out. The question of why
it is that water is correlated with H20 or why it is that heat is
correlated with molecular kinetic energy are bad questions, and they
are ruled out by the identity claims that water = H20 and heat =
molecular kinetic energy. But the question of why we overlap phe-
nomenally with Commander Data in this respect rather than that
respect or some respect rather than none do not seem illegitimate. It
is hard to think of a reason why we should accept a physicalistic view
that dictates that they are illegitimate-disjunctivism-rather than
opt for a nonphysicalist view that holds out some hope for an answer.
Objection: you say identities cannot be explained, but then you also
say that we can have no reason to accept a disjunctive physicalistic
identity because it is not explanatory.
Reply: identities cannot be explained, but they can contribu

explanations of other things. My point about the epistemolog
identity is that it is only because of the explanatory power of iden
that we accept them and the disjunctive identity countenance
disjunctivism does not pass muster.
Disjunctivism is one way of making naturalism compatible w
Commander Data's being conscious, but there are others. One
view that consciousness is as a matter of empirical fact identical to
superficial functional organization that we share with Comma
Data. We might call this view superficialism (with apologies to Rey
has used this term for a somewhat different doctrine). Recall that
phenomenal realist/deflationist distinction is an epistemic on
any ontological view could in principle be held as having e
epistemic status. Superficialism is the phenomenal-realist claim
consciousness is identical to the superficial functional organiz
that we share with Commander Data-as distinct from the deflation-
ist version of this claim mentioned earlier.
Note that superficialism says consciousness is a role property, not a

property that fills or realizes that role. A role property is a kind of
dispositional property. Now, there is no problem about dispositions
being caused: spraying my bicycle lock with liquid nitrogen causes it
to become fragile. So if pain is a superficial functional state, we can
perhaps make use of that identification to explain the occurrence of
pain in neural terms. Whether dispositions are causes-as would be
required by this identity-is a more difficult issue that I shall bypass.
(Does a disposition to say ouch cause one to say ouch?)
The difficulty I want to raise is that, even if identifying pain with
a superficial functional role does license explanations of the su-
perficial causes and effects of being in pain, the identification
cannot in the same way license explanations of the nonsuperficial
causes and effects of being in pain. Suppose, for example, that
psychologists discover that pain raises the perceived pitch of
sounds. Even if we take the thesis that pain is a disposition to say
ouch to help us to explain why pain causes saying ouch, it will not
explain the change in pitch. The epistemic difficulty I am pointing
to is that there is no good reason why the causal relations known to
common sense ought to be explained differently from the ones not
known to common sense. So the identification raises an explana-
tory puzzle that would not otherwise arise, and that puts an
epistemic roadblock in the way of the identification. This is per-
haps not a conclusive difficulty with the proposal, but it does put
the burden of proof on the advocate of the identification to come
up with explanatory advantages so weighty as to rule out the

explanatory disadvantage just mentioned.27
Of course, this objection will not apply to the phenomenal realist
identification of consciousness with its total functional role as op-
posed to its superficial functional role. Since the physiology of Com
mander Data's states differs from ours, their total functional roles will
differ as well. So this would be a chauvinist proposal that would beg
the question against Commander Data's consciousness.
Nida-Rilmelin objected that there are a vast number of properties,
maybe infinitely many, that are entailed nomologically or logically by
the superficial functional equivalence, and each of these is both
shared with Data and is a candidate for the nature of consciousness.
Certainly, a full treatment would attempt to categorize these prope

ties and assess their candidacy. Some-for example, possessing com
plex inputs and outputs--can be eliminated because they are al
shared with mindless computers. Of course, there may be others th
are not so easily dismissed.
IX. THE UPSHOT
I said earlier that it seemed at first glance that a f

which required that consciousness be constituted
cal property dictated that Commander Data is not
now see that, at second glance, this is not the
preclude a disjunctive physical basis to the ph
between us and Commander Data (assuming th
overlap), still the physicalist could allow that Co
conscious on superficialist grounds. And even if we r
there are other potential meta-inaccessible physi
nomenal overlap between us and Commander Dat
The upshot is that physicalism in neither the st
versions mentioned above rules out Commander
scious. But the only epistemically viable naturalist or p
the only naturalist or physicalist hypothesis we h
a reason for accepting-is a deep unitary physical
entific property in common to all and only c
naturalistic basis that Commander Data does not share. So for the
physicalist, Commander Data's consciousness is not epistemic

viable.
Thus, our knowledge of physicalism is doubly problematic: we have

no conception of a ground of rational belief that Commander Data is
or is not conscious, and we have no way of moving from a conclusion
27 I am grateful to Chalmers for pressing me for a better treatment of this issue.
that Commander Data is conscious to any consequence for the t

of physicalism. And this holds despite the fact that physicalism is
default view. Physicalism is the default and also inaccessible and
inaccessible. This is part of the harder problem. A second part follo
But first I shall discuss the question of whether the epist
tension itself is a good reason to conclude that Commander Da
not conscious. The short version of my answer is that, while
epistemic tension is a bad consequence of our phenomenal-r
view that it is an open question whether Commander Data is c
scious, it is not the kind of bad consequence that justifies
concluding that he is not conscious. I shall justify this claim.
Objection: You say disjunctivism is epistemically defective, bu
not also metaphysically defective? How could a unitary pheno
property be identical to a physical property that is nonunitary
Reply: there is no logical flaw in disjunctivism. If a unitary phen
enal property is identical to a nonunitary physical property, th
property is both unitary from the mental point of view and no
tary from the physical point of view. We are willing to allow
unitary properties of economics, sociology, and meteorolog
nonunitary from the physical point of view. Why should we
include mentality, too?
There is more to this issue than I can go into here.28 Of cou
there are views that are worthy of being called 'naturalism
dictate that disjunctivism is metaphysically defective. But they are
the 'naturalism' that I am talking about. The naturalist I am ta
about, you will recall, is also a phenomenal realist. And be
phenomenal realist, this naturalist keeps the question open
whether creatures that are heterogeneous from a physical poi
view nonetheless overlap phenomemenally. If you like, this is a
uralistic concession to phenomenal realism.
Objection: silicon machinery of the sort we are familiar wit
manifestly not conscious. The only reason we could have to su
that Commander Data's brain supported consciousness would b
find some kind of physical similarity to the states that we k
underlie human consciousness, and that possibility has been r
out by stipulation. Moreover, we can explain away our tenden
think of Commander Data as conscious as natural but unjus
anthropomorphizing.
Reply: naturalism and phenomenal realism do not dictate
Commander Data is not conscious or that the issue of his conscious-
28 See my "Anti-reductionism Slaps Back," for more on this topic.
ness is not open. Recall that disjunctivism and superficialism are

metaphysically (though not epistemically) viable. Further, naturalism
gives us no evidence against or reason to doubt the truth of either
disjunctivism or superficialism. Hence naturalism (and physicalism)
give us no good reason to doubt the the consciousness of Com-
mander Data. Imagine arguing at Commander Data's trial that he is
a zombie (or that there is no matter of fact as to whether he is
conscious), while conceding that his zombiehood is not even proba-
bilified by naturalism unless we set aside disjunctivism and superficial-
ism, options on which he may be conscious. And imagine conceding
that we are setting these options aside not because we have any
evidence against them but because we cannot conceive of any way in
which they may be known. He could reasonably say (or to be neutral,
produce the noise): "Your lack of a conception of how to find out
whether I am conscious is no argument that I am a zombie; I similarly
lack a conception of how to find out whether you are conscious." In
any case, phenomenal realism is a form of (Putnamian) metaphysical
realism, so the phenomenal realist cannot suppose that our igno-
rance, even necessary ignorance, is a reason to suppose that Com-
mander Data is not conscious or that there is no matter of fact as to
whether he is.
Phenomenal realists regard consciousness as a real property that

does not have logical ties to behavior. That is what allows phenome-
nal realists to take seriously the application of consciousness or
protoconsciousness to elementary particles. But if anything might be
conscious, why take the consciousness of anything other than humans
seriously? One answer can be seen by considering what happens if
one asks Commander Data whether red is closer to purple than blue
is to yellow. Answering such questions requires, in us, a complex
multidimensional phenomenal space-in part captured by the color
solid-with phenomenal properties at many levels of abstractness (cf.
Loar). Commander Data's functional equivalence to us guarantees
that he has an internal space that is functionally equivalent to our
phenomenal space. But anyone who grasps our phenomenal space
from the first-person point of view has to take seriously the possibility
that an isomorphic space in another being is grasped by him from a
similar first-person perspective. Talking of our "functional equiva-
lence" to Commander Data tends to mask the fact that we are like
him in a complex structure or set of structures. If one thinks of the
functional similarity as limited to saying 'Ouch' when you stick a pin
in him, it is easy to miss the positive phenomenal realist rationale for
regarding Commander Data's consciousness as an open question.
Thus, the phenomenal realist and the deflationist converge on

closing off the possibility that Commander Data is conscious.
Objection (made by many critics): Why should the mere epist
possibility of a bad consequence of physicalism threaten physic
No one thinks that the mere epistemic possibility of an object that
mass traveling faster than light threatens relativity theory. If rela
is true, nothing can travel faster than light. Similarly, if physicali
true, there is no conscious Commander Data.
Reply: first, relativity theory gives us reason to believe that it is
impossible for anything to travel faster than light. But naturalism and
phenomenal realism do not give us reason to believe that there can
be no Commander Data or that it is impossible that Commander Data
is conscious. The die-hard physicalist may take the fact that Com-
mander Data leads to unpalatable consequences as a reason to deny
the existence of the consciousness of Commander Data. But the form
of naturalism that leads to the epistemic problem is a more liberal
and more plausible form. It is not die-hard physicalism, but rather
physicalism that recognizes that we lack much in the way of direct
evidence for the view. Second, the trouble that Commander Data
leads to is not of the sort that gives us rational ground for denying the
existence of a conscious Commander Data. Disjunctivism is not meta-
physically suspect but only epistemically suspect: we have no concep-
tion of how to know whether it is true or not. Our lack of knowledge
is no argument against the consciousness of Commander Data.
Objection: Brian McLaughlin29 has argued that I am mischaracter-
izing the epistemic role of functional similarity in our reasoning
about other minds. The role of functional similarity is in providing
evidence that others are like us in intrinsic physical respects, and that
is the ground for our belief in other minds. In the case of Com-
mander Data, that evidential force is cancelled when we find out what
Commander Data's real constitution is. McLaughlin notes that we are
happy to ascribe consciousness to babies even though they are func-
tionally very different from us because we have independent evidence
that they share the relevant intrinsic physical properties with us. The
same applies, though less forcefully, to other mammals-for exam-
ple, rabbits. He asks us to compare a human baby with a functionally
equivalent robot baby. The robot baby's functional equivalence to the
real baby gives us little reason to believe that the robot baby is
conscious. Similarly, for the comparison between a real rabbit and a
robot rabbit. Moving closer to home, consider a paralytic with Alz-
29 In a response at SOFIA, 2001.
heimers: little functional similarity to us, but we are nonetheless

confident, on the basis of an inference from similarity in intrinsic
physical properties, that the senile paralytic has sensory conscious-
ness. The upshot, he says, is that material constitution and structure
trumps function in our attribution of consciousness to others. And so,
if we become convinced that Commander Data is unlike us in the
relevant intrinsic physical respects, we should conclude that he is

conscious.
Reply: first, Commander Data shares with us disjunctivist and super-

ficialist material constitution and structure, and so no conclusion can be
drawn about the consciousness of Commander Data, even if
McLaughlin is right about material constitution and structure trump
ing function. Nothing in McLaughlin's argument supplies a reason t
believe that disjunctivism or superficialism are false. (Recall that I
have argued that these views are epistemically defective, not that they
are false.) He says that the relevant physical properties are "intrinsic
but if that is supposed to preclude disjunctivism or superficialism, w
are owed an argument. Second, I do agree with McLaughlin that a
substantial element of our belief in other consciousnesses depends
on an inference to a common material basis. It would be a mistake to
conclude, however, that this inference provides the entire basis for
our attribution of other consciousnesses. Our justification is an in-
ference from like effects to like causes. Even if we find out that the
causes of behavioral similarity are not alike in material constitution

and structure, it remains open that the common cause is a similarity
in consciousness itself and that consciousness itself has a disjunctive or
superficial material basis or no material basis. (Recall that naturalism
is committed to physicalism as a default, but a default can be over-
ridden.)
Third, function is not so easy to disentangle from material consti-
tution and structure, at least epistemically speaking. The opponent
process theory of color vision originated in the nineteenth century
from common-sense observations of color vision, such as the fact that
afterimages are of the complementary color to the stimulus and that
there are colors that seem, for example, both red and blue (purple)
or red and yellow (orange), but no color that seems both red and
green or both blue and yellow. The basic two-stage picture of how
color vision works (stage 1: three receptor types; stage 2: two oppo-
nent channels) was discovered before the relevant physiology on the
basis of behavioral data. To the extent that Commander Data behaves
as we do, there is a rationale for supposing that the machinery of
Commander Data's color vision shares an abstract structure with ours
that goes beyond the color solid.
The first of the epistemic difficulties on the right-hand side of

conditional is that physicalism is the default, but also inaccessib
meta-inaccessible. We are now ready to state the second episte
difficulty. Let us introduce a notion of the subjective default view
we have rational ground for believing on the basis of backgro
information-but only ignoring escape hatches-such as disjunc
ism and superficialism-which we have no evidence against but
are themselves inaccessible and meta-inaccessible. Then the second
epistemic difficulty is that of holding both that it is an open question

whether Commander Data is conscious and that it is the subjective defau
view that he is not. These two epistemic difficulties constitute
harder problem.
Before I go on to consider further objections, let me briefly co
trast the point of this paper with Nagel's famous "bat" paper (op. cit.)
His emphasis was on the functional differences between us and ba
creatures which share the mammalian physical basis of sensation.
example, however, is one of a functionally identical creature, th
focus being on the upshot of physical differences between us and that
creature.
The issue of the application of our phenomenal concepts

creatures is often mentioned in the literature, but assimilated to the
hard problem (the "explanatory gap"). (I am guilty, too. That was the
background assumption of the discussion of "universal psychology" in
my "Troubles with Functionalism" (op. cit.).) For example, Levine
notes that we lack a principled basis for attributing consciousness to
creatures which are physically very different from us. He says: "I
submit that we lack a principled basis precisely because we do not
have an explanation for the presence of conscious experience even in
ourselves" (op. cit., p. 79). Later, he says: "Consider again the problem
of attributing qualia to other creatures, those that do not share our
physical organization. I take it that there is a very real puzzle whether
such creatures have qualia like ours or even any at all. How much of
our physicofunctional architecture must be shared before we have
similarity or identity of experience? This problem, I argued above, is
a direct manifestation of the explanatory gap" (op. cit., p. 89).
X. MORE OBJECTIONS
One can divide objections into those which require clarification of
the thesis and those which challenge the thesis as clarified. The
objections considered so far are more in the former category while
those below are more in the latter.
(A) Objections from indeterminacy. Objection: the issue of whether
Commander Data is conscious is just a matter of vagueness or inde-
terminacy in the word 'conscious'. If we reject property dualism, then

the issue of whether Commander Data is conscious depends on
extrapolating a concept of consciousness grounded in our physical
constitution to other physical constitutions. If those other physical
constitutions are sufficiently different from ours as is stipulated for
Commander Data, then the matter is indeterminate and so a decision
has to be made. Similarly, in extending the concept 'wood' to an alien
form of life, we might find that it resembles what we have already
called 'wood' in certain ways but not others and a decision will have
to be made.30
Reply: no phenomenal realist-physicalist or not-should accept
the assumption that the decision whether to attribute consciousness
to Commander Data is a decision about whether to extrapolate from
our physical constitution to his, and so the objection presupposes
phenomenal irrealism. According to the phenomenal realist, Com-
mander Data may share our conscious qualities even if he does not
resemble us physically.
I do not want to give the impression that phenomenal realism is
incompatible with indeterminacy about consciousness. For example,
perhaps a fish is a borderline case of consciousness. Similarly,
Commander Data might be a borderline case of consciousness and
therefore indeterminate. On the phenomenal realist view of con-
sciousness, it is an open question whether Commander Data is (a)
conscious, (b) not conscious, (c) a borderline case. But there is no
reason to think that Commander Data must be a borderline case.
From the phenomenal-realist point of view, epistemic considerat

alone do not show metaphysical indeterminacy.
(B) Closure of epistemic properties. In a response to this article, Nid
Rfimelin3l gave a formalization of the argument which involve
principle of closure of epistemic properties such as being open
being meta-inaccessible. (Brendan Neufeld made a similar poi
For example, she supposes that part of the argument goes someth
like this: supposing physicalism requires a deep unitary property
common to conscious creatures, if Commander Data is conscious,
then physicalism is false; Commander Data's consciousness is meta-
inaccessible; so the falsity of physicalism is meta-inaccessible.
One can easily see that the form of argument is fallacious. If Plum
did it, then it is false that the butler did it. But if it is inaccessible
whether Plum did it, it does not follow that it is inaccessible whether
30 Field and Papineau have pressed such views in commenting on an earlier

version of this article, though they are not responsible for the type of example.
31 At SOFIA, 2001.
or not the butler did it. We might find evidence against the
which has nothing to do with Plum. The application of the po
the argument that Nida-Rilmelin attributes to me is that, eve
Commander Data's consciousness is inaccessible, we might
some independent reason to believe physicalism is false. I expl
noted (and did in the earlier version) that I think the standard
arguments against physicalism do not work.
Here is a standard problem with closure.32 Consider a meta-inac-
cessible claim, I, and an accessible claim, A. The conjunction I & A is
meta-inaccessible, but a consequence of it, A, is not. So meta-inacces-
sibility is not transmitted over entailment. Briefly and metaphorically:
fallacies of the sort mentioned arise with respect to an epistemic
property that applies to a whole even if only one of its parts has that
property. The whole can then entail a different part that does not
have that epistemic property. I doubt that my argument has that
form, but if someone can show that it does, that will undermine it.
(C) Objections concerning empirical evidence. Objection: suppose my
brain is hooked up to Commander Data's and I have the experience
of seeing through his eyes. Is that not evidence that he has phenom-
enal consciousness?
Reply: maybe it is evidence, but it does not get up to the level of

rational ground for believing. Perhaps if I share a brain in that wa
with a zombie, I can see through the zombie's eyes, because whatev
is missing in the zombie brain is made up for by mine.
Objection: suppose we discover what we take to be laws of conscious-
ness in humans and discover that they apply to Commander Data
That is, we find that the laws that govern human consciousness al
govern the functional analog of consciousness in Commander Dat
Does that not get up to the level of rational ground for believing th
Commander Data is conscious?33
Reply: since Commander Data's brain works via different principles
from ours, it is guaranteed that his states will not be governed by all of the
same laws as the functionally equivalent states in us. Two computers
that are computationally equivalent but physically different are inev-
itably different in all sorts of physical features of their operation, for
example, how long they take to compute various functions, and their
failure characteristics-such as how they react to humidity or mag-
netic fields. The most that can be claimed is that the state that is the
functional analog of human consciousness in Commander Data
32 See my discussion of the tacking paradox in "Anti-Reductionism Slaps Back."

33I am grateful to Barry Smith for getting me to take this objection more
seriously.
obeys some of the laws that our conscious states obey. The problem is:
Are the laws that Commander Data does not share with us laws of
consciousness or laws of his different physical realizer? Without a

understanding of the scientific nature of consciousness, how are w
supposed to know? A zombie might share some laws of consciousne
but not enough or not the right ones for consciousness. So long
Commander Data does not share all the laws of our conscious states,
there will be room for rational doubt as to whether the laws that he
does share with us are decisive. Indeed, if we knew whether Com-
mander Data was conscious or not, we could use that fact to help us
in deciding which laws were laws of consciousness and which were
laws of the realization. But as this point suggests, the issue of whether
Commander Data is conscious is of a piece with the epistemic prob-
lem of whether a given law is a law of consciousness or a law of one
of the realizers of its functional role.
An example will be useful to clarify this point. All human sensory

systems obey a power function, an exponential function relating
stimulus intensity to subjective intensity as judged by subjects' reports.
That is, subjective intensity = stimulus intensity raised to a certain
exponent, a different exponent for different modalities. For exam-
ple, perceived brightness is proportional to energy output in the
visible spectrum raised to a certain exponent. This applies even to
outr& parameters of subjective judgments, such as how full the mouth
feels as a function of volume of wadges of paper stuck in the mouth
or labor pains as a function of size of contractions. Should we see the
question of whether Commander Data's sensations follow the power
law as a litmus test for whether he has conscious experiences? No
doubt the power law taps some neural feature. Is that neural feature
essential or accidental to the nature of consciousness? Roger Shep-
ard34 has argued that the power law form would be expected in any
naturally evolved creature. But that leaves open the possibility of
artificial creatures or evolutionary singularities (subject to unusual
selection pressures) whose sensations (or "sensations") do not obey
the power law. The question whether this is a law of consciousness or
a law of the human realization of consciousness that need not be
shared by a conscious Commander Data is of a piece with the ques-
tion of whether creatures like Commander Data (who, let us suppose,
do not obey the law) are conscious. We cannot settle one without the
other, and the epistemic problem I am raising applies equally to both.
34 In his unpublished William James Lectures.
(D) Skepticism and the problem of other minds. Recall that I am ar

for a conditional. On the left are naturalism, phenomenal rea
and the denial of skepticism. There is a superficial resemb
between the harder problem and the problem of other minds
the problem of other minds is a form of skepticism. The nonsk
has no doubt that humans are (sometimes) conscious, but when
find out that Commander Data is not human, denying skepticism
not help.
What is it about being human that justifies rejecting skepticism? It
is not part of my project here to attempt an answer, but I have to say
something to avoid the suspicion that our rationale for regarding other
humans as conscious or rocks as not conscious might apply equally to
Commander Data.
Elliot Sober's "Evolution and the Problem of Other Minds"35 ar-
gues plausibly that our rationale for attributing mental states to other
humans is a type of "common-cause" reasoning. But such common-
cause reasoning is vulnerable to evidence against a common cause,
for example, evidence for lack of genealogical relatedness or evi-
dence for different scientific bases for the similarity of behavior that
is exhibited. Thus the rationale for attributing mentality to humans
does not fully apply to Commander Data.
Stephen White36 raises the skeptical worry of how we know that
creatures whose brains are like ours in terms of principles of opera-
tion but not in DNA are conscious. But this worry may have a scientific
answer that would be satisfying to the nonskeptic. We might arrive at
a partial understanding of the mechanisms of human consciousness
which is sufficient to assure us that a creature that shared those
mechanisms with us is just as conscious as we are even if its DNA

different. For example, we might discover a way to genetically en
neer a virus that replaced the DNA in the cells of living creatures. An
we might find that when we do this for adult humans such
ourselves, there are no noticeable effects on our consciousness. Or we
might come to have something of a grip on why cortico-thalamic
oscillation of a certain sort is the neural basis of human consciousness
and also satisfy ourselves that many changes in DNA in adults do not
change cortico-thalamic oscillation. By contrast, the harder problem
may remain even if we accept the dictates of nonskeptical science.
35 This JOURNAL, XCVII, 7 (July 2000): 365-86.

36 "Curse of the Qualia," Synthese, LXVIII (1983): 333-68; reprinted in Block,
Flanagan, and Gfizeldere, eds., pp. 695-718. See also Shoemaker, pp. 653-54.
XI. SUPERVENIENCE AND MIND-BODY IDENTITY
Much of the recent discussion of physicalism in the p

mind has centered on supervenience of consciousness
rather than on good old-fashioned mind-body identit
recommends this orientation, saying "I find that discu
in terms of identity generally throw more confusion t
the key issues, and often allow the central difficulties to b
contrast, supervenience seems to provide an ideal fram
which key issues can be addressed" (op. cit., p. xvii).
But the harder problem depends on the puzzling natu
ple physical constitution of consciousness, a problem
naturally arise from the perspective that Chalmers re
Supervenience prohibits any mental difference witho
difference, but multiple constitution is a physical diffe
a mental difference. Of course nothing prevents us fro
issue in supervenience terms. In those terms, it is the prob
a unitary phenomenal property can have a nonunitary
neously disjunctive) supervenience base. But there is n
this should be puzzling from the supervenience point
erogeneous supervenience bases of unitary properties-
adding-are common. What makes it puzzling is the th
phenomenal overlap between physically different creat
have a unitary physical basis. That puzzle can be appreci
point of view of old-fashioned mind-body identity-wh
phenomenal overlap is a physical property. (No one w
adding with a physical (for example, microphysical) p
obviously functional.) But it is not puzzling from the
point of view.
XII. THE HARD AND THE HARDER
Are the hard and harder problems really different

hard problem is: Why is the scientific basis of a phenom
the scientific basis of that property rather than anothe
a nonphenomenal property? The question behind th
lem could be put so as to emphasize the similari
physically different creatures overlap phenomenally in
than another or not at all? This way of putting it m
that the harder problem includes or presupposes the
In any case, the harder problem is more narrowly ep
hard problem. The hard problem could arise for so
no conception of another person, whereas the ha
closely tied to the problem of other minds. Finally,
lem involves an epistemic tension not involved in th
My claim is that the "harder problem" differs from
lem" in these ways independently of whether we choose to see the

as distinct problems or as part of a single problem.
Is the harder problem harder than the hard problem? If the hard
problem is the hard problem plus something else, then it is trivia
harder. As indicated above, the harder problem has an epistem
dimension not found in the hard problem, so they are to that exte
incomparable, but the epistemic difficulty involved in the harde
problem makes it harder in one way.
Both the hard and harder problems depend on what we cann
now conceive. Even the epistemic difficulty may be temporary, unlike
the epistemic difficulty of the concept of the gold mountain that no o
will ever have evidence of Perhaps we will come to understand th
nature of human consciousness, and in so doing, develop an objecti
theory of consciousness that applies to all creatues, independently
physical constitution. That is, perhaps the concepts developed in
solution to the hard problem will one day solve the harder problem
though I think our relation to this question is the same as to the
harder problem itself-namely, we have no conception of how to fin
an answer.
XIII. WHAT TO DO?
Naturalism dictates that physicalism is the default, b

ble and meta-inaccessible; and in the "subjective" se
earlier, it is the default that Commander Data is not con
the same time phenomenal realists regard his consc
open issue. What to do? To begin, one could simply
difficulties. They are not paradoxes. Physicalism is t
the same time meta-inaccessible. It is the subject
androids like Commander Data are not conscious, bu
question whether they are. Consciousness is a singu
one of its singular properties is thrusting us into ep
Another option would be to reject or restrict th
naturalism or of phenomenal realism. One way to de
slightly would be to take the problem itself as a reas
disjunctivist or superficialist form of naturalism. Those
weaken phenomenal realism can do so without adop
deflationist views mentioned at the outset: function
tationism, and cognitivism. One way to restrict phen
to adopt what Shoemaker (op. cit) calls the "Frege-Sc
comparisons of phenomenal character are only mea
the stages of a single person and not between indiv
proposal is slightly weaker than the Frege-Schlick
only interpersonal comparisons across naturalistical
sons. That is, although comparisons of phenomenal character amon

subjects who share a physical (or other naturalistic) basis of th
phenomenal character make sense, comparisons outside that class
are nonfactual; or else a significant group of them are false. That i
Commander Data either has no consciousness or there is no matter
of fact about his consciousness.
Naturalistic phenomenal-realism is not an unproblematic position.

We cannot comfortably suppose both that consciousness is real and
that it has a scientific nature. I have not argued here for one o
another way out, but have been concerned only with laying out the
problem.
NED BLOCK
New York University

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Journal of Philosophy, Inc.

The Harder Problem of Consciousness

THE HARDER PROBLEM OF CONSCIOUSNESS*

0022-362X/02/9908/391-425 ? 2002 The Journal of Philosophy, Inc.

someone who has no conception of another person, wherea

I believe that the major ontological disputes about

(1) Deflationism about consciousness, in which a priori or at

In its most straightforward version, deflationism

I apologize for all the "isms" (deflationism, phenomenal realism,

is between phenomenal realism ("inflationism") and (scientific) nat-

natures. (A view on a given subject is the default if it is the only o

tent," Mind, CIII (1994): 249-85. Deflationism with respect to consciousness in

is incoherent. The upshot here is that there is a grain of truth in t

Before I go on, I must make a terminological comment. Imag

OF THE HARD PROBLEM

The hard problem is one of explaining why the

I think there is something right about this answer, but it is nonethe-

property could be identical both to Q and cortico-thalamic o

The standard arguments against physicalism (most r

9 We can reasonably wonder how it is that Mark Twain an

hard. Jackson imagined a neuroscientist of the distant future (

The expressions 'this sudden involuntary muscle contraction' and

11The articles in Block, Flanagan, and Gfizeldere, eds., by Paul Churchland

experience or mental image could function-albeit differently-in

12 Note that my account of subjective concepts allows for subjective concepts of

that everything is physical, including vocabulary. But the vocabula

(A) Naturalism. Naturalism is the view that it is a def

be...consciousness.) I shall lump these sciences together under the

is deflationist, the other phenomenal realist. The latter is psychofunc-

13 See my "Troubles with Functionalism," in C. W. Savage, ed., Minnesota Studies in

is true, physicalism is false. The line of argument assumes that

16 See Jaegwon Kim, "Multiple Realization and the Metaphysics of Reduc

constitute ersatz M merely in virtue of constituting M. So the M-role

V. INTRODUCING THE HARDER PROBLEM

My strategy will be to start with the epistemic possi

complicated forms-with respect to real creatures, such as t

(Cl): We have no reason to believe that there is any deep ph

Moreover-and this goes beyond what is needed for (C1), but

built has been lost.19) Let us take Commander Data to be a me

(C2): Superficial functional equivalence to us is a defeasible reason

(C2) consists of two claims, that superficial functional equivalence

(without challenging our knowledge of the functional equivalen

19 There is a synopsis by Timothy Lynch at http://www.ugcs.caltech.edu/st-

neurophysiological differences of kind-not just complexity-be-

(i) Commander Data is a superficial isomorph of us.

The point of the last two conditions is to specify that Comma

consciousness to him either a priori or on the basis of a theory of

that it is the default that a conscious overlap requires a physical bas

20 Following Putnam. This stipulation needs further refinement, which it wou

basis of any shared phenomenality. The objection ignores the optio

(C3): Fundamentally different physical realization from us per se is not

regarding him as lacking consciousness. Rather, I say that the

(C4): We have no conception of a ground of rational belief to the effect

We can see the rationale for meta-inaccessibility by considering

causal powers equivalent to the brain" (ibid., p. 452). "I think

I have left a number of aspects of the story unspecified. What w

incompatible with Commander Data's being conscious, and the

Disjunctivism is a form of physicalism that allows that consciousnes

In footnote 16, I mentioned Jaegwon Kim's critique of the multi-

24 See my replies to Kim, "Anti-reductionism Slaps Back," Mind, Causation, Worl