Abstract
It is often thought a difficult task to find a place for qualia in the physical world. The reason for this may be that qualia seem to be essentially intrinsic qualities so they cannot be captured entirely in terms of their causal-functional roles. This is the typical way in which qualia are thought to be physicalistically problematic. In this paper I rethink that very problem of qualia by means of metaphysical considerations concerning properties in general. The relevant question in the metaphysics of properties is whether properties have essences which determine their identities independently of their dispositional aspects. (Such essences are called 'quiddities'.) Indeed, the problem of qualia would take a different shape depending on the answer to that metaphysical question. I show this with reference to three main views on that question, namely, quidditism, the causal theory, and the identity theory. In closing, I make a brief remark about what these considerations imply for the relationship between physicalism and qualia.
