Consciousness and Delusions.pdf

8/16/2019 Consciousness and Delusions.pdf

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CONSCIOUSNESS AND DELUSIONS

Varun PandeyB.A(H)Applied Psychology (2013-2016)

Amity University, Noida

In 200,000 years of history humans learned how to create a simulation of big bang

theory in a Large Hadron Collider the most massive machine ever built. We have

successfully learned the concept of how species reproduce to over come the problem

of existence. We have also travelled through space to find if we are alone in this

universe. We have built robots which are capable of self-learning (HONDA- ASIMO

is one fine example of such robots) but there has been a problem, which is the root of

all these problems, and that problem is the “PROBLEM OF HAVING A

CONSCIOUSNESS”.

Now why can’t we be just another highly advanced version of the robots that

we build today and perform our tasks by INPUT and OUTPUT mechanism and only

talk about the numbers and logics? Why and how come that we possess a system

which is so highly advance that it creates the concept of “ONE” as a being and then

collects all those stimuli we obtain from the environment and process them as an

experience we often call Life.

In fact the whole concept of my typing this paper on my computer right now

sitting on my bed at 6:15 a.m. and me being able to recognize that while typing, my

roommate’s cellphone fired the alarm for morning wakeup call is something which

neurologists call the CONSCIOUSNESS.

Since a very long time philosophers have been arguing about mind and

consciousness. There have been many theories and the earliest of them is

consciousness being a part of some external intelligence, which makes us work and

experience life. But the word ‘conscious’ originated in the late 16 th century from a

Latin word CONSCIUS, which means “knowing with others or in oneself”. Which

tells us that since the inception of time there has been an urge to know what

ultimately makes us alive or what ultimately give us the experience of being alive.


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In this paper we are going to discuss about the concept of consciousness based

on neurological and philosophical researches and ideas. Then we’ll also investigate

about the other state of human mind, which we call as Delusional State.

WHAT IS CONSCIOUSNESS?

“Consciousness is the quality or state of awareness, or, of being aware of an external

object or something within oneself”. It has been defined as: sentience, awareness,

subjectivity, the ability to experience or to feel, wakefulness, having a sense of

selfhood, and the executive control system of the mind. Despite the difficulty in

definition, many philosophers believe that there is a broadly shared underlying

intuition about what consciousness is. As Max Velmans and Susan Schneider wrote in

The Blackwell Companion to Consciousness: "Anything that we are aware of at a

given moment forms part of our consciousness, making conscious experience at once

the most familiar and most mysterious aspect of our lives.

When I am in a conscious mental state, there is something it is like for me to be in

that state from the subjective or first person point of view. But how are we to

understand this? For instance, how is the conscious mental state related to the body?

Can consciousness be explained in terms of brain activity? What makes a mental state

be a conscious mental state? The problem of consciousness is arguably the most

central issue in current philosophy of mind and is also importantly related to major

traditional topics in metaphysics, such as the possibility of immortality and the belief

in free will.

The Metaphysics of Consciousness: Materialism vs. Dualism

Metaphysics is the branch of philosophy concerned with the ultimate nature of reality.

There are two broad traditional and competing metaphysical views concerning the

nature of the mind and conscious mental states: dualism and materialism. While there

are many versions of each, the former generally holds that the conscious mind or a

conscious mental state is non-physical in some sense. On the other hand, materialists

hold that the mind is the brain, or, more accurately, that conscious mental activity is


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identical with neural activity. It is important to recognize that by non-physical,

dualists do not merely mean “not visible to the naked eye.” Many physical things fit

this description, such as the atoms, which make up the air in a typical room. For

something to be non-physical, it must literally be outside the realm of physics; that is,

not in space at all and undetectable in principle by the instruments of physics. It is

equally important to recognize that the category “physical” is broader than the

category “material.” Materialists are called such because there is the tendency to view

the brain, a material thing, as the most likely physical candidate to identify with the

mind. However, something might be physical but not material in this sense, such as an

electromagnetic or energy field. One might therefore instead be a “physicalist” in

some broader sense and still not a dualist. Thus, to say that the mind is non-physical is

to say something much stronger than that it is non-material. Dualists, then, tend to

believe that conscious mental states or minds are radically different from anything in

the physical world at all.

Dualism: General Support and Related Issues There are a number of reasons

why some version of dualism has been held throughout the centuries. For one thing,

especially from the introspective or first person perspective, our conscious mental

states just do not seem like physical things or processes. That is, when we reflect on

our conscious perceptions, pains, and desires, they do not seem to be physical in any

sense. Consciousness seems to be a unique aspect of the world not to be understood in

any physical way. Although materialists will urge that this completely ignores the

more scientific third-person perspective on the nature of consciousness and mind, this

idea continues to have force for many today. Indeed, it is arguably the crucial

underlying intuition behind historically significant “conceivability arguments” against

materialism and for dualism. Such arguments typically reason from the premise that

one can conceive of one’s conscious states existing without one’s body or,

conversely, that one can imagine one’s own physical duplicate without consciousness

at all.


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Materialism: General Support

Some form of materialism is probably much more widely held today than in centuries

past. No doubt part of the reason for this has to do with the explosion in scientific

knowledge about the workings of the brain and its intimate connection with

consciousness, including the close connection between brain damage and various

states of consciousness. Brain death is now the main criterion for when someone dies.

Stimulation to specific areas of the brain results in modality specific conscious

experiences. Indeed, materialism often seems to be a working assumption in

neurophysiology. Imagine saying to a neuroscientist “you are not really studying the

conscious mind itself” when she is examining the workings of the brain during an

fMRI. The idea is that science is showing us that conscious mental states, such as

visual perceptions, are simply identical with certain neuro-chemical brain processes

much like the science of chemistry taught us that water just is H2O.

There are also theoretical factors on the side of materialism, such as adherence to the

so-called “principle of simplicity” which says that if two theories can equally explain

a given phenomenon, then we should accept the one, which posits fewer objects or

forces. In this case, even if dualism could equally explain consciousness (which

would of course be disputed by materialists), materialism is clearly the simpler theory

in so far as it does not posit any objects or processes over and above physical ones.

Materialists will wonder why there is a need to believe in the existence of such

mysterious non-physical entities. Moreover, in the aftermath of the Darwinian

revolution, it would seem that materialism is on even stronger ground provided that

one accepts basic evolutionary theory and the notion that most animals are conscious.

Given the similarities between the more primitive parts of the human brain and the

brains of other animals, it seems most natural to conclude that, through evolution,

increasing layers of brain areas correspond to increased mental abilities. For example,

having a well-developed prefrontal cortex allows humans to reason and plan in ways


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not available to dogs and cats. It also seems fairly uncontroversial to hold that we

should be materialists about the minds of animals. If so, then it would be odd indeed

to hold that non-physical conscious states suddenly appear on the scene with humans.

There are still, however, a number of much discussed and important objections to

materialism, most of which question the notion that materialism can adequately

explain conscious experience.

Specific Theories of Consciousness

Most specific theories of consciousness tend to be reductionist in some sense. The

classic notion at work is that consciousness or individual conscious mental states can

be explained in terms of something else or in some other terms. This section will

focus on several prominent contemporary reductionist theories. We should, however,

distinguish between those who attempt such a reduction directly in physicalistic, such

as neurophysiological, terms and those who do so in mentalistic terms, such as by

using unconscious mental states or other cognitive notions.

1. Neural Theories

The more direct reductionist approach can be seen in various, more specific,

neural theories of consciousness. Perhaps best known is the theory offered by

Francis Crick and Christof Koch 1990 (see also Crick 1994, Koch 2004). The

basic idea is that mental states become conscious when large numbers of neurons

fire in synchrony and all have oscillations within the 35-75 hertz range (that is,

35-75 cycles per second). However, many philosophers and scientists have put

forth other candidates for what, specifically, to identify in the brain with

consciousness. This vast enterprise has come to be known as the search for the

“neural correlates of consciousness” or NCCs (see section 5b below for more).

The overall idea is to show how one or more specific kinds of neuro-chemical

activity can underlie and explain conscious mental activity (Metzinger 2000). Of


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course, mere “correlation” is not enough for a fully adequate neural theory and

explaining just what counts as a NCC turns out to be more difficult than one might

think (Chalmers 2000). Even Crick and Koch have acknowledged that they, at

best, provide a necessary condition for consciousness, and that such firing patters

are not automatically sufficient for having conscious experience.

2. Representational Theories Of Consciousness

Many current theories attempt to reduce consciousness in mentalistic terms. One

broadly popular approach along these lines is to reduce consciousness to “mental

representations” of some kind. The notion of a “representation” is of course very

general and can be applied to photographs, signs, and various natural objects, such

as the rings inside a tree. Much of what goes on in the brain, however, might also

be understood in a representational way; for example, as mental events

representing outer objects partly because they are caused by such objects in, say,

cases of veridical visual perception. More specifically, philosophers will often call

such representational mental states “intentional states” which have

representational content; that is, mental states which are “about something” or“directed at something” as when one has a thought about the house or a perception

of the tree. Although intentional states are sometimes contrasted with phenomenal

states, such as pains and color experiences, it is clear that many conscious states

have both phenomenal and intentional properties, such as visual perceptions. It

should be noted that the relation between intentionality and consciousness is itself

a major ongoing area of dispute with some arguing that genuine intentionality

actually presupposes consciousness in some way (Searle 1992, Siewart 1998,

Horgan and Tienson 2002) while most representationalists insist that intentionality

is prior to consciousness (Gennaro 2012, chapter two).

The general view that we can explain conscious mental states in terms of

representational or intentional states is called “representationalism.” Although not

automatically reductionist in spirit, most versions of representationalism do

indeed attempt such a reduction. Most representationalists, then, believe that there

is room for a kind of “second-step” reduction to be filled in later by neuroscience.

The other related motivation for representational theories of consciousness is that


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many believe that an account of representation or intentionality can more easily be

given in naturalistic terms, such as causal theories whereby mental states are

understood as representing outer objects in virtue of some reliable causal

connection. The idea, then, is that if consciousness can be explained in

representational terms and representation can be understood in purely physical

terms, then there is the promise of a reductionist and naturalistic theory of

consciousness. Most generally, however, we can say that a representationalist will

typically hold that the phenomenal properties of experience (that is, the “qualia”

or “what it is like of experience” or “phenomenal character”) can be explained in

terms of the experiences’ representational properties. Alternatively, conscious

mental states have no mental properties other than their representational

properties. Two conscious states with all the same representational properties will

not differ phenomenally. For example, when I look at the blue sky, what it is like

for me to have a conscious experience of the sky is simply identical with my

experience’s representation of the blue sky.

3. First Order Representationalism

A First-order representational (FOR) theory of consciousness is a theory that

attempts to explain conscious experience primarily in terms of world-directed (or

first-order) intentional states. Probably the two most cited FOR theories of

consciousness are those of Fred Dretske (1995) and Michael Tye (1995, 2000),

though there are many others as well (e.g., Harman 1990, Kirk 1994, Byrne 2001,

Thau 2002, Droege 2003). Tye’s theory is more fully worked out and so will be

the focus of this section. Like other FOR theorists, Tye holds that the

representational content of my conscious experience (that is, what my experience

is about or directed at) is identical with the phenomenal properties of experience.

Aside from reductionistic motivations, Tye and other FOR representationalists

often use the somewhat technical notion of the “transparency of experience” as

support for their view (Harman 1990). This is an argument based on the

phenomenological first-person observation, which goes back to Moore (1903),

that when one turns one’s attention away from, say, the blue sky and onto one’s

experience itself, one is still only aware of the blueness of the sky. The experience


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itself is not blue; rather, one “sees right through” one’s experience to its

representational properties, and there is nothing else to one’s experience over and

above such properties.

Whatever the merits and exact nature of the argument from transparency (see

Kind 2003), it is clear, of course, that not all mental representations are conscious,

so the key question eventually becomes: What exactly distinguishes conscious

from unconscious mental states (or representations)? What makes a mental state a

conscious mental state? Here Tye defends what he calls “PANIC theory.” The

acronym “PANIC” stands for poised, abstract, non-conceptual, intentional

content. Without probing into every aspect of PANIC theory, Tye holds that at

least some of the representational content in question is non-conceptual (N),

which is to say that the subject can lack the concept for the properties represented

by the experience in question, such as an experience of a certain shade of red that

one has never seen before. Actually, the exact nature or even existence of non-

conceptual content of experience is itself a highly debated and difficult issue in

philosophy of mind (Gunther 2003). Gennaro (2012), for example, defends

conceptualism and connects it in various ways to the higher-order thought theory

of consciousness (see section 4b.ii). Conscious states clearly must also have

“intentional content” (IC) for any representationalist. Tye also asserts that such

content is “abstract” (A) and not necessarily about particular concrete objects.

This condition is needed to handle cases of hallucinations, where there are no

concrete objects at all or cases where different objects look phenomenally alike.

Perhaps most important for mental states to be conscious, however, is that such

content must be “poised” (P), which is an importantly functional notion. The “key

idea is that experiences and feelings...stand ready and available to make a direct

impact on beliefs and/or desires. For example…feeling hungry… has an

immediate cognitive effect, namely, the desire to eat….States with nonconceptual

content that are not so poised lack phenomenal character [because]…they arise

too early, as it were, in the information processing” (Tye 2000: 62).

One objection to Tye’s theory is that it does not really address the hard problem of

phenomenal consciousness (see section 3b.i). This is partly because what really

seems to be doing most of the work on Tye’s PANIC account is the very

functional sounding “poised” notion, which is perhaps closer to Block’s access

consciousness (see section 1) and is therefore not necessarily able to explain


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phenomenal consciousness (see Kriegel 2002). In short, it is difficult to see just

how Tye’s PANIC account might not equally apply to unconscious

representations and thus how it really explains phenomenal consciousness.

Other standard objections to Tye’s theory as well as to other FOR accounts

include the concern that it does not cover all kinds of conscious states. Some

conscious states seem not to be “about” anything, such as pains, anxiety, or after-

images, and so would be non-representational conscious states. If so, then

conscious experience cannot generally be explained in terms of representational

properties (Block 1996). Tye responds that pains, itches, and the like do represent,

in the sense that they represent parts of the body. And after-images,

hallucinations, and the like either misrepresent (which is still a kind of

representation) or the conscious subject still takes them to have representational

properties from the first-person point of view. Indeed, Tye (2000) admirably goes

to great lengths and argues convincingly in response to a whole host of alleged

counter-examples to representationalism. Historically among them are various

hypothetical cases of inverted qualia (see Shoemaker 1982), the mere possibility

of which is sometimes taken as devastating to representationalism. These are

cases where behaviorally indistinguishable individuals have inverted color

perceptions of objects, such as person A visually experiences a lemon the way that

person B experience a ripe tomato with respect to their color, and so on for all

yellow and red objects. Isn’t it possible that there are two individuals whose color

experiences are inverted with respect to the objects of perception? (For more on

the importance of color in philosophy, see Hardin 1986.)

A somewhat different twist on the inverted spectrum is famously put forth in

Block’s (1990) Inverted Earth case. On Inverted Earth every object has the

complementary color to the one it has here, but we are asked to imagine that a

person is equipped with color-inverting lenses and then sent to Inverted Earth

completely ignorant of those facts. Since the color inversions cancel out, the

phenomenal experiences remain the same, yet there certainly seem to be different

representational properties of objects involved. The strategy on the part of critics,

in short, is to think of counter-examples (either actual or hypothetical) whereby

there is a difference between the phenomenal properties in experience and the

relevant representational properties in the world. Such objections can, perhaps, be

answered by Tye and others in various ways, but significant debate continues


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(Macpherson 2005). Intuitions also dramatically differ as to the very plausibility

and value of such thought experiments. (For more, see Seager 1999, chapters 6

and 7. See also Chalmers 2004 for an excellent discussion of the dizzying array of

possible representationalist positions.)

4. High Order Representationalism

As we have seen, one question that should be answered by any theory of

consciousness is: What makes a mental state a conscious mental state? There is a

long tradition that has attempted to understand consciousness in terms of some

kind of higher-order awareness. For example, John Locke (1689/1975) once said,

“consciousness is the perception of what passes in a man’s own mind.” This

intuition has been revived by a number of philosophers (Rosenthal, 1986, 1993b,

1997, 2000, 2004, 2005; Gennaro 1996a, 2012; Armstrong, 1968, 1981; Lycan,

1996, 2001). In general, the idea is that what makes a mental state conscious is

that it is the object of some kind of higher-order representation (HOR). A mental

state M becomes conscious when there is a HOR of M. A HOR is a “meta-

psychological” state, i.e., a mental state directed at another mental state. So, for

example, my desire to write a good encyclopedia entry becomes conscious when

I am (non-inferentially) “aware” of the desire. Intuitively, it seems that conscious

states, as opposed to unconscious ones, are mental states that I am “aware of” in

some sense. This is sometimes referred to as the Transitivity Principle. Any

theory which attempts to explain consciousness in terms of higher-order states is

known as higher. It is best initially to use the more neutral term “representation”

because there are a number of different kinds of higher-order theory, depending

upon how one characterizes the HOR in question. HO theories, thus, attempt to

explain consciousness in mentalistic terms, that is, by reference to such notions as

“thoughts” and “awareness.” Conscious mental states arise when two

unconscious mental states are related in a certain specific way; namely, that one

of them (the HOR) is directed at the other (M). HO theorists are united in the

belief that their approach can better explain consciousness than any purely FOR

theory, which has significant difficulty in explaining the difference between

unconscious and conscious mental states.


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There are various kinds of HO theory with the most common division between

higher-order thought (HOT) theories and higher-order perception (HOP) theories.

HOT theorists, such as David M. Rosenthal, think it is better to understand the

HOR as a thought of some kind. HOTs are treated as cognitive states involving

some kind of conceptual component. HOP theorists urge that the HOR is a

perceptual or experiential state of some kind (Lycan 1996), which does not

require the kind of conceptual content, invoked by HOT theorists. Partly due to

Kant (1781/1965), HOP theory is sometimes referred to as “inner sense theory”

as a way of emphasizing its sensory or perceptual aspect. Although HOT and

HOP theorists agree on the need for a HOR theory of consciousness, they do

sometimes argue for the superiority of their respective positions (such as in

Rosenthal 2004, Lycan 2004, and Gennaro 2012). Some philosophers, however,

have argued that the difference between these theories is perhaps not as important

or as clear as some think it is (Güzeldere 1995, Gennaro 1996a, Van Gulick

2000).

A common initial objection to HOR theories is that they are circular and lead to

an infinite regress. It might seem that the HOT theory results in circularity by

defining consciousness in terms of HOTs. It also might seem that an infinite

regress results because a conscious mental state must be accompanied by a HOT,

which, in turn, must be accompanied by another HOT ad infinitum. However, the

standard reply is that when a conscious mental state is a first-order world-directed

state the higher-order thought (HOT) is not itself conscious; otherwise, circularity

and an infinite regress would follow. When the HOT is itself conscious, there is a

yet higher-order (or third-order) thought directed at the second-order state. In this

case, we have introspection, which involves a conscious HOT directed at an inner

mental state. When one introspects, one's attention is directed back into one's

mind. For example, what makes my desire to write a good entry a conscious first-

order desire is that there is a (non-conscious) HOT directed at the desire. In this

case, my conscious focus is directed at the entry and my computer screen, so I am

not consciously aware of having the HOT from the first-person point of view.

When I introspect that desire, however, I then have a conscious HOT

(accompanied by a yet higher, third-order, HOT) directed at the desire itself (see

Rosenthal 1986).

Peter Carruthers (2000) has proposed another possibility within HO theory;


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namely, that it is better for various reasons to think of the HOTs as dispositional

states instead of the standard view that the HOTs are actual, though he also

understands his “dispositional HOT theory” to be a form of HOP theory

(Carruthers 2004). The basic idea is that the conscious status of an experience is

due to its availability to higher-order thought. So “conscious experience occurs

when perceptual contents are fed into a special short-term buffer memory store,

whose function is to make those contents available to cause HOTs about

themselves.” (Carruthers 2000: 228). Some first-order perceptual contents are

available to a higher-order “theory of mind mechanism,” which transforms those

representational contents into conscious contents. Thus, no actual HOT occurs.

Instead, according to Carruthers, some perceptual states acquire a dual intentional

content; for example, a conscious experience of red not only has a first-order

content of “red,” but also has the higher-order content “seems red” or “experience

of red.” Carruthers also makes interesting use of so-called “consumer semantics”

in order to fill out his theory of phenomenal consciousness. The content of a

mental state depends, in part, on the powers of the organisms, which “consume”

that state, e.g., the kinds of inferences, which the organism can make when it is in

that state. Daniel Dennett (1991) is sometimes credited with an earlier version of

a dispositional account (see Carruthers 2000, chapter ten). Carruthers’

dispositional theory is often criticized by those who, among other things, do not

see how the mere disposition toward a mental state can render it conscious

(Rosenthal 2004; see also Gennaro 2004, 2012; for more, see Consciousness,

Higher Order Theories of.)

It is worth briefly noting a few typical objections to HO theories (many of which

can be found in Byrne 1997): First, and perhaps most common, is that various

animals (and even infants) are not likely to have to the conceptual sophistication

required for HOTs, and so that would render animal (and infant) consciousness

very unlikely (Dretske 1995, Seager 2004). Are cats and dogs capable of having

complex higher-order thoughts such as “I am in mental state M”? Although most

who bring forth this objection are not HO theorists, Peter Carruthers (1989) is

one HO theorist who actually embraces the conclusion that (most) animals do not

have phenomenal consciousness. Gennaro (1993, 1996) has replied to Carruthers

on this point; for example, it is argued that the HOTs need not be as sophisticated

as it might initially appear and there is ample comparative neurophysiological


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evidence supporting the conclusion that animals have conscious mental states.

Most HO theorists do not wish to accept the absence of animal or infant

consciousness as a consequence of holding the theory. The debate continues,

however, in Carruthers (2000, 2005, 2008) and Gennaro (2004, 2009, 2012,

chapters seven and eight).

A second objection has been referred to as the “problem of the rock” (Stubenberg

1998) and the “generality problem” (Van Gulick 2000, 2004), but it is originally

due to Alvin Goldman (Goldman 1993). When I have a thought about a rock, it is

certainly not true that the rock becomes conscious. So why should I suppose that

a mental state becomes conscious when I think about it? This is puzzling to many

and the objection forces HO theorists to explain just how adding the HO state

changes an unconscious state into a conscious. There have been, however, a

number of responses to this kind of objection (Rosenthal 1997, Lycan, 1996, Van

Gulick 2000, 2004, Gennaro 2005, 2012, chapter four). A common theme is that

there is a principled difference in the objects of the HO states in question. Rocks

and the like are not mental states in the first place, and so HO theorists are first

and foremost trying to explain how a mental state becomes conscious. The

objects of the HO states must be “in the head.”

Third, the above leads somewhat naturally to an objection related to Chalmers’

hard problem (section 3b.i). It might be asked just how exactly any HO theory

really explains the subjective or phenomenal aspect of conscious experience.

How or why does a mental state come to have a first-person qualitative “what it is

like” aspect by virtue of the presence of a HOR directed at it? It is probably fair

to say that HO theorists have been slow to address this problem, though a number

of overlapping responses have emerged (see also Gennaro 2005, 2012, chapter

four, for more extensive treatment). Some argue that this objection misconstrues

the main and more modest purpose of (at least, their) HO theories. The claim is

that HO theories are theories of consciousness only in the sense that they are

attempting to explain what differentiates conscious from unconscious states, i.e.,

in terms of a higher-order awareness of some kind. A full account of “qualitative

properties” or “sensory qualities” (which can themselves be non-conscious) can

be found elsewhere in their work, but is independent of their theory of

consciousness (Rosenthal 1991, Lycan 1996, 2001). Thus, a full explanation of

phenomenal consciousness does require more than a HO theory, but that is no


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objection to HO theories as such. Another response is that proponents of the hard

problem unjustly raise the bar as to what would count as a viable explanation of

consciousness so that any such reductivist attempt would inevitably fall short

(Carruthers 2000, Gennaro 2012). Part of the problem, then, is a lack of clarity

about what would even count as an explanation of consciousness (Van Gulick

1995; see also section 3b). Once this is clarified, however, the hard problem can

indeed be solved. Moreover, anyone familiar with the literature knows that there

are significant terminological difficulties in the use of various crucial terms

which sometimes inhibits genuine progress (but see Byrne 2004 for some helpful

clarification).

A fourth important objection to HO approaches is the question of how such

theories can explain cases where the HO state might misrepresent the lower-order

(LO) mental state (Byrne 1997, Neander 1998, Levine 2001, Block 2011). After

all, if we have a representational relation between two states, it seems possible for

misrepresentation or malfunction to occur. If it does, then what explanation can

be offered by the HO theorist? If my LO state registers a red percept and my HO

state registers a thought about something green due, say, to some neural

misfiring, then what happens? It seems that problems loom for any answer given

by a HO theorist and the cause of the problem has to do with the very nature of

the HO theorist’s belief that there is a representational relation between the LO

and HO states. For example, if the HO theorist takes the option that the resulting

conscious experience is reddish, and then it seems that the HO state plays no role

in determining the qualitative character of the experience. On the other hand, if

the resulting experience is greenish, then the LO state seems

irrelevant. Rosenthal and Weisberg hold that the HO state determines the

qualitative properties even in cases when there is no LO state at all (Rosenthal

2005, 2011, Weisberg 2008, 2011a, 2011b). Gennaro (2012) argues that no

conscious experience results in such cases and wonders, for example, how a sole

(unconscious) HOT can result in a conscious state at all. He argues that there

must be a match, complete or partial, between the LO and HO state in order for a

conscious state to exist in the first place. This important objection forces HO

theorists to be clearer about just how to view the relationship between the LO and

HO states. Debate is ongoing and significant both on varieties of HO theory and

in terms of the above objections (see Gennaro 2004a). There is also


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interdisciplinary interest in how various HO theories might be realized in the

brain (Gennaro 2012, chapter nine).

5.

Other Cognitive Theories

Aside from the explicitly representational approaches discussed above, there are

also related attempts to explain consciousness in other cognitive terms. The two

most prominent such theories are worth describing here:

Daniel Dennett (1991, 2005) has put forth what he calls the Multiple Drafts

Model (MDM) of consciousness. Although similar in some ways to

representationalism, Dennett is most concerned that materialists avoid falling prey to what he calls the “myth of the Cartesian theater,” the notion that there is

some privileged place in the brain where everything comes together to produce

conscious experience. Instead, the MDM holds that all kinds of mental activity

occur in the brain by parallel processes of interpretation, all of which are under

frequent revision. The MDM rejects the idea of some “self” as an inner observer;

rather, the self is the product or construction of a narrative, which emerges over

time. Dennett is also well known for rejecting the very assumption that there is a

clear line to be drawn between conscious and unconscious mental states in terms

of the problematic notion of “qualia.” He influentially rejects strong emphasis on

any phenomenological or first-person approach to investigating consciousness,

advocating instead what he calls “heterophenomenology” according to which we

should follow a more neutral path “leading from objective physical science and

its insistence on the third person point of view, to a method of phenomenological

description that can (in principle) do justice to the most private and ineffable

subjective experiences.” (1991: 72)

Bernard Baars’ Global Workspace Theory (GWT) model of consciousness is

probably the most influential theory proposed among psychologists (Baars 1988,

1997). The basic idea and metaphor is that we should think of the entire cognitive

system as built on a “blackboard architecture” which is a kind of global

workspace. According to GWT, unconscious processes and mental states

compete for the spotlight of attention, from which information is “broadcast

globally” throughout the system. Consciousness consists in such global


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broadcasting and is therefore also, according to Baars, an important functional

and biological adaptation. We might say that consciousness is thus created by a

kind of global access to select bits of information in the brain and nervous

system. Despite Baars’ frequent use of “theater” and “spotlight” metaphors, he

argues that his view does not entail the presence of the material Cartesian theater

that Dennett is so concerned to avoid. It is, in any case, an empirical matter just

how the brain performs the functions he describes, such as detecting mechanisms

of attention.

Objections to these cognitive theories include the charge that they do not really

address the hard problem of consciousness (as described in section 3b.i), but only

the “easy” problems. Dennett is also often accused of explaining away

consciousness rather than really explaining it. It is also interesting to think about

Baars’ GWT in light of the Block’s distinction between access and phenomenal

consciousness (see section 1). Does Baars’ theory only address access

consciousness instead of the more difficult to explain phenomenal consciousness?

(Two other psychological cognitive theories worth noting are the ones proposed

by George Mandler 1975 and Tim Shallice 1988.)

6.

Quantum Approaches

Finally, there are those who look deep beneath the neural level to the field of

quantum mechanics, basically the study of sub-atomic particles, to find the key to

unlocking the mysteries of consciousness. The bizarre world of quantum physics

is quite different from the deterministic world of classical physics, and a major

area of research in its own right. Such authors place the locus of consciousness at

a very fundamental physical level. This somewhat radical, though exciting, option

is explored most notably by physicist Roger Penrose (1989, 1994) and

anesthesiologist Stuart Hameroff (1998). The basic idea is that consciousness

arises through quantum effects, which occur in subcellular neural structures

known as microtubules, which are structural proteins in cell walls. There are also

other quantum approaches, which aim to explain the coherence of consciousness

(Marshall and Zohar 1990) or use the “holistic” nature of quantum mechanics to

explain consciousness (Silberstein 1998, 2001). It is difficult to assess these


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somewhat exotic approaches at present. Given the puzzling and often very

counterintuitive nature of quantum physics, it is unclear whether such approaches

will prove genuinely scientifically valuable methods in explaining consciousness.

One concern is simply that these authors are trying to explain one puzzling

phenomenon (consciousness) in terms of another mysterious natural phenomenon

(quantum effects). Thus, the thinking seems to go, perhaps the two are essentially

related somehow and other physicalistic accounts are looking in the wrong place,

such as at the neuro-chemical level. Although many attempts to explain

consciousness often rely of conjecture or speculation, quantum approaches may

indeed lead the field along these lines. Of course, this doesn’t mean that some

such theory isn’t correct. One exciting aspect of this approach is the resulting

interdisciplinary interest it has generated among physicists and other scientists in

the problem of consciousness.

PANPSYCHISM: A UNIVERSAL APPROACH TO

CONSCIOUSNESS

A few philosophers believed that consciousness is something which cannot be

quantified by simply correlating it to something else which is already present with us

as the tools for fundamental approach towards classifying the universe as we know of

today.

Rather they surmise that each and everything in this universe may have some degree

of consciousness. This view is sometimes called panpsychism: pan for all, psych for

mind, every system is conscious, not just humans, dogs, mice, flies, but even Rob

Knight's microbes, elementary particles. Even a photon has some degree of

consciousness. The idea is not that photons are intelligent or thinking. It's not that a

photon is wracked with angst because it's thinking, "Aww, I'm always buzzing around

near the speed of light. I never get to slow down and smell the roses." No, not like

that. But the thought is maybe photons might have some element of raw, subjective

feeling, some primitive precursor to consciousness.

A really exciting thing is in recent years a neuroscientist, Giulio Tononi, has takenthis kind of theory and developed it rigorously with a mathematical theory. He has a


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mathematical measure of information integration, which he calls phi, measuring the

amount of information integrated in a system. And he supposes that phi goes along

with consciousness. So in a human brain, incredibly large amount of information

integration, high degree of phi, a whole lot of consciousness. In a mouse, medium

degree of information integration, still pretty significant, pretty serious amount of

consciousness. But as you go down to worms, microbes, particles, the amount of phi

falls off. The amount of information integration falls off, but it's still non-zero. On

Tononi's theory, there's still going to be a non-zero degree of consciousness. In effect,

he's proposing a fundamental law of consciousness: high phi, high consciousness.

Altered States Of Consciousness

It is a condition of the conscious level in which there are significant changes from

the normal waking state in cognitive and behavioral functioning . These changes

include, but are not limited to, the following:

•

The mental processing of information are shallow and uncritical;

• Self-perceptions and perceptions of the environment are distorted;

•

Self-control and normal inhibitions diminish, and may even disappear.

It’s important to remember that the characteristics of an altered state of consciousness

include only what is going on at the conscious level: the characteristics of the

preconscious and unconscious levels are not included when describing an altered

state.

Sleep is an altered state of consciousness that we generally experience every day. We

can describe the characteristics of sleep in terms of the three sets of changes defining

an altered state:

1. We are unable to engage in complex thinking (i.e., we process information poorly).

2. We are not self-aware (we don’t perceive ourselves as physical bodies lying in a

bed) nor do we perceive the world around us accurately.

3. We are unable to exhibit self-control (i.e., we can’t regulate our behaviors,

emotions, and cognitions), especially with respect to social rules.

Thus, during sleep, the characteristics of the conscious level of awareness have

undergone significant changes from the normal waking state.


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In defining what is meant by levels of awareness and by an altered state of

consciousness, we begin to see how important and how difficult it is to define

psychological concepts clearly. The way in which a concept is defined is important

because the definition determines how we think about the concept as well as the

actions we take with respect to it. For example, the way in which medical doctors

define the concept of death will influence at which point they stop trying to

resuscitate a person (e.g., Miller, 2009).

An important difficulty for defining psychological concepts for the purposes of

scientific research is that many of the terms are also used in everyday life. This can

cause confusion among laypeople because researchers often use a term, such as

intelligence, in a way that differs from its use in everyday life. For example, there are

at least two meanings of the concept of unconscious in everyday life:

(1) When we say that “Stephanie has repressed memories in her unconscious,” we

mean that she is unaware of memories that exist “somewhere” within her mind. In

this case, the term unconscious refers to a level of awareness containing mental

content that is either very difficult or impossible to attend to.

(2) When we say that “Stephanie is unconscious,” we mean that she shows no

awareness of the external world around her, such as when she has been given a

general anesthetic during major surgery. In this case, the term “unconscious” refers

to an altered state of consciousness: the person is aware mostly of internal mental

events and unaware of the external world.

A few altered states of consciousness:

1. DELUSIONS

2. HYPNOSIS

3.

SLEEP

4.

CONTEMPLATION OF ART (MUSIC, DANCE, PAINTING and DRAMA)

What can cause altered states of consciousness?

1. MEDITATION

2. DREAMS

3.

HYPNOSIS

4. SEX

5. PSYCHEDELIC DRUGS

6.

BRAIN STIMULATION AND BIOFEEDBACK


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DELUSIONS

A delusion is a belief held with strong conviction despite superior evidence to the

contrary. As a pathology, it is distinct from a belief based on false or incomplete

information, confabulation, dogma, illusion, or other effects of perception.

Delusions typically occur in the context of neurological or mental illness, although

they are not tied to any particular disease and have been found to occur in the context

of many pathological states (both physical and mental). However, they are of

particular diagnostic importance in psychotic disorders including schizophrenia,

paraphrenia, manic episodes of bipolar disorder, and psychotic depression.

The psychiatrist and philosopher Karl Jaspers was the first to define the three main

criteria for a belief to be considered delusional in his 1913 book General

Psychopathology. These criteria are:

• Certainty (held with absolute conviction)

• Incorrigibility (not changeable by compelling counterargument or proof to the

contrary)

• Impossibility or falsity of content (implausible, bizarre or patently untrue

Furthermore, when a false belief involves a value judgment, it is only considered as a

delusion if it is so extreme that it cannot be, or never can be proven true. For example:a man claiming that he flew into the sun and flew back home. This would be

considered a delusion, unless he was speaking figuratively.

Delusions are categorized into four different groups:

• Bizarre delusion: A delusion that is very strange and completely implausible; an

example of a bizarre delusion would be that aliens have removed the reporting

person's brain.

• Non-bizarre delusion: A delusion that, though false, is at least possible, e.g., the

affected person mistakenly believes that he is under constant police

surveillance.

• Mood-congruent delusion: Any delusion with content consistent with either a

depressive or manic state, e.g., a depressed person believes that news anchors

on television highly disapprove of him, or a person in a manic state might

believe she is a powerful deity.

• Mood-neutral delusion: A delusion that does not relate to the sufferer's emotional


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state; for example, a belief that an extra limb is growing out of the back of

one's head is neutral to either depression or mania.

THEMES OF DELUSIONS

• Delusion of control: This is a false belief that another person, group of people, or

external force controls one's general thoughts, feelings, impulses, or behavior.

• Cotard delusion: This is a false belief that one does not exist or has died.

• Delusional jealousy: A person with this delusion falsely believes that a spouse or

lover is having an affair, with no proof to back up their claim.

•

Delusion of guilt or sin (or delusion of self-accusation): This is an ungroundedfeeling of remorse or guilt of delusional intensity.

• Delusion of mind being read: The false belief that other people can know one's

thoughts.

• Delusion of thought insertion: The belief that another thinks through the mind of

the person.

• Delusion of reference: The person falsely believes that insignificant remarks,

events, or objects in one's environment have personal meaning or significance.

• Erotomania A delusion in which someone falsely believes another person is in

love with him or her.

• Grandiose religious delusion: The belief that the affected person is a god, or

chosen to act as a god.

• Somatic delusion: A delusion whose content pertains to bodily functioning, bodily

sensations, or physical appearance. Usually the false belief is that the body is

somehow diseased, abnormal, or changed. A specific example of this delusion

is delusional parasitosis: a delusion in which one feels infested with insects,

bacteria, mites, spiders, lice, fleas, worms, or other organisms. Affected

individuals may also report being repeatedly bitten. In some cases,

entomologists are asked to investigate cases of mysterious bites. Sometimes

physical manifestations may occur including skin lesions.

• Delusion of poverty: The person strongly believes that he is financially

incapacitated. Although this type of delusion is less common now, it was

particularly widespread in the days before state support.


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To define delusional thinking in a specific patient, it is important to consult a local

psychiatrist who can make a thorough examination before diagnosing the problem.

Explaining the causes of delusions continues to be challenging and several theories

have been developed. One is the genetic or biological theory, which states that close

relatives of people with delusional disorder are at increased risk of delusional traits.

Another theory is the dysfunctional cognitive processing, which states that delusions

may arise from distorted ways people have of explaining life to themselves. A third

theory is called motivated or defensive delusions. This one states that some of those

persons who are predisposed might suffer the onset of delusional disorder in those

moments when coping with life and maintaining high self-esteem becomes a

significant challenge. In this case, the person views others as the cause of their

personal difficulties in order to preserve a positive self-view.

This condition is more common among people who have poor hearing or sight. Also,

ongoing stressors have been associated with a higher possibility of developing

delusions. Examples of such stressors are immigration or low socio-economic status.

Researcher, Orrin Devinsky, MD, from the NYU Langone Medical Center, performed

a study that revealed a consistent pattern of injury to the frontal lobe and right

hemisphere of the human brain in patients with certain delusions and brain disorders.

Devinsky explains that the cognitive deficits caused by those injuries to the right

hemisphere, results in the over compensation by the left hemisphere of the brain for

the injury, which causes delusions.

A study carried out at The Warwick Medical School at the University of Warwick ,

indicated that children who suffered bullying are more likely to develop psychotic

symptoms in early adolescence. The background facts demonstrated that

hallucinations and delusions are common in childhood as well as in adulthood and

that children who experience such symptoms are more prone to develop psychosis

later in life. Furthermore, the study demonstrated that two for children who suffered

bullying at age eight or ten multiplied the risk of psychotic symptoms, including

delusions. The authors remark that bullying can cause chronic stress that may have an

effect on a genetic predisposition to schizophrenia and result in setting off the

symptoms.


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The following can indicate a delusion:

• The patient expresses an idea or belief with unusual persistence or force.

• That idea appears to have an undue influence on the patient's life, and the way of

life is often altered to an inexplicable extent.

•

Despite his/her profound conviction, there is often a quality of secretiveness or

suspicion when the patient is questioned about it.

• The individual tends to be humorless and oversensitive, especially about the belief.

• There is a quality of centrality: no matter how unlikely it is that these strange things

are happening to him, the patient accepts them relatively unquestioningly.

•

An attempt to contradict the belief is likely to arouse an inappropriately strong

emotional reaction, often with irritability and hostility.

• The belief is, at the least, unlikely, and out of keeping with the patient's social,

cultural and religious background.

• The patient is emotionally over-invested in the idea and it overwhelms other

elements of their psyche.

• The delusion, if acted out, often leads to behaviors which are abnormal and/or out

of character, although perhaps understandable in the light of the delusional

beliefs.

•

Individuals who know the patient observe that the belief and behavior are

uncharacteristic and alien.

The following features are found:

• It is a primary disorder.

• It is a stable disorder characterized by the presence of delusions to which the patient

clings with extraordinary tenacity.

•

The illness is chronic and frequently lifelong.

•

The delusions are logically constructed and internally consistent.

• The delusions do not interfere with general logical reasoning (although within the

delusional system the logic is perverted) and there is usually no general

disturbance of behavior. If disturbed behavior does occur, it is directly related

to the delusional beliefs.

• The individual experiences a heightened sense of self-reference. Events, which, to

others, are non-significant, are of enormous significance to him or her, and the

atmosphere surrounding the delusions is highly charged.


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Documents

Consciousness and Delusions.pdf