L1 - What is Consciousness? Flashcards
1
Q
What is reasoning from first principle?
A
- Deconstruct things to principle elements
- Separate assumptions from facts
- Reconstruct knowledge from the ground up
- Builds structure
2
Q
What is the easy way of thinking?
A
- Take things at face value
- Take things for granted
- Cumulate knowledge
- Lacks structure
3
Q
Why do we think critically?
A
- To create innovative solutions and strategies
- Gain insights into why things appear/behave the way they do
- Develop true understanding about the nature of reality and the meaning of life
4
Q
What are the conventional assumptions?
A
- Universe = physical world & absolute truth
- Life = our body, physical object that can self-grow
- Consciousness = non-physical, emergent property of cellular interaction
- Universe is more fundamental than life, and life is more fundamental than consciousness
- HOWEVER we know what we experience so consciousness should be first
5
Q
What is the reasoning from the first principle:
A
- Consciousness = experience, because we can be certain about it
- From consciousness, infer life and universe
- Every label we have reflects a specific form of our conscious experience (e.g matter/space/time)
- Cannot get behind consciousness as everything we talk or regard as existing postulates consciousness
6
Q
Consciousness equals experiencing:
A
- Consciousness is any and every experience
- One is conscious during wakefulness/hallucination/dream sleep
- One is not conscious during dreamless sleep
7
Q
Why does consciousness not equal self-awareness?
A
- Self-awareness = conscious experience of self (sense of self)
- Self-awareness = specific form of conscious experience
- One can have consciousness without self-awareness e.g early childhood and meditation
8
Q
Why does consciousness does not equal awareness?
A
- Conscious experience that something exists
- Awareness is a specific form of conscious experience
- One can have consciousness without awareness, e.g hallucination, during contentless conscious
9
Q
Why does consciousness not equal intelligence?
A
- Intelligence = general ability to adapt and achieve goals
- One can have intelligence without consciousness e.g AI
- One can have consciousness without intelligence
10
Q
Why does consciousness not equal cognition?
A
- General ability to acquire knowledge
- One can have cognition without consciousness such as during unconscious learning
- One can have consciousness without cognition: dream sleep/severe dementia
11
Q
Why does consciousness not equal sensory processing?
A
- Recipient and processing of inputs from the env
- One can have sensory processing without consciousness, namely unconscious, sensory processing
- One can have consciousness without sensory processing: dream sleep or during sensory deprivation
12
Q
Why does consciousness not equal behaviour?
A
- Refers to production of actions and outputs to env
- One can have behaviour without consciousness: unconscious behaviour
- One can have consciousness without behaviour e.g dream sleep of resting state
13
Q
What is a life without consciousness: sensory processing?
A
- Will exhibit high sensory detection and discrimination
- No visual/auditory/taste/somatosensory/olfactory experience
14
Q
What is a life without consciousness: behaviour?
A
- High motor and executive functions
- No experience of planning, intending, expecting, desiring, aversing, emotions as the behaviour takes place
15
Q
Why is no consciousness good from a third person perspective?
A
- Behaviour can be directly observed and consciousness is what can be inferred from behaviour
- Bad for self as life is meaningless
- As long as person can function and provide service for them = life is meaningful with or without consciousness
- Can be preferable for person to be functioning without experiencing = so not held accountable for suffering of this person
- Meaning of life lies in the beholder of consciousness
- Consciousness defines existence
16
Q
What is the clinical significance of consciousness?
A
- Decision to preserve a brain damaged person is based on consciousness rather than behaviour
- Hard to tell presence vs absence of consciousness
- 40% of patients diagnosed as vegetative state are conscious: consciousness without behaviour
- Signs of behaviour in unconscious patients render the end-of-life decision difficult: behaviour without consciousness
17
Q
What are the social significances of consciousness?
A
- Ultimate judgement of character and liability is based on consciousness
- Hard to tell contents of consciousness
- Someone should not be guilty of committing a crime if they were not conscious of their behaviour
- Involuntary intoxication may have a valid legal defence for conduct committed when unconscious
- Hard to tell real from fake unconscious behaviour
18
Q
How can we tell real from fake unconscious behaviour?
A
- Understand the brain basis of consciousness
- Separating that from the brain basis of behaviour and the brain basis of sensory processing
19
Q
How to study consciousness?
A
- Ability to introspect as well as the tool to report: needs to measure from first-person perspective and have their own conscious experience. And to communicate one’s own conscious experience to others and measure from the third person perspective
- What contents constitutes a conscious experience and How contents are structured
20
Q
What is an example of people not having the ability to introspect?
A
- Sleep state misperception = when one may feel they were awake and conscious all night but were asleep all night
21
Q
What is an example of people not having the tools to report?
A
- Language cannot steadily map onto our conscious
- Conscious is changing constantly because of brain plasticity
- Language remains stable
- Same language corresponds to different conscious experience at different moments for the same person
22
Q
How do we link consciousness to the brain?
A
- Localisation of consciousness : which regions are essential and sufficient for consciousness
- Structural basis of cognition: what is structurally unique about the brain that allows it to generate consciousness
- Functional basis of consciousness: what types of brain activity can generate consciousness
