Consciousness
Related to Sentience, Intelligence, Information
Dehaene, Stanislas, Hakwan Lau, and Sid Kouider. “What Is Consciousness, and Could Machines Have It?” Science 358, no. 6362 (2017): 486–92. https://doi.org/10/gckcpn.
Cellular Basis of Consciousness:
Reber, Arthur S. The First Minds: Caterpillars, ’Karyotes, and Consciousness. New York: Oxford University Press, 2019.
Self-Modelling
Cf. Knowledge
Metzinger, Thomas. The Ego Tunnel: The Science of the Mind and the Myth of the Self. New York: Basic Books, 2009.
Ego Tunnel, cf. umwelt.
Subjective experience is a biological data format. It is a mode of presenting information about the world by making it seem to be the knowledge of the self (or Ego). Selves do not exist in the world. A biological (or artificial)organism is not a self. The model of the self (such as Ego) is also not a self. It is a form of representational content—namely, a self-model or an illusion created by the organism’s brain.
The experience of the world is constructed and calibrated for the model of the ego. For example, internal human processing calibrates the experience of Colour to retain constancy in different light conditions. Some artistic practices are deliberately aiming to teach humans to unlearn colour calibration mechanism.
The very experience of knowing actively changes the physical composition of the brain. This new trained composition of the brain makes new experiences and new forms of consciousness possible. For example people in the past could experience deities and mystical experiences. Such experiences are no longer available to many humans after the Enlightenment due to the differences in the common background knowledge and the current pattern of brain training through thinking, social exchange, and education.
Living beings know the world only through representations. Representing something is knowing (Metzinger, p. 9; he means humans...).
References
Solms, Mark. The Hidden Spring: A Journey to the Source of Consciousness. New York: W.W. Norton, 2021.
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