Metaphysics 15. "Inner" & "Outer" Perception

Philosophers talk a lot about "internal" and "external" experience. They refer continually to the external world or outer world. Some philosophers go further and claim there is no such thing as a private internal world of experience like dreams, thoughts, and memories. See, for example, "Augustine's Invention of the Inner Self" (Oxford University Press 2003). But does such talk of "internal" and "external" perception bring us any closer to explaining our experiential world? In actuality, this strange metaphysical dichotomy of in and out has resulted in numerous paradoxes and conundrums including the infamous mind-body problem. Here we begin to carve a path for a new way of explaining the same distinctions that these terms are meant to account for, without the metaphysical baggage they produce.