Natural Acquaintance

Abstract

First (§1) I isolate the form of acquaintance that interests me, and next (§2) note some of its key epistemological and metaphysical features. Then (§3) I explore a promising metaphysical framework for naturalising acquaintance, higher-order theories of consciousness, and argue that existing variations within the framework are not up to the job. I go on (§4) to set out my own variant of a higher-order theory, and explain how it successfully approximates acquaintance. Since this model can be implemented physically, it is a way of rendering acquaintance perfectly natural.