# Qualia Qualia (singular: quale) are the subjective, qualitative aspects of conscious experience—the redness of red, the painfulness of pain, what it *feels like* to taste chocolate. They're the "raw feels" of experience that seem to resist physical description. [[Thomas Nagel]]'s "What Is It Like to Be a Bat?" argued that even complete physical knowledge wouldn't capture what echolocation feels like from inside. Qualia are central to debates about [[Consciousness]]. Frank Jackson's "Mary's Room" thought experiment imagines a color scientist who knows everything physical about color but has only seen black and white—when she sees red for the first time, does she learn something new? [[David Chalmers]] argues qualia show consciousness isn't reducible to physics. [[Daniel Dennett]] controversially denies qualia exist as commonly conceived, calling them a philosophical illusion. ## Key Arguments | Argument | Proponent | |----------|-----------| | **Mary's Room** | Frank Jackson | | **What is it like...** | [[Thomas Nagel]] | | **Qualia don't exist** | [[Daniel Dennett]] | ## References - Jackson, F. (1982). "Epiphenomenal Qualia" - Nagel, T. (1974). "What Is It Like to Be a Bat?" ## Related - [[Consciousness]] - [[Philosophy of Mind]] - [[Thomas Nagel]] - [[David Chalmers]] - [[Daniel Dennett]] - [[Dualism]]