Consciousness Trilemma

[Whateverist]

(*Hat-tip Maverick Philosopher, here)

It appears that of the following three propositions only two can be true:

1) Conscious experience is not an illusion.
2) Conscious experience has an essentially subjective character that purely physical processes do not share.
3) The only acceptable explanation of conscious experience is in terms of physical properties alone.

I must hand it to Maverick Philosopher because this trilemma so neatly identifies and clarifies the dominant positions with respect to philosophy of mind. Like him, I am inclined to accept 1) and 2) which entails that I must reject 3). I have some inkling of where other AF members would place their bets but it would be nice to let people weight in and see where the discussion leads.

I sure don't see why you think your acceptance of 1 and 2 requires you to reject 3. The problem must lie with the third statement.

That there are physiological systems that support conscious experience which can be altered by physical means is easy to establish in a lab. An account of the physical basis for consciousness is therefore necessary for a complete account of conscious experience. However most people interested in questions of consciousness would find that insufficient for a complete explanation as it doesn't account for the phenomenological quality of consciousness.

But why in the world would you want to toss away the only part of the explanation we are currently capable of acquiring just because it doesn't answer every question? That seems pretty arbitrary.

You are still at liberty to speculate lavishly about the subjective parts, you just can't ignore what is known about physical underpinnings of conscious experience if you want to be taken seriously.