From newshub.ccs.yorku.ca!torn!cs.utexas.edu!cs.utexas.edu!jonabbey Mon Nov  9 09:36:28 EST 1992
Article 7483 of comp.ai.philosophy:
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>From: jonabbey@cs.utexas.edu (Jonathan David Abbey)
Newsgroups: comp.ai.philosophy
Subject: Re: definition of consciousness
Date: 1 Nov 1992 23:49:39 -0600
Organization: Univ. of Texas at Austin, CS Dept.
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In-reply-to: tim@giaeb.cc.monash.edu.au's message of Sun, 1 Nov 1992 01:18:29 GMT

>>>>> In article <tim.720580709@giaeb>, tim@giaeb.cc.monash.edu.au (Tim Roberts) writes:


TR> Consciousness is to the study of the brain what phlogiston is to the study of
TR> combustion.

Hm.  Are you saying that the study of consciousness is bullshit, or
are you trying to say something more subtle?

I can't agree that the study of consciousness is bullshit.  I find it quite
interesting to contemplate how consciousness is implemented.  Is
consciousness an interaction of symbolic processing in the brain with
mechanisms that report on the state of the brain? 

Researchers have speculated that human proprioception awareness is
mediated by dynamic patterns of oscillation in the brain, that input
from the proprioceptive nerve endings perturbs this continual dynamic
activity in characteristic ways.  (cf. the recent Scientific American
article on phantom limbs).  Is semantic consciousness similarly a
dynamic pattern that is perturbed by activity in the associative
cortex?  Does our awareness arise out of such a neuro-symphony?

Perhaps these questions are trivially simplistic, but it is at this
level of questioning that we most closely deal with trying to
understand what shapes our subjective experience.  What could be
more interesting or more meaningful?

TR> -- 
TR> Tim S Roberts
TR> School of Applied Science                 tel:     051-226467
TR> Monash University (Gippsland)             fax:     051-221348
TR> Switchback Road
TR> Churchill                                 email:   tim@giaeb.cc.monash.edu.au
TR> Victoria 3842
TR> Australia

--
Jonathan Abbey                               jonabbey@cs.utexas.edu
the university of texas at austin             --------------------
computer science/math/psychology    -- Oh, my.. life is just so.. you know.. --
-- 
Jonathan Abbey                               jonabbey@cs.utexas.edu
the university of texas at austin             --------------------
computer science/math/psychology    -- Oh, my.. life is just so.. you know.. --


