---
abstract: 'Little is gained, and much lost, by casting an empirical theory of previous consciousness in a "functionalist" philosophical mold. Consciousness Explained is an instructive failure. It resurrects various behaviorist dogmas; it denies consciousness any distinct cognitive ontology; it obliquely adopts many long-standing research positions relating parallel and sequential processing to consciousness, yet denies the core assumption which produced this research; it takes parallel processing ("Multiple Drafts") to be incompatible with educated common-sense views of consciousness (the "Cartesian Theater"), while in fact parallel processing is compatible with some Cartesian Theater views. Contrary to Dennett, the Cartesian Theater does not necessarily imply that contents must fully "arrive" in consciousness at a single, specifiable instant; criticism of the Cartesian Theater based on this attribution is thus without force. And if consciousness is a distinct information-bearing medium, functionalist attempts to "explain" consciousness are inherently inadequate.'
altloc: []
chapter: ~
commentary: ~
commref: ~
confdates: ~
conference: ~
confloc: ~
contact_email: ~
creators_id:
- mangan@cogsci.berkeley.edu
creators_name:
- family: Mangan
given: Bruce B.
honourific: Dr.
lineage: ''
date: 1993
date_type: published
datestamp: 2011-08-30 04:22:41
department: ~
dir: disk0/00/00/75/88
edit_lock_since: ~
edit_lock_until: 0
edit_lock_user: ~
editors_id: []
editors_name: []
eprint_status: archive
eprintid: 7588
fileinfo: application/pdf;http://cogprints.org/7588/1/Mangan_1993_DennettConsciousnessAndTheSorrowsOfFunctionalism_ConsciousnessAndCognition.pdf
full_text_status: public
importid: ~
institution: ~
isbn: ~
ispublished: pub
issn: ~
item_issues_comment: []
item_issues_count: 0
item_issues_description: []
item_issues_id: []
item_issues_reported_by: []
item_issues_resolved_by: []
item_issues_status: []
item_issues_timestamp: []
item_issues_type: []
keywords: 'Consciousness Explained, Daniel C. Dennett, Functionalism, Medium Hypothesis, Meta Cognition, Multiple Drafts'
lastmod: 2011-08-30 04:22:41
latitude: ~
longitude: ~
metadata_visibility: show
note: ~
number: 1
pagerange: 1-17
pubdom: FALSE
publication: Consciousness and Cognition
publisher: ~
refereed: TRUE
referencetext: ~
relation_type: []
relation_uri: []
reportno: ~
rev_number: 16
series: ~
source: ~
status_changed: 2011-08-30 04:22:41
subjects:
- phil-mind
succeeds: ~
suggestions: ~
sword_depositor: ~
sword_slug: ~
thesistype: ~
title: 'Dennett, Consciousness, and the Sorrows of Functionalism'
type: journalp
userid: 14191
volume: 2