Can Science Explain Consciousness?

Science as one piece of a large puzzle

The idea that science (i.e., the physical/hard sciences, like biology, chemistry, and physics) is either the highest or the only means by which we ought to acquire knowledge has had a profound influence on the topic of understanding consciousness. We can see this influence quite vividly in Paul & Patricia Churchland’s eliminative materialism. The idea of eliminative materialism is that our common sense understanding of the mind, which is fundamentally an understanding from the subjective point-of-view, is a gravely erroneous assumption. In light of this, it eliminative materialists propose that only a mature science of the mind (in particular, a mature neuroscience of the mind) can give us a sufficient and correct understanding of the mind. Some eliminative materialists protest folk states of consciousness (e.g., beliefs, thoughts, perceptions, etc.). Others object to the “folk” concept of consciousness itself — or, more precisely, phenomenal consciousness (i.e., the fact that we have experiences/what-it-is-likeness), as Ned Block[i] puts it — believing that understanding consciousness will wholly depend upon a science of the mind. However, such views thwart the hard problem of consciousness, as posed by David Chalmers and the fact that consciousness is a multifaceted concept. Likewise, such views ignore Thomas Nagel’s…