Knowledge Tree
physical properties
Also known as: physical property
Facts (68)
Sources
Non-physicalist Theories of Consciousness cambridge.org Dec 20, 2023 18 facts
referenceMontero (2006) discusses the objection that energy could be a neutral property rather than a physical one, and that non-physical things might possess physical energy.
claimPhysical properties have realizers that possess phenomenal or protophenomenal properties.
claimSubjective idealism differs from dual-aspect monism by asserting that the single substance possesses only mental properties throughout, and that physical properties are observer-dependent and not fully real.
claimDual-aspect monism posits that the physical and mental (or protomental) are two complementary aspects of a single underlying substance, where physical properties appear from a third-person, scientific perspective, and mental properties appear from a first-person, introspective perspective.
claimNon-reductive physicalism, as described by Donald Davidson in 1980, asserts that phenomenal properties are not identical to physical properties, but that specific instances of phenomenal properties are fully constituted by instances of physical properties.
claimDefining physical properties as those described by a future, completed physics leads to the objection that we do not know what that future physics will look like, potentially allowing anything to count as physical.
claimOntic structural realism is the position that all physical properties are purely structural or relational, possessing no intrinsic realizers or relata.
claimDispositionalism is the view that fundamental physical properties are nothing more than brute dispositions or potentials, a position argued by philosophers such as Sydney Shoemaker (1980) and Stephen Mumford (2004).
claimProperty dualism differs from dual-aspect monism by asserting that physical and mental properties are causally related or sharply distinct, rather than being complementary aspects, and typically posits that only some things possess mental properties.
claimPhysicalism differs from dual-aspect monism by asserting that the single substance possesses only physical properties throughout, with mental properties being constituted by physical properties.
claimOne proposed resolution to Hempel's dilemma is to define physical properties as those described by a completed physics that is continuous with current physics.
claimSubjective idealism posits that only mental properties are fundamental, while physicalism posits that only physical properties are fundamental.
claimDual-aspect monists argue that physical properties are structural, relational, or dispositional, and that these structural properties have realizers with intrinsic or non-relational categorical properties.
claimProperty dualists argue that it is metaphysically possible for phenomenal consciousness to inhere in a substance that does not have physical properties, while maintaining that this is nomologically impossible (incompatible with actual psychophysical laws).
claimDual-aspect monism posits that everything, including particles, possesses both a physical and a (proto)mental aspect because (proto)consciousness is the intrinsic nature of physical properties, which physics describes only as structural or relational.
referenceDefining physical properties as those described by the science of physics is an alternative to defining physical as material, because modern physics recognizes that many things, such as certain particles, lack properties traditionally associated with matter like mass, solidity, or extension.
claimDispositionalism is the position that all physical properties are dispositional, possessing no categorical grounds or aspects.
claimDual-aspect monism is defined by the view that phenomenal properties are either fundamental or constituted by protophenomenal properties, and that physical properties are relations between or structures of these phenomenal or protophenomenal properties.
The Hard Problem of Consciousness | Springer Nature Link link.springer.com 16 facts
claimThe arguments regarding the irreducibility of consciousness postulate an explanatory gap between physical and phenomenal accounts, implying an ontological distinction between phenomenal and physical properties.
claimA non-reductive naturalistic theory of consciousness may propose natural supervenience of phenomenal properties on physical properties, provided it incorporates additional natural principles not found in physical law.
claimDavid Chalmers's theory of mind posits that the phenomenal character of experience is irreducible to physical properties, which implies the existence of an additional ontic category without necessarily requiring non-physical 'stuff'.
perspectiveThe author of the text argues that the 'hard problem' of consciousness is largely a problem of definition, as 'functional' can be defined in various ways and is not the only way to distinguish between physical and phenomenal properties.
claimPhenomenal properties of consciousness might represent a separate ontic category obeying 'psychophysical principles' that differ from those governing physical properties, while specifying how phenomenal or protophenomenal properties depend on physical properties.
claimDavid Chalmers argues that because there is a subjective experience of being, consciousness cannot be explained solely in terms of physical properties and must be based on an irreducible fundamental non-physical ontic category.
claimThe core assumption of David Chalmers's 'hard problem of consciousness' is the irreducibility of consciousness to physical properties.
claimDavid Chalmers relates 'property dualism' to both the phenomenal and physical properties of an individual, and to emergent ontic properties of an underlying, more fundamental ontic substance.
claimThe hard problem of consciousness, as discussed in the context of the Springer Nature chapter, involves the question of the nature of the correlation between phenomenal and physical properties of consciousness.
claimEven if humans possessed precise knowledge about the physical properties of a bat's sonar system, it would remain impossible to know what it is like to be a bat, illustrating the limitation of physical knowledge in understanding subjective experience.
claimThe decisive requirement for Russellian panpsychism and the hard problem of consciousness is finding a logically necessary relation between physical and protophenomenal properties.
claimSome ontologies treated as 'monisms' suggest that both physical and phenomenal properties supervene on, or are aspects of, a more fundamental ontic category or principle, thereby avoiding the problem of treating them as two separate existing categories.
claimDavid Chalmers does not consider a priori entailment between phenomenal and physical properties to be a necessary requirement for his theory of consciousness, preferring instead to rely on a contingent principle to explain the relationship.
claimDavid Chalmers defines the physical as properties that can be sufficiently described from a third-person perspective, in contrast to phenomenal properties which can only be described from a first-person view.
claimRussellian monism is not affected by the conceivability argument or the knowledge argument, and it supports a naturalist view on consciousness while integrating phenomenal and physical properties.
claimDavid Chalmers transforms the epistemological explanatory gap into an ontological gap between physical and phenomenal properties by arguing for the necessity of additional ontic categories.
Good Old-Fashioned Artificial Consciousness and the Intermediate ... frontiersin.org Apr 17, 2018 6 facts
referenceThe authors cite Manzotti (2006, 2017) and Manzotti and Chella (2016) as sources for the theory that the physical properties of the external world might be the same as the properties of conscious experience.
perspectiveThe author argues that the hypothesis that physical properties and subjective properties are different is self-confuting, because if they were different, humans could never perceive physical properties.
claimThe hypothesis that physical properties are different from subjective (phenomenal) properties is unproven and serves as the foundation for the 'hard problem' framework.
perspectiveThe 'hard problem' of consciousness relies on the premise that subjective and physical properties are alien to each other, a premise that is not experimental in nature and can be questioned.
claimThe 'hard problem' of consciousness, as defined by David Chalmers, creates a conceptual gap between subjective phenomenal experience and physical properties, leading to the conclusion that robots cannot be genuinely conscious because physical implementation alone is insufficient.
claimThe authors argue that the same object can appear different to different agents because physical properties are relative to the physical system observing them, similar to how an object's velocity is relative to different frames of reference.
Hard Problem of Consciousness | Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy iep.utm.edu 6 facts
claimIn a dual-aspect view, phenomenal properties are not reducible to physical properties, and the instantiation of these properties may depend on the configuration of the basic substance (e.g., a brain vs. a table).
claimNeutral monism, panpsychism, and dualism all share the premise that consciousness is as basic as, or more basic than, physical properties.
claimConsciousness epiphenomenalism is a view that accepts the causal closure of physics but maintains that phenomenal properties are metaphysically distinct from physical properties, asserting that while physical events can cause conscious properties, conscious properties cannot cause physical events.
claimDual aspect theory, neutral monism, and panpsychism hold that phenomenal properties cannot be reduced to basic physical properties, but may reduce to a more basic substance that possesses both physical and phenomenal properties.
claimUnder epiphenomenalism, phenomenal properties are lawfully correlated with physical properties, ensuring that a phenomenal property of a particular type occurs whenever a brain event of a corresponding type occurs, even though the phenomenal property does not cause the physical behavior.
claimA dual-aspect view of consciousness holds that there is one basic underlying substance that possesses both physical and phenomenal properties.
Consciousness (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy/Fall 2025 ... plato.stanford.edu Jun 18, 2004 5 facts
claimThe multiple realization objection, proposed by Fodor (1974) and Hellman and Thompson (1975), argues that mental properties are abstract and can be realized by diverse structural or chemical substrates, making strict identity with physical properties impossible.
claimFundamental property dualism, as described by David Chalmers in 1996, regards conscious mental properties as basic constituents of reality, comparable to fundamental physical properties like electromagnetic charge, and asserts that their existence is not dependent on or derivative from other properties.
claimProperty dualism asserts the existence of conscious properties that are neither identical to nor reducible to physical properties, even though these conscious properties may be instantiated by the same entities that instantiate physical properties.
claimNeutral monist property dualism posits that both conscious mental properties and physical properties are dependent upon and derivative from a more basic level of reality that is neither mental nor physical, as proposed by Bertrand Russell (1927) and Galen Strawson (1994).
claimType-type identity theory defines mental properties as identical to physical properties, similar to how the property of being water is identical to the property of being composed of H2O molecules.
Dualism (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy/Winter 2016 Edition) plato.stanford.edu Aug 19, 2003 3 facts
claimThe mind-body problem is the philosophical inquiry into the relationship between the mind and the body, or between mental properties and physical properties.
claimPhysical properties, such as size, weight, shape, color, and motion through space and time, are public in the sense that they are in principle equally observable by anyone, sometimes requiring scientific equipment.
claimInteractionism faces a significant objection because mental properties, states, or substances are often considered to be of radically different kinds from physical ones, which supposedly prevents the communality necessary for interaction.
Quantum Approaches to Consciousness plato.stanford.edu Nov 30, 2004 2 facts
claimRussell and the neo-Russellians posit that the compositional arrangements of psychophysically neutral elements determine the differences between mental and physical properties, rendering both reducible to a neutral domain.
referenceDavid Chalmers' 1996 work on 'consciousness and information' classifies mental and physical properties as reducible to a psychophysically neutral domain.
Critique of Panpsychism: Philosophical Coherence and Scientific ... thequran.love May 7, 2025 2 facts
claimPhilosophically, panpsychism can be classified as either non-reductive physicalism or property dualism because particles are viewed as having both physical and mental properties.
claimCritics argue that panpsychism is a form of property dualism because it posits that matter possesses both physical properties and irreducible mental properties.
Non-Reductive Physicalism - Theories of Consciousness theoriesofconsciousness.com 2 facts
claimNon-reductive physicalism distinguishes itself from property dualism by maintaining that mental properties are entirely dependent on and determined by physical properties.
claimSupervenience in non-reductive physicalism is the principle that mental properties depend on physical properties, meaning no mental change can occur without a corresponding physical change, even though mental properties are not identical to physical ones.
Moving Forward on the Problem of Consciousness - David Chalmers consc.net 2 facts
Self-Consciousness - Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy plato.stanford.edu Jul 13, 2017 1 fact
claimHarry Frankfurt claims that defining personhood as having both mental and physical properties is inadequate because many non-person entities possess both.
Consciousness, Physicalism, and Panpsychism - R Discovery discovery.researcher.life May 1, 2013 1 fact
claimNeutral monism, as analyzed in the context of William James's philosophy, does not provide complete independence of a substance from mental and physical properties, which may lead the theory toward panpsychism unless it is an idealistic variety.
PANPSYCHISM (Philosophy of Mind Series) - Amazon.com amazon.com 1 fact
claimIn the author's idealist panpsychism, physical properties such as distance are defined as the reconciliation of structural features in the percepts of centers of experience, meaning distance is not an external or objective entity but is secondary to experience.
Panpsychism - Wikipedia en.wikipedia.org 1 fact
referenceIn the book 'Mortal Questions' (1979), Thomas Nagel argues that panpsychism follows from four premises: (P1) everything that exists is material, (P2) consciousness is irreducible to lower-level physical properties, (P3) consciousness exists, and (P4) higher-order properties of matter can be reduced to lower-level properties.
Episode 2: The Hard Problem of Consciousness – David Chalmers ... futurepointdigital.substack.com Jul 24, 2025 1 fact
claimDavid Chalmers supports property dualism, which is the idea that mental properties are not reducible to physical ones, even if they are tightly correlated.
Panpsychism - Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy plato.stanford.edu Jul 18, 2017 1 fact
claimThomas Nagel's argument for panpsychism relies on four premises: Material Composition (living organisms are complex material systems with no immaterial parts), Realism (mental states are genuine properties of living organisms), No Radical Emergence (all properties of a complex organism are intelligibly derived from the properties of its parts), and Non-Reductionism (mental states are not intelligibly derived from physical properties alone).