HOW MUCH WORK CAN A QUALE DO

It is argued that theoretical models cannot use qualia as explanatory tools, and cannot explain them either; thus, there is no way to make q ualia do any useful work at all, at least in a theory. However, qualia do occur in both imagery and perception, and this article presents so me ways of thinking about qualia from a functional perspective. Imager y differs from perception in its function. It is not a faded copy of p erception. It is less distinct than perception because it is only as d istinct as it needs to be, not because it is inherently indistinct. Qu alia represent functionally relevant encodings whether in perception o r imagery. The present approach is functionalist and quite similar to Pani's (1996). (C) 1996 Academic Press, Inc.