ABSTRACT
The disruption model of suffering has interesting implications for the role of agency in suffering. A disruptive mental state, such as a pain, impacts upon many different facets of the mental life. The proposal on the table is that suffering is the disruption to one’s mental life caused by a suffered mental state. A natural proposal is that the kind of mental disruption constitutive of suffering is unpleasant mental disruption. On the disruption model, experiencing an unpleasant mental state does not suffice for suffering. Suffering is the unpleasant disruption of a subject’s mental life so, in principle, one might have a pain without it having any negative impact on one’s mental life. The disruption model states that the process constitutive of suffering encompasses all facets of conscious mental life. Unpleasant disruption is how we make the transition from having a mental state that is at odds with the wider mental economy to adjusting the mind to accommodate that mental state.
