Professor Massimo Pigliucci asks: “What Hard Problem?”

 

I also published this at medium.com, July 8, 2025

Recently I published a short article at Medium.org questioning David Chalmers’ so-called hard problem of consciousness and a commenter took me to task.

Unfortunately he chose not to engage with my response, which is what usually happens. The heart of his complaint reads:

HS commented: “…But an organism still has to utilize the equipment available in its universe and how molecules or physical forces create consciousness is not explained just because, for example, a neuron has come to be.

Get it? It is still a hard problem. There has to be something inherent to that universe with the potential to create consciousness. …”

No. I don’t get it.

The universe is about as distal from down to Earth reality, as we can get. For me, the really hard problem is why does this sort of philosophizing get away with ignoring the realities of our evolutionary biological origins down here on Earth?

So, in an attempt to better clarify my previous article. I want to share from Professor Massimo Pigliucci’s short essay (©2013) in philosophynow.org. The essay asks: “What Hard Problem?” — and I believe it provides a perfect vehicle for constructively pushing back.

(What a refreshing read it was for me — to see the writing of someone so qualified resonating with what I keep trying to discuss — but only to find cold shoulders and slamming doors.)

Though first, in response to SH. Okay, there is the fabric of space/time, with everything afterwards being constrained within that matrix. Still, I don’t see how that’s relevant to life on Earth, as it has evolved over these past billions of years.

Organisms don’t get their equipment from the “universe” — organisms get their equipment via biology and evolution down upon this wet planet Earth.

Everything interesting happened down here on Earth where geology and biology learned how to dance together with the passage of time, which created Evolution and eventually us.

All of us creatures alive today are another iteration of body-plans whose origins go back a half billion (and more) years, unfolding, one day at a time, upon this miracle planet.

As for “consciousness” Scientists are learning how biology managed to turn electricity inside-out and then to harness it into something useful. Something that evolved into all the life forms we know of. (see Nick Lane)

Why isn't Evolution interesting enough for popular philosophers? 

Of course, I’m simply an Evolution enthusiast, my words don’t carry much weight unless I can support them with more authoritative information.

That is why I want to bring in Professor Massimo Pigliucci’s short article: “What Hard Problem?” published at philosophynow.org into my discussion.

Prof. M.P.: …What is ‘hard’, claims the man of the p-zombies (Chalmers), is to account for phenomenal experience, or what philosophers usually call ‘qualia’: the ‘what is it like’, first-person quality of consciousness.

I would add that qualia is simply the consequence of the entire body/brain working in harmony, which includes communicating with itself. (For details, Drs Solms, Damasio, etc.). “Consciousness is the inside reflection of our body/brain communicating with itself.”

Everything we know gets processed through our individual body. What else could one feel — other than the body one inhabits? Be it bat or human.

Prof. M.P.: “I think that the idea of a hard problem of consciousness arises from a category mistake. I think that in fact there is no real distinction between hard and easy problems of consciousness, and the illusion that there is one is caused by the pseudo-profundity that often accompanies category mistakes.

“Category mistake” and “pseudo-profundity” — that’s worth taking note of.

I believe it is worse, it’s theology, that unspoken need among people to cling to notions of human exceptionalism. Imagining we MUST be cosmically endowed.

Too many dare not accept that we come from the muck of the Earth. Still that is how it is, based on all the evidence at hand.

I’m convinced that the Biological Evolutionary truth will set you free. No need for woo, all within the confines of materialist scientific methods — and yet surprisingly full of spiritual and mystical challenges, insights and resolutions.

We cannot understand ourselves without becoming familiar with, and reconciled with, our evolutionary origins.

Prof. M.P.: “A category mistake occurs when you try to apply a conceptual category to a given problem or object, when in fact that conceptual category simply does not belong to the problem or object at hand.”

Worth adding here is that, the evolutionary reality of all creatures since the first successful single celled organisms evolved, required inner awareness, communication, processing abilities, command and control, willing itself to do things, then doing them.

Prof. M.P.: “… The same, …, goes for Chalmers’ hard problem (or Nagel’s question, and so on). The hard problem is often formulated as the problem of accounting for how and why we have phenomenal experience.”

And it ignores that internal communication has been a hallmark of life since the first successful single cells. There were never any stupid animals.

Prof. M.P.: “Let’s unpack this. Why phenomenal consciousness exists is a typical question for evolutionary biology. Consciousness is a biological phenomenon, like blood circulation, so its appearance in a certain lineage of hominids seems to be squarely a matter for evolutionary biologists to consider. …”

“Second, how phenomenal consciousness is possible is a question for cognitive science, neurobiology and the like. If you were asking how the heart works, you’d be turning to anatomy and molecular biology, and I see no reason things should be different in the case of consciousness. …”

“… Of course an explanation isn’t the same as an experience, but that’s because the two are completely independent categories, like colors and triangles. It is obvious that I cannot experience what it is like to be you, but I can potentially have a complete explanation of how and why it is possible to be you. To ask for that explanation to also somehow encompass the experience itself is both incoherent, and an illegitimate use of the word ‘explanation’.”

This echoes how I’ve felt about Chalmers’ so-called “Hard Problem” for a long time. It is invigorating reading a learned professor, with a solid background, make the same observations.

Prof. M.P.: “Unlike Dennett, I don’t think for a moment that consciousness is an ‘illusion’; and unlike Churchland I reject the idea that we can (or that it would be useful to) do away with concepts such as consciousness, pain, and the like, replacing them with descriptions of neurobiological processes. On this I’m squarely with Searle when he said that “where consciousness is concerned, the existence of the appearance is the reality” (chew on that for a bit, if you don’t mind).

Here I also agree with Prof. Pigliucci’s observation.

The only thing to add is that we should keep in mind that we create our “perception” of the world, and our perceptions are limited to our body’s abilities and needs.

All creatures live within the same physical reality and time.

Each creature perceives that world to the best of their abilities.

Thank you to Professor Massimo Pigliucci for your insightful article.

It would be wonderful if someone wanted to continue this discussion.

Previously: Airing out David Chalmers’ Problem — Medium, July 2nd, 2025