The two-dimensional argument against materialism and its semantic premise

• Authors: Karol Polcyn
• Languages of publication: EN

Abstracts

EN

David Chalmers argues that zombies are possible because they are ideally conceivable and that therefore consciousness does not supervene on the physical. In this paper I discuss the most influential criticism of the conceivability-possibility principle in the current literature. According to that criticism, the conceivability-possibility principle is unjustified because it depends on a certain unjustified assumption concerning the semantic conditions under which necessary statements can be true a posteriori, namely that a posteriority is due to contingency at the reference-fixing level, so that a necessary statement can be true a posteriori only if at least one of the concepts flanking the identity sign refers contingently.

• Publisher: Instytut Filozofii - Uniwersytet Jagielloński
• Journal: Diametros
• Year: 2011
• Issue: 29
• Pages: 80-92

Contributors

author

Karol Polcyn

• Uniwersytet Szczeciński

References

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Identifiers

DOI

10.13153/diam.29.2011.447