Editing Hard problem of consciousness (section)

==== Implications for physicalism ====
{{See also|Physicalism}}
[[File:Sturnus vulgaris -Rotterdam, South Holland, Netherlands -flock-8.ogv|thumb|right|A swarm of birds showing high order structure emerging from simpler physical constituents]]

Chalmers's idea contradicts [[physicalism]], sometimes labelled [[materialism]]. This is the view that everything that exists is a physical or material thing, so everything can be reduced to microphysical things. For example, the rings of Saturn are a physical thing because they are nothing more than a complex arrangement of a large number of subatomic particles interacting in a certain way. According to physicalism, everything, including consciousness, can be explained by appeal to its microphysical constituents. Chalmers's ''hard problem'' presents a [[counterexample]] to this view and to other phenomena like swarms of birds, since it suggests that consciousness, like swarms of birds, cannot be reductively explained by appealing to their physical constituents. Thus, if the hard problem is a real problem then physicalism must be false, and if physicalism is true then the hard problem must not be a real problem.{{cn|date=September 2022}}

Though Chalmers rejects physicalism, he is still a [[Naturalism (philosophy)|naturalist]].<ref name=":0" />{{importance inline|date=April 2023}}

[[Christian List]] argues that the existence of first-person perspectives and the inability for physicalism to answer Hellie's vertiginous question is evidence against physicalism, since first-personal facts cannot supervene on physical third-personal facts.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://philpapers.org/rec/LISTFA |title=The first-personal argument against physicalism |last=List |first=Christian |date=2023 |website= |publisher= |access-date=4 March 2025 |quote=}}</ref> List also claims that there exists a "quadrilemma" for metaphysical theories of consciousness, and that for the metaphysical claims of first-person realism, non-solipsism, non-fragmentation, and one-world, at least one of these must be false.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://philarchive.org/rec/LISAQF |title=A quadrilemma for theories of consciousness |last=List |first=Christian |date=2023 |website= |publisher=The Philosophical Quarterly |access-date=4 March 2025 |quote=}}</ref> List has proposed a model he calls the "many-worlds theory of consciousness" in order to reconcile the subjective nature of consciousness without lapsing into solipsism.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://philarchive.org/rec/LISTMT-2 |title=The many-worlds theory of consciousness |last=List |first=Christian |date=2023 |website= |publisher=The Philosophical Quarterly |access-date=4 March 2025 |quote=}}</ref>