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Dissertations / Theses on the topic 'Consciousness'
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Chin, Chuanfei. "Borderline consciousness, phenomenal consciousness, and artificial consciousness : a unified approach." Thesis, University of Oxford, 2015. http://ora.ox.ac.uk/objects/uuid:9c0c5009-ba8d-4fd7-bc8d-3c27c723d1ea.
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Borderline conscious creatures are neither definitely conscious nor definitely not conscious. In this thesis, I explain what borderline consciousness is and why it poses a significant epistemological challenge to scientists who investigate phenomenal consciousness as a natural kind. When these scientists discover more than one overlapping kind in their samples of conscious creatures, how can they identify the kind to which all and only conscious creatures belong? After assessing three pessimistic responses, I argue that different groups of scientists can legitimately use the concept of phenomenal consciousness to refer to different kinds, in accord with their empirical interests. They can thereby resolve three related impasses on the status of borderline conscious creatures, the neural structure of phenomenal consciousness, and the possibility of artificial consciousness. The thesis has three parts: First, I analyse the concept of borderline consciousness. My analysis counters several arguments which conclude that borderline consciousness is inconceivable. Then I explain how borderline consciousness produces the multiple kinds problem in consciousness science. Second, I assess three recent philosophical responses to this problem. One response urges scientists to eliminate the concept of consciousness, while another judges them to be irremediably ignorant of the nature of consciousness. The final response concludes that scientific progress is limited by the concept's referential indeterminacy. I argue that these responses are too pessimistic, though they point to a more promising approach. Third, I propose that empirically constrained stipulation can solve the multiple kinds problem. Biologists face the same problem because of their longstanding controversy over what counts as a species. Building on new arguments for stipulating the reference of species concepts, I demonstrate that this use of stipulation in biology is neither epistemologically complacent nor metaphysically capricious; it also need not sow semantic confusion. Then I defend its use in consciousness science. My approach is shown to be consistent with our understanding of natural kinds, borderline cases, and phenomenal consciousness.
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Powell, Jonathan S. "Consciousness naturalised : an integral approach to consciousness." Thesis, University of Reading, 2010. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.541971.
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Muzio, Isabella. "Consciousness, self-consciousness, and introspective self-knowledge." Thesis, University College London (University of London), 2005. http://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/1445604/.
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We are, it seems, able to know a wide range of our own thoughts, beliefs, desires and emotions in a special immediate, authoritative way in which we are not able to know the mental states of others, nor indeed a certain range of our own such states. How is this possible What is this special way we have of knowing a certain class of our own mental states What, in fact, is the class of states of which we are able to have such knowledge, and, what is it about this class that enables us to know them in such a distinctive, authoritative way The broad aim of this thesis is to bring out, in answering these questions, an important point of intersection between issues about world-directed consciousness, self-consciousness and introspective self-knowledge. More specifically, starting from the problem of authoritative self-knowledge, the aim of the thesis is threefold: to motivate, to articulate, and to expand upon a particular Sartrian solution to this problem, based on a view of our world-directed conscious states as being in some sense at the same time states of implicit or 'pre- reflective' self-consciousness. In accordance with this threefold aim, the thesis divides into three parts as follows: Part I begins with the problem of authoritative self-knowledge and the standard solutions on offer in the literature: inferential models, perceptual models, and constitutive accounts. It then suggests how a close examination of the shortcomings of these standard approaches ultimately points towards a solution along the above Sartrian lines, ie. based on an understanding of first-order consciousness as involving already itself an implicit form of self-consciousness. Part II then focuses more narrowly on this notion of implicit self- consciousness, proceeding (a) to distinguish it first from other similar-sounding notions in the literature (ie. notions of 'non-conceptual' self-consciousness, higher- order-thought conceptions of consciousness, and constitutive accounts of self- knowledge), moving on then (b) to show how the notion introduced here, contra these others, can indeed provide the basis for a solution to the initial problem of introspective self-knowledge meeting all the desiderata on a successful such theory. Finally, Part III takes on the more concrete issue of how such a form of implicit self-consciousness might, in practice, be seen to be involved in our two main categories of world-directed states, ie. in our cognitive states on the one hand (thoughts, beliefs, perceptual experiences), and in our emotions on the other (desires, fears, hopes, etc). This section of the thesis goes beyond mere concerns about the relation between an implicit form of self-consciousness and the problem of self- knowledge, drawing on both other parts of the philosophical literature and on various parts of the current psychological literature, to make not only more concrete sense of the view of world-directed consciousness here advocated, but to thereby show it to be also plausible independently from the theoretical considerations about self-knowledge initially driving it in this thesis.
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Bieganski, Brian P. "Consciousness Restrained: Does Consciousness Have Any Adaptive Function?" Kent State University / OhioLINK, 2018. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=kent1522679432841333.
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Crooke, Alan 1952. "Confabulating consciousness." Monash University, Dept. of Philosophy, 2002. http://arrow.monash.edu.au/hdl/1959.1/8532.
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Meyerson, D. "False consciousness." Thesis, University of Oxford, 1987. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.375992.
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Mauraisin, Grégoire. "Hosting Consciousness: The Implications of Voice and Consciousness in Westworld." Thesis, Malmö universitet, Fakulteten för kultur och samhälle (KS), 2019. http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:mau:diva-22185.
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In this paper, I take a look at the ontological status of Westworld as a TV show and of Westworld as a theme park and move within the show’s ontological frame to analysis the theme park as a narrative medium. From this perspective, I also consider the ontological status of the hosts and examine the implications of their being on their voice. I further analyze the role of voice in relation to consciousness portrayed in Westworld. First by addressing a notion of consciousness held by one of the creators of the park and then by referring to the philosophical debate surrounding the recognition of a conscious entity. This rise to consciousness serves as a basis for a re-inspection of the hosts voice, this time outside of the realm of narratology. Finally, I see how self-consciousness is at the origin of the war between hosts and humans. I then investigate the existential implications of the hosts newly gained consciousness and reflect on the possible future outcomes of machines becoming conscious.
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Chan, Hoi-wuen Katherine, and 陳凱媛. "Consciousness of language." Thesis, The University of Hong Kong (Pokfulam, Hong Kong), 2006. http://hub.hku.hk/bib/B32020491.
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Norton, Jonathan Lee Gareth. "Physicalism and consciousness." Thesis, University College London (University of London), 1998. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.300447.
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John, James R. 1975. "Consciousness and intentionality." Thesis, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2004. http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/28838.
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Thesis (Ph. D.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Linguistics and Philosophy, 2004.<br>Includes bibliographical references (p. 174-180).<br>(cont.) having perceptual experiences, subjects can be--and usually are--directly aware of material objects.<br>This dissertation is about phenomenal consciousness, its relation to intentionality, and the relation of both to issues in the philosophy of perception. My principal aim is (1) to defend an account of what it is for a perceptual experience to be phenomenally conscious and (2) to develop, within the terms set forth by this account, a particular theory of perceptual phenomenal consciousness. Given the way these matters are usually understood, it probably is not obvious why I distinguish two philosophical tasks here. One might ask: "Isn't defending an account of what it is for a perceptual experience to be phenomenally conscious the same thing as developing a particular theory of perceptual phenomenal consciousness?" I argue that it is not. In addition to my principal aim, I have three subsidiary aims. First, to shed some light on what it means for a perceptual experience to be an intentional mental event, one with representational content. Many philosophers regard the notion of perceptual intentionality as utterly unproblematic. Though I accept that experiences almost always have content, I subject this claim to more scrutiny than is usual. Second, to go some way towards better understanding the relationship between perceptual phenomenal consciousness and perceptual intentionality. In particular, I examine recent attempts to explain the former in terms of the latter. My conclusion is that there can be no such explanation. Finally, to show that, by improving our understanding of perceptual phenomenal consciousness, perceptual intentionality, and the relation between them, we can make headway on some very difficult problems in the philosophy of perception. I am especially interested in defending direct realism, the view that, in<br>by James R. John.<br>Ph.D.
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Foley, Nadine. "Stream of Consciousness." Bowling Green State University / OhioLINK, 2019. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=bgsu1555689988119793.
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Stubenberg, Leopold. "Consciousness and qualia." Diss., The University of Arizona, 1992. http://hdl.handle.net/10150/186002.
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This is an attempt to arrive at a philosophical understanding of (qualitative) consciousness, characteristic examples of which are pains, tickles, experienced colors, sounds, tastes, and odors. Consciousness is analyzed as the having of qualia. Qualia (or phenomenal properties) are problematical because nothing (neither physical nor nonphysical, neither actual nor merely possible) can bear them. This suggests qualia eliminativism; but it is argued that qualia should be retained as properties that can be exemplified though nothing bears them. Phenomenal objects are then presented as bundles of qualia. The bundle theory of phenomenal objects is complemented with a bundle theory of the conscious subject. Qualia are crucial elements of the bundle that constitutes a conscious subject. For a subject to have a quale is for this quale to be included in the bundle that is the subject. This account makes consciousness into a noncognitive phenomenon. Having a quale is not a matter of knowing anything, believing anything, or cognizing anything in any way. It is simply to feel a certain way. Two theses are singled out for particular critical attention. Concerning the nature of qualia, David Armstrong has argued that (color) qualia are complexes of primary qualities borne by the surfaces of (actual or possible) physical objects that we perceive or seem to perceive. More than other reductionists, Armstrong is concerned to ensure the phenomenologial adequacy of his reductionist theory. This phenomenological sensibility makes his theory of qualia particularly interesting and also particularly vulnerable. Concerning the question what it takes to have qualia, introspection appears to be the chosen tool of many contemporary theorists. Using John Pollock's introspectionist account of qualitative consciousness as a model, it is argued that introspection can play no part in an adequate explanation of qualitative consciousness. Throughout the investigation the methodological importance of the first-person point of view is emphasized. The primary responsibility of philosophical theory of consciousness is to insure phenomenological adequacy. Straying from the first-person point of view makes it easy to forget this.
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Quinn, Laleh Kathleen. "Consciousness and explanation." Diss., The University of Arizona, 2000. http://hdl.handle.net/10150/289172.
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We have yet to develop a theory of explanation that will account for all of consciousness. Recent debate on this topic has been impaired because it has in large part proceeded without any explicit attention to the nature of explanation. On the one hand, the lack of commitment to any well-specified theory of explanation leads to imprecision and vagueness. On the other hand, much of the optimism concerning the possibility of explaining all aspects of consciousness stems from an attachment to the only developed theory of psychological phenomena at our disposal and the belief that all of consciousness can be captured by such a theory. Some of the inadequacy in the literature on consciousness is due to a conflation between consciousness construed as mode of presentation , that is, the way content is presented to the agent, and consciousness construed as subjective or qualitative feel. Once the two objects of concern are distinguished, we have a much clearer vision of what needs to be explained, and we can turn our focus on the proper way to do so. I argue that subjective feel is an important aspect of consciousness in need of explanation, and that an explanation of this phenomenon is distinct from an explanation of mode of presentation or representation. Furthermore, while there are well-articulated methods of explanation that properly address mode of presentation and representation, this is not the case for subjective feel. I delineate several genera of scientific explanation in an attempt to exhaust the possible methods by which we may be capable of explaining subjective feel. This involves the taxonomizing of types of phenomena that are the targets of our explanatory methods. While one type of explanatory strategy may be adequate when the target explanandum is a property, the same strategy may fall short in explaining a single event, event type, or regularity. Subjective feel is best construed as a property. However, while the method employed by cognitive science to explain mental properties may be adequate for explaining much cognitive phenomena, I argue that it is incapable of explaining subjective feel.
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Verbinets, Veronika. "Тheoretical-legal basis of legal consciousness as forms of social consciousness". Thesis, Тернопіль: Вектор, 2020. http://er.nau.edu.ua/handle/NAU/43917.
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Не дивлячись на великий інтерес науковців до особи Євгена Ерліха, варто все ж таки віддати належне вченому, який працював на теренах Буковини і черпав натхнення для своєї наукової діяльності саме із цього мальовничого краю. Відомий на увесь світ правознавець Євген Ерліх розробив правову концепцію, яка отримала назву «вільного права». Будучи основоположником соціології права, він закликав шукати його витоки в соціальних асоціаціях і існуючому в них порядку: «Щоб зрозуміти витоки, розвиток і сутність права, слід перш за все вивчити порядок, який існує в громадських спілках. Причина невдач всіх
попередніх спроб пояснити право полягала в тому, що вони виходили від правових приписів, а не з цього порядку». Ерліх вважав, що успіх права залежить виключно від тих соціальних відносин, які існують у державі. Суспільство існує в асоціаціях, або союзах, які Ерліх поділяє на два великі класи - «самобутні» і «нові». До самобутніх спілок він відносить усі соціальні асоціації, утворені природнім шляхом: сім’ю, рід, сімейну громаду. Нові союзи - це асоціації, що утворилися в ході цілеспрямованої діяльності людей: держави, політичні партії, профспілки, виробничі об’єднання і т.д.
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Litscher, Jeanette. "Influences of ecological consciousness /." Connect to online version, 2009. http://minds.wisconsin.edu/handle/1793/45126.
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Lehtonen, Tor. "Neural Darwinism and Consciousness." Thesis, University of Skövde, School of Humanities and Informatics, 2008. http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:his:diva-1105.
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<p>Neural Darwinism (ND), also called the Theory of Neuronal Group Selection (TNGS) is a biological theory of brain development and function which is based on evolutionary and developmental principles. ND highlights the importance of selectionist processes underlying these principles. The aim of this literature review is to capture and summarize the essentials of both ND and its theoretical extensions, the Dynamic Core Hypothesis (TDCH) and Information Integration Theory, and reflect how ND as a theory accounts for a wide range of conscious phenomena such as general, informational and subjective conscious states. This is achieved by evaluating how 16 widely recognized properties of consciousness can be explained and accounted for with the theoretical framework of ND.</p>
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Owen, Matthew. "Neuroscience, consciousness and neurofiction." Thesis, University of British Columbia, 2017. http://hdl.handle.net/2429/63969.
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This study undertakes a comprehensive examination of neurofiction – a genre of literary fiction which has emerged in response to what scholars have termed neuroculture. Neuroculture refers to the cultural ascendancy of neuroscience witnessed by Anglo- American society over approximately the past thirty years, and the associated predominance of materialist conceptions of consciousness.
By examining works from four authors – Oblivion (2004), by David Foster Wallace; The Echo Maker (2006), by Richard Powers; Enduring Love (1997) and Saturday (2005), by Ian McEwan; and The Sorrows of an American (2008), by Siri Hustvedt – this work of contemporary cognitive historicism establishes and explores three grounding themes of neurofiction: pessimistic biologism, neuro-introspection, and neuro-intersubjectivity. Pessimistic biologism refers to a demoralizing view of human existence as dispiritingly mechanistic and existentially isolated; neuro-introspection refers to the the capacity for individual minds/brains to perceive and observe themselves; and neuro-intersubjectivity refers to the capacity for individual minds/brains to engage in forms of communication or empathy with their analogs.
This study demonstrates how these three overarching themes frame and motivate the neurofictional works of my four authors, and how my conception of neurofiction brings into sharper focus other concerns of the genre. These other concerns include the so-called Hard Problem (the disconnect between, and irreconcilability of, objective and subjective accounts of consciousness); the Two Cultures (a perceived epistemological and philosophical clash between scientific and humanistic forms of enquiry); forms of obscured mysticism or spirituality; and the question of the value of fiction in the neurocultural era.<br>Arts, Faculty of<br>English, Department of<br>Graduate
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Eilan, Naomi. "Self-consciousness and experience." Thesis, University of Oxford, 1988. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.303500.
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McHugh, Conor. "Self-knowledge in consciousness." Thesis, University of Edinburgh, 2008. http://hdl.handle.net/1842/3488.
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When you enjoy a conscious mental state or episode, you can knowledgeably self-ascribe that state or episode, and your self-ascription will have a special security and authority (as well as several other distinctive features). This thesis argues for an epistemic but nonintrospectionist account of why such self-ascriptions count as knowledge, and why they have a special status. The first part of the thesis considers what general shape an account of self-knowledge must have. Against a deflationist challenge, I argue that your judgments about your own conscious states and episodes really do constitute knowledge, and that their distinctive features must be explained by the epistemic credentials that make them knowledge. However, the most historically influential non-deflationist account—according to which such self-ascriptive judgments are based on introspective experiences of your conscious states and episodes— misconstrues the unique perspective that you have on your own conscious mind. The second part of the thesis argues that the occurrence in your consciousness of a state or episode of a certain type, with a certain content, can itself suffice for you to have a reason to judge that you are enjoying a state or episode of that type, with that content. Self-ascriptions made for such reasons will count as knowledge. An account along these lines can explain the special status of self-knowledge. In particular, I show that a self-ascription of a content, made for the reason you have in virtue of entertaining that content, will be true and rational, partly because it is an exercise of a general capacity, which I call “grasp of the first-/third-person distinction”, that is fundamental to our cognition about the world. A self-ascription of a particular type of conscious state or episode, made for the appropriate reason, will be true and rational in virtue of features distinctive of states or episodes of that type—features that contribute to determining which judgments are rational for a subject, without themselves being reasons that the subject has. I consider in detail the cases of perceptual experience and of judgment. The thesis concludes by arguing that this kind of account is well placed to explain how selfknowledge fulfills its central role in the reflective rationality that is characteristic of persons.
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Duggins, Andrew John. "The form of consciousness." Thesis, University College London (University of London), 2009. http://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/18759/.
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A model of consciousness is proposed, in which the experience attributable to a single neuron is related to its instantaneous firing rate. In that the experience afforded by a sensory neuron can only be quantified within statistical limits from the incidence of spikes across multiple presentations of a stimulus, consciousness remains inaccessible to direct measurement on a single trial. In this way, the model disambiguates subjective experience from objective neural properties. The model adopts a quantum mechanical formalism, in which the state of the neuron is represented as a vector in A complex vector space, or as a projector from the space onto that vector. Extension of this formalism to more realistic neural systems merely requires the assimilation of the quantum mechanical principles applicable in this broader context. Initially, a mathematical expression for the smooth evolution of a single dimension of perceptual experience will be derived for the single neuron case. There follows a description of how the neural state itself might evolve in this process, utilising the quantum operations formalism of amplitude damping. This approach reveals how smooth evolution of conscious experience might arise from discrete spikes and discontinuous synaptic interaction between neurons. A tensor product formalism will be used to describe the combination of state spaces of individual neurons to form a composite neural space, in which a pure 'mental state' would represent unified conscious experience. The binding of elementary features in this non-local mental state would be reflected in specific patterns of correlated neural firing between remote brain regions. In contrast, the conventional neuron doctrine is classical and local realistic. Local realistic constraints, expressed as Bell Inequalities, limit potential correlations in firing between remote neurons, presenting an opportunity for the experimental test of the scheme in a neurophysiologic thought experiment.
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Johnston, Richard Rutherford. "Romanticism and Mortal Consciousness." Thesis, Harvard University, 2013. http://dissertations.umi.com/gsas.harvard:11043.
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The Romantic period coincides with a fundamental shift in Western attitudes toward death and dying. This dissertation examines how Romantic poets engage this shift. It argues that "Romantic mortal consciousness" - a form of mortal reflection characteristic of English Romantic poetry - is fundamentally social and political in its outlook and strikingly similar to what one might now call a liberal social consciousness. During the Romantic period, mortally conscious individuals, less able or willing to depend on old spiritual consolations, began to regard Death not as the Great Leveler of society but rather as a force that sealed social inequality into the records of history. Intimations of mortality forced one to look beyond the self and, to quote Keats, "think of the Earth." This dissertation considersthe development of Romantic mortal consciousness. Death’s transformation from the Great Leveler of social inequality into its crystallizing agent is evident in the Romantic response to Graveyard School poetry. This is the subject of my first chapter, which focuses on Gray’s "Elegy" and Wordsworth’s "The Ruined Cottage." Chapter Two examines Lord Byron’s Cain, where mortal consciousness transforms Cain’s personal lament about mortality into a protest on behalf of a doomed race. Cain anticipates death studies by dramatizing the shift from what Ariès calls the "death of the self" to the "death of the other" and by recognizing that mortality is essentially a cultural construct. However, the other idea of mortality as a solitary reckoning with death does not disappear entirely. Poems by Hemans and Keats, the subjects of my third and fourth chapters, show how the "death of the self" flourishes as the other side of Romantic mortal consciousness. Romantic mortal consciousness has centripetal and centrifugal aspects. It exhorts the ruminative soul to engage sympathetically with the suffering of others. At the same time, it turns the soul inwards, bringing the fate of the self into focus. One aim of this dissertation is to unify these aspects through an analysis of the sublime. In Chapter Five, which focuses on Byron and Smith, I illustrate the connection between mortal consciousnesses, social or political consciousness, and aesthetic awareness.
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Blaszak, Urszula. "THE REBIRTH OF CONSCIOUSNESS." Master's thesis, University of Central Florida, 2007. http://digital.library.ucf.edu/cdm/ref/collection/ETD/id/3820.
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Human beings encounter cascades of a plethora of experiences, one after another, every single microsecond of our lives. There are many things happening around. The world is full of events and occurrences. As they happen, the mind reacts to every individual input. This is a very exhausting and difficult. Thus, people have developed a process of self-defense against this horrible mishmash of information. Their minds have this amazing capacity of sorting them out and making sense out of them. Humankind's survival depends on that. If one does not sort all this information out, one might not be able to make a simplest decision. As humans process the information, they learn to ignore and forget. They focus on their feelings and emotions. They forget the logic. The oversimplification process begins. Humans create rigid systems of oversimplified formulas. They assign adjectives to things, occurrences, and other people. The number of those adjectives is small. After assigning, those adjectives obscure everything else. A new world is created, stupid, limited, lazy, and in the end making humans very easy to control. What starts as a basic survival process ends up as a tool one can use to destroy the owners of the mind. In the end, the birth of consciousness leads to its death. My work fights this process. It aims to put a person back into that state of shock created by a mishmash of information and thus create the rebirth of consciousness.<br>M.F.A.<br>Department of Art<br>Arts and Humanities<br>Studio Art and the Computer MFA
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Whittington, Mark R. "Identity, continuity and consciousness." Thesis, University of Warwick, 2004. http://wrap.warwick.ac.uk/1227/.
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It is my intention in this thesis to demonstrate that there exists a clear and explicit formal relationship between the seemingly exclusive descriptions of spatio-temporal and purely temporal continuity, and further, that this relationship manifests itself within our most fundamental understanding of the physical world itself, namely; within our understanding of the identity, diversity and re-identification of material bodies (Book 1). It may therefore be claimed that behind that cultural understanding which leads us to imagine that the physical world is located in both space and time, whereas our thoughts and feelings are located in time alone, there lies a formal logical framework, or an explicit formal description of how being in space and time relates to being in time alone - leading us to wonder, perhaps, whether these two things are really as distinct as we might at first imagine. That I should then go on (albeit without a formal methodology) to apply to this analysis a philosophical interpretation of Bergson's conception of the relationship between the intuition and the intellect (Book 2) is of lesser importance - indicating as it does little more than my own philosophical inclinations. However, something will be gained, I hope, from this further exercise. Along the way it will allow me to clarify a number of technical points of which the general philosopher may be unaware; for example the unobservable nature of numerical identity and re-identification, the importance of the principle of special relativity to the topic of mind and the technical difficulties of claiming that mental events are 'in time' at all. Notwithstanding these latter points, however, the intentions of this work are predominantly analytical and are adequately described as an attempt to consolidate spatio-temporal and purely temporal description under a unified logical framework.
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León, Encarnación Díaz. "Consciousness, conceivability and concepts." Thesis, University of Sheffield, 2007. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.443884.
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Poulter, Damian. "Perceptual learning and consciousness." Thesis, University of Reading, 2005. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.413930.
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Klaudat, Andre Nilo. "Kant on self-consciousness." Thesis, University College London (University of London), 1998. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.299063.
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Anderson, Hazel Patricia. "Synaesthesia, hypnosis and consciousness." Thesis, University of Sussex, 2015. http://sro.sussex.ac.uk/id/eprint/54236/.
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For people with synaesthesia, a percept or concept (inducer) triggers another experience (concurrent) which is usually in a different modality. The concurrent is automatic, and in the case of certain types of synaesthesia also consistent, however the relationship between the inducer and concurrent is not fully understood and shall be investigated in this thesis from different perspectives. The first is using hypnosis to suggest synaesthesia-like phenomenological experiences to participants, and measuring behavioural responses to see whether they behave in a similar manner to developmental synaesthetes. Results from hypnotic; 1) grapheme-colour (GC) synaesthesia; 2) motion-sound synaesthesia; suggest that phenomenological experiences similar to developmental synaesthesia can be experienced by highly susceptible participants, but is not associated with the same behaviour as developmental synaesthetes. Developmental GC synaesthetes were tested to determine whether a grapheme presented preconsciously binds with the concurrent colour to the extent that it influences behaviour or evokes the phenomenology of colour. Two techniques were used, gaze-contingent substitution (GCS) and continuous flash suppression (CFS). Using GCS, it was shown that although digits can be primed preconsciously, they don't bind with their concurrent colour to influence behaviour. Nevertheless, many synaesthetes still experienced colours though they didn't necessarily match the primed digit. CFS experiments showed that the colour of a grapheme's concurrent, or whether the grapheme is presented in the correct or incorrect colour for that synaesthete, doesn't influence the time for conscious perception of a grapheme, even though colour words presented in the correct colour are perceived faster than those in the wrong colour. Phenomenological differences were compared to the behavioural measures using questionnaires modified using factor analysis (the R-RSPA and R-ISEQ). Overall, inducers must be seen consciously for them to bind with the concurrent, and experiencing the phenomenology of synaesthesia is not sufficient to behave like a synaesthete.
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Almotahari, Mahrad. "Situating language and consciousness." Thesis, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2011. http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/68909.
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Thesis (Ph. D.)--Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dept. of Linguistics and Philosophy, 2011.<br>Cataloged from PDF version of thesis.<br>Includes bibliographical references (p. 98-104).<br>Language and consciousness enrich our lives. But they are rare commodities; most creatures are language-less and unconscious. This dissertation is about the conditions that distinguish the haves from the have-nots. The semantic properties of a natural language expression are determined by conventions governing the way speakers use the expression to communicate information. The capacity to speak a language involves highly specialized (perhaps even modular) cognition. Some authors think that one cannot consistently accept both views. In Chapter 1 ('Content and Competence') I explain why one can. According to the convention-based theory of content determination, propositions are fit to be the contents of both thought and speech. Recently, this view has been challenged. The challenge exploits a series of observations about what it takes to understand semantically incomplete sentences. In Chapter 2 ('Speaker Meaning in Context'), I explain how the challenge can be met. Physicalists seem to owe an explanatory debt. Why should psychophysical relations appear contingent? In Chapter 3 ('There Couldn't Have Been Zombies, but it's a Lucky Coincidence That There Aren't') I pay the debt on their behalf. My explanation proceeds in three steps. First, I observe that there are necessary coincidences, or accidents. Second, I show that traditional epistemological arguments for dualism merely establish that phenomenal states and corresponding physical states are accidentally, or coincidentally, related. Finally, I suggest that inattention to the distinction between coincidence/accidentality and contingency results in frequent equivocation. Thus the disposition to (correctly) judge that psychophysical relations are coincidences manifests itself as a disposition to (incorrectly) judge that psychophysical relations are contingent. In Chapter 4 ('Zombies are Inconceivable') I deny that psychophysical relations appear contingent. The chapter begins with an argument to the effect that zombies cannot be coherently conceived. I then consider and reject various ways of resisting the argument.<br>by Mahrad Almotahari.<br>Ph.D.
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Vega, Karjalainen Fabián Andrés. "Bounderby and False Consciousness." Thesis, Högskolan i Gävle, Avdelningen för humaniora, 2018. http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:hig:diva-27246.
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Krstic, Bojan. "Consciousness Development No. 1." Master's thesis, Vysoké učení technické v Brně. Fakulta výtvarných umění, 2009. http://www.nusl.cz/ntk/nusl-232209.
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Sprouse, Warren. "Production, Consumption, and Consciousness." Oberlin College Honors Theses / OhioLINK, 1991. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=oberlin1503923437479061.
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Veillet, Benedicte. "Consciousness, concepts and content." College Park, Md.: University of Maryland, 2008. http://hdl.handle.net/1903/8571.
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Thesis (Ph. D.) -- University of Maryland, College Park, 2008.<br>Thesis research directed by: Dept. of Philosophy. Title from t.p. of PDF. Includes bibliographical references. Published by UMI Dissertation Services, Ann Arbor, Mich. Also available in paper.
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Naimo, Giuseppe (Joseph). "Consciousness: A triadic process." Thesis, Naimo, Giuseppe (Joseph) (2002) Consciousness: A triadic process. PhD thesis, Murdoch University, 2002. https://researchrepository.murdoch.edu.au/id/eprint/50343/.
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The disciplinary enterprises engaged in the study of consciousness now extend beyond their original paradigms. Any serious attempt at establishing a comprehensive theory of consciousness should facilitate the additional knowledge contributed by these enterprises toward an overall understanding of the fundamental meaning and scope of consciousness itself. This dissertation draws on the recent findings of several disciplines that share a common interest .in consciousness studies. This transdisciplinary domain results from the syncretism of several approaches and brings about a new paradigm, one that might enable an advance beyond the stalemate reached in the particular disciplines. One of the central theses emerges from a radical reformulation of certain core concepts, e.g. Space, Time, Event and Motion (STEM), that transforms many ontological assumptions about the material basis for consciousness. The acronym STEM forms a new concept to capture the notion of simultaneous activity of physical processes at all levels.
The background for this overarching enterprise draws from a variety of traditions. First from the work of Vasubandhu (2nd C. India), the principal exponent of the Yogacara School of Buddhism who further expanded the Skandha theory of mind (psychophysical person). Skandha theory presents an account of the psychophysical nature of human beings where the constitution of an individual is described in terms of consciousness-moment-energy-events. According to this view, the psychophysical person is an aggregate of such consciousness-events which themselves are reducible to the ultimate level of Nibbana. Second, the Buddhist theory has close parallels with certain features of the quantum-mechanical account in David Bohm's theoretical work. An argument is made tying in the notion of consciousness-events with Bohm's ideas about "active information", "protointelligence", and "non-locality". This leads, third, to the adoption of Bohm's thesis about the explicate and implicate orders of the Universe - the Expression order and the Impression order. On this view, the Universe is formed on an actual- physical level, the apparent properties of things, and a potential-physical level, a constant progress of becoming that exerts an influence on the present. And fourth, to the development of a triadic scheme, the Triangulate-Three Principle (TTP) - Consciousness, Body-of-Experience, and the Intellect-Reflective, a proposed universal principle of being formed by these triadic-conditions.
Attention is paid to Marcer's and Schempp's model of Phase-Conjugate-AdaptiveResonance (PCAR) which they have argued is a necessary condition to enable a living organism to perceive in three-dimensional reality. This notion, fifth, coheres to a physical-theoretical model called Signature-Energy-Frequency (SEP), well demonstrated in the atomic, chemical, and information fields (i.e. spectroscopy). The outcome of this research embraces a holistic and creative worldview based on a triadic model wherein consciousness itself is postulated as the most basic, primordial stratum. This primordial consciousness or proto-intelligence can be considered as either manifest or unmanifest. The unmanifest is primary, amorphous, and a zero-point field; the manifest is secondary, ordered, and energyfilled. However, both orders are constantly conjoined since the Impression order exists as potential energy of the quantum vacuum. The physical Expression order is formed by the proposed triadic-conditions of which one aspect emerges as lifelike properties. These triadic-conditions inhere in every particle and organism to which it guides its development, adaptation, and survival. The concept of individuated experience implicates perception, intelligence, motility, and other-recognition; reciprocity entails attraction and repulsion through exchange and patterned dominance. Intellect-Reflective, represents the inherent cognitive faculties shared by all living organisms to varying degrees. The triadic-conditions, however, at one end of the scale are exhibited at their most basic level as attractive, repulsive and neutral properties. At an increasing scale, they manifest as the self-organizing properties found .in all living organisms moving up to the higher order cognitive processes of human beings, on to the level of Nature. The conscious being is thus a self-organizing system formed from the triadic-conditions in Expression order through STEM-interactions.
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Campbell, Douglas Ian. "A Theory of Consciousness." Diss., The University of Arizona, 2010. http://hdl.handle.net/10150/195372.
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It is shown that there is an unconditional requirement on rational beings to adopt “reflexive” beliefs, these being beliefs with a very particular sort of self-referential structure. It is shown that whoever adopts such beliefs will thereby adopt beliefs that imply that a certain proposition, ᴪ, is true. From the fact that there is this unconditional requirement on rational being to adopt beliefs that imply ᴪ, it is concluded that ᴪ is knowable a priori. ᴪ is a proposition that says, in effect, that one’s own point of view is a point in space and time that is the point of view of some being who has reflexive beliefs. It is argued that this information that is contained in ᴪ boils down to the information that one’s point of view is located at a point in the world at which there is something that is “conscious” in a certain natural and philosophically interesting sense of that word. In other words, a theory of consciousness is defended according to which an entity is conscious if and only if it has reflexive beliefs.
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Bayne, Timothy. "The unity of consciousness." Diss., The University of Arizona, 2002. http://hdl.handle.net/10150/279999.
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I am currently enjoying a number of experiences: I can hear the sound of a dog barking in the distance, I can feel the pressure of my feet on the floor, and I can smell freshly brewed coffee. These experiences don't simply occur at the same time, they also seem to be unified in a certain way. More generally, it is often said that consciousness is necessarily unified. This claim raises three questions: (1) What exactly does it mean? (2) Is it true? (3) What implications does it have? Chapters one and two are concerned with the first question: what does it mean to say that consciousness is unified? I develop a conception of the unity of consciousness that is both substantive and plausible. I call this conception the "unity thesis". Roughly, the unity thesis says that any pair of experiences that a single subject of experience has at the same time must be contained within a single fully unified phenomenal field: they must have a conjoint phenomenology. Chapters three and four are concerned with the second question: Is consciousness necessarily unified? In chapter three I tentatively endorse an inconceivability-based argument for thinking that they are not. Of course, a priori arguments against the possibility of disunified subjects must be weighed against empirical considerations. In chapter four I examine the evidence for thinking that some people actually are disunified subjects, focusing mostly on the split-brain syndrome. I argue that empirical arguments against the unity thesis are inconclusive. Chapters five and six are concerned with the third question: what implications does the unity of consciousness have? In chapter five I argue that the unity thesis places constraints on our account of state consciousness: if the unity thesis is true, then certain influential accounts of consciousness are false. In chapter six I argue that the unity thesis also constrains our account of the self: if the unity thesis is true, then we need to think of the self in phenomenal terms.
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Winfield, Tom. "Being consciousness : a phenomeno-analytical investigation into the relationship between consciousness and selfhood." Thesis, University of Liverpool, 2015. http://livrepository.liverpool.ac.uk/2049720/.
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The notion that we are essentially conscious beings has a good deal of intuitive appeal, but also gives rise to a number of philosophical problems. As a result of its appeal, and in conjunction with a growing dissatisfaction with reductive accounts of consciousness, a number of experiential accounts of personal identity have been introduced into the relatively recent literature. These accounts offer various analyses of the relationship between consciousness and selfhood in an attempt to overcome the problems faced by adopting such a position. I argue that a correct appreciation of the nature of inner awareness, and experience more generally, entails that the experiential approach is indeed justifiable. Specifically, I argue that the relationship between an experience and its subject necessitates the view that selves are constituted by episodes of consciousness. I then evaluate a number of theories of temporal consciousness and argue that the most promising kind of account has implications concerning our persistence conditions. Subsequently, I argue for a radical account of our nature by defending the resulting ontological claim: selves are streams of consciousness.
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Lundin, Emil. "The neural correlates of visual consciousness and no-report paradigms." Thesis, Högskolan i Skövde, Institutionen för biovetenskap, 2021. http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:his:diva-20007.
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Traditional ways to examine and investigate the neural correlates of consciousness usually require the participants to actively report their perceptions and conscious contents. Having the participants actively report can confound the neural correlates with co-occurring processes. Instead, no-report paradigms try to remove the active process of reporting by either objectively trying to measure conscious content by tracking eye movements and pupil dilation, or retroactively inquire about the conscious states. The results of an fMRI experiment utilising tracking of optokinetic nystagmus and pupil dilation as an objective measure of conscious content highlight a difference in frontal areas while activation in posterior areas are similar to active report experiments. EEG experiments utilising the sustained inattentional blindness paradigm did not see the late positivity commonly seen when the participants were aware of the stimuli but it was not task relevant. Utilising no-report paradigms can provide unique insights into the discussion of theories of consciousness and further develop our understanding of consciousness.
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Sanders, David W. "Consciousness is spirit teaching consciousness, possibility and actuality as a pattern of Christian becoming /." Ashland, OH : Ashland Theological Seminary, 2008. http://dx.doi.org/10.2986/tren.028-0285.
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Tripp, Lloyd D. "+Gz acceleration loss of consciousness /." Cincinnati, Ohio University of Cincinnati, 2002. http://www.ohiolink.edu/etd/view.cgi?acc%5Fnum=ucin1089841115.
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Dodsworth, Robin M. "Linguistic variation and sociological consciousness." Connect to resource, 2005. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc%5Fnum=osu1123115802.
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Thesis (Ph. D.)--Ohio State University, 2005.<br>Title from first page of PDF file. Document formatted into pages; contains xvi, 244 p.; also includes graphics (some col.). Includes bibliographical references (p. 235-244). Available online via OhioLINK's ETD Center
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Pace, G. Michael. "Perceptual consciousness and epistemic justification /." View online version; access limited to Brown University users, 2005. http://wwwlib.umi.com/dissertations/fullcit/3174655.
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Stevens, Nicholas Stamer. "Identifying core consciousness in animals /." view abstract or download text of file, 2006. http://hdl.handle.net/1794/2847.
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Boutel, Adrian. "Could consciousness be physically realised?" Thesis, University of Cambridge, 2011. https://www.repository.cam.ac.uk/handle/1810/237244.
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I defend physicalism about phenomenal consciousness against recent epistemic arguments for dualism. First I argue (as against Kripke) that psychophysical identities can be a posteriori (and apparently contingent, and conceivably false). Their epistemic status is due to the analytic independence of phenomenal and physical-functional terms. Unlike Kripke's own explanation of a posteriori necessity, analytic independence is consistent with - indeed explained by - the direct reference of phenomenal terms, so Kripke's argument against psychophysical identities fails. I then argue (as against White and Chalmers) that direct reference does not itself make identities a priori. Next I endorse the 'a priori entailment thesis': if physicalism is true, phenomenal truths follow a priori from a complete statement of the facts of physics. I argue that physicalists must accept a priori entailment if we are to avoid brute or 'strong' a posteriori necessities. I show that a priori entailment is consistent with analytic independence, and so make room for what Chalmers calls 'type-C' physicalism. Jackson's 'Mary', who knows all the physical facts, would be able to deduce the physical-functional reference of phenomenal terms, and so the truth of psychophysical identities, without appealing to analytic connections. The 'knowledge' argument for dualism therefore fails. The lack of such connections does, however, help explain why Mary's deduction seems intuitively impossible. A priori entailment makes zombie scenarios inconceivable, so Chalmers's 'conceivability' argument fails. It also closes Levine's 'explanatory gap' between physical and phenomenal truths. Though it may not satisfy all demands for explanation, any remainder poses no threat to physicalism. I then defend type-C physicalism against some recent objections to the 'phenomenal-concept strategy'. I close by observing that while the view I defend can rebut epistemic arguments for dualism, it leaves the question of whether consciousness has a physical basis as a matter for empirical investigation.
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Eklund, Rasmus. "RECURRENT PROCESSING AND THE CONSCIOUSNESS." Thesis, Högskolan i Skövde, Institutionen för kommunikation och information, 2012. http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:his:diva-6172.
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Recurrent processing is the corticocortical activity that appears after the feedforward sweep of information processing in the brain. According to Victor Lamme, this process is directly connected to visual awareness. Our consciousness can be divided into phenomenal and reflective consciousness. The underlying process of phenomenal consciousness is suggested to be localized recurrent processing. Widespread recurrent processing to motor and frontal regions correlates with reflective consciousness. Recent electroencephalographic studies have shown visual awareness negativity correlating with localized recurrent processing in both a temporal and spatial aspect. If we accept that localized recurrent processing is consciousness, we get the controversial implications that we can be conscious of something without being able to introspect.
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Dempsey, Liam P. "Consciousness, issues and explanatory strategies." Thesis, National Library of Canada = Bibliothèque nationale du Canada, 1998. http://www.collectionscanada.ca/obj/s4/f2/dsk2/tape15/PQDD_0025/MQ36429.pdf.
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Borchert, Thomas. "Computational correlates of access consciousness." Connect to online resource, 2007. http://gateway.proquest.com/openurl?url_ver=Z39.88-2004&rft_val_fmt=info:ofi/fmt:kev:mtx:dissertation&res_dat=xri:pqdiss&rft_dat=xri:pqdiss:1446085.
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Oxtoby, Peter Thomas. "Dualist intuitions and phenomenal consciousness." Thesis, University of Sheffield, 2011. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.574562.
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My aim in this thesis is to examine some of the principal intuitions that have been employed in arguments for dualism about the phenomenal and the physical. I argue that, in each case, the intuition at issue has no evidential value in the debate between dualists and physicaiists In the case ofSaul Kripke's modal arguments against physicalism I make use of functionalist arguments. Physicalists wish to identify mental states with physical states. Kripke intuits that these states could exist separately from each other However, I argue, this intuition is irrelevant to the debate since 'pain' may refer to different entities in different worlds. His essentialist intuitions about pain are also dealt with through this argument. Pain might have been some entity other than the one it happens to be in the actual world. The intuition at the heart of Frank Jackson's knowledge argument is that complete physical knowledge of a system does not entail any knowledge of the phenomenal quality of the states of that system. This intuition is shown to be consistent with physicalism through the strategy of conceptual dualism. We can think in terms of physical concepts, or we can think in terms of phenomenal concepts. Since phenomenal concepts cannot be derived from physical concepts it is not possible to know what an experience is like through the possession of complete physical knowledge Finally. I turn to the intuition that human beings would lose their special moral status were it to be shown that phcnomcnaliry is physical. This contention rests. I argue. upon a misunderstanding of the role that phenomcnalitv plays in the conferral of moral worth. Even if phenomenality were shown to be physical it would continue to endow its possessor with moral value. This particular intuition. I argue. is especially difficult to shift. because there arc good reasons to think that the tension between regarding an object as both \ ••. holly physical. and as a bearer of phenomenality, exists as the result of evolutionary forces operating at different levels of selection. This tension also forms tJ1C background against which other intuition based arguments are presented. ii
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Hanlon, N. "Baudrillard and the contemporary consciousness." Thesis, University of Cambridge, 2004. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.603654.
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This thesis constitutes a re-thinking of the work of Jean Baudrillard and its relationship with the intellectual context in which it is situated, and from which it emanates. One of the foremost Baudrillard scholars (Douglas Kellner) asks whether Baudrillard has become ‘the court jester of the societies on which he has chosen to comment’. Despite (and in a sense because of) this potential status, I argue that Baudrillard’s thinking is situated at a key site for an often banalised contemporary society and thought: that is, at a crossroads between sociology, philosophy and politics, and between populist and intellectual culture. Therefore, to attempt to understand his thought within the context of these various intersecting aspects may be viewed as a step on the path to better understanding our contemporary epistemological paradigm (and its relation to history). Through such an understanding we may find avenues to move beyond such modes of thinking, which is exactly what I attempt to do in the thesis. Chapter 1 (Becoming and Transvaluation) establishes a temporality of ‘becoming’(through Heraclitus and Nietzsche) as foundational for the methodology o the thesis. That methodology is more specifically related to the connected notion of <i>Verwindung </i>(as propounded by Vattimo and Heidegger), which refers to the process of re-conceptualising and rejuvenating the paradigm of thinking in which an individual (and collective) consciousness is situated, a process commensurate with Baudrillard’s ‘réversibilité’. Chapter 2 (Situatedness) explores the relationship between Baudrillard and Heidegger on the theme of death, and the implicit questions of subjectivity and temporality. The Heideggerian concept of <i>Befindlichkeit </i>(‘situatedness’), crucial to the German philosopher’s thinking on death, facilitates the uncovering of an aporia in Baudrillard’s theorising on temporality. Chapter 3 (History and Structure) builds on the critique of Baudrillard’ conception of temporality established in Chapter 2, moving to a consideration of the relationship between history and structure, which is a problematic that arises in particular out of Baudrillard’s attempt to overcome Foucault (<i>Oublier Foucault, </i>1977). The later Baudrillard’s astructurality is considered in relation to the structural understandings of Foucault (episteme), Kuhn (paradigm), Vattimo, Gadamer and Heidegger (all three with epochal conceptions of Being).
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李錦昌 and Kam-cheong Li. "Linguistic consciousness and writing performance." Thesis, The University of Hong Kong (Pokfulam, Hong Kong), 1999. http://hub.hku.hk/bib/B31238890.
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Dixon, Joan Elizabeth. "Time, consciousness and scientific explanation." Thesis, University of Warwick, 1997. http://wrap.warwick.ac.uk/4309/.
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To date, there is no universal and coherent theory concerning the nature or the function of time. Furthermore, important and unresolved controversies raging within both philosophy and the natural sciences apparently indicate that there is little hope of constructing a single, unified theory. Even so-called "folk" theories of time, embedded within different cultural traditions, show no common elements, and therefore can not provide a pre-theoretical description of time, towards which an explanatory framework could be constructed. This lack of consensus indicates that the concept as it is currently being used is ill defined, and, at the very least, needs to be considerably revised. The conceptual disarray surrounding time has aided and abetted the arguments of certain thinkers, especially Ricoeur, working within the phenomenological tradition who make de principe claims that there can not be a single theory of time. My intention is not to try and to produce a concept of time that was capable of unifying all these different elements. Rather, Ricoeur's arguments and those of others working in the phenomenological tradition dissatisfied me. I believed that their arguments were informed by a myopic, muddled and positively 19th Century understanding of the scientific project. Hence, my aim is to show that Ricoeur's claim will not stand up to scrutiny, and that there are no principled arguments against the possibility of a unified theory of time. We examine the major arguments against unification in general, and also with particular reference to theories of time, such as Husserlian phenomenology, conventionalism, instrumentalism, anti-reductive positions in general, as well as the specific problem of reducing subjective experience to objective description. We demonstrate that none of these objections constitutes a watertight a priori argument against a unified theory of time. Furthermore, we demonstrate that recent developments in the philosophy of science and the philosophy of mind have made such a unified theory a plausible goal. We argue that post-positivist philosophy of science, with its emphasis on research programmes, the co-evolution of theories and super-empirical rational support, opens the way for new types of evidence to be brought to bear on questions about time. Also, recent developments in the brain sciences mean that a neurologically plausible and fully naturalised analysis of our experience of time is being developed. Although much work in this direction has begun, we argue that it is fragmented, partly through the limitations of our current knowledge, but more particularly through an inadequate background of coherent philosophical thought. This has lead both philosophers and scientists to attempt grand metaphysical answers to muddled philosophical questions which threaten the progress which natural science and the philosophy of science have offered in the second half of the twentieth century.