People
Galen Strawson

Galen Strawson Quotes

Total quotes: 2

Galen Strawson

Birthname

Birthplace: England, United Kingdom

Nationality: United Kingdom

Occupations: University Teacher, Philosopher

Total quotes: 2

“It’s ironic that the people who are most likely to doubt or deny the existence of consciousness (on the ground that everything is physical, and that consciousness can’t possibly be physical) are also those who are most insistent on the primacy of science, because it is precisely science that makes the key point shine most brightly: the point that there is a fundamental respect in which ultimate intrinsic nature of the stuff of the universe is unknown to us — except insofar as it is consciousness.”

— Galen Strawson, Consciousness Isn’t a Mystery. It’s Matter.

“We know what conscious experience is because the having is the knowing: Having conscious experience is knowing what it is. You don’t have to think about it (it’s really much better not to). You just have to have it. It’s true that people can make all sorts of mistakes about what is going on when they have experience, but none of them threaten the fundamental sense in which we know exactly what experience is just in having it.

‘Yes, but what is it?’ At this point philosophers like to give examples: smelling garlic, experiencing pain, orgasm. Ned Block replies by adapting the response Louis Armstrong reportedly gave to someone who asked him what jazz was: ‘If you gotta ask, you ain’t never going to know.”

— Galen Strawson, Consciousness Isn’t a Mystery. It’s Matter.

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