Edgar Dawn Ross "Ted" Honderich (30 January 1933 – 12 October 2024) was a Canadian-born British philosopher, who was Grote Professor Emeritus of the Philosophy of Mind and Logic, University College London.
Biography Honderich was born on 30 January 1933 in Baden, Ontario, Canada, the younger brother of Beland Honderich, who became publisher of the Toronto Star. An undergraduate at the University of Toronto, qualifying as B.A. (Hons) in Philosophy and English Literature, he came to University College London to study under the logical positivist and Grote Professor A. J. Ayer,who had actually left for Oxford in 1961, graduating with a PhD in 1968. He subsequently lived in England and became a British citizen. After being a lecturer at the University of Sussex he became lecturer, reader, professor and then Grote Professor at University College London. He was visiting professor at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York, Yale and the universities of Bath and Calgary. He was author of many books and articles on such subjects as consciousness, determinism, qualia, functionalism, timings of sensory experiences, psychophysical intimacy, the correspondence theory of truth, Russell's theory of descriptions, time, causation, Mill's On Liberty, John Searle's view of free will and G. A. Cohen's defence of Marx's theory of history. He also edited several series of philosophy books. He was involved in controversy for his moral defence of Palestinian political violence, despite his justification of the founding and maintaining of Israel in its original 1948 borders. His papers in philosophical journals have been published in three volumes by Edinburgh University Press. He appeared on radio and television, was the editor of The Oxford Companion to Philosophy, wrote a philosophical autobiography, was chairman of the Royal Institute of Philosophy where he inaugurated the annual lectures subsequently published as Philosophers of Our Times, and he was an honorary associate of the National Secular Society. Honderich was married to Ingrid Coggin. He died on 12 October 2024, at the age of 91.
Consciousness Honderich's theory of consciousness in the long book Actual Consciousness and the precis-book Your Being Conscious is What? Where? replaces entirely his philosophy of mind in A Theory of Determinism: The Mind, Neuroscience and Life-Hopes and the precis-book How Free Are You?. The new theory derives from a database to the effect that being conscious, figuratively speaking, is something's being actual. This issues, by way of (a) speculation that disagreement about consciousness is significantly owed to no adequate initial clarification of the subject matter, and (b) examination of five leading ideas of consciousness and existing theories of consciousness, and (c) a specification of the objective physical world, into the wholly literal theory or analysis of the nature of consciousness called Actualism. It distinguishes three sides of consciousness: (1) perceptual consciousness—consciousness in perception, (2) cognitive consciousness, and (3) affective consciousness. In each case the theory satisfies the two primary criteria of explaining what is actual, and what its being actual consists in. In the case of perceptual consciousness what is actual is only a subjective physical world out there. I.e. being perceptually conscious is essentially or primarily a state of affairs external to the perceiver. Its being actual is its being subjectively physical, which is specified. In the case of cognitive and affective consciousness, what is actual is representations, internal to the conscious thing, and their being actual is their being subjectively physical, differently so from subjective physical worlds. Actualism argues, further, that it satisfies further criteria better than other existing theories of consciousness including one of subjectivity, individuality or personal identity, and that it is relevant to desires for human standing that are the motivation of beliefs in free will as against determinism. Actualism has been received as a new and arguable theory by philosophers who have previously declared the urgent need for one. A predecessor of the theory is discussed by 11 other philosophers in Radical Externalism: Honderich's Theory of Consciousness Discussed, ed. Anthony Freeman, Imprint Academic.
Determinism and freedom In A Theory of Determinism: The Mind, Neuroscience and Life-Hopes and in the precis-book How Free Are You?, Honderich expounds a theory of causation as well as other lawlike connections. This he uses to formulate three hypotheses of a deterministic philosophy of mind. They are argued to be true, mainly on the basis of neuroscience. The clarity of determinism is contrasted with the obscurity of the doctrines of free will or origination. The centuries-dominant philosophical traditions of determinism and freedom, Compatibilism and Incompatibilism, are examined. According to the first, determinism is consistent with our freedom and moral responsibility; according to the second, it is inconsistent with them. Honderich considers Compatibilism's argument that our freedom consists in voluntariness, doing what we desire and not being coerced; hence its conclusion that determinism and freedom can go together. He also examines Incompatibilism's argument that our freedom consists in origination or free will, our choosing without our choosing's being caused; hence the conclusion that determinism and freedom are inconsistent. Honderich argues that both views are mistaken, since freedom as voluntariness and freedom as origination are each as fundamental to our lives. The real problem of the consequences of determinism is not choosing between the two traditional doctrines, but a more practical one: trying to give up what must be given up, since we do not have the power of origination. Honderich's rejection of both traditions has been taken up by other philosophers, many of whom find his criticisms decisive.
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