Article ID: CBB202060374

Reconsidering the ignorabimus: Du Bois-Reymond and the hard problem of consciousness (2020)

unapi

In this paper I present an interpretation of du Bois-Reymond’s thesis on the impossibility of a scientific explanation of consciousness and of its present importance. I reconsider du Bois-Reymond’s speech “On the limits of natural science” (1872) in the context of nineteenth-century German philosophy and neurophysiology, pointing out connections and analogies with contemporary arguments on the “hard problem of consciousness.” Du Bois-Reymond’s position turns out to be grounded on an epistemological argument and characterized by a metaphysical skepticism, motivated by the unfruitful speculative tendency of contemporary German philosophy and natural science. In the final sections, I show how contemporary research can benefit from a reconsideration of this position and its context of emergence, which is a good vantage point to trace open problems in consciousness studies back to their historical development.

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Citation URI
https://data.isiscb.org/isis/citation/CBB202060374/

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Authors & Contributors
Polger, Thomas W.
Leblanc, Richard
Tye, Michael
Young, Allan
Walsh, D. M.
Thau, Michael
Concepts
Philosophy of mind
Consciousness
Neurophysiology
Psychology
Brain
Neurosciences
Time Periods
19th century
20th century
20th century, late
21st century
Medieval
20th century, early
Places
Germany
Great Britain
United States
Vienna (Austria)
Institutions
University of Chicago
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