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The quest for a definition of the term 'consciousness'
Hans Ricke
Saturday, 17 May 2008 08:55 UTC
Arnold chose this expression of a quest to refer to what I am doing elsewhere, in fact almost fulltime since a while.
And he also gave his own definition, which is a remarkable one :
“I suggest the following succinct definition:
Consciousness is a transparent phenomenal experience of the world from a privileged egocentric perspective."
My actual concern is the situation that no generally agreed upon definition or a set of definitions exists within the fields of science that are working on the phenomenon of consciousness. This missing definition could be a kind of minimal consensus, with very few properties, but even that does not seem to exist.
There are many different views on this matter:
Thomas Metzinger: – an ill-defined term
David Chalmers: – we need more definitions
Christof Koch: – we just need a rough definition
Max Velmans: – we follow the common usage in which the term “consciousness” is synonymous with “awareness” or “conscious awareness”
Andrew Brook: – It is unlikely that consciousness studies will ever achieve a sound scientific footing with such an imprecise and ungainly conceptual toolbox
( these statements – Chalmers and Koch – not to be taken literally, but from how I remember the talks )
My idea that a well founded group of veteran consciousness researchers should be locked up like in a ‘conclave’ until they have come up with some sensible agreement has not been entirely embraced, which may be due to many reasons.
I still think this task is overdue and the current situation is almost embarrassing and it is the obligation of those people who want to establish a science of consciousness.
So getting back to Arnold’s definition I do not think it is possible to find wider agreement upon a definition like that. Also I believe a process of definition will need a longer determined effort, in which properties will be included others will be excluded. As long as there is not even undisputed wether consciousness is a real or an illusiory phenomenon, as long as there is still unlclear wether consciousness is only receptive or as well active, we are facing quite some task, but I think it is worth going for it.
references:
Max Velmans on Defining Consciousness
Andrew Brook on Terminology of Consciousness
John Searle on Consciousness
Thomas Metzinger on The Problem of Consciousness
Robert van Gulick on Consciousness
Rocco Gennaro on Consciousness
David M. Rosenthal on Concepts and Definitions of Consciousness
Please note this:
Hi all,
even though there were some interesting new turns last week, we have decided to lock this thread for several reasons. We may reopen it when the special edition of the Journal of Consciousness Studies covering this topic is out.
Meanwhile the thread stays locked and pinned. If you want to continue certain lines of thought please open a new thread for this.
Yours friendly
Hans
Updated 07 April 2009 06:50 UTC
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Dear Alfredo and Arnold,
Arlnold wrote:“Alfredo, I think your last definition is better. I’m glad you changed your view of consciousness from being “able to control action” to being “used to control action”. This is an important distinction.
Of course consciousness evolved because it enhanced adaptive action in a complex and uncertain world.
Best, Arnold”I agree with your first point and would like to specify on the second one.
The question is wether we address a ( concept of ) consciousness that has been there already and evolved in this sense, or it has not been there at all in e.g. amoebas, locust and then at some point in the history of evolution evolved. In that view would it would be more appropriate to use the term emergence.I think the decision wether consciousness is emergent or not can not by made and thus not be part of the definition we may be able to push forward here.
In general the definitory process here has two ways to address conflicting view and concepts of consciousness.
One is avoiding them by putting them to the side and regard them as not parts of the preliminary basic unified definition and thus indicating there is research necessary to try and resolve this conflict.
Two is including both conflicting views in the definition which I do not advocate. I am clearly for exluding conflicting views from the defintion we want to push forward here.
Thus we can include a statement about evolution but no statement about emergence.Yours friendly
Hans -
Hi all,
I have invited Costa into this thread, who did a brilliant post in another thread here.
This is part of Costa’s statement: “This is where my theory distances itself from most contemporary or what Id call Gibsonian notions.
It assumes that consciousness is not a ready entity that one is born with but evolves thru the interaction of the organism with its environment and thru a mechanism of motor efference copy.”I replied as follows:
( Your statement ) is adding the aspect of development of consciousness to the discusssion.
I think it is as essential as the evolutional aspect and also brings about much of the confusion and mess in the current terminology. This confusion comes because people, even very qualified scientist jump between aspects they address, sometimes this kind of jump happens in the same sentence!
Obviously my view is that the development of consciousness continues ( at least potentially ) throughout the whole life of a human individual. And thus not only neurobiological development takes place, but also psychological and even sociological development takes place.And I would like to add here: it is also good to introduce the concept of an ‘entity’ into the definitory discussion. Max Velmans did that in the paper I have linked in the opening post.
I think it is clear that this kind of ‘entity’ addresses a part of human individuals similar to the circulatory system and by no means an entity of the sort that might leave our body and travel elsewhere. The ‘entity’ aspect of consciousness Alfredo and I have tried to address as ‘that which experiences’.Yours friendly
Hans -
Dear Kurt,
let me comment on this: “The toothache is not brought to the attention of your ears, or your fingers or toes, or somewhere inside your chest. The pain of a toothache is brought directly to that thing in the back of your eyes to be aware of and to ponder upon moment by moment.”
You refer to ‘that thing’ which is funny and welcome because of that. You need to make clear though in this kind of thread wether you are addressing the brain or consciousness or whatever you want to address.
I have carefully avoided so far to assume that brain=consciousness or that the brain is the seat of consciousness or the organ of consciousness. I do this for many reasons, knowing that the brain is the prime candidate if consciousness must be related to just one anatomically defined organ in human individuals.
I do this because there are other views about the seat of consciousness and I think it would be premature to take sides in this kind of definitory process. A theory of consciousness can afford to take sides, this kind of preliminary and basic and unifying definition cannot afford that. It has to be quite general. I still hope it can be more than just ‘rough’.Yours friendly
Hans -
Hans,
You are right. My statement could be interpreted in two different ways. Here’s the meaning I want to convey:
Consciousness emerged in the course of evolution because it enhanced adaptive action in a complex and uncertain world.
My claim is that consciousness is an innate property of the cognitive brain. I don’t think that consciousness per se develops as we engage with the world, but I would certainly agree that the complexity of the phenomenal content of consciousness evolves through one’s interaction with the environment (broadly conceived).
Best,
Arnold
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Hans, I’m of the opinion that theories are of little or no import if not practical in some way, shape, or form. And with this idea I believe the construction of systems and devices and models mimicking biological cognition, from the simple nervous system of the nematode on up to human cognition and volition, the invention of these future (computer) systems will be the determining factor deciding these philosophical questions such as what is consciousness, what is volition, and what is that thing in the back of the eyes, etc., …
Quantum theory is only a bunch of words until the invention of say the television set. The systems and devices to an actual functioning television set give proof and confirmation that the concepts described in quantum theory are true. The same with how to bring an answer to the question of the nature of consciousness. One’s theory has to be put to the test, and the test involves applying the concepts within a theory into a working model or system or device. The theory is proven true or false, or more true or false than another theory if mimickry of the aspect of consciousness is the result.
Perfecting systems of biological cognition will bring about the most challenging task of them all: mimicking human volition. What theories are true, and which ones are close but no cigar? Wow, all these theories and notions I read about, from Descartes to today, we have to start putting all these ideas into the meat grinder, and deciding what functions and what does not function and thereby determining what is the truth and what is not.
Sincerely,
KLH
New York -
Kurt, Quantum mechanics is a language and so metaphor for what the brain deals with – patterns of differentiating/integrating. Included in this is a property of asymmetric processing – wave/particle duality. This is NOT restricted to the microcosm, it in fact has a fractal element and is sourced in the methodology used to interpret reality – self-referencing.
All of our experiment design reflects our thinking in attempts to mediate with our environment as we try to describe it. We can in fact create wave/particle duality patterns from combining self-referencing a dichotomy in the presence of indeterminacy. See such an example in the Categories of Mediation pdf file
There is no way we can interpret reality other than through the filtering system that is our neurology. Any attempt to do so means we will interpet something from WITHIN the neurology and so detect that something as paradox (our brains will oscillate as it tries to pin down that something but be unable to do so) – as such we are born to argue where I assert A and you assert NOT-A and our brains instinctively go into ‘paradox resolution’ mode to resolve the A and NOT-A being in the same space and time.
GIVEN this dynamic, we trace the birth of consciousness to mediation dynamics and the realm of the asymmetric – the ‘middle space’ of the differentiate/integrate dichotomy. It this space that allows for the development of the unique as well as language to communicate that difference and also any sameness.
Chris
IDM Intro -
Thank you very much for your warm welcome to this most important of discussions. As someone said recently we are in the midst of a scientific revolution in the brain and psychological sciences.
I will need time to study this thread to be able to post a worthy contribution but I do want to make some preliminary comments on Hans’ very insightful post.
“Obviously my view is that the development of consciousness continues ( at least potentially ) throughout the whole life of a human individual. And thus not only neurobiological development takes place, but also psychological and even sociological development takes place.”
There are many examples of the ongoing developmental process in conscious behaviour, some adaptive others aberrant.
The studies are actually quite old and these refer to prism adaptations including the classic studies of Kohler and even prior in the late 1800’s which showed that movement facilitated correcting an image of the world through inverting lenses.
Aberrant motor efference copy MEC is posed as an explanation of altered consciousness in psychiatric disease states such as schizophrenia and autism. A component MEC of premotor theory links the respective observed motor difficulties associated with the basal ganglia and cerebellum respectively, to cognitive dysfunction. We know that autistic subjects have a deficient feedforward modulation of action (cerebellum) and schizophrenics have difficulty modulating force in load tasks (basal ganglia). 90% plus of autistic postmortems show that the most consistent abnormality to be demonstrated is the substantial loss of Purkinje cells. Yet it is rarely discussed when theories of autism are posed. This demonstrates how far behind the pathophysiological findings theory remains. I believe premotor theory is the one of the first detailed explanations to make the connection between action and cognition as fundamental in mental disease.
“And thus not only neurobiological development takes place, but also psychological and even sociological development takes place.”
Premotor theory is meant to be a model for the ongoing categorization of association cortex including prefrontal ie of widely distributed networks not just the primary sensory modalities. This implies that motor reafference mediated through the basal ganglia and cerebellum is essential for ongoing learning. These have therefore, psychological and sociological correlates.
Costa -
I’m inclined to propose the following revised definition of consciousness:
Consciousness is that activated part of the cognitive brain which manifests for its owner a transparent, coherent representation of the world from the owners privileged egocentric perspective.
This leaves open questions about what it might be used for, how its phenomenal contents might change over time, etc. But it does tie consciousness to the activity of a particular brain mechanism.
As for Costa’s points about premotor activity in the brain, I suggest taking a look at The Cognitive Brain (Trehub 1991), Ch. 8 “Composing Behavior: Registers for Plans and Actions”, and Ch. 9 “Set Point and Motive: The Formation and Resolution of Goals”.
Best,
Arnold
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Dear Arnold
You are correct in stating a definition of consciousness as an egocentric perspective ie that it should deal with embodiment if it is to be scientifically valid.
Your chapter on goal selection also suggests an important relation mentioned by Alfredo as well of distributed networks for voluntary behaviour, goal selection and how this is tied to the conscious act.
I would like to dispel, however any possible misconception about my use of the term ‘premotor’. My usage is purely descriptive and does not refer directly to the premotor cortex or its activity. It is meant to encapsulate though these ideas of choice to act and how to act when we are in a particular phenomenal state. Furthermore, in a reversal of this logic, it is meant to convey the critical stages in development of awareness as a categorization of sensory data during formal early and initially non-conscious experience of the world around us. Out of random action we discover the properties of the world and as our behaviour becomes more deliberate it is also causal in the emergence of awareness. ie consciousness emerges from our motor understanding of the world.
The inverted lens experiments in a previous post offer a window into this process. One can imagine all sorts of distorting prisms that little semblance to the object being viewed through them. Yet adaption allows potential reinversion of what is being seen. Simply wearing the prisms isnt enough, the gestalt to a correct image of the world involves an interaction with the world to inform the brain of the error of the message. Action has to teach the mind a new interpretation of the distorted sensory data ie the data only attains correct phenomenal form after a process of motor discovery.
Taking this logic one step further imagine then sensory data in the infant which has not acquired yet any action precedents. The theory predicts no phenomenal awareness until the infant has a chance to actively explore its surroundings. Although he/she is inclined to do so in an evolutionary sense the infant will eventually only acquire a conscious sense of its surroundings through grasping sucking colliding with objects.
I hope this isnt repetitive
Costa -
Re: Costa: Premotor theory is meant to be a model for the ongoing categorization of association cortex including prefrontal ie of widely distributed networks not just the primary sensory modalities. This implies that motor reafference mediated through the basal ganglia and cerebellum is essential for ongoing learning. These have therefore, psychological and sociological correlates.
I want to reply that this fact with evidence, make a lot of sense=behavior =a fact of a relationship with the environmental. Language has it roots in self oriented action and related communication. I want to suggest another important factor that may be involved although to stress that from the orientation given data and interpretation may be very accurate, but may not reveal actual dynamics interms of environmental interactions, response to stresses, as causation of both the diseased state and the physiological response rather than the attribution of disease to altered molecular mechanisms. In this sense mechanisms (assumptions of evolved psychological and social characteristics related to consciousness) would be in a broad sense correctly interpreted, but falsely ordered –i.e. in the pathologies described it is possible for physiological phenomenon to originate externally in the environment and for the two possible conditions (inborn problems and problems related to external causation)to be indistinguishable scientifically. In the case of molecular genetics ‘phenomenon of imprinting’ ( the acquisition of traits from the external environment) and reverse transcription of RNA to DNA emerged to awareness after basic genetic mechanisms were elucidated –add an, almost incomprehendable in scope, extra dimension to interpretation; even a means of Lamarkian inheritance of induced physical traits from basic concepts is possible if one can integrate facts creatively to intersections that result that way. My point is that regardless of the accuracy of interpretation of physical data an actual route to understanding is dependant on knowing the path to pathologies. If one views all pathology as parasitic in nature involving agents that get under the skin: 1) Physiological function attains a much more stable and less prone to error status-pathologies originate from the external and otherwise mutationally caused change to cause malfunction is absent 2) Pathology, in terms of a reaction to external stress attains a new perspective: a) An autistic person from this perspective has learned a restricted range of potential motor responses from an agent, having penetrated the skin, imposes a (sensual only)?) threat to free movement or a fear. His experience is internally oriented and not observable; the same might be proposed for schziophrenia and in both cases a internal physiological correlation of function with alterations of behavior or experience might not be discriminated a secondary in the chain of causation. This actually simplifies things considerable-i.e.-disease states are not related to fluctuations in evolutionary behavior from phenomenon of particulate spatial properties- of a molecular genetic nature. A whole picture of evolution emergences that has shed many implied, intricate paths and mechanisms, that could be explained sufficiently from the environmentally initiated with ensued propogation in a genetic sense .- leaving intact and sound core philosophies and science of genetic mechanisms in the wake of a growing list of exceptions. At the same time a new perspective invalidates the old conceptual picture. DNA as a physical phenomenon totally of meshing surfaces rather than of a language, two views that can diverge into different empirical pictures. The language we ascribe to DNA with specific variables is a restricted view from a narrow perspective modulated by restriction in time interval of observation, provides a conceptually invalid view of realities of nature. This would naturally lead to confusions in other studies. History, consciousness maybe modulatable by unnoticed transient agents acting, found a place under the skin, into history/science interpretation, in a wake of function that is explainable by normal-simplier mechanisms-though the elucidation/tracking of such transients may be as complex and challanging. Regardless of physiological correspondences to observation the normal mechanism has to be known as the base line, the control…..it might turn out that such normals are very stable and dependable as to enable the release of efforts and energy towards other things –i.e. externally caused internally modulated inheritance of behavioral traits . (hopefully before we all assume some aspects of autism ourselves from constricted spaces of view). Marvin
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