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selylindi comments on The supposedly hard problem of consciousness and the nonexistence of sense data: Is your dog a conscious being? - Less Wrong
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Comments (18)
There are fMRI studies like this one that are are trying some clever methods that may begin to reveal such structures. Qualia are obviously a real phenomena experienced by either all people or a great many people, so the whole project of coming up with philosophical reasons to close off scientific inquiry into them seems misguided. We can be materialists without insisting that there are no important mysteries remaining to understand about material!
It's not a matter of closing off inquiry. Rational argument (metaphysical analysis) is never certain. I wouldn't say I'm more than 85% or 90% sure of the correctness of these conclusions. I don't believe actual inifinities exist (sorry, you can't do ontology if you taboo "exists"!)—but that doesn't mean I would close off scientific inquiry into theories that assume they do exist. Deny that qualia exist doesn't close off scientific inquiry, but what you're suggesting is closing off rational thinking about what could be true.