Philip Goff

Philip Goff is a British philosopher of mind, professor at Durham University, and a leading defender of panpsychism, the view that consciousness is a fundamental and widespread feature of the physical world. He previously taught at the Central European University in Budapest. In Galileo's Error (2019) he argues that modern science was built by deliberately setting aside the qualities of experience, which is why it struggles to explain consciousness. He has also written on whether the universe has a purpose, in Why? The Purpose of the Universe (2023).

Key ideas

• Galileo set sensory qualities aside so that science could describe the world mathematically, leaving consciousness out of the picture.
• Physics tells us what matter does, not what it intrinsically is; consciousness may be that intrinsic nature.
• Panpsychism holds that consciousness is a fundamental feature of matter, present in very simple forms in basic particles.
• The combination problem, how simple minds combine into complex ones, is the main challenge for panpsychism.

Major works

• Galileo's Error: Foundations for a New Science of Consciousness (2019)
• Consciousness and Fundamental Reality (2017)
• Why? The Purpose of the Universe (2023)

In the Book corner

• Galileo’s Error: Foundations for a New Science of Consciousness 2019 · Beginner
  A short, accessible case for panpsychism, the view that consciousness is a fundamental and widespread feature of the physical world. Goff argues…

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