Properties not necessary to consciousness.

A materialist view suggests a few non-requirements:rS9

  • Contiguousness: Presumably, components can communicate at a distance.
  • No conscious sub-components: There’s no reason part of the conscious system cannot have its own conscious properties.
  • Procreation: Nothing about the properties of consciousness require procreation to function.

Contrast with necessary properties.


  1. Eric Schwitzgebel, “If Materialism Is True, the United States Is Probably Conscious,” Philosophical Studies, no. 172 (2015): 1697–1721. (See notes.)