Lecture 1- Consciousness Flashcards
Define consciousness:
It is a state or quality of awareness, through thoughts perceptions, memories and feelings.
Which 2 research methods pertaining to people with brain damage in hopes to understand how they perceive the world:
-The frontal lobotomy
- The split brain procedure
The frontal lobotomy won a Nobel prize in 1949, what was it used to treat and how many were performed?
-By the 1950s, 20,000+ lobotomies were performed is the US.
-It treated Psychosis, depression, anxiety etc.
The split brain operation is an outdated surgical approach used to gain a physiological perspective on its patients, what did it treat, how and was it effective?
It treated seizure disorders such as epilepsy. This was done by cutting into the corpus callosum ( a bundle of nerve fibers that connect the left and right part of the cerebral cortex).
This was effective but the side effects were unacceptable.
Why are the cerebral hemispheres critical within our brain anatomy? ei how does it make us behave?
-To consciously process sensory information (sight, sounds, touch..)
-To consciously move our body (hand and leg movements)
-Each hemisphere is responsible for half of our bodies
Right brain= left side of body
Left brain= right side of body
If there is damage on the left side of the brain, what will it effect physiologically?
It will disrupt movements and sensory processing from the right side of the body.
Although after the split brain procedures were considered a success due to the frequency and severity of seizures being reduced,
what was the controversial dilemma and what does it signify? give an example.
-Some patients had claimed that overtime, their left hand had a mind of its own. It would act against anything the person was actively trying to accomplish.
ei. A patients left hand started attacking his wife, he had to use his right hand to protect her.
-This signifies that the left had was being controlled by processes outside their conscious awareness.
A split-brain patient named vicki described her left hand problems: What were they and how long did they last?
-Shopping for groceries would take hours as she wanted to place and item in her cart but physically could not as her left hand acted like a repelling magnet.
-sometimes she would end up wearing 3 outfits at once
-these effects had lasted about a year, activities such as cutting veggies, tying shoelace, and playing cards became easy.
Explain the touch and vision studies used to prove their deficits in perception:
Touch: When a split brain patient closes their eyes and touches a familiar object, with their left hand, they cannot identify the object out loud.
Vision: When a split brain patient sees an image in their left peripheral vision (processed in right side of brain), they cannot verbalize what they see.
What does it signify when a split brain patient cannot verbalize stimuli directed to their right brain?
With such an unconscious deficit within the right side of their brain, patients must find ways to compensate, such as choreograph movements, where one hemisphere would take lead in controlling behaviours.
Human language ability (comprehension, talking and writing) is found in which cerebral hemisphere? How do split brain patients accommodate this?
The left,
however split brain patients have been seen to develop a “dictionary” to understand simple letters and statements within their mute right brain.
When the command “laugh” or “walk” were directed to the right hemisphere of patients, they began to initiate the actions, what were there reasonings behind the actions when asked?
It appeared that the left brain was constantly coming up with explanations for the actions the right brain would instigate.
ei: “Im walking because i’m getting a coke”
Explain the key points to Gazzanigas interpreter theory:
-Behaviour is fully controlled by unconsciousness processes, our left brain consciousness creates narratives to make sense of the world.
-consciousness is just storytelling and relies on language, therefore consciousness must only be located in the left cerebral hemisphere.
What is Descartes definition of “Mind-Body Dualism”
Although the body may be a mechanical device, the mind (soul) is something immaterial that exists outside of the body.
