David Papineau

Nearly everybody nowadays accepts the 'causal completeness of physics' - every physical event (or at least its probability) has a full physical…

— David Papineau

My first degree was in mathematics. That was great, but it didn't help with many of the things that puzzled me. I…

— David Papineau

If there is such a simple argument for physicalism, how come everybody hasn't always been a physicalist? That's a good question, and…

— David Papineau

Kripke says that physicalists like me can't explain the 'apparent contingency' of mind-brain identities. He maintains that, if I really believed that…

— David Papineau

A certain kind of methodologically-minded philosopher of science is quick to read off metaphysical conclusions from features of scientific practice. Chemists don't…

— David Papineau

I think my view is rather more radical than Pete Mandik's. Both of us want to show that colour perception doesn't transcend…

— David Papineau

On the methodological issue, I think that would be hopeless to try to adjudicate between my view and orthodoxy by appeal to…

— David Papineau

Again, when we view a scene fleetingly, do we consciously see all the details even though we don't retain them, or do…

— David Papineau

Everybody agrees that a future in which you are dead is a very bad thing, and that it isn't made any better…

— David Papineau

I don't think that we can figure out what is going on in conscious colour perception just by phenomenological introspection. We need…

— David Papineau

In truth a clear-headed physicalist shouldn't be thinking any of these dualist thoughts. If pains are one and the same as C-fibres…

— David Papineau

The use of neuroscientific data to help resolve phenomenological questions is proving a common theme in much contemporary thinking about the mind.…

— David Papineau

Natural selection has ensured that each species achieves the requisite effect somehow, but it doesn't care, so to speak, how the trick…

— David Papineau

I realize that I won't have quite enough time to understand everything - but that hasn't stopped me wanting to understand as…

— David Papineau

Schrödinger's cat has a 50% quantum chance of coming out of the box alive and a 50% quantum chance of coming out…

— David Papineau

I favour an interpretation of quantum mechanics (the 'Everett interpretation') according to which reality branches in any chancy quantum situation. On this…

— David Papineau

Even if no learning to speak of was involved in locking my mental term onto doorknobs, it is odd to say that…

— David Papineau

Philosophers sometimes also use 'reductionist' more strictly, to mean 'type-identities' between mental and physical categories, and to exclude 'non-reductive physicalisms' like metaphysical…

— David Papineau

I don't have much use for the concept of innateness. The everyday concept incorporates a number of different notions that can come…

— David Papineau

The 'phenomenal concept' issue is rather different, I think. Here the question is whether there are concepts of experiences that are made…

— David Papineau

Of course our genes will make some capacities very much easier to learn than others, and of course our genes themselves are…

— David Papineau

If neuroscientific research shows that those mechanisms only contain comparative information about colour differences, and have 'thrown away' more fine-grained information about…

— David Papineau

The orthodox view of colour experience assumes that, when we see a colour difference between two surfaces viewed side-by-side, this is because…

— David Papineau

Of course, there remains the question of why we should find mind-brain identities so persistently counter-intuitive, if they are true. But this…

— David Papineau

This doesn't show that there is anything wrong with our theoretical understanding, any more than the intuition that the Earth is at…

— David Papineau