Tag Archives: Consciousness

Islands of awareness

Posted on February 20, 2020 by

(Warning: neuroscience weeds) An interesting paper by Tim Bayne, Anil Seth, and Marcello Massimi, which came up in my Twitter stream today, asks whether there can be islands of awareness. Ordinary consciousness involves ongoing interaction with the environment, receiving sensory … Continue reading →

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Daniel Dennett on why phenomenal consciousness is access consciousness

Posted on February 17, 2020 by

This old talk by Daniel Dennett touches on a lot of topics we’ve discussed recently.  Dennett explains why it’s wrong to regard phenomenal consciousness (the “what it’s likeness” or “raw experience” version) as separate from access consciousness (the cognitive access … Continue reading →

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Stimulating the central lateral thalamus produces consciousness

Posted on February 14, 2020 by

(Warning: neuroscience weeds) A couple of people have asked me about this study, described in numerous popular science articles (such as this one).  A monkey had electrodes installed in its brain that allowed scientists to stimulate parts of its thalamus, … Continue reading →

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Do qualia exist? Depends on what we mean by “exist.”

Posted on February 11, 2020 by

The cognitive scientist, Hakwan Lau, whose work I’ve highlighted several times in the last year, has been pondering illusionism recently.  He did a Twitter survey on the relationship between the phenomenal concept strategy (PCS) and illusionism, which inspired my post … Continue reading →

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The phenomenal concept strategy and issues with conceptual isolation

Posted on February 2, 2020 by

I’ve often pondered that the hard problem of consciousness, the perceived problem of understanding how phenomenal consciousness can happen in physical systems, arises due to the fact that our intuitive model of the phenomenal is very different from our intuitive … Continue reading →

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Prefrontal activity associated with the contents of consciousness

Posted on January 29, 2020 by

The other day I bemoaned the fact that the Templeton competition between global workspace theory (GWT) and integrated information theory (IIT) would take so long, particularly the point about having to wait to see the role of the front and … Continue reading →

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Recurrent processing theory and the function of consciousness

Posted on January 25, 2020 by

Victor Lamme’s recurrent processing theory (RPT) remains on the short list of theories considered plausible by the consciousness science community.  It’s something of a dark horse candidate, without the support of global workspace theory (GWT) or integrated information theory (IIT), … Continue reading →

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Is there a conscious perception finish line?

Posted on January 19, 2020 by

Global workspace theory (GWT) is the proposition that consciousness is composed of contents broadcast throughout the brain.  Various specialty processes compete for the limited capacity of the broadcasting mechanisms, to have their content broadcast to the all the other specialty … Continue reading →

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For animal consciousness, is there a fact of the matter?

Posted on January 18, 2020 by

Peter Carruthers has been blogging this week on the thesis of his new book, Human and Animal Minds: The Consciousness Question Laid to Rest.  I mentioned Carruthers’ book in my post on global workspace theory (GWT), but didn’t get into … Continue reading →

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Peter Carruthers on the problems of consciousness

Posted on January 13, 2020 by

Peter Carruthers is posting this week at The Brains Blog on his new book, Human and Animal Minds, which I mentioned in my post on global workspace theory.  His first post focuses on two issues: latent dualism and terminological confusion. … Continue reading →

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