Nicholas Humphrey in his Soul Dust: The Magic of Consciousness (2011) writes about that question in an accessible way. He suggests that maybe consciousness does not provide any new capacity that a mere non-conscious information-processing system could not have, but the emergence of experience in the first-person modality produced a creature who started to use its already existing capacities in a wholly novel way.

In the end, Humphrey's point is staggeringly simple: maybe conscious creatures are efficient in adapting to their environments just because they are (at least in the human case) personally interested in their survival, start to take interest in external objects for their own sake, and develop a notion of a unique self and a personal life. In short, they LIKE being alive. The environment and the space of possibilities it affords become qualitatively different for a conscious being.

Humphrey does not even purport to give a detailed theory there, but the book was quite intellectually inspiring for someone like me (a philosopher with an interest on cognitive science, but not having expert knowledge of it).

Alan,

Do you think that having a brain representation of the world all around us gives humans an evolutionary advantage? If you think that this kind of egocentric representation of the world we live in gives us an adaptive advantage, then I think you have to agree that consciousness gives us an evolutionary advantage because, as I see it, consciousness *is* our brain representation of our surrounding world. For more about this, see "Space, self, and the theater of consciousness", "Where Am I? Redux", and "Evolution's Gift: Subjectivity and the Phenomenal World" on my Research Gate page.

I would highly recommend Dan Dennett's various works on 'consciousness'. In particular and with regard to the above question, his 'consciousness explained' (or 'explained away' as some of his critics would have it). There are valid reasons for not having the notion of 'consciousness' in one's equations.

Gavin,

What are the valid reasons for doing away with the notion of consciousness?

I am convinced that consciousness is the byproduct of the animal's brain learning ability based on cause-and-effect relationships, which, in turn and in some cases, places the self on the arrow of time.

Whether Time itself is real or a biological artifact remains to be seen (and it is another can of worms altogether!). No matter, it is this Before(memory)-Now(senses)-After(imaginary planning) trichotomy that makes an animal aware of itself and, at the same time, allows both for learning to take place and experience to be used in the struggle for survival.

So, to answer your question, Alan, yes, consciousness does offer evolutionary advantages, even if it does come with extrasensory stress, as it increases the effectiveness of learning and the ability of behavioral adaptation. Your machine needs to have a sense of time and be able to place itself on it.

As to free will, I always imagined conscious thinking as a thin ice raft, floating on an ocean of subconscious currents. The brain is vastly complicated and every sensation, every thought and every imagery alters its synaptic circuitry. Thus, conscious decisions are made freely - but only as freely the brain's past experiences will allow.

Much more the selfconsciousness. It is specificity of humans and maybe by othe primates.

Hey there... Check out bonnie basslers work on the language of bacteria.. You'll find a talk of hers on Ted tv.. From there you'll find more about her and her work. Hope that helps. Best christian

Dear Alan,

Your puzzle seems to take as assumed the idea that only people, or maybe animals, have a first person modality and that evolution favoured its 'appearance'. However, we have no evidence for this. People have a sense of first person in this modality but, as you say, this is another issue. The usefulness of human experience will presumably relate to its content and how that content helps survival - it builds a model of space and time and 'me' placed in those, as Arnold says. But your question is different, it is the nature of the first person MODALITY itself and we have no reason to think that this modality is limited to animals or even life. As David Skrbina has pointed out over history it has often been accepted that first person modality is everywhere - and why not? The idea that humans only have it is largely a feature of Abrahamic religions and particularly the Church of Rome. It is a political ruse that says that only we have it because we are mini copies of an all knowing God who we need to fear and can only be appeased by going to church and putting silver in the tray each Sunday. What a con trick!

Modern thinking has largely done away with purpose, but if you are asking of biological advantage then, as I say, that is a matter of what content is put in the modality and how it is made use of for behaviour. As to what the modality is, it is maybe 'experience'. Experience is not something flaky, dissociated from science, but the gold standard of all science, as Russell says. David Chalmers's suggestion that you could have a physical reality without experience is incoherent because physical reality is defined as that which determines our experiences. Leibniz showed that there can be no other hypostatic basis for our idea of 'matter' - just the dynamic relations that determine the changes in experience. So experience is just the way the world is. That is where Dennett goes wrong. He says everything is physics but forgets that physics does not even exist without the first person modality. Almost everyone still holds the nineteenth century billiard ball view of the world, still taught in school. What is forgotten is that this was a rather brief interlude in a history of deep thought that before and since has worked out there ain't no billiard balls there - just experiences obeying dynamic rules!

So the old chestnut idea about consciousness, in the sense of the modality, needing to be driven by natural selection, is an empty conflation, I would suggest.

Azlan: "I would recommend David Chalmers. He doesn't sweep the "hard problem of consciousness" under the carpet like most scientists today."

Here's what I commented about the so called "hard problem" in the Montreal Conference on Turing Consciousness - 2012:

Arnold Trehub15 July 2012 08:52

"The hard problem is turned into an insoluble problem by the mistaken notion that feeling must be something that is *added* to an essential brain process -- the activity of a particular kind of brain mechanism. So the objection is repeated "But the *doing* of the brain mechanism does not explain its *feeling*!" If we adopt a monistic stance, then the processes -- the doings -- of the conscious biophysical brain must *constitute* feelings, and nothing has to be added to these essential brain processes.
 I have argued that we are conscious only if we have an experience of *something somewhere* in perspectival relation to our self. The minimal state of consciousness/feeling is a sense of being at the center of a volumetric surround. This is our minimal phenomenal world that can be "filled up" by all kinds of other feelings. These consist of our perceptions and other cognitive content such as your emotional reaction in response to reading this comment.
 On the basis of this view of consciousness, I proposed the following working definition of consciousness:

*Consciousness is a transparent brain representation of the world from a privileged egocentric perspective*. 

The scientific problem then is to specify a system of brain mechanisms that can realize this kind of egocentric representation. It is clear that it must be some kind of global workspace, but a global workspace, as such, is not conscious -- think of a Google server center. What is needed is *subjectivity*, a fixed locus of spatiotemporal perspectival origin within a surrounding plenum . I call this the *core self* within a person's phenomenal world. A brain mechanism that can satisfy this constraint would satisfy the minimal condition for being conscious. I have argued that the neuronal structure and dynamics of a detailed theoretical brain model that I named the *retinoid system* can do the job, and I have presented a large body of clinical and psychophysical evidence that lends credence to the retinoid model of consciousness."

You can check out a TEDx talk on excatly this question that I gave some time ago:

http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=xr1WkV6tSjo&desktop_uri=%2Fwatch%3Fv%3Dxr1WkV6tSjo

Your last comment "asking why we have consciousness could lead us to understand it better" is where we should start. We cannot rule out the possibility that conscious is not so much a trait that we could either have or not have -- which is the adaptationist assumption. To ask, "is consciousness adaptive?", assumes we could have the brain/mind we currently have but without consciousness. That may already be an illusion. The evolutionary development of the brain we have, and its capacity for conceptualization and understanding in a gestalt sense, as well as our highly developed social sense, may not be possible without what we call consciousness. What our brain/mind is capable of is not simply decoding concepts as you mention, but constructing what those concepts are in the first place and in a manner that we can convey to others an understanding of those concepts.

The latter is critical, for it is not sufficient to consider a concept of self as non-other -- a simple, logical opposition-- for as social beings we have constructed the concept of self-other in which we define (for our social universe) the concept of other and then we construct for ourselves a self-other opposition that does not individuate but joins together self with others. This is the basis of kinship in human societies; we create for ourselves what the anthropologist Marshall Sahlins has referred to as the mutuality of being in which we perceive that we are part of those that we define as the other -- our kin. Our cognitive ability to do this is not captured by a computational theory of mind. Can we do it without consciousness as part of our cognitive apparatus? I think not. As I have written elsewhere ("How Culture Makes Us Human"), the development of social systems based on kinship relations is central to the transition from non-human primate social systems based on face-to-face interaction (where a computational theory of mind might operate) to relation based social systems (where a computational theory of mind is not sufficient). My suspicion is that this transition could not take place without the development of consciousness. If so, asking whether consciousness is adaptive becomes asking whether the transition to a relational based social systems was adaptive and obviously the latter was adaptive, else we would not be here as a species.

But this leaves unanswered what consciousness is -- and I make no claim to having any particular insight. Consciousness seems to involve, at a minimum, a sense of awareness of what one is doing and the perception that by being aware we can make choices about our behavior -- a sense of free will. To be aware suggests that we have a highly developed part of the brain that can make sense of the operations of other parts of the brain. I am thinking, in computer terms, of an observing computer that can make sense of the patterning of 0's and 1's that are part of the operation of another computer and on the basis of that observation can conceptualize what that other computer is doing. We do this with software -- we do the conceptualization of what we want the computer to do and this is translated into machine code which is then acted upon by the computer's processor. I have in mind the reverse, whereby we have another computer that can observe that machine code and can construct representations of what that first computer is doing. We do this through a visual (and a sound) interface, but for this we have already built in the connection between the patterns of 0's and 1's and the visual representation.

I am suggesting that our brain/mind developed this capacity of being able to make representations of the equivalent of the machine language level of our brain and that we have the cognitive ability to conceptualize our behavior through this system of representations. Thus we not only have the neural firings that cause, for example, my arm to move upwards, but the capacity to represent those neural firings as the action of the arm moving upwards and we then can cognize about that action. If we also add the ability to generate behavior on the basis of cognizing about action, we have dissociated our behavior from external stimuli that trigger behavior (the computational cognition model), to a level in which we can conceptualize to ourselves that action and how that action may relate to other actions, thereby generating behavior as an internal process and not just one of reacting to external stimuli.

It may be that this dissociation is what we conceptualize as free will; that this process of generating representations based on neural firings that makes it possible to cognize the action (much like creating a visual image for ourselves of actions) in the context of other possible actions (again, like creating a visual image for ourselves of how our action would generate other actions) and thereby to generate a behavior response through the representations we make that is not tied to external stimuli is what we mean by free will. Consciousness would, then, be something like this level at which we are able to conceptualize the patterns at the level of neural firings, and free will would essentially be our representation to ourselves of this ability to internally generate behavior.

Is consciousness giving human beings an evolutionary advantage? Yes and No. Question by itself is framed wrongly on the assumption that it is only humans that possess consciousness. To understand Consciousness correctly, those references that belong to no religion in particular, but belong to all of mankind and have stood the test of Time, the world's scriptures need to be understood. They speak of Seven Planes/Worlds/Kingdoms/Levels of Consciousness. 1. Mineral 2. Plant 3. Animal 4. Human 5. Pitris(Reproductive Angels) 6. Devas(Angels) 7. Rishis(Seers). Consciousness evolves from plane 1. to plane 7. The plan of life is to evolve from lower states to higher states. The lowest plane, that of the Mineral Kingdom, has more matter and less Consciousness(Light). The highest, that of the Rishis(Seers) has more of Consciousness and less of matter. the phenomena we know of as Light is therefore consisting of least amount of matter and highest of Consciousness. The Human kingdom is described as the 'half-way' house, with planes below and above. The ignorance of this led to some religions assuming that animals have no souls and its Ok to consume them. animals do have souls(Consciousness) but less than that of Humans, but more than that of plants and minerals. Scientific research has proven and shown that animals and plants do have emotions and feelings.

The Human kingdom is a privileged one. Because "God made Man in his own Image". We are at that level where matter is about to give way to Light, the turning point in evolution. We, as humans, have a choice, to consume more matter and sink deeper into Matter or escape from the clutches of matter to the next higher planes to reach that final state called Liberation/ Moksha/ Freedom/ Oneness with the Universe/ Immortality/God. The means and methods of reaching this highest evolutionary goal is given in every religion of the world and is known as Yoga(Union/Oneness with the Universe) in the worlds oldest surviving religion(Hinduism) and civilisation (India). Religions are basic preparatory courses which teach the Do's and Dont's of being Human. Yoga starts where religions end, a sort of advanced course where the anatomy of the Human body is described along with the detailed plan of the Universe, stressing that both are one and the same, and it is our goal to evolve from the current petty state of individual exclusivity to the state of Universality/Oneness/Inclusiveness. The concept that the Human being is a miniature Universe is revealed. "So above, Thus below". Every human being is a miniature solar system who will further evolve. An ancient sanskrit treatise on Mathematics, the "Suryasiddhanta" reveals that every atom, with its nucleus and electrons and protons,electrons and sub atomic particles(planets) will evolve into a future Solar system with its Sun and planets. The author exclaimed "I see Suns and Suns in every direction", 5000 years ago. Also mentioned in this ancient work is the exact time taken by light to travel from the Sun to the earths surface. This ancient work, with its highly advanced mathematical concepts of astronomy, is also beautiful for the fact that its author wished to remain anonymous(Patents are petty and mean! Yoga is Open Source!). More on this can be found here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surya_Siddhanta

Therefore, it is wrong to assume that only humans have consciousness. Mankind is at the threshold of evolution, Higher than Minerals, Animals and Plants but lesser than the Saints and Masters. Our evolutionary goal is to transform higher in Consciousness, from Mineral(matter) to God(Consciousness),giving up meat(heavy matter) and growing finer and more ethical(transparent) towards light. The method is Yoga. In Yoga, the subtle energy vortexes(Chakras) and lines of force along the spinal cord are described, showing that the lowest Chakra, the Muladhara, represents matter and the highest, the Sahasrara, represents the highest level of Consciousness(Light) or Unity with the Universe/God. The duty of Man is to evolve from the animal/beastly states(Lower Chakras) of matter to the state of Immortality. The anatomy of Man also changes, the Pineal Gland bridging the gap(Space too short here)...

The normal course of evolution is millions of years. But the Yogi takes the expressway with a special technique of Sound(Mantra) and Breathing(Pranayama), bridging tens of years in only hours. In one lifespan, thousands of years of evolution are conquered. The soul reincarnates until liberation is attained, Time being cyclical and not linear, as is popularly assumed.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hindu_units_of_measurement

Yoga is also the science of balancing Matter(physical Body) and Light(Consciousness), that of holding on to the body ONLY for using it as an instrument to achieve the goal of Ultimate Conscousness.

Prof. Brian David Josephson (1940 - ) Welsh physicist, the youngest Nobel Laureate has said:

"The Vedanta and the Sankhya hold the key to the laws of mind and thought process which are co-related to the Quantum Field, i.e. the operation and distribution of particles at atomic and molecular levels."

Jack Sarfatti Physicist of the Physics/Consciousness Research Group

"I suspect that general relativity and quantum theory are two complimentary aspects of a deeper theory that will involve a kind of cosmic consciousness. The cosmic consciousness or the Mahat of India's Samkhya Philosophy is the basis of entire creation".

Hope this helps.

Hi All

I've written quite a bit about this. You might find the in-depth analysis at

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/245032935_The_evolution_of_consciousness?ev=prf_pub worth a look.

as well as the critical review at

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/246547968_Can_evolutionary_theory_explain_the_existence_of_consciousness_A_Review_of_Humphrey_N._(2010)_Soul_Dust_The_Magic_of_Consciousness._London_Quercus_ISBN_9781849162371?ev=prf_pub

It's far too much to summarise in a brief paragraph - but if anyone wants to explore any of it with me on this thread let me know and I will do my best.

Max Velmans

Article The evolution of consciousness

Article Can evolutionary theory explain the existence of consciousne...

I think the crux of the question is the causal nature of the relation between consciousness and behavior. A lot of the posts made above indicate that the things that the brain can 'do' are adaptive (the types of problems that can be solved, the types of relationships that can be registered and noted), but there is no solid evidence that I am aware of that says that consciousness itself makes this possible. The alternative explanation is that the systems that make these things possible give rise to conscious experience. I don't see a way to truly rule out either argument. We obviously can't randomly assign participants to the experimental conditions of 'conscious' and 'non-conscious', and see whether their behavior differs. Without the ability to do this, we can't definitively draw a causal link between consciousness and behavior. This precludes us from answering the question about whether consciousness has adaptive value in the evolutionary sense. In order for it to even be a possibility for consciousness to have been favored by evolutionary processes, we have to be able to say, with a high degree of certainty, that consciousness is more than experiential; that it can actually influence behavior. We would also need to know the TYPE of influence it can have on behavior (along with all the potential types of influence it can not have). IF we could get to that point, then we could begin to reason about why consciousness would have given individuals a reproductive advantage over those that did not possess it. However, as I am not aware of any definitive answers to the first question, I would say that trying to answer the question about the adaptive advantage of consciousness is not possible, and all we can do at this point is speculate.

Russ: "In order for it to even be a possibility for consciousness to have been favored by evolutionary processes, we have to be able to say, with a high degree of certainty, that consciousness is more than experiential; that it can actually influence behavior."

Russ, would you be able to respond to my comment here if you were not conscious?

If consciousness is required for your response, aren't we justified in claiming that consciousness has an influence on your behavior?

Hi Max,

Good to hear from you. I enjoyed reading your papers but I think we are fated to go round and round through the same revolving door unless we stake out our working definition of consciousness. I define consciousness this way:

*Consciousness is a transparent brain representation of the world from a privileged egocentric perspective*.

I take this as the hallmark of subjectivity, and on the basis of this definition I disagree with the following two claims:

1. Consciousness has always existed.

2. Consciousness serves no adaptive function.

In order to get a better idea of why you apparently believe 1 and 2, can you give your own working definition of consciousness?

What is a rolle of miror in development of selfconsciiousnes and modern narcismus?

Hi Arnold - There is no reason to believe that I wouldn't be able to respond to you if I were not conscious of it. Isn't this the classic "philosophical zombie" problem? It is extremely plausible that any thinking, feeling, acting human being without consciousness could behave in exactly the same way as a conscious being, such that the two are indistinguishable. In fact, we have absolutely no way of knowing that anybody other than ourselves has conscious experience. We just take it on faith that since everybody reports consciousness that it we all really do experience it. Further, there are plenty of examples, whether you are talking about behavior that results from trauma or behavior that occurs in a drug or alcohol induced state, of behavior occurring in the absence of conscious awareness - but it still occurs. So I would still contest that there is any evidence that consciousness has any influence on behavior whatsoever. I would go a step further to say that this evidence, at least using contemporary measures, is not empirically possible to obtain.

To take my argument a step further, considerable evidence in psychology points to the fact that most human behavior stems from cognitive processes that are NOT consciously experienced, so we can easily step past the argument that consciousness is required for behavior. What we would need then is some sort of evidence to suggest that the small set of behaviors that ARE experienced consciously would somehow be different if consciousness were absent.

Russ: "Isn't this the classic "philosophical zombie" problem? It is extremely plausible that any thinking, feeling, acting human being without consciousness could behave in exactly the same way as a conscious being ..."

The philosophical concept of a zombie is incoherent. Zombies do not exist. You are not a zombie. The question is, would you be able to read and reply properly to this question if you were unconscious? A vast body of empirical evidence says that you would not. I don't know anybody who would believe you if you claimed otherwise. I think the evidence is overwhelming that consciousness has an influence on human behavior.

Russ: "... considerable evidence in psychology points to the fact that most human behavior stems from cognitive processes that are NOT consciously experienced ... "

True, but some of our most important non-conscious cognitive processes depend on the perception and analysis of conscious content. We do not have direct sensory access to the volumetric world around us. What we perceive are features of our phenomenal/conscious world. See "Where am I? Redux" and "Evolution's Gift: Subjectivity and the Phenomenal World".

Arnold: "....A vast body of empirical evidence says that you would not. I don't know anybody who would believe you if you claimed otherwise. I think the evidence is overwhelming that consciousness has an influence on human behavior."

I want to be as informed as possible, but I have to say I have never come across any of this empirical evidence. If you have, please point me in the right direction. I completely see how we all 'feel' like our conscious experiences influence our behavior, but consensus on this 'feeling' doesn't constitute empirical evidence. I don't see how it would be methodologically possible to manipulate consciousness, while holding all other cognitive processes constant (this is the real rub), to determine that consciousness influences behavior. In lieu of that kind of study, all we are left with is corelational evidence of a relationship between conscious experience and behavior, which doesn't let us eliminate the possibility that consciousness might be nothing more than a phenomenological experience.

Hi Arnold

You are right that we are doomed to forever go around in circles unless we agree on a n intuitively satisfying and scientically justifiable definition of consciousness. You are locked into arguing in the way that you do, for the reason that you define consciousness in a functional way, so for you it naturally follows that it has a function (it is tautologically true). I have argued in depth and in many places that such functional definitions beg the question, are contrary to natural intuition, and ultimately, impede the development of a more complete science of consciousness that fits in smoothly with our natural intuitions. A good starting place for my views on this is my online paper "How to define consciousness - and how not to define consciousness" at https://www.researchgate.net/publication/233593329_How_to_Define_Consciousness_And_how_Not_to_Define_Consciousness?ev=prf_pub

Once one accepts that phenomenal consciousness can't be reduced to brain functioning, one can get on with the investigation of how any given form of phenomenal consciousness RELATES to brain functioning - for example to isolate the precise functionally defined neural CORRRELATES of a given experience). That's how I view your own valuable work on visual experience.

Best

Max

Article How to Define Consciousness: And how Not to Define Consciousness

This is such an ill posed question. An evolutionary advantage over what? plants? If so, yes they do. To ignore (or imply) the fact that animals have consciousness is proof to have somewhat missed the boat on this whole enterprise. And of course, consciousness has an evolutionary advantage: it allows us to manipulate symbolic information. For more on this, read the excellent works by Don Dulaney, from the University of Illinois. But, again, arguing for some type of human exception with consciousness is a bit of a mystical statement that does not belong in any serious discussion of evolution.

Russ: "I want to be as informed as possible, but I have to say I have never come across any of this empirical evidence. If you have, please point me in the right direction."

Just for example, look at the Glasgow Coma Scale [1] which is used worldwide for assessing level of consciousness, from deep unconsciousness to full alert consciousness. In the lower part of the scale, a person is unable to respond intelligibly to verbal questions, let alone printed questions. So the evidence is clear; if you (or anybody else) are in a deep sleep or otherwise unconscious, you are unable to read (or listen to) this comment and make a proper response.

.......................................................................................................................................

1. The Glasgow Coma Scale or GCS is a neurological scale that aims to give a reliable, objective way of recording the conscious state of a person for initial as well as subsequent assessment. A patient is assessed against the criteria of the scale, and the resulting points give a patient score between 3 (indicating deep unconsciousness) and either 14 (original scale) or 15 (the more widely used modified or revised scale). GCS was initially used to assess level of consciousness after head injury, and the scale is now used by first aid, EMS, nurses and doctors as being applicable to all acute medical and trauma patients. In hospitals it is also used in monitoring chronic patients in intensive care.

Arnold: "In the lower part of the scale, a person is unable to respond intelligibly to verbal questions, let alone printed questions."

This conflates corelational evidence with causal evidence. I don't argue at all that humans who are assessed as having very low levels of consciousness are unable to behave in certain ways, such as providing verbal responses. However, it is irresponsible science to mistake this corelational relation for evidence of a causal relationship. Based on the the relationship you indicated above, we cannot justifiably rule out that the ability to verbally respond gives rise to consciousness (though I will concede that it is probably unlikely), and we certainly can't rule out that some third variable (potentially some more basic threshold of information processing activity that allows for the processing of verbal responses, and also allows for awareness of these abilities in the self) may give rise to both the ability to verbally respond as well as conscious experience of the response. This third variable explanation is, in my view, EXTREMELY plausible and must be ruled out before we can even feel justified in proposing a causal relation of consciousness.

We can't just say that "because person X was not assessed as being conscious at the same time that they were unable to form a verbal response, consciousness must cause a verbal response" This would be logically akin to stating that "because the tires on my car only rotate when my car is in motion, the tires must cause the motion in my car". This is obviously a false and short-sighted statement. The engine propels my car forward, and in the process, the tires rotate. However, the rotation of the tires and the car's motion reliably accompany one another, and the engine is hidden from view, so it would be a tempting argument at first glance, without a deeper knowledge of the workings of a car.

Without the ability to experimentally manipulate consciousness (and only consciousness, keeping all other cognitive processes functioning normally), we can't infer a causal relationship between consciousness and behavior.

Perhaps we should ask Alan what he wants to mean by experience in first person modality. Will any experience do or does it have to include a sense of time and place as in Arnold's version? If it does then that would be content and I agree with Arnold that human behaviour would not be possible without it. Certainly not the sort of behaviour we are demonstrating here. And presumably that evolved to be useful even if what we are doing here may not be!

Is it just experience or with a sense of venue Alan?

Russ: "However, it is irresponsible science to mistake this corelational relation for evidence of a causal relationship."

This is not a matter of mistaking correlational evidence for causal evidence. Science is a pragmatic enterprise. Conclusions are based on the weight of evidence, and scientific evidence is often limited to strong correlations. In the case of consciousness, the strikingly high correlation between normative measures of low consciousness and loss of cognitive function leads to the reasonable conclusion that consciousness influences behavior.

Russ: "Without the ability to experimentally manipulate consciousness (and only consciousness, keeping all other cognitive processes functioning normally), we can't infer a causal relationship between consciousness and behavior."

If consciousness is involved in the expression of other cognitive processes, how could we possibly manipulate consciousness without changing other cognitive processes? To claim a causal relationship between consciousness and behavior requires an accepted theoretical model of the physical processes involved in the phenomena of interest. This is why the retinoid model of consciousness is of particular interest.

Max, you wrote:

"A good starting place for my views on this is my online paper "How to define consciousness - and how not to define consciousness".

I agree, and I think that the following observation at the conclusion of your paper is important in this discussion:

"Once a given reference for the term "consciousness" is fixed in its

phenomenology, theinvestigation of its nature can begin, and this may in time transmute the meaning (or sense)of the term."

My claim is that the root phenomenology common to all conscious states is an experience of *something somewhere in relation to oneself*. This is the first-person perspective (1pp). This is subjectivity.

The scientific goal is to systematically relate 1pp descriptions of subjective/conscious content to the corresponding public third-person (3pp) descriptions. The problem is that 1pp and 3pp occupy separate descriptive domains. This is an epistemological problem that I have discussed in my chapter "A Foundation for the Scientific Study of Consciousness" in Pereira, Jr. and Lehmann (Eds.). *The Unity of Mind, Brain, and World: Current Perspectives on a Science of Consciousness*. Cambridge University Press, 2013.

Here is what I wrote in my preliminary draft for the book:

..........................................................................................

However, there is a peculiar difficulty in dealing with phenomenal consciousness

as an object of scientific study because it requires us to systematically relate third

person descriptions or measures of brain events to first person descriptions or

measures of phenomenal content. We generally think of the former as objective

descriptions and the latter as subjective descriptions. Because phenomenal

descriptors and physical descriptors occupy separate descriptive domains, one

cannot assert a formal identity when describing any instance of a subjective

phenomenal aspect in terms of an instance of an objective physical aspect, in the

language of science. We are forced into accepting some descriptive slack. On

the assumption that the physical world is all that exists, and if we cannot assert

an identity relationship between a first-person event and a corresponding third person event, how can we usefully explain phenomenal experience in terms of

biophysical processes? I suggest that we proceed on the basis of the following

points:

1. Some descriptions are made public; i.e., in the 3rd person domain (3 pp).

2. Some descriptions remain private; i.e., in the 1st person domain (1 pp).

3. All scientific descriptions are public (3 pp).

4. Phenomenal experience (consciousness) is constituted by brain activity

that, as an object of scientific study, is in the 3 pp domain.

5. All descriptions are selectively mapped to egocentric patterns of brain

activity in the producer of a description and in the consumer of a

description (Trehub 1991, 2007, 2011).

6. The egocentric pattern of brain activity – the phenomenal experience – to

which a word or image in any description is mapped is the referent of that

word or image.

7. But a description of phenomenal experience (1 pp) *cannot be reduced* [emphasis added] to a description of the egocentric brain activity by which it is constituted (there can be no formal identity established between descriptions) because private

events and public events occupy separate descriptive domains.

It seems to me that this state of affairs is properly captured by the metaphysical

stance of dual-aspect monism (see Fig.1) where private descriptions and public

descriptions are separate accounts of a common underlying physical reality

(Pereira et al 2010; Velmans 2009). If this is the case then to properly conduct a

scientific exploration of consciousness we need a bridging principle to

systematically relate public phenomenal descriptions to private phenomenal

descriptions.

.......................................................................................................

So you see that I do not subscribe to the epistemological *reduction* of consciousness to brain activity. But I do claim that consciousness, from the scientific perspective, is *constituted* by brain activity.

None of what we observe exist "per se" (inherent). Anything that we observe only exists as a system of relations, which is part of a system of relations. What we qualify as "consciousness", is a system of relations, which is part of a system of relations.

Is consciousness a psychic phenomenon or not? Put it another way: is the system of relations "consciousness" part of the system of relations "psyche"? And then: Is the psychic phenomenon (system of relations "psyche") a neurological epiphenomenon (a system of relations derived and supported by the neurological system of relations) or not?

Consciousness "has a life of its own", independent from the psychic and neurological systems?

Consciousness is a system of relations prefigured in the dynamics of other systems of relationships, independent to the neurological and psychic systems?

How many degrees of consciousness we know?

By the way: why we care so much to give an ontological place to the phenomenon "consciousness," and we do not care that much, to give an ontological position to sexual reproduction? Sexual reproduction is less important, less crucial, then consciousness?

Yet many cosmogonies, in different times and different parts of the world, explain the origin of the World from the union of sexual beings, endowed with consciousness, aware that from their union, male and female, it would be "born" the World. A primigenial act of will!

Yes! Consciousness implies an egoic principle. But this does not mean that consciousness and the egoic principle are equivalent! The egoic principle is one thing, consciousness is another. In what it consists the egoic principle?

The egoic principle says: all forms of the manifestation comes from confinement processes. The egoic principle brings together all the confinement processes under one umbrella.

What is a confinement process? Every structuring process of a system of correlations endowed with a degree of subsistence (condition of resonance) such as to make it distinct and/or distinguishable (even when not observable) from the context of the relationships it forms part of ; in general, a confinement process is equivalent to a phenomenon of localization.

Here we are: localization.

You and I are localized systems (biological) of relationships.

In the biological phenomenon the egoic principle takes on a particular value and connotation, summed up in one word: autopoiesis (H. Maturana, 1972).

An autopoietic system is a system that constantly redefines itself, and in its interior, supports and reproduces itself. The autopoiesis dynamics of a cell are organised around biochemical and biophysical auto-catalytic patterns, accelerated and self-regulating by continuous fluctuation, nonlinear energy transfer, and discriminating between the internal and external environment. The selectivity trans-membrane is the central element of the autopoietic cellular dynamic. There is a catalytic core (Microtubule Organizing Centre or MTOC)( Efimov et al., 2007) capable of interacting with the substrate so that it can produce the components that make up the membrane. As a result, a membrane separates this network of interactions with the environment, so that a standalone unit can exist. A cell is a continuous and recursive production of components, which through the membrane, define the cell. Although there are myriads of sub-cellular structures inside the cell, in addition to atoms, molecules, macromolecular polymers, mitochondria, chloroplasts, and so on, the properties of the components do not determine the properties of the cell, as an autopoietic system. Cell properties are the properties of relationships and interactions which are produced and that produce its components.

Consciousness implies autopoiesis. But this does not mean that consciousness and autopoiesis are equivalent! Autopoiesis is one thing, consciousness is another.

To understand the evolutionary significance of consciousness we must first understand the evolutionary significance of the nervous tissue.

In the nonlinear process of phylogenetic diversification, nerve cells or neurons play the role of receptor unit of zoological individual of tissue organisation, whose dual selective function on change of state and functional interface between innervated tissues, supports and integrates the function exerted by the catalytic cellular core on energy-transfer. Cellular differentiation leads to identifying the neuron, responds to a phylogenetic request (bifurcation), which at a certain stage of evolution (Cambrian), gave a new degree of freedom to the zoological line of biological systems in their relationship with the environment: neuron-dependent "behavioural" relationship. Different behavioral relationships , involve different levels of neurological interfacing between individual and environment.

From a certain point onwards, the degree of integration of the neuro-dependent behavior, it is describable in terms of "psychological behavior". A psychological behavior is always mediated by a perceptual process supplemented by sensations. Sensations assign a new value to the adaptive neurological behavior because introduce the individual in a relational dimension, based on the presence of the distinction between localized neurological system and the environment, which prefigures, now yes, that level of integration of the perceptual process, which we call consciousness .

Consciousness is a psychological system of correlations, implicated in the relationship of interfacing between individual and environment, given by the doubling of our reality perceived by a my-Ego which perceives another-from-my-Ego.

An ant asking another ant, "Is consciousness giving ants an evolutionary advantage?"

Is there any contributor who could say this dialogue/communication between two ants is not possible. If you think it is not, could you please throw some light? How do we decide if the plants and animals do not think the same way, act the same way, feel the same way as we do within the limits of every species?

Suresh,

''within the limits of every species'

Since these limits are different then their consciousness are different.

Excepts from:

HOW TO DEFINE CONSCIOUSNESS—AND HOW NOT TO DEFINE CONSCIOUSNESS by Max Velmans,

Normally we point to some thing that we observe or experience. The term “consciousness” however refers to experience itself. Rather than being exemplified by a particular thing that we observe or experience, it is exemplified by all the things that we observe or experience. Something happens when we are conscious that does not happen when we are not conscious—and something happens when we are conscious of something that does not happen when we are not conscious of that thing. We know what it is like to be conscious when we are awake as opposed to not being conscious when in dreamless sleep. We also know what it is like to be conscious of something (when awake or dreaming) as opposed to not being conscious of that thing.

This everyday understanding of consciousness based on the presence or absence of experienced phenomena provides a simple place to start. A person, or other entity, is conscious if they experience something; conversely, if a person or entity experiences nothing they are not conscious. Elaborating slightly, we can say that when consciousness is present, phenomenal content (consciousness of something) is present. Conversely, when phenomenal content is absent, consciousness is absent.

In common usage, the term "consciousness" is often synonymous with "awareness", "conscious awareness", and “experience”. For example, It makes no difference in most contexts to claim that I am "conscious of" what I think, "aware of" what I think, "consciously aware" of what I think, or that I can “experience” what I think.

The "contents of consciousness" encompass all the phenomena that we are conscious of, aware of, or experience. These include not only experiences that we commonly associate with ourselves, such as thoughts, feelings, images, dreams, body sensations and so on, but also the experienced threedimensional world (the phenomenal world) beyond the body surface.

it is important to reserve the term "mind" for psychological states and processes

that may or may not be "conscious".

Descartes also famously believed thought to epitomise the nature of consciousness, and

consequently defined it as a “substance that thinks” (res cogitans), which distinguishes it (in his view) from material substance that has extension in space (res extensa). Modern psychology accepts that verbal thoughts (in the form of phonemic imagery or ‘inner speech’) are amongst the contents of consciousness. However it does not accept that thoughts exemplify all conscious contents. Unlike thoughts, pains, tactile sensations, itches and other body experiences appear to have both spatial location and extension in different regions of the body, and the sights and sounds of the experienced external world (the phenomenal world) appear to have locations and extensions in a surrounding three-dimensional space. These interoceptive and exteroceptive experiences also differ widely from each other and many descriptive systems have been developed for investigating their phenomenology (in studies of visual and auditory perception, emotion, pain, and so on). It should be evident that such developments in phenomenology are an essential first step in characterising what it is about consciousness that needs to be explained—and that restricting the phenomenology of

“consciousness” to the phenomenology of “thought” is too narrow.

it makes more sense to reserve the term “self-consciousness” for a special form of reflexive consciousness in which the object of consciousness is the self or some aspect of the self.

For the purposes of definition, the importance of retaining an initial, clear distinction between information processing and the conscious experiences that may or may not accompany it We do not have introspective access to how the preconscious cognitive processes that enable thinking produce individual, conscious thoughts in the form of “inner speec

If one makes up one’s mind about the ontology of phenomenal consciousness before fully investigating how its phenomenology relates to processing in the brain and surrounding world, one precludes a deeper understanding of that ontology.

Once a given reference for the term "consciousness" is fixed in its phenomenology, the

investigation of its nature can begin, and this may in time transmute the meaning (or sense) of the term.

Hi Max,

You wrote what I take to be your working definition of phenomenal consciousness this way"

"A person, or other entity, is conscious if they experience something; conversely, if a person or entity experiences nothing they are not conscious."

This is my working definition of phenomenal consciousness:

*Phenomenal consciousness is an experience of something somewhere in relation to oneself.*

1. Do you think that there is a significant difference between these two definitions of phenomenal consciousness?

2. If you do think there is a significant difference difference between these definitions, what is the difference?

@ Suresh

The mentality, which emerges in the state of non-enlightenment, which incorrectly perceives and reproduces the world of objects and, conceiving that the reproduced world of objects is real, continues to develop deluded thoughts, is what we define as mind. The mind has five different names. The first is called the "activating mind," for without being aware of it, it breaks the equilibrium of mind by the force of ignorance. The second is called the "evolving mind," for it emerges contingent upon the agitated mind as the subject that perceives incorrectly. The third is called the "reproducing mind," for it reproduces the entire world of objects as a bright mirror reproduces all material images. When confronted with the objects of the five senses, it reproduces them at once. It arises spontaneously at all times and exists forever reproducing the world of objects in front of the subject. The fourth is called the "analytical mind", for it differentiates what is defiled and what is undefiled. The fifth is called the "continuing mind," for it is united with deluded thoughts and continues uninterrupted. It retains the entire karma, good and bad, accumulated in the immeasurable lives of the past, and does not permit any loss. It is also capable of bringing the results of the pain, pleasure, etc., of the present and the future to maturity; in doing so, it makes no mistakes. It can cause one to recollect suddenly the things of the present and the past and to have sudden and unexpected fantasies of the things to come. The triple world, therefore, is unreal and is of mind only. Apart from it there are no objects of the five senses and of the mind. What does this mean? Since all things are, without exception, developed from the mind and produced under the condition of deluded thoughts, all differentiations are no other than the differentiations of one's mind itself. Yet the mind cannot perceive the mind itself; the mind has no marks of its own that can be ascertained as a substantial entity as such. It should be understood that the conception of the entire world of objects can be held only on the basis of man's deluded mind of ignorance. All things, therefore, are just like the images in a mirror which are devoid of any objectivity that one can get hold of; they are of the mind only and are unreal. When the deluded mind comes into being, then various conceptions (dharma) come to be; and when the deluded mind ceases to be, then these various conceptions cease to be. [Ashvaghosha, The Awakening Of Faith In Mahayana http://www.fodian.net/world/1666.htm]

Arnold,

you pronounce the subjectivity of the experience a little more than Max did: " ... in relation to oneself."

This relation is essential. Anything that I realize has a relation to me - even if it is not important. To be "not important" is in this case the relation and I realize it - in other words - I am conscious, that something is not important to observe more and I know this.

So I suggest using in Max's version the words "has quale" instead of "is conscious", emphasizing that quale / qualia represents the lowest level of awareness.

HISTORY & INTRODUCTION: Simply put, Consciousness is the Unified Field Einstein was theorizing about but which was never empirically proven. The "theory of everything". Consciousness is the very 'essence' of everything. In another approach incompatible to Western science because of the 'State & Church divide', 'it' is called Omnipresent 'God'. The unseen 'force' existing in everything that makes it what it is. The recent Western science approach is objective, needing empirical evidence. Thus Western science focused on Empirical , Objective approaches verifiable by our senses. The senses are the primary source of empirical evidence. Like studying the brain and highlighting the specific areas which become active due to specific emotions/actions. This is purely a material approach while Consciousness is beyond the realm of matter.

The senses are only instruments, and instruments have their own limits and limitations, say 50KHz to 100KHz. What then about those phenomena BEYOND the range and limits of the instruments/ senses? Deny their existence? Voodoo? Pagan? The advancement of machines, is mistaken for the advancement of man.

Knowing fully well the limits of the sense instruments and their "Zero Errors"(the fact that they can be easily deceived through illusions and appearances, mistaking one for the other),the ancient Easterners cultivated the subjective approach, based on personal intuition honed on meditation and personal ethics. Thus even without laboratory instruments worth millions of dollars, they came up with the Theory of Numbers, Calculated planetary positions and Eclipses to the minutest detail, calculated the Age of the Universe, life of Sub atomic particles,,,All without number crunching super computers or Hubble Telescopes or particle colliders.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hindu_units_of_time

In the West, the Church(Light) is always at loggerheads with Science(matter). And Western science is all about matter (materialist societies) and thus "sense based" empirical evidence..In the East, Science is Religion and Religion is science. Because "Matter" is the lowest form of Consciousness and "Light' is the highest.(Please refer to my earlier post for more on Light and Matter above). Western science developed as a reaction/rebellion to the church's atrocities based on faith and perpetuated by superstition. Western science, arising as the underdog, demanded "proof" in response to clergy's demand for submissiveness to the authority of the hedonistic church. Very commendable, but in demanding empirical and objective proof, the realm beyond the senses was discarded.

It is only recently, after dominating the world with technology, but failing to solve mankind's problems with technology, and failing to achieve that elusive concept of "happiness" through material consumption and material science wreaking havoc in materialist families and societies, in a bid to resolve newly discovered evidence that there is something BEYOND the senses and that the East had fairly full knowledge of it, The West Turned East.

Prof. Brian David Josephson (1940 - ) Welsh physicist, the youngest Nobel Laureate has said:

"The Vedanta and the Sankhya hold the key to the laws of mind and thought process which are co-related to the Quantum Field, i.e. the operation and distribution of particles at atomic and molecular levels.

He has turned to meditation and Indian Philosophy especially the Vedanta and Samkhya philosophy to find" scientific explanations" for the laws of mind and thought processes and their correlation to the quantum field in physics, which deals with creation and destruction of particles at atomic and molecular levels. Indian philosophy shows the relationship between mind and matter. Mind as seen in Indian philosophy enables one to describe subjective reality or the process of decision making as a wave function in terms of quantum physics.

Jack Sarfatti Physicist of the Physics/Consciousness Research Group

"I suspect that general relativity and quantum theory are two complimentary aspects of a deeper theory that will involve a kind of cosmic consciousness. The cosmic consciousness or the Mahat of India's Samkhya Philosophy is the basis of entire creation".

Max Planck stated, "I regard consciousness as fundamental. I regard matter as

derivative from consciousness."

Erwin Schroedinger (1887--1961) Austrian theoretical physicist, a Nobel prize-winner, on

Quantum Mechanics,

"In all world," writes Schroedinger in his book My View of the World (chapter iv), "there is no

kind of framework within which we can find consciousness in the plural; this is simply

something we construct because of the temporal plurality of individuals, but it is a false

construction....The only solution to this conflict insofar as any is available to us at all lies in the

ancient wisdom of the Upanishad."

CURRENT APPROACHES: Still in its nascent stages, the current approach in modern research is again, revolving around matter. MRI's, Brain Imaging, Cognitive Science...Egocentric scholarly semantics on the concept of "Me, I, and the perception of the World' abound. Western science has sadly not given up its addiction to matter. But there is something beyond matter, existing EVEN in matter. The "something beyond matter' can never be registered and measured objectively by material instruments and the senses. Because PART can NEVER deduce the WHOLE. Faced with this obstacle, the Eastern Seer(Scientist, albeit without PhD's) sought this truth beyond matter not by talking about or measuring it, but by "BECOMING' it. . By "EXPERIENCING" it. Because there is a whole lot of difference between "TALKING ABOUT the Truth" and "BECOMING Truth itself". In the East, the scientist not only studied Truth, but transformed himself into it, Walking the Talk, aligning THOUGHT, WORD & DEED to let the Light shine through. The Researcher of Truth/Consciousness BECOMES Consciousness itself.

There was only one drawback to this approach. The one who experienced this state was unable to convey the beauty of the experience to another individual because of the limitations of Language. But the Seer "knew' that the other knew. And rested it at that. No Patents, Copyrights, Royalty's. Many remained anonymous, content with drinking the beauty of their findings

This 'experiencing' Consciousness in its magnificence is known as Yoga, the Fourth State of Consciousness, where the puny excluding individual identity is merged with the all-inclusive Universal. The other states of Consciousness known to man are 1.Sleeping 2. Dreaming 3.Waking. The Fourth State is called Yoga, where the Mind is used as a portal to enter the subjective world of Consciousness while still rooted in objective matter(the human body).

In sleep, we merge with Consciousness, but we are not "there' to be aware of it. Similar to this is the dreaming state. In the wakeful state, we wake into our individual existences, different from others, competing with others, not realising that they are in fact "US" and that we all share the same essence called Consciousness. Thus a Fourth state is needed where we can willingly train ourselves into entering and merging with Universal Consciousness, but while still retaining the physical matter of the body, the "I" personality and individual identity with a name.. Thus the Yogis achieved and mastered Consciousness to become Immortal. Individual consciousness is slowly transformed into Universal Consciousness. The minor side effects of this process are the beneficial health effects of Yoga on body and mind which we hear in the news, studied by researchers on Yoga and exploited by the Yoga industry.

1.The science of the deliverance of Man from the imprisoning mortal restrictions of Matter is known as Yoga.

2. This is the path of Yoga, the first and foremost science, the Science of Man, where One works out Oneself from out of oneself. No laboratory rats. The experimental rat is yourself ! When the basic root and driving force of morality are felt by the individual as constituents of his own nature and not

as external restrictions.

3. To be truthful in Thought, Word and Deed until you become Truth itself. Not just talking ABOUT the truth in lengthy scientific papers, but becoming and LIVING the truth. After all, what is the use of science/ truth if not for transforming ourselves by our self to reach Sustainability and Immortality? Return to the Primal Source from where we came from.

Horace Alexander (1899 - 1989) English Quaker, diplomat, teacher and writer, pacifist and ornithologist

“The wisdom of ancient India, which has sustained the lives of millions through the centuries, is in fact highly relevant to the sickness of our world order.”

Amaury de Riencourt (1918 - )born in Orleans, France, author of The American

empire and The Soul of India “Yoga – is Indian Civilization’s finest product, the ultimate perfection reached by India’s best men.”

Sir Yehudi Menuhin (1915 – 1999) Violinist “We in the Western world have grown to understand matter as imprisoned light, and light as liberated matter, yet this has had no influence on our spiritual thought. In practical terms it only led to the creation of the atom bomb. When I was a boy no one seemed to ask where the energies come from. Land, oil, coal, air seemed inexhaustible. Now we are realizing how our very life depends upon restoring not only our balance with nature, but also the balance within ourselves.

We are depleting our reserves of spirit, health, courage and faith at an alarming rate. The quiet practice of Yoga is, in its humble yet effective way, an antidote.”

Claudio,

your version of ancient Indian philosophical texts is extremely aesthetic and beautiful. The only problem is that the described 'consciousness' as the 'vis vitalis' is regarded as a substance which is inherent in the material or must be added. This is a hypothesis which is now falsified or at best as not to be considered scientific.

Wilfried: "So I suggest using in Max's version the words "has quale" instead of "is conscious", emphasizing that quale / qualia represents the lowest level of awareness."

I am not a philosopher, but as I understand it, qualia are the perceptual features/images in our global conscious experience. In other words they are part of the present content of consciousness. What I am trying to suggest is that we cannot have a phenomenal experience of *something* without having it an experience of something *somewhere* in our egocentric space -- a coordinate location with respect to our "point" of phenomenal perspectival origin (I!).

Arnold,

Some experience are not related to any location in space. If one of your close one died, you will experience grief for a long period. This type of experience has nothing to do with egocentric space.

Louis,

On the contrary, the grief you experience is your personal emotion. This emotion is expressed somewhere within your own body, even if its exact location is indistinct. The space within your body envelope is a special part of your global egocentric space. See Fig. 1 in "Evolution'sGift: Subjectivity and the Phenomenal World". Itches and pains are more sharply localized within us than experiences like happiness, sadness, and anger.

Arnold,

I agree that the grief experience is felt to be within our body around the thorax. It makes breathing difficult and our muscles become tensed. But those aspects of grief which felt within our body does not exaust the grief phenomenology. That person that was closed and that you will not see was a part of you in a certain sense; so the grief is the suffering of this part of you. Memories of your relations with the person that passed away are coming up. What is this painfull grief for? Your extended self has been amputated and you have to learn living with a part of you that will never meet his/her external counterpart in this life. There is a part of our egocentric space that is an extended self, a part of us that care to a being outside of our body as if it was part of our body, as if a part of us is outside our body.

Hi all, and Louis ..thanx for the topic and discussion.

There is not a single person (thing or species) that could feel the way the other person or thing or species feels. Each one of us is a product of genetic tendencies and environmental action, reaction and gain or loss. The result is what each one of us is now, at this instant. In spite of being similar, no two things are similar,not even our voice, let alone our finger prints. We think the way we have been trained over the millions of years by collecting information, knowingly, or unknowingly from the same environment (cosmic) of which we are a part. We are all the same (plants or animals or atoms) yet we are different due to perceived individuality. Aren't we all like a drop of water in the ocean that make no difference to the ocean if we separate from the ocean? Are we not the drop, that together make an ocean? I feel it is idividuality in unversality and universe in individuals (animate or inanimate)

These terms are made by us and the reality is a social construction, different for different people and things. Reality remains the same though except that it changes each fraction of time ...what is now is different later and never returns ...Take that frontal lobe away and we are crippled, and will feel nothing ...conscious or unconscious. That however doesn't mean that every other individual cell of the body is not conscious. A red blood cell in us will still function normally with same tendency/ies as it was before. The sum total effect of our uncountable cells, microcosms in us, will not be perceived by us if we lost that frontal lobe, but it will still be there.

Had we not invented things like computers and programs, we would have discarded great people like Stephen Hawking as he would not have been able to tell what is he thinking about. We would have called him a vegetable.

Furthermore, who decides ants are not as conscious as we are? We take a life time to understand ourselves (even that is an exageration), how could we understand an ant, or a spider. We are limited, and so is everything else. Evolution is great. It is there as a result to adjust to the environment that is our savior as well as destroyer. Nevertheless, that is true for every species, and inanimate things.

Everyone and everything has an evolutionary advantage, thats how we are all surviving as we all are, including the same little ants ...we had tried hard to get destroyed through the evolutionary disadvantage we had with limited far sightedness ...environment is still 'one up' on us and has been slowing the speed of destruction through our evolutionary disadvantage/stupidity'ignorance.

It is a beautiful topic, many thanx to all the contributors.

I will leave you at this time with one statement that reads, "we have saved one leg due to this advantage, however we have lost the other due to this disadvantage," and it is all Nature that keeps the balance ...lose something to get something and vice versa ...e=mc2 ...we are just a drop in the ocean, the ocean that is nothing but many similar drops

Louis:" There is a part of our egocentric space that is an extended self, a part of us that care to a being outside of our body as if it was part of our body, as if a part of us is outside our body."

I agree. But the loved one who is lost to us remains within our brain as a dear memory, one whom we experience in our imagination -- within our own phenomenal space. You can speak of this as a memory outside of our own body only in a metaphorical sense. As you say, it is an *as if* experience.

@ Raveendra

(...) When one seeks one's mind in its true state, it is found to be quite intelligible

although invisible. In its true state, mind is naked, immaculate; not made of

anything, being of the Voidances; clear, vacuous, without duality, transparent,

timeless, uncompounded, unimpeded, colorless, not realizable as a separate thing,

but as the unity of all things, yet not composed of them; of one taste, and

transcendent over all differentiation.

(...) When looking outward into the vacuity of space, there is no place to be found

where the mind is shining. When looking inward into one's own mind in search of

the shining, there is to be found no thing that shines. One's own mind is transparent,

without quality.

(...) There being no thing upon which to meditate, no meditation is there whatsoever.

There being no thing to go astray, no going astray is there if one be guided by

memory. Without meditating, without going astray, look into the True State, wherein

self cognition, self knowledge, self illumination shine resplendently. These, so

shining, are called the Bodhisattvic Mind.

(...) Although there are no two such things as knowing and not knowing, there are

profound and innumerable sorts of meditation; surpassingly excellent it is in the end

to know one's mind.

There being no two such things as object of meditation and meditator, if by those

who practice or do not practice meditation the meditator of meditation be sought

and not found, thereupon the goal of the meditation is reached and also the end of

the meditation itself.

(...) Although he that is ignorant of this may seek externally or outside the mind to know

himself, how is it possible to find oneself when seeking others rather than oneself?

He that thus seeks to know himself is like a fool giving a performance in the midst

of a crowd and forgetting who he is and then seeking everywhere to find himself.

This simile applies to one's erring in other ways.

(...) The various concepts, too, being illusory, and none of them real, fade away

accordingly. Thus, for example, everything postulated of the Whole, the Sangsara

and Nirvana, arises from nothing more than mental concepts. Changes in one's train

of thought [or one's association of ideas] produce corresponding changes in one's

conception of the external world. Therefore, the various views concerning things

are merely different mental concepts.

(...) The bodily forms in which the world of appearances is contained are also concepts

of the mind. "The quintessence of the six classes of beings" is also a mental

concept. "The happiness of the gods in heaven-worlds and of men" is another

mental concept. "The three unhappy states of suffering," too, are concepts of the

mind.

"Ignorance, miseries, and the Five Poisons" are likewise, mental concepts.

"Self-originated Divine Wisdom" is also a concept of the mind. "The full realization

of passing away into Nirvana" is also a concept of mind.

"Misfortunes caused by demons and evil spirits" is also a concept of mind. "Gods

and good fortune" are also concepts of mind. "Likewise the various perfections"

are mental concepts. "Unconscious one-pointedness" is also a mental concept.

The colour of any objective thing is also a mental concept. "The Qualityless and

the Formless" is also a mental concept "The One and the Many in at-one-ment" is

also a mental concept. "Existence and non-existence," as well as "the

Non-Created," are concepts of mind.

[The Tibetan Book of the Great Libération - The Method of Realizing Nirvanna Through Knowing The Mind, by Padma Sambhava; http://arfalpha.com/OneMind/TheGreatLiberation.PDF]

Arnold,

"I am not a philosopher, but as I understand it, qualia are the perceptual features/images in our global conscious experience. In other words they are part of the present content of consciousness. What I am trying to suggest is that we cannot have a phenomenal experience of *something* without having it an experience of something *somewhere* in our egocentric space -- a coordinate location with respect to our "point" of phenomenal perspectival origin (I!)."

I agree in most of your answer. For consciousness - I think - is needed more than the experience of something somewhere (naturally in our egocentric space). Although simple organisms experience their environment, but they are delivered to this experience. Higher organisms experience their environment too, however they know what they experiences and therefore they can respond more flexibly to it. Here begins consciousness. It is the knowledge to know or experience something. Without this knowledge it is only a passive, subjective experience - qualia.

Wilfried: "Although simple organisms experience their environment, but they are delivered to this experience."

This is a key point at which I disagree. In my view, simple organisms (e.g., planaria) do *not* experience their environment (the world around them) because, unlike conscious creatures, they have no coherent internal representation of their environmental space. All that they are able to experience are the separate energy transductions at their various sensory organs. Their behavior is restricted to sensory-motor reflexes. See "Evolution's Gift: Subjectivity and the Phenomenal World" on my RG page.

Wilfried: "Higher organisms experience their environment too, however they know what they experiences and therefore they can respond more flexibly to it."

Conscious creatures (higher organisms) respond more flexibly to their environment because they really do have subjectivity, a brain representation of the world around them from a fixed perspectival point of origin, a core self (I!). The amount of knowledge that they have about their environment depends on the power of their unconscious and pre-conscious cognitive mechanisms.

Arnold: It sounds like you are advocating a Cartesian Theater perspective of conscious experience. Is that correct? If so, how do you reconcile that against the lack of neurological evidence for any such structure in the brain where "it all comes together", and what is your view of the alternative, 'Multiple Drafts' model that Dennett advocates, which posits that the notion of a single, coherent representation of the world occurring in consciousness is an experiential illusion? Or, am I misinterpreting your notion of conscious experience?

Russ,

You are not misinterpreting my theory of conscious experience. The notion of a Cartesian Theater is just a metaphor, but it is a metaphor that might well be applied to my retinoid model of consciousness. See my paper "Space, self, and the theater of consciousness" on my RG page.

As for Dennett's "Multiple Drafts " model, it simply does not explain consciousness. In my view, our having a coherent brain representation of the world around us from a fixed perspectival point of origin is not an illusion; it is a necessary and sufficient biophysical condition for the very existence of consciousness. Each of us may have different intuitions about how to explain consciousness but, in science, evidence trumps intuition. A successful theoretical model should be able to explain/predict conscious phenomena that competing theories are unable to explain/predict. The retinoid model has successfully explained many previously inexplicable phenomena. Good examples are my explanation of the moon illusion and the prediction of the SMTT hallucination on the basis of the neuronal structure and dynamics of the retinoid system. I describe these in the paper referenced above. By the way, I have had several discussions with Dan Dennett on these issues.

I will definitely give it a read. Thanks for pointing me towards the materials. I guess what I am having a hard time reconciling at this point is how we could design a study that would be able to distinguish a true Cartesian theater from a system that regularly updates memories of specific aspects of conscious experience without ever having a fully developed view of consciousness at any point in time. It seems that the experience of either type of system in the individual would be indistinguishable. However, in a Cartesian Theater model, a brain injury or lesion to the right (or wrong) region should knock out consciousness altogether, even though all of the functioning leading up to that point should remain intact. I'm not aware that such a region has been identified, correct?

Dear Russ,

You raise an interesting issue in relation to Arnolds' model. Neurobiologists often toss out this idea that there is no evidence for anywhere where it all comes together, but actually what they mean is that neuroanatomy is very hard to reconcile with the idea that there is ONE SINGLE PLACE where it all comes together. To get a conscious experience we probably need something like 1000 to 10,000 signals to come together. (There is good evidence that it would not be much more than that and some would say less.) There are literally millions of places in the frontal region that receive this number of signals - single cells do. So there is absolutely nothing to suggest that there are no places where everything comes together - just that there does not seem to be a unique place, as Descartes wanted.

Dan Dennett makes what I think is at first a very sensible suggestion - that there are lots of places hosting experiential material - since it fits with the anatomy. What I find weird about his theory is that these are not experiences as such but just drafts. I cannot quite see how a draft helps explain experience. If you believe in experiences you want experiences, if not why need even drafts? It would seem to me much more sensible for there to be multiple copies of the same experiential material - multiple copies of experience if you like. This fits perfectly with the anatomy and as you say, could not be distinguished. That is the line I have taken for the last 10 years.

To return to Arnold's model though, it may be worth mentioning that Arnold and I have discussed these issues for several years and come to an interesting truce. We agree totally on the neurodynamics. If I want an explanation for a particular brain function I go to Arnold's account because he seems to understand what is needed in a way that I have not actually found elsewhere. However, where Arnold places experience in his retinoid system, I would place it in a million or more cells - one copy each - fed by his retinoid system or something very like it. Arnold's model may not have a defined neuroanatomical site but I have no doubt that something of the sort must exist somewhere forward of the primary sensory cortices. Moreover, it will be maybe the last and most highly abstracted of a whole set of maps of reality where everything comes together in a network. The brain is full of maps like this. Like Descartes, I think a network must be the penultimate place on the way to any site of experience, which must be a unitary locus (for him just one, for me many). Arnold, I believe, 'cuts the problem at different joints' and places experience in the net. We will probably never agree but at least we agree on how the brain must work!

If another viewpoint interests you my material is at http://www.ucl.ac.uk/jonathan-edwards.

BW

Jo E

Russ: "However, in a Cartesian Theater model, a brain injury or lesion to the right (or wrong) region should knock out consciousness altogether, even though all of the functioning leading up to that point should remain intact. I'm not aware that such a region has been identified, correct?"

You are not correct. Consider the neurological condition of hemi-spatial neglect. In patients who have suffered brain lesions involving the right temporal-parietal-occipital junction, the visual system functions properly except that the patient has a loss of conscious experience for objects and events in the left region of his *egocentric space*. A particularly striking example of this has been reported by Bisiach and Luzzatti (1978). In this study, patients were asked to imagine that they were standing in the main square in Milan, a place that was very familiar to them. They were first instructed to imagine that they were facing the cathedral and to describe what they could see in their "mind's eye". They reported a greater number of details to the right than to the left of their imaginary line of sight, often neglecting prominent features on the left side. When they were asked to perform the same imagery task, facing away from the cathedral, they were able to describe previously neglected details that were now on the right side of their egocentric image space. These results can be explained by the operating characteristics of the brain's putative retinoid mechanisms.

Arnold: I definitely find that research interesting, but perhaps I misstated my description of the research that I did not believe existed. The Cartesian Theater view would imply that the total conscious experience comes together at some point, and is represented, in totality, in the brain. Even if information is stored across thousands or millions of nodes in a network, the crux of the Cartesian theater model is that there comes a point in the information processing where this information is brought together into a single coherent picture. Whether this finished product is then stored as its own piece of information, or whether the instructions for how to piece this conscious experience back together is what is stored (more similar to the manner in which distributed files are stored in a silicon-based computer), the implication is that some form of representation of this total picture must exist. If it does, then logically, this representation (or the mechanism for constructing it) must be capable of being damaged, or in some way having its function disrupted, in which case the entirety of the conscious experience would be lost. What you described above, the loss of experience for objects and events in the left region of the egocentric space (your explanation seems to imply that this is only the loss of visual experience as opposed to total sensory experience emanating from the region, but I don't want to make a false assumption), is not a total loss of conscious experience, but a loss of a particular component of the information. I would see this as consistent with the information loss that would be expected from either a system that operated according to the multiple drafts view, or from a properly functioning Cartesian system with damage to a particular section of the upstream inputs resulting in information loss.

To be clear, I am not as well-versed in the empirical literature as others on this thread, and I definitely have some catching up to do (which I am eagerly looking forward to), so I apologize that my responses are more theoretical and philosophical in nature. I certainly lack the depth of understanding of the literature that many of the other contributors have. Consciousness is definitely not my main research area....just an area that I find particularly interesting to discuss and debate.

I think you are asking the key question, Russ, and not many people do. Of course if you have lots of Cartesian theatres, each with a full experience, then you can damage lots of them and still have a full experience in some others, and that is the hidden alternative that I think people have missed. Many people then ask 'which experience is "me" though' and the strange truth is that we have no reason to think that question has a single answer. Its all on the website, as you will see.

Russ: "... the implication is that some form of representation of this total picture must exist. If it does, then logically, this representation (or the mechanism for constructing it) must be capable of being damaged, or in some way having its function disrupted, in which case the entirety of the conscious experience would be lost."

I don' t see why the entirety of the conscious experience must be lost if part of the total picture (subjective space) is damaged. Since retinoid space/consciousness is a volumetric spatiotopic structure, damage to any part of it would result in the loss of consciousness in just the damaged part of our phenomenal "picture".

Arnold,

where can we find meta-knowledge about conscious contents (I know that I know s.th.)?

Wilfried: "where can we find meta-knowledge about conscious contents (I know that I know s.th.)?"

As I see it, meta-knowledge is always framed in a propositional mode. So we would find knowledge of this kind in the unconscious synaptic-weight profiles of the semantic networks of our brain. If you ask how we can be *conscious* of the fact that we know something, then I would say that sentential output from our lexicon, organized by the propositional output of our semantic networks, controls the phonological component of inner speech as well as our associated imagery which, when projected into our retinoid space, results in the conscious experience, "I know X". Moreover, the sentence "I know that I know (something)" can be stored as a proposition in your semantic networks, to be evoked and consciously recalled whenever there is an appropriate query (either a self-query or a question asked by someone else.

Arnold,

I am not sure, that I understand your answer fully.

If I open my eyes and I am seeing the PC-screen, I do not only see the screen but I am sure, that I (!) see it and it is real. I am not surprised seeing it - I would be surprised if it disappeared suddenly. I like to explain this situation a little bit different:

I expect the screen and in the moment, the image of the screen enter my eyes the visual cortex calculates the image. So my brain could compare two scenes, the expected and the perceived one. If both are fitting, an experience occurred and the mentals image of the screen becomes conscious.

My Expectation may result of a system like your retinoid space, a mental storage of schematic objects with spacial relations with my subjective position. To have such a storage in mind is very powerful but not enough. The stored knowledge must be coupled with the reality and only if it fits, a light is on in our imagination. This light of fitting I would like to identify with conscious experience: I am seeing the screen and I know it.

Wilfried,

''I expect the screen and in the moment, the image of the screen enter my eyes the visual cortex calculates the image. So my brain could compare two scenes, the expected and the perceived one.''

The expression ''calculates the image'' is peculiar. The visual sytem analyses the images and what is compared are not raw image inputs but what is perceived, the results of the analysis.

Louis,

I agree, therefore I noted "calculates the image". I am fully aware that not the pixels, but the result of cortical processing is perceived.

Consciousness owner or client?

Consciousness may be not an advantage for "mister x". Co represent an advantage for our species. Imaging and developing something of unknow before (working on an imaginary context to produce new weapons or movies and drugs) is the main consequence of the raising of consciousness.

If we wonder to know something about the lions or the ants the main step is: "where is the boss"? And: "what about the boss"?. Lion's boss is the most strong and impetuous. Human's chief had to be the most aware about the environment's features (please don't think to my country, Italy, where the boss is simply "the boss").

So, remember: when we are looking for consciousness in the common people whe may be not not in front of "the consciousness"! This is because a simple "human being" is the recipient of who is a "consciousness owner": filmakers, scientists, pushers, politicians, writers, and so on.

Most of us living day by day togheter with a lot of fears about death and risks, in a dangerous world. "Consciousness owners" represent the race playing and putting in context "the consciousness" to "combact or forget" the fears of life. Consciousness is a damned optional for humanikind, so we are in search for "sleeping on the reality" togheter with a good wine, drug, religion, belief, conformism, in this strange proscienium tha we call "life".

In conclusion: consciousness represent an advantage for the community, not directly for the single human being.

Wilfried: "My Expectation may result of a system like your retinoid space, a mental storage of schematic objects with spacial relations with my subjective position. To have such a storage in mind is very powerful but not enough. The stored knowledge must be coupled with the reality and only if it fits, a light is on in our imagination. This light of fitting I would like to identify with conscious experience:"

It seems to me that you are lumping together some brain events that should be described separately. Your *expectation* is an image of an experience that you think you will have. Your current conscious experience is what is real for you now. Your "light" is *always* on when you are conscious. Consciousness does not depend on the fitting of your expectation with current "reality", because what is reality for you must already *be* your conscious experience. If what you expect to perceive is different from what you actually perceive, you are not thereby rendered unconscious; you are merely surprised. If what you expect to perceive fits what you actually do perceive, you are not surprised and you go about your business, but I don't see why there should be an *additional* light of consciousness in this case. Our expectations are images recalled from our preconscious synaptic matrices, and our phenomenal world/"reality" is always the current pattern of activation of autaptic neurons in our retinoid space. Our *understanding* of our current reality is generated by our unconscious cognitive mechanisms. For example, you have a preconscious understanding of these words before you are actually conscious of your understanding.

There's an interesting suggestion one can take from what Hegel says in Phenomenology of Spirit/mind/Geistewhatever. There is the existence of the object which for Hegel is an existence defined by others -- presumably, the conscious (to some extent). However, we all exist as objects in the experience of others and to ourselves as others. Hegel seems to suggest that consciousness is to exist with one's objective definition, to even be in conflict with it. From this, we might wonder if consciousness isn't a function of language and as such a byproduct of a survival skill (making meaning within a social group), though it may cause as many problems as it might have solved.

Arnold,

You seemed to privilege a passive conception of memory where images are recalled like retrieved from a memory storage. Most of our memories are not like that. If I violently kick a dog, the next time I come close to this dog the dog will try to stay away from me. I do not think that the memory of me kicking is stored in terms of the actual series of events being retrieved from memory and then analysed as dangerous etc. Most probably a few cues such a smell characterizing me are directly trigger some appropriate dangerous human avoidance strategies. In this case, what is memorize of the kinking events are some links of a few recognition cues to dangerous predator class avoidance strategies.

Wilfried,

Expectation is context based. The mammal are animals that have a high capacity to learn which include a feeding territory. This type of learning like any type of learning and even any type of knowledge forms an expectation structure. Knowledge is Expectation. You know your house which is equivalent to say that wherever you are located inside your house, this knowledge are what you expect to see or to smell. When you climb the stairs, your motor system have probably calibrated itself to the height of the steps and even know how to dose the effort in function of the numbers of steps. All animal inherit a basic set of biological knowledge built-in in the body structure of its species and those like mammal that can increased their biological knowledge can thus built inside their sensori-motor system specific specialization of the sensory-motor schemata for a large class of contexts. It is the construction of a context based expectation structures. The whole sensori-motor system is a expectation structure, it is a sense-acting implicit map. An implicit map of the relation of your body with the world, an implicit science of the world, an embodied platonic world as conceived by Aristotle.

Anold,

Louis,

May I found the wrong words...

With expectation I did not mean anything like wishes but the unconscious interpolation of the present state to the near future, an anticipation of the next sensor input. The brain is an anticipation machine (Dennet). Also the computation of the visual input is unconscious. If both meet with respond the light appears.

(Dear Arnold: thank you for the request. I am still becoming familiar with how this forum works and have no idea how to hook you up with the article you requested. It probably is not pertinent to this discussion in any obvious or even useful way, but addresses some issues in a totally different field, writing instruction. It can be found in the Writing Center Journal's online archive.) I too like the question, why do we have consciousness? The Hegel section I mentioned further down kind of makes me think of a reasoning feedback loop: we define ourselves in the same way that others define us, though the definitions probably vary. Then we contend with or cooperate with those definitions, accept ourselves as male or female or both, etc., attempting to reconcile the definer with the defined and then believe it is a priori.

Louis: "You seemed to privilege a passive conception of memory where images are recalled like retrieved from a memory storage."

If images are not recalled from a memory store, what do you think they are recalled from? Also, memory is not usually passive; its content is normally modulated by personal needs and motives in a given context. It is questionable that even free association or reverie is purely passive.

Louis: "Knowledge is expectation."

Expectation is based on knowledge, but I don't think they are the same concept. If I know that the outside temperature is - 10 deg F., I can make many logical inferences on which to base a number of expectations about other events, but these expectations are events that are *derived* from the original knowledge, not equivalent to the original knowledge.

Wilfried: "Also the computation of the visual input is unconscious. If both meet with respond the light appears."

Do you mean that if the visual stimulus is *recognized* "the light appears"?

Louis,

I agree, yes that is what I mean. Knowledge is expectation for animals and even humans in many cases, but not all (see Arnolds respond).

Arnold,

I miss the "light" in your volumetric-space-concept. I doubt if my last post was clear enough to describe the little addition to your brain mechanism.

Wilfried, I take it that "light" in your example is a metaphor for the enhancement in excitation of a conscious image if the image is perceived/recognized. If you look at Fig. 1 in "Where Am I? Redux", you will see that there is a recurrent loop of activation between the self-locus in retinoid space and the unconscious mechanisms that give us sensory/perceptual experience (in one of the boxes below the dashed line) via I!. These mechanisms are the preconscious synaptic matrices that do the job of pattern detection and recognition. Their positive feedback to retinoid space accounts for what you call the "light" of recognition (I think). But in any case, there is no perception without the dimmer "light" of our ambient conscious experience when we are awake.

I have a very simplitic model of living organism, from the amoeba to the homo sapiens sapiens: a sense-acting loop. Just think of that as system with inputs (sense the environment) and outputs (acting on environment). Learning is an alteration of the sense-acting structure based on previous experience. What is learned is a modification of the sense-acting structure. What is important to learn are modification of sense-acting structure that are important for survival which mean modifications that correspond to important for survival, in order words that are likely to correspond to usefull new behaviors. A sense-acting structure is into a active interactive loop with the environment. It is necessary anticipative by its very existence and if its survival value is high it means that this anticipation is correct. A sense-acting structure loop is method of participation, it depend on the organism structure and needs and depend on the environment dynamic. The internal and the external aspect are intrinsically linked together.

Yes if I watch a thermometer reading then I learn what is the temperature in term of a number and this knowledge is not anticipation. It is not and it is why you are not going to remember this number as important for you as a human being and you are not going to fundamentally change because you learn that the thermometer gave you a reading of 10C. Arnold, do you really think that animal learning has anything to do with recording a piece of input from the sense. An animal only learn type of things, which mean class of things, which mean general category likely to occur frequently, regularity of the world, thus expectation with high probability and the learning is a change in the sense-acting structure, the schemata of Piaget with accomodation and assimilation.

Louis: "Arnold, do you really think that animal learning has anything to do with recording a piece of input from the sense."

Yes, I do. One-trial learning is empirically well established. We not only learn patterns that occur frequently; we learn pattern exemplars that seldom occur but which are novel and accompanied by high arousal (ascending reticular activation). For example, you not only learn the general category of faces, you learn to identify individual faces. Normal social interactions woul be impossible otherwise. See "Self-Directed Learning in a Complex Environment" on my RG page.

Arnold,

I will have to disagree. What we learn is to detect patterns and for that we do not need to store examplar patterns. To recognize a circle, you do not need to have circles into a representation and then match input to this kind of examplar. you need an efficient circle detection mechanism. We human have create objective representation of patterns and have created the mathematical language and are able to remember explicit fact about our past. We are the only animal able to do that because that is only possible through the human imagination. Our basic sensory-motor mechanism has notthing of explicit. I can explain in my theory of imagination how explicit memory has been invented and how remember a number or a story is possible based on access to implict memory.

Particular faces are recognized only after its has already recognized by a whole hiearchical organisation of schemata so that Paul's face belong to a whole set of implicit categories. Perception is not about particular but about universal because only universals have a predictive value.

Arnold,

The human vision system has to detect whatever is coming in the field of view which means that that the search for patterns has to start for all possible crude pattern simultaneously. Once a crude type of pattern is positively detected into an area of the visual field then all the child schemata of this crude pattern can simultaneously detect their correponding patterns and the process can finally get to more detail matching. Classification is automatically done a priori in the schemata tree organisation.

Louis: "Perception is not about particular but about universal because only universals have a predictive value."

If you are attacked by your neighbor's dog, you stay away from your neighbor's dog whenever you perceive that particular dog. You do not avoid a universal dog.

An example of how the brain learns to recognize particular individuals as well as general types is given in "Sparse Coding of Faces in a Neuronal Model: Interpreting Cell Population Response in Object Recognition" on my RG page.

First, what is an advantage? Is it what you think is an advantage, or is it what I think to be an advantage is advantage? Two of us never think alike in consciousness ...is that an overstatement?

First again, but for the physicists and philosophers, electrones moving around an atom. Must creat something like flux ...right? If that flux is there, there has to be some sort of feeling, effect, affect, current, attraction, repulsion (etc.) within that atom. Do we as human beings, and u as thinker decide what the atom is thinking, or is conscious about?

Or, do we assume we are a superior race than our parts? Could the same parts that could be called 'a drop in the ocean' I mentioned in my previous writing?

"Eyes can't see what mind doesn't know, and mind can't know what eyes haven't seen." (S Vatsyayann 1995). Therefore, someone has to give wisdom of knowing if the egg or the hen was the first. Your mental model withh be biased by your Guru's (teacher's) understanding of the world.

My answer to the main question about consciousness giving evolutionary advantage is, "advantage or disadvantage is a coined term. It has no limit in time and space. For this reason an advantage today could be and generally would be seen as the greatest disadvantage in distant future. Howvever that's how this acceleration or deceleration of cosmos, time, energy, totality or God continues making everything obsolete that belongs to past."

It is a long thought, will cut it short here with one statement, "that there is nothing to suggest, but to trigger others' minds to philosophise, hypothesise and work on proving something that is only in our mind/s, be that in atomic form, or a collective human form."

To every action there is an equal and opposite reaction and this hold good not only in physics and the physical world but also in the mental plane of the mind. When the entire world functions on truth; every action has a true impact pleasant and unpleasant. Truth is knowledge and exactness and any reaction just follows that. The main problem with man is his limitation in judging what is truth in a complex world and in a social network it is impossible and for him to be unbiased. But the functioning of Nature which is infinite to man's knowledge seems to work perfectly and the mechanism is elusive to man. All actions actually get imprinted and stored and released as Nature decides. In the process good thoughts and ideas also get recorded and released through ones genes, off-springs, or in the same individual itself.

The best example of our practice is worship which is totally an exercise between man and the God he worships. Man thinks and believes some thing Higher is listening to him and will do him a favor or justice as the prayer may be. If one does not believe this then he is an atheist. It is impossible to convince both sects of people, for that matter, Nature has no time to bother that one is an atheist or not , because it just functions on Truth alone and its mechanism can only be intuitively guessed by man.

Dear gentlemen (curiously not a single lady answered),

thank you for the discussion and for all the food for thought. I'm still trying to digest most of the answers, but I wanted to answer a direct request in order to not leave it up in the air.

Jonathan Edwards: "Perhaps we should ask Alan what he wants to mean by experience in first person modality. Will any experience do or does it have to include a sense of time and place as in Arnold's version? [...] Is it just experience or with a sense of venue Alan?"

I think this is a nice point. What I meant (and mean) by "experience in first person modality" doesn't necessarily include the sense of time and place. I'm not aware, though, of any possible experience in first person modality that does not include the sense of time and place. I know that there is a case of a patient that wasn't able to perceive the passing of time: he/she perceived the moving scenarios projected to his/her retinas as a series of slides. I don't know the case in depth, and it might have been explained with a sensorial cortex deficit as opposed to a time perception deficit. I don't know of syndromes in which patients feel that the position of the self is scattered in the space.

The absence of evidence doesn't mean to me that experience in first person modality without time and place coordinates isn't possible. This seems the reason for all the really interesting answers that strictly focus on consciousness and abstract from the neural underpinnings of the brain (of which I didn't know a lot). In this answer, though, I'm addressing the neuropsychological levels of the discussion, leaving the metaphysical aspects for later, since they seem even harder to elaborate.

As for the link you (Jonathan) made in your question with Arnold's model (which to me is really nice, well thought and utterly interesting), I may be not totally able to understand how it explains experience in first person modality. I still want to study more in depth his three papers, but to me the main assumption is (and I cite Arnold here): "consciousness *is* our brain representation of our surrounding world" . I'm not sure I agree with this. To me this can mean either:

1-all the information that constitutes the representation of our surrounding world *is* the consciousness. But in this case if I write down on paper all the information, is the pile of paper conscious? Has it a state of consciousness? If I could transfer all the information that constitutes my consciousness to a pc (and why in principle shouldn't it be possible?) is the pc conscious? Having all the information on its surrounding, is a switched off pc still conscious? If so, why are we not conscious while asleep? Maybe we need a flux of information. Does it mean that a flux of information rather thant information per se generates consciousness? Either way, does information per se generate consciousness?

or

2-we need information about our surrounding world to be conscious (consciousness as consciousness of something/relation with self/etcetera). But isn't this a case of ad infinitum regression? If we exclude the "we", does information about surrounding generate consciousness? This means any observer, even animals, pc, and whatever processes information has to be considered conscious.

Arnold's model explains very well how a neural system can code a first person experience. But let's say it will be implemented on a pc with a webcam and a gps (just mere examples with faults): will it be considered conscious?

I'm sorry to I put down things in this way, but I don't seem to grasp any anambiguous logical following from the premise to the "consciousness is/does this", especially on the interaction between behavior and consciousness.

I'd also like to clarify that I firmly believe that consciousness has evolutionary advantage, but I don't want to stop at "beliefs" level.

Also, all the objection about the incorrectly formulated question have been appreciated and will be addressed soon.

Alan,

We need model such as Arnold's model for understanding consciousness but as you point out any such models identifies consciousness as a state in the model so that it assume that an artificial machine built along this model and having these states would be experiening the world. I do not agree that such machine would be conscious because I agree that such models are usefull for understanding our perceptions as we experience them but these models leave 'experience itself' out of the equation. Max Velmans defined phenomenal consciousness as '' experience itself'' ather than being exemplified by a particular thing that we

observe or experience, it is exemplified by all the things that we observe or experience. These models capture some aspects of these manifestations in consciousness but leave consciousness out.

So the question of this thread could be answer if it was framed in term of the evolutionary advantage of better biological perceptual models. The answer would be obvious. But although ''phenomenal consciousness'' is intimatly linked to perceptual model, it cannot be reduced to them. As Suresh point out, if any natural growing entity of the cosmos from a neutrinos to a human being has a core consciousness then the question of the evolutionary advantage vanish since consciousness become intrinsic to all living and non-living natural entities.

Louis: "We need model such as Arnold's model for understanding consciousness but as you point out any such models identifies consciousness as a state in the model so that it assume that an artificial machine built along this model and having these states would be experiening the world."

I make no assumption that "an artificial machine built along this [retinoid] model and having these states would be experiencing the world."

My theoretical model of consciousness does *not* identify consciousness as a state in the model. It identifies consciousness as a state in a particular kind of neuronal brain mechanism. The minimal structure and dynamics of the part of the brain that gives us our conscious experience (retinoid space) are *described* by the theoretical model.

This is my working definition of consciousness:

*Consciousness is a transparent brain representation of the world from a privileged egocentric perspective*

An "artificial machine" is not a living biological brain and could not satisfy my definition of consciousness.

As far as we can tell, the biological phenomenon began (prokaryotic cell organisms) between 3.5 to 3.0 billion years ago, in a terrestrial environment completely different (atmosphere has 75% nitrogen, 15% carbon dioxide, Sun brightens to 80% of current level) from the current one. Over the millions of years that separate us from the appearance of biological life on the planet we live on, different biological mass extinction events have taken place, triggered by different causes, including abiotic (eg., climate) and biotic (eg., diseases) factors, gradual (eg., reduction of the oxygen concentration, climate changes generating aridity, shifts in ocean current circulations and changes in sea levels) and catastrophic (eg., bolide impacts, increased volcanism, release of methane clathrate from sea and ocean floors) events. Thus, such events have shaped the life on the Earth, determining the catalog of biological entities at each particular time in the biological diversification of the planet.

The major mass extinctions are (from oldest to most recent):

- 2400 million years ago: Great Oxidation Event, also called the Oxygen Catastrophe, oxidation precipitates dissolved iron, creating banded iron formations, anaerobic organisms are poisoned by oxygen.

- 650 mya: Mass extinction of 70% of dominant sea plants due to global glaciation ("Snowball Earth" hypothesis).

- 443 mya: Glaciation of Gondwana, mass extinction of many marine invertebrates, second largest mass extinction event, 49% of genera of fauna disappeared.

- 374 mya: Mass extinction of 70% of marine species, this was a prolonged series of extinctions, occurring over 20 million years, evidence of anoxia in oceanic bottom waters, and global cooling, Surface temperatures dropped from about 93øF (34øC) to about 78øF (26øC).

- 251 mya: Mass extinction (Permian-Triassic), possible 480km-wide meteor crater in the Wilkes Land region of Antarctica, period of great volcanism in Siberia releases large volume of gases (CO2, CH4, and H2S), Oxygen (O2) levels dropped from 30% to 12%, Carbon dioxide (CO2) level was about 2000 ppm, Earth's worst mass extinction eliminated 90% of ocean dwellers, and 70% of land plants and animals.

- 201 mya: Mass extinction caused by oceanic anoxic event killed 20% of all marine families.

- 65.5 mya: Meteor impact, 170 km crater, Chicxulub, Yucatan, Mexico, mass extinction of 80-90% of marine species and 85% of land species, including the dinosaurs.

- 12,900 yrs ago: Explosion of comet over Canada causes extinction of American megafauna such as the Mammoth and sabretooth cat (Smilodon), as well as the end of Clovis culture.

@ Sundaresan

"Nature has no time to bother that one is an atheist or not , because it just functions on Truth alone and its mechanism can only be intuitively guessed by man."

The Truth of which you speak, includes mass extinctions?

@ Arnold

"The notion of a Cartesian Theater is just a metaphor, but it is a metaphor that might well be applied to my retinoid model of consciousness."

It can also be applied to the scenario described by the mass extinctions?

So, Arnold, consciousness is, more or less, the sticker on the map pointing "You are here"?

Why, then, would a machine fail to achieve this?

Thanks for the reply Alan. Your uncertainty about Arnold's model actually giving us experience is the one I share and which is the division between Arnold and I. To me at least one individual entity has to experience all the information encoded in all the cells in Arnold's retinoid system, or the equivalent. Neurology tells us unequivocally that for this to be a single entity that obeys the locality laws of physics it has to be an individual neuron. This seems to pose an insurmountable problem but it does not - the fact that it does not is what I have been working on for the last 10 years and is what my website is devoted to. I agree that PCs will not have experiences like ours, but I have to conclude that neither do 'persons'. A person is a useful but for from fixed biological domain that includes a liver and some toenails, neither of which get in involved in these experiences. You might say OK a brain does the experiencing but that's no good either because most of the brain does other jobs. You might say that the experience belongs to Bernard Baars 'Global Workspace' but even that violates locality since it is a mass of connected units, not a receiving unit.

I will say no more here because it would take a long time. I agree with others who suggest that the evolution of a brain that puts together very detailed representations is clearly useful to survival but that is quite different from those representations being experienced and as far as we know that has not evolved, we have no reason not to think it was not always there everywhere. It may still be true that what evolution produced was not just detailed representations but very cunning ways of those being made available to an experiencing unit - by the design of the way cells receive inputs. But the key point is that this has to be an input to a cell because nothing else is local in the way physics requires. Its all on http://www.ucl.ac.uk/jonathan-edwards.

Arnold,

''I make no assumption that "an artificial machine built along this [retinoid] model and having these states would be experiencing the world."

I know that you make no claim in that direction but anyone who claim that consciousness corresponds to a state of a part of the brain that is modeled implicitly is also making a claim that a machine implementing this model would be conscious.

''My theoretical model of consciousness ... identifies consciousness as a state in a particular kind of neuronal brain mechanism. The minimal structure and dynamics of the part of the brain that gives us our conscious experience (retinoid space) are *described* by the theoretical model. ''

I read this as a claim that the state of the retinoid system is our conscious experience. Is this reading correct?

If it is correct. Lets assume that I build a robot with artificial sense that provide appropriate input to an artificial retinoid system. Then the state of this artificial retinoid system would become the consciousness of this robot. Is the robot conscious?

Alan, first let me say (in response to your 1, your first interpretation) that information per se does not generate consciousness. Then, in your second interpretation of my claim that "consciousness is our brain representation of our surrounding world", you wrote the following:

"2-we need information about our surrounding world to be conscious (consciousness as consciousness of something/relation with self/etcetera). But isn't this a case of ad infinitum regression? [a] If we exclude the "we", does information about surrounding generate consciousness? This means any observer, even animals, pc, and whatever processes information has to be considered conscious." [b]

a. No, the fundamental state of conscious is not a matter of having *information about* the world; it is a matter of having a global, coherent analog/representation of our surrounding world from our perspectival origin (I!). *Information* is developed by parsing and capturing selected parts out of our global phenomenal world via unconscious cognitive mechanisms which recognize the parts, label them, and relate them to other parts. These processes are described in *The Cognitive Brain*.

b. Our conscious experience is simply the pattern of autaptic-cell activity in retinoid space. The core self (the perspectival origin) in retinoid space is *not* an observer, so there is no infinite regression. Observations are performed by the synaptic matrices in the pre-conscious sensory modalities. Recurrent axonal projections into retinoid space from the imaging mosaic-cells of the synaptic matrices constitute our perceptions of particular objects and events in our global phenomenal world. In other words consciousness is a precondition for perception/observation. Animals can be conscious, but PCs cannot be conscious.

Bottom line: The fundamental state of consciousness does not depend on observation; it depends on the brain representation of a global volumetric space around a fixed locus of perspectival origin, the core self (I!). What kind of brain mechanism can realize consciousness? I argue that the neuronal structure and dynamics of the retinoid system can do the job, and I provide empirical evidence in support of this theoretical model.

Arnold,

now I understand your retinoid system better and I agree as far as I understood it until now.

You are right, the "light" in my last post is a metaphoric expression and it means: "light" = qualia. This results a perception and naturally it is conscious.

My assumption was to formulate a mechanism describing how qale appears in mind. I'll try again.

If I understood the retinoid space right, it represents the conscious representation of the perceived environment of the self-system (I!). I disagree in this point and I fear it is a key point. If the egocentric space (3D-Retioid) is only the actual perceived situation of the surrounding space there are only small differences. But if this 3D-Retinoid represents the knowledge about the environment as stored data I feel uncomfortable because of the identification of this data with consciousness.

Why feel I uncomfortabe?

Many objects in the surrounding of the observer are dynamical objects. Even artefacts may be moved so they change their position. If the observer recalls this data it would be wrong because the objects have new positions. It is impossible, that this would be a conscious perception. Dennet says "the brain is an anticipation machine". So the brain calculates dynamical and unconscious the anticipated position of these objects in the individuals environment. If the time-step of the calculation is too big, the calculation would go wrong but if it would be small enough the aberration would be very small. The senses input data have to be calculated by the sensual cortex areas and compared with the anticipated situation. If both data fits, I said more up in the threat, the "light" is on, the anticipation process succeeds and the sensation becomes perception (qualia).

Where is the difference?

If I understood your retinoid system (it) right way, you say "it is" the conscious perceived world. In my hypothesis it is the unconscious data set of the known world and in an act of consensus (fitting) of neuronal calculations of stored data and precalculated sensorial input data, the perceived world becomes experience.

Louis,

I would say "no!"

The robot in your last post has a nice representation of object data of his surrounding. This data could be used to curve around but there is no conscious and no experience of the sensual input. This is the state of the art in robotics. It is like a primitive organism (worm or insect) which reacts like a zombie with cleverly-made algorithms.

Wilfried,

Whatever model is proposed for consciousness, its implementation into a machine produces a zombie. The reason is that all such models are functional models that belong to the world of what can be expressed and that consciousness does not belong to that world of things that can be expressed. If it would be expressable functionally. We are scientists and our job is to create models. Is consciousness entirely outset the world expressable in models? This is the interesting question. My prototype case to think about this question is quantum mechanics. Here is a phenomenal domain where science has give up the possibility of expression the full reality and limit itself to what can be known. In this domain, science acknowledge its limits. A similar mode of thinking is necessary here on the modeling of consciousness. What is this modeling boundary? Thinking that modeling can reduce consciousness reduce concious being to zombies.

Wilfried,

i am also searching on the side of creative imagination. Here is another aspect of consciousness that cannot in principle be totally modeled because it would automatically eliminate the creative part. The whole biological evolution is an evolution of the perception and an evolution of the creative part of the animals and the evolution of humanity has been a tremendous jump in the creative power. So consciousness is tightly linked to the creative power of an organism. I personnally think that the fundamental existence of any entity is its participation in the creative process of this universe. Leonardo Da Vinci was convinced that when he was creating scenes on the canvas, the creative part of him was intimately linked to the creative process that had created this scene in the first place. Those are not answers but lines of inquiries.

Louis,

looking up to the sky, I hope you will not see a gray soup of clouds today, but beautiful white clouds on blue ground. In these clouds, interestingly, we often recognize shapes, animals, people, artifacts. This is certainly a creative act and this form of creativity you can easily explained by associations. Perhaps this is a promising approach on the way discovering the mystery of creativity.

Louis,

you know my position to quantum mechanics in the case of conscious. I do not agree with you. We should not discuss this furthermore.

My doubt is, can a sequential working machine simulate a state like qualia of my proposed resonance model or will the effect be lost in the sequences of the process ... ?

Wilfred:"In my hypothesis it is the unconscious data set of the known world and in an act of consensus (fitting) of neuronal calculations of stored data and precalculated sensorial input data, the perceived world becomes experience."

But Wilfried, we do not perceive the world. We only perceive parts of the world. We have a global conscious experience which is the internal presentment of the space around us. This is our current phenomenal world. Perception is an act of selection and the highlighting of particular content/features within the space of this global world experience. So consciousness must be a precondition for perception to happen. And, of course, because of the biophysical limitations of our cognitive mechanisms, there is often a mismatch (error of fit) between our perceptions and the real events in the physical world around us.

Claudio Sir,

It is really exciting to hear the involved and probing discussions that are going on. First I must express my humble respects to all.

Extinction of natural system masses, destruction due to Nature, mass extinction of life and species are man made definitions. A full forest fire occurs and after that we see nothing really exists. One can apply conservation of mass and the like. The world according to ancient philosophy is that the world continually changes, and is called "Jagath" i.e, changing Universe. It also says anything that changes is not permanent and Real.

Reality is to the beholder's eye. We must understand Truth can be realized by even a blind man and what we see is not True but only as a relative Reality. Yet the relative reality functions orderly and truly with creation, sustanence and destruction as a characteristics of Nature. Life i.e, birth and death of humans leave alone animals and plant life is beyond the grasp of ordinary humans. Yet there will be a key which can open up various chests of the beautiful Nature, which wants to reveal to man. It seems to be an infinite journey to man but nothing is impossible.

The man with his limited power creates, governs and also causes mass destruction justified and unjustifiable, Who below the humans can ever understand while most us also do not understand?

It is definite that something cannot come out of nothing. Cause and effect is the Law of Nature which all will accept. Then the Source of Creation with its Infinite power is unquestionable by limited humans like us, and we can only seek information just as the developing nations seek high level technology from the developed nations on matters which they are yet to understand. Learning is sacred and no one need to be shy.

Arnold: "But Wilfried, we do not perceive the world. We only perceive parts of the world." This is of course trivial.

Arnold: "Perception is an act of selection and the highlighting of particular content/features within the space of this global world experience."

I agree and say nothing different. We only perceive parts of what our senses can register.

Arnold: "So consciousness must be a precondition for perception to happen."

I do not agree. I think qualia is the result of a consensus of unconscious anticipation of a part of the perceivable world and the (precalculated) sensorial input data. This fitting information is, what becomes conscious. This means perception. With this perception we can act and reflect consciously.

It makes no sense to postulate a conscious map in mind to declare what conscious is and how it runs. In this sense is Louis question if the robot would be conscious.