Subjective character of experience
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That all subjective phenomena are associated with a single point of view ("ego") is called the subjective character of experience. The term was coined and illuminated by Thomas Nagel in his famous paper "What is it like to be a bat?"
Because bats are apparently conscious mammals with an entirely different way of perceiving their environments than the way in which human beings do, we can conclude that we know that there is something that it is like to be a bat, but not what it is like for a bat. While the example of the bat is particularly illustrative, any conscious species might fit. Further, any organism would work, as each organism has a unique point of view from which no other organism can gather experience.[citation needed]
Nagel claims that the subjective character of experience implies the cognitive closure of the human mind to some facts, specifically the way in which physical states create mental ones.
[edit] See also
- Dualism (philosophy of mind)
- Inverted spectrum
- Functionalism
- The map is not the territory
- Mary's Room
- Philosophy of mind
- Philosophy of perception
- Physicalism
- Qualia
- Zombies
