A “quale” (singular form) is a brain state with the following properties: (a) like the abnormal activation of a colorblind synesthete’s color pathways in the occipital lobe, or like the first-ever feeling of sexual desire, it is in principle an objectively measurable event with detectable correlates in brain and body, and (b) it’s incommunicable.
Ahh, I was fully on board until the 'incommunicable'. Not even sure what it means to say something's uncommunicable by definition, except that it seems to introduce a brand new element of mystery. Is the 'quale', then, the element of the redness that doesn't go across when I tell the other person about the letterbox? Sounds like putting a name on 'the stuff we don't fully understand yet' - not helpful.
To be honest though, it's not a particularly interesting question. We are physics. All we're doing is shedding light on the particular oddities that arise from experiencing the brain from the inside - there are no deep insights here for me.
Sounds like putting a name on 'the stuff we don't fully understand yet' - not helpful.
Helpful. We need to put labels on Stuff We Don't Understand yet so that we know what we are talking about when we try t understand it.
http://esr.ibiblio.org/?p=1192#more-1192
ADDED: Even if you disagree with ESR's take, and many will, this is the clearest definition I have seen on what qualia is. So it should present a useful starting point, even for those who strongly disagree, to argue from.