The Reflexive Nature of Consciousness

The Reflexive Nature of Consciousness PDF Author: Greg Janzen
Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing
ISBN: 9789027252081
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 202

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Book Description
Combining phenomenological insights from Brentano and Sartre, but also drawing on recent work on consciousness by analytic philosophers, this book defends the view that conscious states are reflexive, and necessarily so, i.e., that they have a built-in, “implicit” awareness of their own occurrence, such that the subject of a conscious state has an immediate, non-objectual acquaintance with it. As part of this investigation, the book also explores the relationship between reflexivity and the phenomenal, or “what-it-is-like,” dimension of conscious experience, defending the innovative thesis that phenomenal character is constituted by the implicit self-awareness built into every conscious state. This account stands in marked contrast to most influential extant theories of phenomenal character, including qualia theories, according to which phenomenal character is a matter of having phenomenal sensations, and representationalism, according to which phenomenal character is constituted by representational content. (Series A)

The Reflexive Nature of Consciousness

The Reflexive Nature of Consciousness PDF Author: Greg Janzen
Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing
ISBN: 9789027252081
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 202

Get Book Here

Book Description
Combining phenomenological insights from Brentano and Sartre, but also drawing on recent work on consciousness by analytic philosophers, this book defends the view that conscious states are reflexive, and necessarily so, i.e., that they have a built-in, “implicit” awareness of their own occurrence, such that the subject of a conscious state has an immediate, non-objectual acquaintance with it. As part of this investigation, the book also explores the relationship between reflexivity and the phenomenal, or “what-it-is-like,” dimension of conscious experience, defending the innovative thesis that phenomenal character is constituted by the implicit self-awareness built into every conscious state. This account stands in marked contrast to most influential extant theories of phenomenal character, including qualia theories, according to which phenomenal character is a matter of having phenomenal sensations, and representationalism, according to which phenomenal character is constituted by representational content. (Series A)

The Reflexive Nature of Awareness

The Reflexive Nature of Awareness PDF Author: Paul Williams
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1136810455
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 289

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Book Description
Places the controversy initiated by the Tibetan Tsong kha pa - who elaborated on one of the eight difficult points in understanding Madhyamaka philosophy - in its Indian and Tibetan context.

Consciousness

Consciousness PDF Author: Sara Heinämaa
Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media
ISBN: 1402060823
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 365

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Book Description
This collection represents the first historical survey focusing on the notion of consciousness. It approaches consciousness through its constitutive aspects, such as subjectivity, reflexivity, intentionality and selfhood. Covering discussions from ancient philosophy all the way to contemporary debates, the book enriches current systematic debates by uncovering historical roots of the notion of consciousness.

The Nature of Consciousness

The Nature of Consciousness PDF Author: Mark Rowlands
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 113943098X
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 257

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Book Description
In The Nature of Consciousness, Mark Rowlands develops an innovative account of the nature of phenomenal consciousness, one that has significant consequences for attempts to find a place for it in the natural order. The most significant feature of consciousness is its dual nature: consciousness can be both the directing of awareness and that upon which awareness is directed. Rowlands offers a clear and philosophically insightful discussion of the main positions in this fast-moving debate, and argues that the phenomenal aspects of conscious experience are aspects that exist only in the directing of experience towards non-phenomenal objects, a theory that undermines reductive attempts to explain consciousness in terms of what is not conscious. His book will be of interest to a wide range of readers in the philosophy of mind and language, psychology and cognitive science.

Reflexivity

Reflexivity PDF Author: Nicholas Rescher
Publisher: Walter de Gruyter
ISBN: 3110320185
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 194

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Book Description
The book seeks to characterize reflexive conceptual structures more thoroughly and more precisely than has been done before, making explicit the structure of paradox and the clear connections to major logical results. The goal is to trace the structure of reflexivity in sentences, sets, and systems, but also as it appears in propositional attitudes, mental states, perspectives and processes. What an understanding of patterns of reflexivity offers is a deeper and de-mystified understanding of issues of semantics, free will, and the nature of consciousness.

Waking, Dreaming, Being

Waking, Dreaming, Being PDF Author: Evan Thompson
Publisher: Columbia University Press
ISBN: 0231538316
Category : Religion
Languages : en
Pages : 497

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Book Description
A renowned philosopher of the mind, also known for his groundbreaking work on Buddhism and cognitive science, Evan Thompson combines the latest neuroscience research on sleep, dreaming, and meditation with Indian and Western philosophy of mind, casting new light on the self and its relation to the brain. Thompson shows how the self is a changing process, not a static thing. When we are awake we identify with our body, but if we let our mind wander or daydream, we project a mentally imagined self into the remembered past or anticipated future. As we fall asleep, the impression of being a bounded self distinct from the world dissolves, but the self reappears in the dream state. If we have a lucid dream, we no longer identify only with the self within the dream. Our sense of self now includes our dreaming self, the "I" as dreamer. Finally, as we meditate—either in the waking state or in a lucid dream—we can observe whatever images or thoughts arise and how we tend to identify with them as "me." We can also experience sheer awareness itself, distinct from the changing contents that make up our image of the self. Contemplative traditions say that we can learn to let go of the self, so that when we die we can witness its dissolution with equanimity. Thompson weaves together neuroscience, philosophy, and personal narrative to depict these transformations, adding uncommon depth to life's profound questions. Contemplative experience comes to illuminate scientific findings, and scientific evidence enriches the vast knowledge acquired by contemplatives.

Consciousness in Locke

Consciousness in Locke PDF Author: Shelley Weinberg
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0198749015
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 257

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Book Description
Shelley Weinberg argues that the idea of consciousness as a form of non-evaluative self-awareness runs through and helps to solve some of the thorniest issues in Locke's philosophy: in his philosophical psychology and in his theories of knowledge, personal identity, and moral agency. Central to her account is that perceptions of ideas are complex mental states wherein consciousness is a constituent. Such an interpretation answers charges of inconsistency in Locke's model of the mind and lends coherence to a puzzling aspect of Locke's theory of knowledge: how we know individual things (particular ideas, ourselves, and external objects) when knowledge is defined as the perception of an agreement, or relation, of ideas. In each case, consciousness helps to forge the relation, resulting in a structurally integrated account of our knowledge of particulars fully consistent with the general definition. This model also explains how we achieve the unity of consciousness with past and future selves necessary for Locke's accounts of moral responsibility and moral motivation. And with help from other of his metaphysical commitments, consciousness so interpreted allows Locke's theory of personal identity to resist well-known accusations of circularity, failure of transitivity, and insufficiency for his theological and moral concerns. Although virtually every Locke scholar writes on at least some of these topics, the model of consciousness set forth here provides for an analysis all of these issues as bound together by a common thread.

The Self

The Self PDF Author: Jonardon Ganeri
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0199652368
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 387

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Book Description
Jonardon Ganeri presents a ground-breaking study of selfhood, drawing on Indian theories of consciousness and mind. He explores the notion of embodiment and the centrality of the emotions to the self, and shows how to harmonize the idea of the first-person perspective with a naturalist worldview which encompasses the normative.

Kant on Self-Knowledge and Self-Formation

Kant on Self-Knowledge and Self-Formation PDF Author: Katharina T. Kraus
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 110883664X
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 321

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Book Description
Explores the relationship between self-knowledge, individuality, and personal development by reconstructing Kant's account of personhood.

Consciousness Unbound

Consciousness Unbound PDF Author: Edward F. Kelly
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN: 153813943X
Category : Philosophy
Languages : en
Pages : 531

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Book Description
Building on the groundbreaking research of Irreducible Mind and Beyond Physicalism, Edward Kelly and Paul Marshall gather a cohort of leading scholars to address the most recent advances in the psychology of consciousness. Currently emerging as a middle ground between warring fundamentalisms of religion andscience, an expanded science-based understanding of nature finally accommodates empirical realities of spiritual sorts while also rejecting rationally untenable overbeliefs. The vision sketched here provides an antidote to the prevailing postmodern disenchantment of the world and demeaning of human possibilities. It not only more accurately and fully reflects our human condition but engenders hope and encourages ego-surpassing forms of human flourishing. It offers reasons for us to believe that freedom is real, that our human choices matter, and that we have barely scratched the surface of our human potentials. It also addresses the urgent need for a greater sense of worldwide community and interdependence - a sustainable ethos - by demonstrating that under the surface we and the world are much more extensively interconnected than previously recognized.