Lewis on Materialism and Experience

Abstract

This chapter reviews four elements of David Lewis's account of materialism and experience. These elements include: materialism for which Lewis gave a distinctive and well-known characterization; an account of what experience is; an account of the source of the tension between experience and materialism; and a strategy for resolving the tension. Lewis did not just give a distinctive and well-known characterization of materialism, he gave two: one in terms of fundamental properties, and one in terms of supervenience. The chapter considers two recent objections to that account. The first argues that knowledge-how is a certain kind of knowledge-that and in consequence Lewis's well-known “ability hypothesis” fails. The second argues that if Lewis's contextualist approach to epistemology is correct, his rejection of the identification thesis is impossible. The author suggests that Lewis has the resources to answer both objections, but he ends by stating the real problems for Lewis's lie.