The philosophers Glenn Carruthers and Elizabeth Schier said in 2012 that the main arguments for the
existence of a hard problem—philosophical zombies, Mary's room, and Nagel's bats—are only persuasive
if one already assumes that "consciousness must be independent of the structure and function of mental
states, i.e. that there is a hard problem." Hence, the arguments beg the question. The authors suggest that
"instead of letting our conclusions on the thought experiments guide our theories of consciousness, we
should let our theories of consciousness guide our conclusions from the thought experiments."[64]
The philosopher Massimo Pigliucci argued in 2013 that the hard problem is misguided, resulting from a
"category mistake".[17] He said: "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."[17]
In 2017, the philosopher Marco Stango, in a paper on John Dewey's approach to the problem of
consciousness (which preceded Chalmers' formulation of the hard problem by over half a century), noted
that Dewey's approach would see the hard problem as the consequence of an unjustified assumption that
feelings and functional behaviors are not the same physical process: "For the Deweyan philosopher, the
'hard problem' of consciousness is a 'conceptual fact' only in the sense that it is a philosophical mistake:
the mistake of failing to see that the physical can be had as an episode of immediate sentiency."[65]
The philosopher Thomas Metzinger likens the hard problem of consciousness to vitalism, a formerly
widespread view in biology which was not so much solved as abandoned.[66] Brian Jonathan Garrett has
also argued that the hard problem suffers from flaws analogous to those of vitalism.[67]
The philosopher Peter Hacker argues that the hard problem is misguided in that it asks how consciousness
can emerge from matter, whereas in fact sentience emerges from the evolution of living organisms.[68] He
states: "The hard problem isn’t a hard problem at all. The really hard problems are the problems the
scientists are dealing with. [...] The philosophical problem, like all philosophical problems, is a confusion
in the conceptual scheme."[68] Hacker's critique extends beyond Chalmers and the hard problem, being
directed against contemporary philosophy of mind and neuroscience more broadly. Along with the
neuroscientist Max Bennett, he has argued that most of contemporary neuroscience remains implicitly
dualistic in its conceptualizations and is predicated on the mereological fallacy of ascribing psychological
concepts to the brain that can properly be ascribed only to the person as a whole.[69] Hacker further states
that "consciousness studies", as it exists today, is "literally a total waste of time" and that "the conception
of consciousness which they have is incoherent".[68]
Eliminative materialism or eliminativism is the view that many or all of the mental states used in folk
psychology (i.e., common-sense ways of discussing the mind) do not, upon scientific examination,
correspond to real brain mechanisms.[59] According the 2020 PhilPapers survey, 4.51% of philosophers
surveyed subscribe to eliminativism.[25]
While Patricia Churchland and Paul Churchland have famously applied eliminative materialism to
propositional attitudes, philosophers including Daniel Dennett, Georges Rey, and Keith Frankish have
applied it to qualia or phenomenal consciousness (i.e., conscious experience).[59] On their view, it is
mistaken not only to believe there is a hard problem of consciousness, but to believe phenomenal
consciousness exists at all.[19][61]
Eliminative materialism / Illusionism