Why "consciousness" means what it does.

Manson, Neil C. (2011) Why "consciousness" means what it does. Metaphilosophy, 42 (1-2). pp. 98-117. ISSN 0026-1068

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Abstract

“Consciousness” seems to be a polysemic, ambiguous, term. Because of this, theorists have sought to distinguish the different kinds of phenomena that “consciousness” denotes, leading to a proliferation of terms for different kinds of consciousness. However, some philosophers—univocalists about consciousness—argue that “consciousness” is not polysemic or ambiguous. By drawing upon the history of philosophy and psychology, and some resources from semantic theory, univocalism about consciousness is shown to be implausible. This finding is important, for if we accept the univocalist account then we are less likely to subject our thought and talk about the mind to the kind of critical analysis that it needs. The exploration of the semantics of “consciousness” offered here, by way of contrast, clarifies and fine-tunes our thought and talk about consciousness and conscious mentality and explains why “consciousness” means what it does, and why it means a number of different, but related, things.

Item Type:
Journal Article
Journal or Publication Title:
Metaphilosophy
Additional Information:
this is a draft - for the published version with correct pagination see the Metaphilosophy link above.
Uncontrolled Keywords:
/dk/atira/pure/subjectarea/asjc/1200/1211
Subjects:
?? * concept of consciousness* consciousness* theories of consciousness* history of psychology* unconscious mind* state consciousnessphilosophyb philosophy (general)bf psychology ??
ID Code:
35613
Deposited By:
Deposited On:
25 Jan 2011 14:44
Refereed?:
No
Published?:
Published
Last Modified:
31 Dec 2023 00:18