Talk:Heterophenomenology

message: This article is currently nothing more than two quotations slapped together. Anyone want to work on it?  —  Adam Conover † 05:32, Jun 12, 2004 (UTC)
Adam,
I'd be happy to work on it some more, but Dennett's paper seems like the right place to go for more on the topic.  What do you suggest?  —  Muness
I added a bit more here, but perhaps it could be fleshed out further.  I also set up a redirect from autophenomenology. Alienus 20:45, 7 February 2006 (UTC)

message: I've reverted your changes, not because I think you intend to harm the article, but because they were — variously — redundant, wordy or misleading.  Please talk about your changes here.  If you keep reverting back to your version, this is edit-warring, which goes against Wikipedia rules.  Let's talk about this and come to some consensus. Alienus 21:32, 20 March 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Sorry, Alienus - I'm new to Wikipedia and didn't realize that someone was actually "reverting" my changes -- I thought they weren't going through.  You seem to miss an important point at the end of your post -- that what begins as methodology in Dennett winds up being substance; heterophenomenology is introduced, in Consciousness Explained, as simply a method; Dennett deliberately brackets the question of qualia, not because, at the beginning, he believes they don't exist, but because he thinks there can be no reliable accounts of them.  Heterophenomenology, as a method, is agnostic on the question of subjective phenomenon.   But, by the end of the book, as the quote you selected betrays, Dennett winds up saying that heterophenomenology reproduces the complete set of conscious data -- that there is nothing more to consciousness than what his method revealed.  This is a famous mistake in his argument, and worth pointing out I think.  I also think my edits weren't redundant (that point had not been made), wordy (they were rather concise -- even pithy) or misleading -- indeed, including the quote you did at the end of the entry without calling attention to the slippage from method to substance is dangerously misleading. (unsigned by Merlothemagnificent)
When I reverted your changes, I knew there was something biased and misleading about them, but couldn't spell it out in full detail.  Now, thanks to your clarification, I can.
From the moment Dennett introduces heterophenomenology in Consciousness Explained, his goal is to render qualia irrelevant and unmotivated so he can throw the concept out.  It's not that he starts off with just a methodology and then makes the "mistake" of confusing it with ontology; he never for a moment believed qualia existed.  We know this because he said so in as many words, years before this book, in an essay entitled "Quining Qualia".
The only people who would call this entirely intentional progression a "mistake" are those who, like Chalmers, hold out for the existence of qualia despite Dennett's arguments.  These people, unfortunately, not only disagree with Dennett but demonstrably fail to understand his arguments.  As a consequence, attempts by such people to summarize Dennett tend to be rather inaccurate.
When you add a bunch of words that serve only to spread this inaccurate view, they come across as redundant at best, wordy at the least, and in the end, misleading. Alienus 07:41, 21 March 2006 (UTC)

text: There may well be some notion of qualia that remains untouched by Dennett's arguments.  However, it may be clearer to just use a different term to describe these residuals, to avoid confusion.  Whatever we call them, though, they are not a threat to physicalism, the way Chalmers' qualia are. Al 16:01, 20 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Well, there are plenty,probably the majority, of philosophers of mind who are non-reductive physicalists and  argue  that qualia in any sense are  not a threat to physicalism. Probably Dennett would argue that such a position is not very strong. In any case, even coming up with a new term for different senses of qualia would constitute original research for the purposes of an Encyclopedia. We should leave to Dennett to define the kind of eliminativist he is or is not. From some of the things he writes I get the impression that he seems to want to leave it an open question and is not very concerned about such labels. As long as there is no real controversy here anymore--you both seem to agree that he is a qualia eliminativist of some kind and were apparently arguing about wether that is good or bad (a POV issue)--- it's not really necessary to add confusing distinctions. I was just making an observation that struck me as a possible cause of so much confusion and angry debate on this issue: different interpretations of the same term. Just trying to help.--Lacatosias 07:57, 21 June 2006 (UTC)

text: In fact, I notice that qualia is not directly addressed in the article anyway. So I would just leave it at that.--Lacatosias 08:00, 21 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Changes by 198.182.154.4  

message: This article appears well written and internally consistent but depends upon only two references. It contains statements which do not appear to be wikiverifiable except using material written by Dennett himself. Is the subject truly notable in the greater world or only within the context of Dennett's opinions? Needs more references.Trilobitealive (talk) 19:06, 18 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Notability is not an issue, because Dennett is one of the world's leading philosophers and this is one of his most important ideas. I agree that the criticism section needs more material and references. His idea is not widely accepted, and there is plenty of literature to show this. We just need someone to do the research. ---- CharlesGillingham (talk) 17:50, 1 May 2012 (UTC)
thread_title: Addition of a <nowiki>{{refimprove}}</nowiki> flag today

message: --How about this reference as a critiqueMax Velmans, Heterophenomenology vs. critical phenomenology ...https://philpapers.org/rec/VELHVC; Has Mr. Dennett taken liberty with the direction of 'that which appears'; appears in context is a phenomenon; appears is a question; thanks...Arnlodg (talk) 22:41, 8 April 2019 (UTC)
replies: text: Your proposed addition appears to only be supported by a WP:primary source, a research paper.  As I've mentioned to you before, Wikipedia standards say primary sources alone, like research papers, are not enough to support content, they need to be backed up by secondary sources, such as survey articles or textbooks, see WP:PSTS. Thanks --ChetvornoTALK 21:18, 14 April 2019 (UTC)
thread_title:  Add Critique to Content