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Why are dreams interesting for philosophers? The example of minimal phenomenal selfhood, plus an agenda for future research

This metatheoretical paper develops a list of new research targets by exploring particularly promising interdisciplinary contact points between empirical dream research and philosophy of mind. The central example is the MPS-problem. It is constituted by the epistemic goal of conceptually isolating a...

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Autor principal: Metzinger, Thomas
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Frontiers Media S.A. 2013
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3813926/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24198793
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2013.00746
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author Metzinger, Thomas
author_facet Metzinger, Thomas
author_sort Metzinger, Thomas
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description This metatheoretical paper develops a list of new research targets by exploring particularly promising interdisciplinary contact points between empirical dream research and philosophy of mind. The central example is the MPS-problem. It is constituted by the epistemic goal of conceptually isolating and empirically grounding the phenomenal property of “minimal phenomenal selfhood,” which refers to the simplest form of self-consciousness. In order to precisely describe MPS, one must focus on those conditions that are not only causally enabling, but strictly necessary to bring it into existence. This contribution argues that research on bodiless dreams, asomatic out-of-body experiences, and full-body illusions has the potential to make decisive future contributions. Further items on the proposed list of novel research targets include differentiating the concept of a “first-person perspective” on the subcognitive level; investigating relevant phenomenological and neurofunctional commonalities between mind-wandering and dreaming; comparing the functional depth of embodiment across dream and wake states; and demonstrating that the conceptual consequences of cognitive corruption and systematic rationality deficits in the dream state are much more serious for philosophical epistemology (and, perhaps, the methodology of dream research itself) than commonly assumed. The paper closes by specifying a list of potentially innovative research goals that could serve to establish a stronger connection between dream research and philosophy of mind.
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spelling pubmed-38139262013-11-06 Why are dreams interesting for philosophers? The example of minimal phenomenal selfhood, plus an agenda for future research Metzinger, Thomas Front Psychol Psychology This metatheoretical paper develops a list of new research targets by exploring particularly promising interdisciplinary contact points between empirical dream research and philosophy of mind. The central example is the MPS-problem. It is constituted by the epistemic goal of conceptually isolating and empirically grounding the phenomenal property of “minimal phenomenal selfhood,” which refers to the simplest form of self-consciousness. In order to precisely describe MPS, one must focus on those conditions that are not only causally enabling, but strictly necessary to bring it into existence. This contribution argues that research on bodiless dreams, asomatic out-of-body experiences, and full-body illusions has the potential to make decisive future contributions. Further items on the proposed list of novel research targets include differentiating the concept of a “first-person perspective” on the subcognitive level; investigating relevant phenomenological and neurofunctional commonalities between mind-wandering and dreaming; comparing the functional depth of embodiment across dream and wake states; and demonstrating that the conceptual consequences of cognitive corruption and systematic rationality deficits in the dream state are much more serious for philosophical epistemology (and, perhaps, the methodology of dream research itself) than commonly assumed. The paper closes by specifying a list of potentially innovative research goals that could serve to establish a stronger connection between dream research and philosophy of mind. Frontiers Media S.A. 2013-10-31 /pmc/articles/PMC3813926/ /pubmed/24198793 http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2013.00746 Text en Copyright © 2013 Metzinger. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/ This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
spellingShingle Psychology
Metzinger, Thomas
Why are dreams interesting for philosophers? The example of minimal phenomenal selfhood, plus an agenda for future research
title Why are dreams interesting for philosophers? The example of minimal phenomenal selfhood, plus an agenda for future research
title_full Why are dreams interesting for philosophers? The example of minimal phenomenal selfhood, plus an agenda for future research
title_fullStr Why are dreams interesting for philosophers? The example of minimal phenomenal selfhood, plus an agenda for future research
title_full_unstemmed Why are dreams interesting for philosophers? The example of minimal phenomenal selfhood, plus an agenda for future research
title_short Why are dreams interesting for philosophers? The example of minimal phenomenal selfhood, plus an agenda for future research
title_sort why are dreams interesting for philosophers? the example of minimal phenomenal selfhood, plus an agenda for future research
topic Psychology
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3813926/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24198793
http://dx.doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2013.00746
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