Max Velmans

Max Velmans (born 27 May 1942) is Emeritus Professor

of Psychology at Goldsmiths, University of London. He
co-founded the Consciousness and Experiential Psychol-
ogy Section of the British Psychological Society in 1994,
and served as its chair from 2003 to 2006. He was ap-
pointed National Visiting Professor for 20102011 by the
Indian Council of Philosophical Research, and in 2011
was elected to the British Academy of Social Sciences.
[1]
Velmans has around 100 publications in the area of
consciousness studies, including Understanding Con-
sciousness (2000). In his map of prominent theo-
ries of consciousness Francisco Varela categorises Vel-
mans work as non-reductionist, stressing the impor-
tance of rst-person accounts of the phenomenology of
consciousness,
[2]
as well as third-person accounts of brain
states and functions, which in Velmans work are thought
of as complementary.
[3]
Velmans is principally known for the theory of con-
sciousness called "reexive monism, in which the
materialist/dualist gap is bridged by placing aspects of
human consciousness in the experienced world, rather
than within the brain; the theory also combines facets of
realism with facets of idealism, though it falls short of
avowing the necessity of perception to the existence of
reality per se (the principle of "esse est percipi").
[4]
1 Understanding Consciousness
Velmans Understanding Consciousness (2000) is a com-
prehensive summary of his theoretical work, and intro-
duces the idea of reexive monism.
[5]
Reexive monism presents itself as an alternative to both
dualism and reductionism. It states that it does not make
sense to speak of phenomenological experiences of re-
ality as occurring within the brain, given that some of
them quite clearly occur within the experienced world it-
self (that is, asked to point to the light they experience,
almost all rational subjects would point to the light that is
experienced rather than to the brain, which is where, ac-
cording to dualists and reductionists, the experience ac-
tually takes place). Thus, Velmans argues, the relation-
ship between subjects and experienced reality is reexive:
some experiences apprehended by the subject are quite
clearly placed in the world by the perceiving mind. The
contents of consciousness are, thus, not exclusively in the
brain, but often in the perceived physical world itself; in
fact, in terms of phenomenology, there is no clear and dis-
tinct dierence between what we normally think of as the
physical world, the phenomenal world and the world
as perceived.
[6]
He writes:
This sketch of how consciousness ts into
the wider universe supports a form of non-
reductive, Reexive Monism. Human minds,
bodies and brains are embedded in a far greater
universe. Individual conscious representations
are perspectival. That is, the precise manner in
which entities, events and processes are trans-
lated into experiences depends on the location
in space and time of a given observer, and the
exact mix of perceptual, cognitive, aective,
social, cultural and historical inuences which
enter into the 'construction' of a given experi-
ence. In this sense, each conscious construc-
tion is private, subjective, and unique. Taken
together, the contents of consciousness provide
a view of the wider universe, giving it the ap-
pearance of a 3D phenomenal world. ... How-
ever, such conscious representations are not the
thing-itself. In this vision, there is one universe
(the thing-itself), with relatively dierentiated
parts in the form of conscious beings like our-
selves, each with a unique, conscious view of
the larger universe of which it is a part. In so
far as we are parts of the universe that, in turn,
experience the larger universe, we participate
in a reexive process whereby the universe ex-
periences itself.
[6]
2 Changing Places
The changing places thought experiment was conceived
by Velmans, and discussed in Understanding Conscious-
ness. The experiment was designed to demonstrate the
diculties in distinguishing phenomenologically between
a rst-person experience of an event (a subjective expe-
rience of an object) and a third-person experience of the
same (that is, the observation of such an experience in a
subject).
2.1 The experiment
Velmans conceives of a situation in which an experi-
menter (E) is observing a subject (S) exposed to a
1
2 5 REFERENCES
light stimulus. The dierences between the two view-
points, Velmans argues, is primarily derived from a dif-
ference in interest, reected in a dierence in their re-
quired activities. To explain, during the experiment S is
required only to report on her experiences of the light,
which she needs to communicate to E in an appropriate
manner. E, on the other hand, is interested primarily in
Ss experience of the light, and thus Es focus is not just on
the light (which he now thinks of as a stimulus) but also
on the observable events in Ss brain, and on Ss reports
concerning what she experiences. Thus, E is interested
rst and foremost in the subjects experience, and how
these relate to the light stimulus and brain states of S that
he can observe. In such a case, Es experience of events
would be considered objective or public, while Ss ex-
periences are subjective and private"; while Es focus
is on recording the neural causes and correlates of visual
experiences, S is interested only in reporting about such
experiences.
However, Velmans points out that all that would be re-
quired for S and E to exchange roles is for them to change
their respective foci (as he puts it S and E merely have
to turn their heads), so that E focuses exclusively on the
light and reports his experiences, while S focuses her at-
tention not just on the light, but on the events in Es brain
and his reports of the experience. In such an event, S be-
comes the experimenter and E becomes the subject; thus,
following current conventions, S would now be entitled
to think of her observations (of the light and Es brain)
as 'public and objective' and to regard Es experiences of
light as 'private and subjective'.
[7]
Velmans points out that this outcome is patently absurd,
as the phenomenology of the light (that is, the way it is
experienced) remains the same from the perspective of S
or E, whether it is thought of as being an observed stim-
ulus or a subjective experience. Nothing has changed in
the nature of the light that either party can observe, save
in the contextualising focus of their interests. That is,
Velmans concludes, there is no phenomenological dier-
ence between publicly observed phenomena and private,
subjective experiences.
3 Selected publications
Velmans is the author and editor of numerous books and
papers on consciousness, including the following:
[8]
Understanding Consciousness (Rout-
ledge/Psychology Press, London, 2000)
Understanding Consciousness, edition 2 (Rout-
ledge/Psychology Press, London, 2009)
The Blackwell Companion to Consciousness (Black-
well, 2007)
The Science of Consciousness (Routledge, 1996)
Investigating Phenomenal Consciousness (John Ben-
jamins, 2000)
How Could Conscious Experiences Aect Brains?
(Imprint, 2003)
4 See also
Monism
5 References
[1]
[2] Varela, F. J. (1999) Present time consciousness. Journal
of Consciousness Studies, 6(23), 111140.
[3] biem Graben, P. & Atmanspacher, H. (2009) Extending
the philosophical signicance of the idea of complemen-
tarity. In H. Atmanspacher and H. Primas (eds.) Re-
casting reality: Wolfgang Paulis Philosophical Ideas and
Contemporary Science. Springer, pp.99113.
Hoche, Hans-Ulrich (2007) Reexive monism ver-
sus complementarism: An analysis and criticism of
the conceptual groundwork of Max Velmanss re-
exive model of consciousness Phenomenology and
the Cognitive Sciences, 6 (3) , pp. 389409.
[4] Blackmore, S. (2003) Consciousness: An introduction.
Hodder & Stoughton.
Blackmore, S. (2005) Conversations on Conscious-
ness: Interviews with wenty minds. Oxford Univer-
sity Press.
Revonsuo, A. (2006) Inner Presence: Conscious-
ness as a Biological Phenomenon. Cambridge:
MIT Press.
[5] Harris, K. (2009) Review of Max Velmans Under-
standing Consciousness. Metapsychology, 13 (52)
http://metapsychology.mentalhelp.net/poc/view_doc.
php?type=book&id=5300&cn=396
Faw, B. (2009) Book review of Max Velmans, Un-
derstanding Consciousness (2nd ed.) Journal of
Consciousness Studies. Vol. 16, No.9, pp103-108
http://www.imprint.co.uk/pdf/16-9_br.pdf
Zeman, A. (2001) The paradox of consciousness:
a review of Understanding Consciousness (2000)
by Max Velmans. The Lancet Vol. 357, Issue
9249, p77. http://www.thelancet.com/journals/
lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(05)71582-8/fulltext
Batthyany, A (2002) Consciousness in the natu-
ral world (a review of M.Velmans, 2000, Under-
standing Consciousness). Theory & Psychology
12(3), pp. 415417. http://www.psych.ucalgary.
ca/thpsyc/Reviews12(3).pdf
[6] Velmans, M. (2009) Understanding Consciousness, Edi-
tion 2. Routledge/Psychology Press, p. 298
3
Harris, K. (2009) Review of Max Velmans
Understanding Consciousness. Metapsychology,
13 (52) http://metapsychology.mentalhelp.net/poc/
view_doc.php?type=book&id=5300&cn=396
[7] Velmans 2000, p. 175
Harman, W. (1993) Towards an Adequate Epis-
temology for the Scientic Exploration of Con-
sciousness Journal of Scientic Exploration, 7 (2),
pp. 133143. http://www.scientificexploration.
org/journal/jse_07_2_harman.pdf
[8] list of Velmans publications on consciousness
6 External links
Velmans website including list of selected publica-
tions with brief descriptions
Depository of online papers at Academia.edu with
added comments
Velmans lecture on The Unconscious Ground of
Being, Cortona, Italy, 2009.
Velmans lecture on Whos in Control?, National
Institute of Advanced Study, Bangalore, India, 2012
Consciousness Studies (on Wikibooks)
Indian Council of Philosophical Research (Indian
Government)
4 7 TEXT AND IMAGE SOURCES, CONTRIBUTORS, AND LICENSES
7 Text and image sources, contributors, and licenses
7.1 Text
Max Velmans Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Max_Velmans?oldid=623268985 Contributors: Charles Matthews, Visualerror,
SlimVirgin, Gurch, Mholland, Clicketyclack, Ohconfucius, Second Quantization, Widefox, Waacstats, JaGa, Max Velmans, EPadmira-
teur, Addbot, Yobot, AnomieBOT, Omnipaedista, RjwilmsiBot, ZroBot, MusikAnimal, BattyBot, ChrisGualtieri, SusanStuart, Karol
Alexandre and Anonymous: 2
7.2 Images
File:Wikiquote-logo.svg Source: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/fa/Wikiquote-logo.svg License: Public domain
Contributors: ? Original artist: ?
7.3 Content license
Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0