Written in March 2018 for an undergraduate philosophy course on the philosophy of mind

I will argue that Dennett’s attempts to knock down the intuitions of qualia have failed and that the burden of proof remains on the denier.

Dennett makes his mistake by falsely attributing certain characteristics to qualia. Of the characteristics he attributes to qualia, only “ineffable” is accurate. Dennett would probably say, maybe nothing is really there if we cannot describe it? I reply that they are ineffable because language is only available to describe objective phenomena, while qualia only occur from a single viewpoint. Further, it is this subjective component of consciousness that is “directly apprehensible”, “private” and “intrinsic” in consciousness – not experience (qualia). This essay will show how Dennett wrongfully attributes these characteristics of subjectivity to qualitative experience (qualia) to make it seem like there are no qualia in consciousness. I defend the intuitive foundation of qualia.

In “Quining Qualia”, Dennett argues that “conscious experience has no properties that are special in any of the ways that qualia have been supposed to be special” and that therefore it makes sense to declare there is no such thing as qualia (Dennett 1-2). Qualia are the way things are, or in other words, the “raw feels” or the “qualitative character of experience” (Dennett 2). How is Dennett seemingly able to deny something that is obvious to us all? He does this by performing a trick that is tantamount to pointing to the “tails” side of a coin, and declaring that the “tails” side must not be there because it does not have the characteristics of the “heads” side of the coin. Except, he performs this trick on our minds, which makes it incredibly convincing. Kierkegaard would rightfully describe Dennett as a speculative philosopher who “confuses himself with humanity at large, whereby he becomes something infinitely great – and at the same time nothing at all” (Kierkegaard 206). He has wilfully forgotten that he is a subject of experience.

How is Dennett seemingly able to deny something that is obvious to us all? He does this by performing a trick that is tantamount to pointing to the “tails” side of a coin, and declaring that the “tails” side must not be there because it does not have the characteristics of the “heads” side of the coin.

It is necessary to begin by describing in detail the difference between the subjective and qualitative experience (qualia) components of consciousness. More importantly, it is necessary to explain why these components are inextricably linked but conceptually different and analogical to “two sides of a coin”, which explains how Dennett performs his trick. Uriah Kriegel best describes the distinction between the two components of consciousness. He gives the following example:

“Suppose…that you suddenly hear a distant bagpipe. In your auditory experience of the bagpipe you are aware primarily, or explicitly of the bagpipe sound; but you are also implicitly aware that this auditory experience of the bagpipe is yourexperience. That is, you are aware of yourself as the subject of expérience” (Kriegel 104).

To clarify even further, if Dennett thinks to himself, “I do not like the taste of the cauliflower”, he is aware of two things: (a) the experience of not liking the taste (qualia), and further that (b) the experience of not liking the taste belongs to him (subjectivity).

Any statement of consciousness necessarily involves these two distinct but inextricable components. In Nagel’s paper “What is it like to be a bat?” he brought attention to the importance of the subjective character of experience. Experience occurs subjectively, which means that it occurs from a single viewpoint. To summarize his point quickly, Nagel asks, “what would be left of what it was like to be a bat if one removed the viewpoint of the bat?” (Nagel 443). This is what Dennett does: he first neglects the importance of the “viewpoint of the bat” component and secondly, he attacks the existence of the “What it is like” component of consciousness by attributing to it characteristics that it does not have but that we intuitively attribute to the subjective component of consciousness. Intuitively, the difference between subjectivity and experience is not extremely clear. However, since it is clear conceptually, I will be able to show how he conflates these separate notions to unfairly attack our intuition of qualia.

This is what Dennett does: he first neglects the importance of the “viewpoint of the bat” component and secondly, he attacks the existence of the “What it is like” component of consciousness by attributing to it characteristics that it does not have but that we intuitively attribute to the subjective component of consciousness.

I will now move on to showing exactly how he does this by analyzing two of his intuition pumps. In Dennett’s Intuition Pump #7, he describes the story of Chase and Sanborn, two coffee-tasters responsible for maintaining the flavour of Maxwell House Coffee (Dennett 7). After years of working, both Chase and Sanborn no longer enjoy the taste of the coffee. Chase reports that he stopped liking the taste of the coffee because he has become a more sophisticated coffee drinker and so his standards of taste have changed (Dennett 7). Sanborn, on the other hand, says that he no longer likes the taste because his taste buds have changed, not because his standards have changed (Dennett 7). Dennett goes on to point out that they are making statements that rely on their memory. Both of them, therefore, cannot know whether the shift in taste-experience is one or the other since both are equally plausible but equally unknowable due to reliance on memory (Dennett 8). For Dennett, this is an indication that Chase and Sanborn do not have qualia, because if they did, they would be exactly aware of whether their standards of coffee changed or whether their taste buds changed. In other words, he is saying, one cannot have direct knowledge of their qualia, so what qualia are people talking about? Dennett does acknowledge that people respond to his claim by saying something along the lines of “I know how it is with me right now” but he rejects this in a weak ad hominem manner by stating that “perhaps people just want to reaffirm their sense of proprietorship over their conscious states” (Dennett 8).

I reply that it is not that they want to reaffirm their sense of proprietorship; it is that they do have proprietorship over the shift of sense-experience, and that is exactly the point I am making. The shift of the taste of the coffee occurred for both Chase and Sanborn, either through changing taste buds or changing preferences. For Dennett, it is not enough that Chase and Sanborn have direct knowledge of the occurrence of a shift in qualia that belongs to them; they must be able to identify with perfect accuracy what this shift consists of or else there is no qualia. This train of thought only appears to bring down the intuition of qualia because he chooses to apply the characteristic of “direct access” to the qualitative component of consciousness, even though it actually applies to the subjective component of consciousness.

When one says that one is directly and infallibly accessing conscious experience, one is referring to the fact that the experience belongs to oneself and not the sense-experience itself. The characteristic of consciousness that is “directly apprehensible in consciousness” actually applies to the fact that tasting the coffee is your experience and not the knowledge of the taste-experience itself. For instance, if you were kicked in the shin, you would be directly aware that the experience belongs to you. There is no way to deny that this component of consciousness, the “belonging-to”, is directly accessible. You know the qualia belongs to you, and you use your memory and senses to understand the qualia, but our memory and senses are fallible so our access to qualia is not a wholly direct one. In all the three options that Dennett gives for Chase and Sanborn, in which he claims they cannot know which one truly occurred, he is acknowledging that a shift in taste-experience has occurred for them. Clearly, if one has bad hearing, bad taste buds, or bad eyesight, their knowledge of sense-experience (qualia) shifts will be weaker, but the knowledge that the experience is theirs cannot weaken. Subjectivity is what one has “direct infallible access” to in consciousness, yet since he applies this characteristic to the “raw feels” of consciousness instead, he is able to take down his straw man of qualia.

Clearly, if one has bad hearing, bad taste buds, or bad eyesight, their knowledge of sense-experience (qualia) shifts will be weaker, but the knowledge that the experience is theirs cannot weaken.

In Intuition Pump #5: the Neurological Prank, “you wake up one morning to find that the grass has turned red, the sky yellow, and so forth” (Dennett 5). He admits that here it seems, intuitively, that qualia are acceptable properties after all, but then goes on to suggest this is a mistake in Intuition pump #6: alternative neurosurgery. He suggests that an evil neurosurgeon would be able to create the effect of inverted qualia by either changing the qualia or by changing the memory-access to the previous qualia (Dennett 6). Like the Chase and Sanborn thought experiment, he comes to the conclusion that there is nothing there if one cannot be sure of which neuropsychological event occurred, since one could better determine what changed with outside help (Dennett 6).

However, at least, this time he vaguely acknowledges the argument I am making: “[Some] suppose that the subject’s noticing the difference — surely a vivid discovery by the subject – would have to be an instance of (directly? Incorrigibly?) recognizing the difference as a shift in qualia” (Dennett 6). He dismisses this by saying that those who argue this miss that the memory link in the intrapersonal inverted spectrum “is analogous to the imaginary cable that might link two subjects in the original version [interpersonal inversion]” (Dennett 6). To clarify, he is saying, that since changing memory could give the illusion that something changed, even though nothing did change, that memory is a link between two things that are not really there (no qualia), so it is not a link at all. He also suggests this link is analogous to comparing the qualia of two separate individuals.

Dennett unknowingly concedes that he is neglecting the importance of subjectivity in consciousness since there is nothing analogous about comparing the qualia of two subjects and comparing the qualia of one subject, since subjectivity is what is intrinsic about consciousness. He misses the point of what is intrinsic about consciousness entirely. After missing the importance of subjectivity, he goes on to apply a characteristic of subjectivity (it being “directly accessible”), to the qualia of the inverted spectrum to claim there are no qualia. It is this ongoing conflation of characteristics of the two components of consciousness that allows Dennett to deny, and convincingly so, that there are no qualia – something that we are all aware of every morning the moment we wake up and turn on the light.

After missing the importance of subjectivity, he goes on to apply a characteristic of subjectivity (it being “directly accessible”), to the qualia of the inverted spectrum to claim there are no qualia.

Daniel Dennett has achieved what I previously thought was impossible – to somehow convincingly argue that qualitative experience does not exist and is not worthy of philosophical inquiry. I have argued that he ultimately failed, since qualia are ineffable but that he seemed to show that “nothing is there” by merely showing that qualia do not have characteristics that they do not have. This argument appeared to alter our intuitions about qualia only because intuitively we attribute the characteristics of “directly accessible”, “private” and “intrinsic” to something in consciousness, and that is subjectivity. Dennett’s choice to use words like “subjective” and “experience” almost interchangeably throughout his paper, along with his choice to apply characteristics of subjectivity to qualia, has led him to achieve nothing more than beautiful sophistry. Qualia are left “unquined”, and I will continue to enjoy the reliably pleasing qualia of my daily morning coffee.

Works Cited

Dennett, Daniel C. “Quining qualia.” Consciousness in modern science. Oxford University Press, 1988.

Harman, Gilbert. “The intrinsic quality of experience.” Philosophical perspectives 4 (1990): 31-52.

Kierkegaard, Soren. “Concluding Unscientific Poscript.” A Kierkegaard Anthology, Princeton University, 1973, pp. 190–252.

Kriegel, Uriah. “Consciousness as intransitive self-consciousness: Two views and an argument.” Canadian Journal of Philosophy 33.1 (2003): 103-132.

Nagel, Thomas. “What is it like to be a bat?.” The philosophical review 83.4 (1974): 435-450.