Phenomenal externalism

I shall call those philosophers who hold that phenomenal character supervenes on internal constitution (where the term phenomenal character is understood as explained earlier) phenomenal internalists. On this view, it is metaphysically impossible for intrinsic duplicates to differ with respect to the phenomenal character of their internal states. Until recently, phenomenal internalism was almost universally accepted in the philosophy of mind. With the rise of representationalism, however, the view has begun to feel some pressure (Byrne, 2001 Dretske, 1995 Jackson, 2002b Lycan, 1996 Tye, 1995, 2000). For if the phenomenal character of a state is (or supervenes on) its representational content (or a representational content the state has that meets certain further conditions, e.g., with respect to the functional role it plays) and content brings in external factors, then prima facie it is metaphysically possible for intrinsic duplicates to differ phenomenally. 

I say prima facie here since there is a weaker form of phenomenal externalism that has it that even though phenomenal character is partly constituted by causal relations to external entities, other downstream factors enter into it that preclude internal duplicates from differing phenomenally when the normal causes of, or normal environments for, their internal states differ. This form of externalism is compatible with phenomenal... 

This might be the reaction of Jaegwon Kim. Although Kim does not take up the issue of internalism versus externalism directly in his 2005, it is clear from his remarks (pp. 172-5) that he remains a phenomenal internalist. It is also clear that he rejects physicalism for individual qualia or phenomenal characters. However, my argument creates trouble for Kim, since he is not a dualist about the representational properties of mental states. 

I shall not press the point here since it is not needed for present purposes, but, in my view, our experiences generally have what might be called a presentational phenomenology. For the appropriate external aspects, experiences with the same phenomenal character present the same aspects of the world to us or the same aspects of our bodies (or sometimes both). I focus on the case of phenomenal location, since it seems especially clear-cut and compelling. 

A fourth reason (suggested to me by Cory Juhl) appeals to causal considerations. Consider a microphysical duplicate of the present time slice of our world (call it MD) that (a) is governed by the same physical laws as our world and (b) is the initial slice of a world, W, with no history prior to the present time. If the physical world is causally closed, then W will unfold physically just as the actual world will. So, future behavior in W will be the same as in our world. Now, given that phenomenal externalism imposes some sort of backward-looking tracking requirement on phenomenal character, since MD is the first time slice of I, there is no phenomenal character tokened in Wat the present time. MD, then, is a zombie replica of the current time slice of the actual world. But if this is the case, then... 

I conclude that phenomenal internalism is a view we have no reason whatsoever to accept and serious reason to question (at least if physicalism is true). It is no more or less than a dogma, a hangover from an outdated Cartesian conception of the mind. The time has come to take phenomenal externalism very seriously indeed. 

What, then, is radical externalism It is the view that experiences are to be sorted into phenomenal types depending on what objects or properties in the environment they are experiences of. It may be boiled down to the following principle of type-individuation ifei and ex are shape experiences, then ei is of the same type or phenomenal character as if and only if the object of ei (i.e., the shape apprehended by ei) has the same geometrical properties as the object of ex. ... 

I. If radical externalism is correct, seeing a cube and touching a cube are the same in phenomenal character. 

Two ordinary observers standing in roughly the same place, looking at the same scene, are bound to have experiences with the same phenomenal character. For the phenomenal charactet of the experience is constituted by the layout and characteristics of the vety same external objects. ... 

Dretske, F. (1996). Phenomenal externalism. In E. Villanueva, ed.. Philosophical Issues, Vol. 7. Ridgeview Pubfishing Company, pp. 143—58. 

The notion of reflexivity might be of some help here to put it succinctly, suture means that external difference is always an internal one, that the external limitation of a field of phenomena always reflects itself within this field, as its inherent impossibility to fully become itself. To take the elementary example of sexual difference in a patriarchal society, the external limit/opposition that divides women from man also functions as the inherent obstacle which prevents women from fully realizing their potentials. We can see how, in this precise sense, suture is the exact opposite of the illusory self-enclosed totality that successfully erases the decentered traces of its production process suture means precisely that such self-enclosure is a priori impossible, that the excluded externality always leaves its traces within—or, to put it in the standard Freudian terms, that there is no repression (from the scene of phenomenal selfexperience) without the return of the repressed. 

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