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Single Idea 3138

[filed under theme 15. Nature of Minds / B. Features of Minds / 5. Qualia / a. Nature of qualia ]

Full Idea

The contents of thoughts, beliefs and desires seem quite distinct from qualia. Arithmetic has no particular feeling attached to it, and Freud showed that many propositional attitudes have no feeling at all, as they are unconscious.

Clarification

Beliefs and fears are examples of 'propositional attitudes'

Gist of Idea

Arithmetic and unconscious attitudes have no qualia

Source

Georges Rey (Contemporary Philosophy of Mind [1997], 1.1.2)

Book Ref

Rey,Georges: 'Contemporary Philosophy of Mind' [Blackwell 1997], p.19

A Reaction

I don't think we should rule out 'pre-conscious' qualia. The fact that advanced human mental capacities like arithmetic have thinned out their qualia doesn't count against qualia being essential to normal mental life.

The 17 ideas with the same theme [what we should take qualia to be]:

3151 Descartes put thought at the centre of the mind problem, but we put sensation [Rey on Descartes]
5788 The use of 'qualia' seems to imply that consciousness and qualia are separate [Searle]
5808 Qualia are just the properties objects are represented as having [Dretske]
4894 I say Mary does not have new knowledge, but knows an old fact in a new way [Perry on Jackson]
4895 Is it unfair that physicalist knowledge can be written down, but dualist knowledge can't be [Perry on Jackson]
4886 Mary knows all the physical facts of seeing red, but experiencing it is new knowledge [Jackson]
3360 Are pains pure qualia, or do they motivate? [Kim]
8209 Part of the folk concept of qualia is what makes recognition and comparison possible [Lewis]
4873 What is it like to notice an uncomfortable position when you are asleep? [Dennett]
6624 Dennett denies the existence of qualia [Dennett, by Lowe]
2584 Lobotomised patients can cease to care about a pain [Block]
3138 Arithmetic and unconscious attitudes have no qualia [Rey]
3142 Why qualia, and why this particular quale? [Rey]
4106 If someone removes their glasses the content of experience remains, but the quality changes [Crane]
2389 Sometimes we don't notice our pains [Chalmers]
2419 Why should qualia fade during silicon replacement? [Chalmers]
4905 Normal babies seem to have overlapping sense experiences [Carter,R]