Visiting Speaker: Matt Soteriou

'The Ontology of Pain'

Abstract

I shall be suggesting that the right account of the ontology of the bodily sensation of pain can help accommodate some puzzling aspects of the phenomenology of the experience of pain. I shall be proposing that in an account of the ontology of pain we’ll need to invoke both states and occurrence, and we’ll need to specify how state and occurrence combine and depend on one another. I’ll also be suggesting there is explanatory to be done by the notion of ‘occurrent state’. There’s complexity to the account that can’t simply be read off from introspective reflection, but introspective reflection can play a role in helping us to articulate various aspects of the phenomenology of pain; and the right account of the combination of occurrence, state and occurrent state can play a significant role in accommodating that phenomenology.

• Professor Matt Soteriou is a Professor of Philosophy in the Department of Philosophy at the University of Warwick.  Further information about Matt Soteriou.