Overview

Although often framed in terms of 'analysis', many prominent philosophical questions about minds are also interpretable as questions regarding the correct classification of mental categories. Can we make sense of, and illuminate the nature of, a particular mental category - say, beliefs, or imaginative episodes - by classifying them as instances of a broader mental kind - say, representations, or mental actions? Is the correct classification of perceptual phenomena one on which veridical perception, illusion, and hallucination are classified as instances of the same mental kind, or a taxonomy which holds that these are fundamentally distinct kinds of mental categories? This is no less true of philosophical theorizing about consciousness. In the philosophical literature on consciousness, one typically finds central questions posed in terms of how this particular mental kind relates, or fits into, the existing classificatory system we have for categorizing the natural world. Does consciousness belong in the same 'physical' category which includes things like electrons, water, and neurochemical brain states, or does the reality of consciousness force us to recognize a category of 'non-physical' phenomena which current scientific methods are ill-equipped to explain? Similarly, can we classify all instances of phenomenal consciousness - the what it's like aspect of conscious experience - as instances of conscious access, or are these distinct mental kinds which are not necessarily co-extensive? These latter questions are exciting and pressing, for they have important methodological implications for the growing empirical research program which aims to deliver an account of the neurobiological basis, or explanation, of consciousness. Thought to be one of the central challenges for modern science, the ability of philosophical investigation to shed light on foundational questions which bear on this project serve to further demonstrate the importance of philosophy as a research field, and its role in producing a mature scientific understanding of the mind.

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