Consciousness is understood in a variety of ways. In one belief, a person is conscious when awake, but unconscious when sleeping or comatose. Yet people also do things requiring perception and thought unconsciously even when they are awake. A person can be conscious of their physical surroundings, pain and even a wish or fantasy. In short a creature is conscious if it is aware of itself and that it is a physical and emotional being. Consciousness is a psychological condition defined by the English philosopher John Locke as "the perception of what passes in a man’s own mind".1
Consciousness is defined and perceived differently in many psychological view points. For instance the earlier views around the 19th century was diversely considered. Most perceived consciousness as a substance or "mental stuff" unlike an object from the physical world. Others deferred that the conscious mind was what separated man from lower forms of life. It is an attribute characterized by sensation and voluntary movement which described the difference between normal waking state of animals and men and their condition when asleep.2 Other descriptions included an analysis of consciousness as a form of relationship or act of the mind toward objects in nature, and a view that consciousness was a continuous field or stream of essentially mental "sense data."
The method believed by most early writers in determining consciousness was introspection—looking within one’s own mind to discover the laws of it’s operation. This belief was limited when it was apparent when observationalists could not agree on observations. Obviously due to the differences in one’s own idea of introspection and the underlying views they possessed.
The failure of introspection to reveal consistent laws led to the refection of all mental states as subjects of scientific study and thus psychology attached consciousness to its diversity.
The term consciousness is most often used by philosophers and psychologists as meaning "attention to the contents or workings of one’s own mind." This notion had little significance for the ancients, but it was emphasized in the 17th century by John Locke and Rene Descartes.
Contemporaries of ...
... middle of paper ...
... physical framework of reality.6 Smythies presents that everyone has a private space in addition to the shared, public version. Each individual’s personal framework intersects with the familiar dimensions while remaining distinct from them, and it provides an arena for all conscious sensations that have spatial extension or location–objects discernible by sight or touch.7 To understand Smythies’ theory see Appendix A.
In conclusion one can determine a variety of theories in the evolution of consciousness. As cited earlier, consciousness is viewed as being physical or material in some cases and yet in others it is viewed as a function of the inner mind or the minds eye. These theories have even been as radical as Smythies’ philosophy that the state of consciousness is a sort of physical plane.
If we were to collaborate these theories to form a conclusive view point, individuals would possibly be able to understand consciousness and the workings of consciousness. Perhaps the mystery of consciousness is to remain a mystery. Possibly this mystery is the key to cognitive thinking. And perhaps the key to our personal evolution.
theorists attempt to develop a mode of consciousness and cognition that breaks the identity of
Descartes' formulation of what he calls the “Real Distinction” has proved foundational to our modern concepts of being and consciousness. His contention has irreversibly influenced the fields of psychology, neuroscience, philosophy, and others while cementing into the popular consciousness the notion of a definite dichotomy between the mind and the body. In this paper, I will flesh out what Descartes' meant by the term “real distinction,” discuss the arguments he uses in its' defense, and then argue myself that this distinction between mind and body (at least as Descartes frames it) goes much too far, and that it is a much more viable probability to believe that mind and body are actually intertwined, one and the same.
Dyslexia has been a commonly known problem in the Unites States. Even though, dyslexia is a mental problem that causes disabilities in reading, most people do not know the truth about it. There have been movies where a person with dyslexia sees letters moving around, yet people with dyslexia do not have disabilities like moving letters around. The truth is that there are plenty of misconceptions. The myths going around of what dyslexia supposedly is, is not the truth. These myths are just misconceptions and the truths about dyslexia are more complex than what it seems like. Dyslexics have different learning processes and different ways of handling the problems at hand.
Consciousness is a very common and much used word used to describe the condition of being awake and aware. In other words, being conscious means responding to the environment, in contrast to being asleep or in coma. But in philosophical terms, consciousness is defined as the state in which humans are able to clearly distinguish between themselves and all other
To conclude this essay, I like to emphazise that Rosenthal's HOT is more of an empirical hypothesis, rather than an analysis of the term ‘consciousness.’ His aim is precisely to explain the phenomena of consciousness in relation to other mental states, such as thought and perception, and while achieving this, he has elaborated a theoretical structure for comprehending the functions of our mind.
Human beings are thought of as a combination of mind and body, and it is assumed that there is a union between them. Although the mind and body may or may not correspond and interact with each other, it is scientifically unclear whether it is true that they both affect each other. René Descartes, a famous French philosopher who gave grand contributions to the mind body problem, viewed the mind as distinct from matter, and so laid the groundwork on the controversy for interactionism, which dictated the mind and body were separate. Furthermore, the different sectors of the medical field and dualistic theories propose that the mind and the body are relatively distinct.
[4] Guven Guzeldere (1995) 'Consciousness: What it is & how to study it' Journal of Consciousness Studies vol.2, no.1; pp. 30-51
Absence of Evidence, or Evidence of Absence? A paper on Animal Consciousness Consciousness is a difficult term to grasp; so much so, that many scientists will not even attempt to define the term, much less search for it’s evidence. Most, however, do agree that consciousness must include certain aspects; specifically cognition, self-awareness, memory, and abstract thought. Lesley J. Rogers describes consciousness as, “related to awareness, intelligence, and complex cognition, as well as language.
The most common learning disability in children does not affect only one aspect of their lives, but alters nearly every measure. Dyslexia inhibits one 's ability to read, write, and spell. About 5 to 20 percent of children attending school have some sort of a disability involved with reading. When thinking of a condition that contains no cure, such as dyslexia, you may imagine a lifetime of complications and difficulties; although, dyslexia does not damage a person’s ability to learn, it merely forces them to grasp ideas and think in their own original way. Multiple obstacles can potentially arise, but successfulness and intelligence tends to prevail, and has in multiple situations. Numerous well known people have personally suffered through
In conclusion, it is very difficult to come up with scientific solutions to the problem of consciousness. Science may never be able to solve the mysteries of qualia. New methods might need to be introduced to uncover personal experience that lie far off in the future. Philosophers will just need to continue in their search for a complete theory of a science of mind. In addition, humility within the sciences may go along way towards an understanding of consciousness. “ We do not know what consciousness means outside the frame of personality”- Albert Einstein
Many students struggle with learning disabilities. Two common disabilities are Dyslexia and Dysgraphia. “According to the latest dyslexia research from the National Institutes of Health, Dyslexia affects 20 percent of Americans” (“What is Dyslexia?”) Dysgraphia is difficulty with writing that sometimes accompanies Dyslexia. Students that have Dyslexia and Dysgraphia will struggle with vocabulary, grammar, and punctuation, but there is help.
While the great philosophical distinction between mind and body in western thought can be traced to the Greeks, it is to the influential work of René Descartes, French mathematician, philosopher, and physiologist, that we owe the first systematic account of the mind/body relationship. As the 19th century progressed, the problem of the relationship of mind to brain became ever more pressing.
2) There is very little access to one’s total mental being (consciousness) since so much of it has been repressed into the unconscious.
Even though we accept Cashmore's argument of free will being an illusion derived from consciousness and that consciousness has an evolutionary advantage of conferring the illusion of responsibility, we are still far from understanding the concept with consciousness and free will. What type of brain activity is associated with consciousness? Why does conscious experience exist at all? Research studies can not prove this to be incorrect but research results certainly do constrain the philosophical answers that we can seriously consider.
Referencing back through Who Are You: Consciousness, Identity, and the Self, the English philosopher and physician John Locke ideas about self state what does it mean to be a person and what is consciousness? He felt a person is a thinking, intelligent being who has the ability to reason and to reflect. He also thought consciousness is being aware that we are thinking (Chaffee, 2013). Personally, he was one of the few philosophers that I could agree with in this chapter. The world is full of human beings, with the ability to think, to go about their day and perform the tasks needed to survive, but with one of the questions that arose fairly early in the class, how many people contemplate their existence? How many have the ability to reason and reflect and actually do so? I feel Locke was on the right track in his thinking – we have the ability, but each one of us has failed to ask the right questions and look for deeper answers throughout our life. I have gone through periods in my life where surviving was all I could manage and I look back on those times with regret because, as I si...