A definition of consciousness

… the annoying time between naps…

Higher-Order-Thought Theory of Consciousness

Since yesterday we are discussing this. The topic is well known for David Rosenthal

We are discussing two of his papers that are not available publicly, but he has a lot of papers and presentations on his website so anyone who wants to dive into this…

I met David in Berlin at the annual meeting of our scientific association ASSC.

I tried to make a point in the discussion that has one focus on reportability: consciousness experience is only reportable partially. This view I have also expressed in the recent article in the Journal of Consciousness Studies together with Alfredo Pereira Jr.

Week three of an online workshop on theories of consciousness

A few days ago we started discussing the Global Workspace Theory by Bernard Baars.

From my opening statement: “I am most happy that we enter the stage of individual presentations today. Bernard Baars will be the one to start this with arguably the most influential theory to date.”

Bernard did a very interesting opening statement and we are looking forward to a lively discussion.

So far, focusing mainly on three articles by Anil Seth, Sid Kouider and Vincent de Gardelle (all three held the tutorial about theories of consciousness at ASSC 13 in Berlin and are members in our workshop) we had more than 100 contributions.

I have put this question as an incentive: “Is GWT a theory of Consciousness or of Cognition or of the Mind? Or of a mixture of those three phenomena/concepts?”

Does anyone want to comment?

Kokin Gumi

The Medium Problem of consciousness

In the online workshop about theories of of consciousness we are currently discussing a paper by Sid Kouider about Neurobiological Theories of Consciousness

In my response I have addressed the explanatory gap and that Sid links it to the famous Hard Problem of consciousness. Now I feel there may be a different kind of problem, that could be much easier to solve and have suggested to call it the Medium Problem. I think it is already well known or detected. We are aware that many contents of conscious experience are possible at any given moment, yet because of the limited space, we are aware of a selection. How does this selection exactly happen? And I am not talking about attentional mechanisms. I am talking about psychological mechanism that may be largely unconscious.

What is it like to be a cat?

Nora the famous Piano cat

Cats are conscious, most of us would agree on this, but how conscious are they?

New Book available online: Anatomy of the soul

This book has been posted in the newsgroup of the Journal of Consciousness Studies a few days ago. I have not read it thoroughly, just across, so I cannot recommend it or even comment on it. It is available for download as PDF for free. So maybe you have a look yourself.

The most interesting topic that caught my attention was: consciousness of consciousness.

Zombie Blues

Maybe it is time for some ZOMBIFICATION?

David Chalmers is well known for the hard problem of consciousnes, but almost as well for zombies. It was difficult to find this gem of a youtube clip. They could certainly improve musically, on the other hand: would that still be zombification?

News

Meanwhile a lot of water went down the Rhine and I am still not sure if I should continue with this Blog.

Most of the time I was involved in defining consciousness. First I tried to invite people into my own forum, which is basically idle now. That call led to a long discussion here on Nature Network.

I was not too much happy with this discussion, but Alfredo Pereira Jr. and myself were invited to write an article in a special issue of the Journal of Consciousness Studies

After that the interest in the topic seems to have diminished. I became moderator in the abovementioned  online forum together with Alfredo Pereira Jr. and Bernard Baars.

Then a new topic came up: Theories of Consciousness. I was quite skeptical after these first few experiences, but after writing a bit around, we decided to take another step, as I was going to Berlin anyway to attend ASSC 13, one of the annual conferences of consciousness science.

There I spoke to many authors and it became clear quickly, that we would have a good chance to organize a workshop with some of the best scientists and philosophers in the field.

The workshop is about to start now. May be I will blog about it here or post a link, if we are publishing a bulletin.

Zen

With graceful movement

Draw the character for tea

Join the smallest with the largest

And understand

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