Work

Is Having a Pain Having an Unshareable Particular?

Year: 2026

Type: article

Abstract: ABSTRACT Do I have something no one else can have when I am in pain? This puzzle about the so‐called ‘privacy of ownership’ of sensations is a special case of the problem of whether the states and qualities of a subject are particulars. (For if someone ‘has’ a pain, then that someone ‘is in’ a pain state and vice versa.) The debate addressing the problem is unclear regarding the distinction between what is ‘had’ in having pain and owner‐individuated experiential episodes. The most common answer to the question claims that other people cannot have the numerically identical pain but only a qualitatively identical one. Building on recent work on states, events, and processes, I show that this answer is caught in a trilemma when faced with the task of identifying the allegedly unshareable particular that is ‘had’; a trilemma that renders the answer either incoherent, false, or trivial.

Source: Analytic Philosophy

DOI: 10.1111/phib.70021

Author: Bernhard Ritter

Institution: University of Graz

Language: English

Topic: Philosophy and Theoretical Science

Subfield: Experimental and Cognitive Psychology

Field: Psychology

Domain: Social Sciences

Open Access status: hybrid

Estimated APC paid: $2,900

Funder: Austrian Science Fund