Research On Tye's Materialism Without Phenomenal Concepts

Fixing the Explanatory Gap has in recent decades become one of the major problems for physicalism.This situation in result gave rise to the so-called Phenomenal Concept Strategy.In response to the objection of contingent identity,Neo-Physicalist like Loar proposed a posteriori versions of physicalism which holds a monistic ontology yet conceptually speaking endorses dualistic view.On the other hand,some philosophers,Michael Tye for example,claim that phenomenal concepts are nothing special,even cast doubt on the very existence of such thing.Tye's recent defense of physicalism totally ditched phenomenal concepts,his Physicalism without Phenomenal Concept confronts both physicalism with Phenomenal Concept Strategy and objections to physicalism in general,therefore it has received critical responses from both non-physicalists and physicalist camp within.The Phenomenal Concept Strategy is intended as a new frame against non-physicalism,it serves this purpose to some extent,but inevitably it also faces attacks from several different standpoints.So in the first chapter,we will present the general idea and different variations of Phenomenal Concept Strategy as well as its main objections.In the second chapter we will focus on the development arc of Tye's view on Phenomenal Concept Strategy,how he changed from an earlier endorser to its most noticeable antagonist.Later in the third chapter we will elaborate on Tye's Physicalism without Phenomenal Concept,he claims that there's no such thing as phenomenal concept at all,the concept we used to generate subjective feeling is no different than other concepts we have.Since he rejected phenomenal concepts,other defending strategies of physicalism has be proposed.In the final chapter,we will evaluate the overall viability of Tye's view on phenomenal concept,and also give summary to Phenomenal Concept Strategy and its objections as end of this essay.