Composite Subjectivity and Microsubjects

Abstract

This chapter is about how to combine the very simple subjects of experience posited by panpsychism, the theory that matter itself is inherently conscious. The combination problem has been most thoroughly discussed in relation to the combination of these microsubjects, and this chapter addresses head-on the two central strands of the combination problem: the subject-summing problem and the problem of the unity, and boundaries, of consciousness. Alternative solutions, including cosmopsychism (the world as a whole is conscious) and panprotopsychism (matter is not conscious, but contains some sort of germ of consciousness) are also discussed. The metaphysics of nature that results from addressing these challenges is both highly counterintuitive and theoretically elegant.