qualia - The 'what it's like' character of mental states. The way it feels to have mental states such as pain, seeing red, smelling a rose, etc

Plural for quale. "Quale" is a technical term introduced by C.I. Lewis (1929). A quale is an introspectible and seemingly monadic property of a sense-datum. For example, the qualia of a visual sense-datum of a rose would include the experienced red-ness, and the qualia of an olfactory sense-datum of a rose would include the sweet-ness of the scent.

Chris Eliasmith & P. Mandik

References

[Qualia Biblio]

Dennett, D.C. 1988. Quining qualia. In (A. Marcel & E. Bisiach, eds) Consciousness in Contemporary Science. Oxford University Press. [bookstore]

Kitcher, P.S. 1979. "Phenomenal qualities." American Philosophical Quarterly 16:123-9.

Horgan, T. 1987. "Supervenient qualia." Philosophical Review 96:491-520.

Lewis, D. 1995. "Should a materialist believe in qualia?" Australasian Journal of Philosophy 73:140-44.

Lewis, C.I. (1929) Mind and the world order. New York: C. Scribner's Sons. [bookstore]

Thanks to our sponsors: Logo design by logobee