What exactly are the boundaries around the things we are likely to call physical? Do all material things have mass? But some of the elements of theoretical physics might not have mass. Do they have to take up space, or have determinate spatial location? Again, some theoretical entities lack these as well. Galen Strawson doesn’t provide guidelines for what to regard as being physical or material, but he’s willing to enlarge the boundaries so that consciousness counts as a physical entity.
It’s a bold and somewhat bewildering claim. One of the ways we’re likely to demarcate the physical is by excluding ideas or concepts from it. Ideas and concepts aren’t the same as consciousness, but they seem closely related — you need consciousness to experience ideas and concepts. Thinking of consciousness as physical runs against that line of thought, but why not? My own metaphor for understanding GS’s view is to think of consciousness as the heat generated by an electric blanket. It’s not a very good metaphor, since heat hasn’t seemed unphysical in the way that consciousness has to some, but the metaphor captures the idea that consciousness is something like a physical field generated by active components when they’re functioning in a certain way.
Interesting consequences follow. GS is not a dualist; everything, including consciousness, is physical (it’s just that consciousness can’t be reduced to brain states). (Exception: GS might be a dualist about numbers and concepts, but he doesn’t discuss it in these essays.) Each time a “consciousness field” is generated, it’s a new one — so we’re not necessarily the same numerical person after each dreamless sleep or state of unconsciousness. Similarly, each time I turn on my electric blanket, a new heat field is generated, though it’s very similar to the last one. GS also has a couple of essays against the importance of “narrative” for selves — he’s happily “episodic”, meaning that he feels no deep need for his actions to belong to some over-arching theme or story of his life. He does one thing, moves to another, and doesn’t need to see a continuous thread throughout. Moreover, he argues there is no need for such a continuous thread in order to be ethical.
He’s also a hard determinist. He doesn’t see a lot of value in the compatibilist notion of freedom, and he thinks genuine freedom would be the capacity to be the total cause of one’s actions (a causa sui); but we lack this capacity. He doesn’t think there can be such a thing as ultimate moral responsibility.
What I really like about these essays is GS’s style and approach. He is a bit of an outsider to professional philosophy. That might seem incredible, since he is a professor at Reading, and the son of one of the more important philosophers of the second half of the 20th century (Peter Strawson). But he spent many years outside the discipline, working at the TLS and other places, before finally completing his phil degree. He has read very broadly in many areas (literature, science, Buddhism, psychology), and has read the Great Dead (at least the British early modern Great Dead) with considerable care. He’s very straightforward about his own shortcomings and isn’t afraid to show his own personality. Many of his essays are a dialogue with imagined objectors.
Indeed, as I read the essays, I often felt excited in the way that drew me first to philosophy. It’s fun to kick around cool ideas and see where they land, without fretting so much about what imagined critics might say. Why not think of consciousness as a physical force? Why not suppose that each time I wake up I’m a different “field” than I was when I went to bed? Why not accept that, in the end, no one is ultimately responsible for what they do? Fun ideas to mull over.