Abstract

BERNAL-VELASQUEZ, Reinaldo J.. Microphysicalism and the scope of the zombie argument. Estud.filos [online]. 2019, n.59, pp.45-64. ISSN 0121-3628.  https://doi.org/10.17533/udea.ef.n59a03.

Chalmers’ (1996) zombie argument against physicalism (or ‘materialism’) about (phenomenal) consciousness supposes that every property of a composed physical system supervenes (logically) on the system’s fundamental constituents. In this paper, I discuss the significance of this supposition and I show that the philosophy of physics provides good grounds to resist it. As a result, I conclude that the zombie argument does not rule out a physicalist view of consciousness that conceives it as emergent in the sense of S-emergence (Howard, 2007). I finish by discussing some objections.

Keywords : philosophy of mind; zombie argument; phenomenal consciousness; physicalism; emergence.

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