Consciousness and Cosmos

The Faculty of Philosophy at the John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin invites everyone to a series of seminars Consciousness and Cosmos by Professor Yujin Nagasawa from John Hick Centre for Philosophy of Religion, University of Birmingham, UK. The seminars will take place on October 23-24, 2018. Participation is free but registration through the website is required. Deadline for the registration is October 20. More details can be found at kul.pl/Nagasawa. In case of any inquiries, please contact Jacek Jarocki ([email protected]).

Seminar 1: The Knowledge Argument and Consciousness

The knowledge argument is one of the most powerful arguments against the materialist approach to the problem of consciousness. I develop a response to the argument by comparing it with an argument against God’s omniscience in the philosophy of religion. I argue that my comparison motivates Russellian monism, which includes a version of panpsychism.

Seminar 2: Panpsychisms

Panpsychism was once dismissed as a highly counterintuitive, if not an absurd, view. Karl Popper, for example, said that the view was based on an assumption that is ‘either trivial and completely verbal, or grossly misleading’. Over the last twenty years, however, panpsychism has been revived as a novel alternative to materialism. In this seminar, I critically examine panpsychism. I argue that although panpsychism makes progress towards solving the hard problem of consciousness the truth of the view cannot be demonstrated.

Seminar 3: Panpsychism, Pantheism and Cosmopsychism

Panpsychism says that phenomenality is everywhere. Pantheism says that divinity is everywhere. These views appear parallel initially and that is why they are often contrasted or conflated. I argue, however, that panpsychism is not exactly parallel to pantheism. What is parallel to pantheism is cosmopsychism, which says that divinity is everywhere throughout the cosmos because the cosmos as a whole is phenomenal, not that because everything in the cosmos is phenomenal. I consider if cosmopsychism entails pantheism.

Seminar 4: The Problem of Evil for Pantheism

Critics often claim that the problem of evil constitutes the most powerful argument against traditional theism. In fact, many of them reject traditional theism and subscribe to atheism or pantheism precisely because they do not think that traditional theism can successfully respond to this problem. I argue, however, that the problem of evil is not a problem only for traditional theism. There is a version of the problem of evil that applies to atheism and pantheism as well. Moreover, I argue that it is particularly forceful against atheism and pantheism because they face a significant disadvantage compared with traditional theism in responding to this version of the problem.