The Phenomenal Self

by Dainton, Barry

• ISBN13: 9780199288847
• ISBN10: 0199288844
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2008-05-25
• Publisher: Oxford University Press

Summary

Barry Dainton presents a fascinating new account of the self, the key to which is experiential or phenomenal continuity. Provided our mental life continues we can easily imagine ourselves surviving the most dramatic physical alterations, or even moving from one body to another. It was this fact that led John Locke to conclude that a credible account of our persistence conditions - an account which reflects how we actually conceive of ourselves - should be framed in terms of mental rather than material continuity. But mental continuity comes in different forms. Most of Locke's contemporary followers agree that our continued existence is secured by psychological continuity, which they take to be made up of memories, beliefs, intentions, personality traits, and the like. Dainton argues that that a better and more believable account can be framed in terms of the sort of continuity we find in our streams of consciousness from moment to moment. Why? Simply because provided this continuity is not lost - provided our streams of consciousness flow on - we can easily imagine ourselves surviving the most dramatic psychological alterations. Phenomenal continuity seems to provide a more reliable guide to our persistence than any form of continuity. The Phenomenal Self is a full-scale defence and elaboration of this premise. The first task is arriving at an adequate understanding of phenomenal unity and continuity. This achieved, Dainton turns to the most pressing problem facing any experience-based approach: losses of consciousness. How can we survive them? He shows how the problem can be solved in a satisfactory manner by construing ourselves as systems of experiential capacities. He then moves on to explore a range of further issues. How simple can a self be? How are we related to our bodies? Is our persistence an all-or-nothing affair? Do our minds consist of parts which could enjoy an independent existence? Is it metaphysically intelligible to construe ourselves as systems of capacities? The book concludes with a novel treatment of fission and fusion.

Author Biography

Barry Dainton is Professor of Philosophy at the University of Liverpool. He is the author of Stream of Consciousness (Routledge 2000, 2nd edn. 2006) and Time and Space (Acumen 2001).

Table of Contents

List of Figures	p. viii
Preface	p. xi
Acknowledgements	p. xxvi
Mind and Self	p. 1
Can it be so easy?	p. 1
Psychological continuity	p. 6
First doubts	p. 11
Some varieties of virtual life	p. 14
Strands untangled	p. 21
Phenomenal Unity	p. 28
Experience	p. 28
Phenomenal space	p. 34
Self and awareness	p. 39
A superfluous self	p. 42
Simplicity and unity	p. 46
Phenomenal Continuity	p. 51
A constraint	p. 51
Memory	p. 53
Chunks, apprehensions and representations	p. 56
Overlap and flow	p. 63
Phenomenal cuts	p. 68
The one experience view	p. 71
Streamal unity	p. 73
Powers and Subjects	p. 75
Bridge building	p. 75
Experience-machines and beyond	p. 81
Power structures	p. 88
The C-theory	p. 111
Powers in general	p. 114
Projection and production	p. 131
Alternatives	p. 135
The self in experience	p. 135
Bridges of resemblance	p. 148
Fundamentalism	p. 151
Foster's modal bridge	p. 153
Unger's material bridge	p. 161
Minds and Mental Integration	p. 170
From C-systems to minds	p. 170
Aspects of mind	p. 171
Psycho-phenomenal integration	p. 175
C-relations and P-relations	p. 178
From a functional perspective	p. 181
Non-phenomenal selves	p. 188
What matters	p. 192
Embodiment	p. 201
A blurring	p. 201
Four grades of embodiment	p. 203
Phenomenal embodiment	p. 206
Effective embodiment	p. 209
Boundary disputes	p. 215
Monist alternatives	p. 224
Minimalism and possession	p. 227
Simple Selves	p. 236
Simplicity and isolation	p. 236
Isolation: strands of a defence	p. 238
Reductio?	p. 245
Minimal subjects	p. 249
A minimal modification, and a moral	p. 251
Weak unity	p. 254
Holism	p. 264
Unity and interdependence	p. 264
Interdependent potentials	p. 266
Phenomenal interdependence	p. 272
Organization and interference	p. 273
C-holism	p. 277
From C-holism to power holism	p. 289
Power systematicity	p. 300
Simplicity	p. 307
Modes of Incapacitation	p. 311
Absoluteness	p. 311
Some varieties of incapacitation	p. 313
Brains	p. 316
Cyclical subjects	p. 319
Congenial decomposition	p. 321
Assessments	p. 325
Deviancy	p. 331
Teleportation revisited	p. 336
From Egos to C-systems	p. 338
Objections and Replies	p. 341
Ontological qualms	p. 341
Issues of substance	p. 342
Unity and independence	p. 344
Menacing circularities	p. 348
Ownership, isolation and holism	p. 354
Power worlds	p. 359
The Topology of the Self	p. 364
Fission	p. 364
Fission as fatal	p. 368
Can consciousness divide?	p. 370
Overlap to the rescue?	p. 373
Time travel and double existence	p. 378
Personal and phenomenal time	p. 381
Non-linearity	p. 385
Time and times	p. 389
Issues and objections	p. 393
Fusion	p. 400
The many shapes of life	p. 406
Appendix: Reductionism	p. 409
Bibliography	p. 418
Index	p. 427
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