Toward a Science of Consciousness III
Toward a Science of Consciousness III

Author: Stuart R. Hameroff

Publisher: MIT Press

Published: 1999

Total Pages: 532

ISBN-13: 9780262581813

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Can there be a science of consciousness? This issue has been the focus of three landmark conferences sponsored by the University of Arizona in Tucson. The first two conferences and books have become touchstones for the field. This volume presents a selection of invited papers from the third conference. Can there be a science of consciousness? This issue has been the focus of three landmark conferences sponsored by the University of Arizona in Tucson. The first two conferences and books have become touchstones for the field. This volume presents a selection of invited papers from the third conference. It showcases recent progress in this maturing field by researchers from philosophy, neuroscience, cognitive psychology, phenomenology, and physics. It is divided into nine sections: the explanatory gap, color, neural correlates of consciousness, vision, emotion, the evolution and function of consciousness, physical reality, the timing of conscious experience, and phenomenology. Each section is preceded by an overview and commentary by the editors. Contributors Dick J. Bierman, Jeffrey Burgdorf, A. Graham Cairns-Smith, William H. Calvin, Christian de Quincey, Frank H. Durgin, Vittorio Gallese, Elizabeth L. Glisky, Melvyn A. Goodale, Richard L. Gregory, Scott Hagan, C. Larry Hardin, C. A. Heywood, Masayuki Hirafuji, Nicholas Humphrey, Harry T. Hunt, Piet Hut, Alfred W. Kaszniak, Robert W. Kentridge, Stanley A. Klein, Charles D. Laughlin, Joseph Levine, Lianggang Lou, Shimon Malin, A. David Milner, Steven Mithen, Martine Nida-Rumelin, Stephen Palmer, Jaak Panksepp, Dean Radin, Steven Z. Rapcsak, Sheryl L. Reminger, Antti Revonsuo, Gregg H. Rosenberg, Yves Rossetti, Jeffrey M. Schwartz, Jonathan Shear, Galen Strawson, Robert Van Gulick, Frances Vaughan, Franz X. Vollenweider, B. Alan Wallace, Douglas F. Watt, Larry Weiskrantz, Fred A. Wolf, Kunio Yasue, Arthur Zajonc

Toward a Science of Consciousness
Toward a Science of Consciousness

Author: Stuart R. Hameroff

Publisher: MIT Press

Published: 1996

Total Pages: 820

ISBN-13: 9780262082495

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This text originates from the second of two conferences discussing the concept of consciousness. In 15 sections, this book demonstrates the broad range of fields now focusing on consciousness.

The Constitution of Phenomenal Consciousness
The Constitution of Phenomenal Consciousness

Author: Steven M. Miller

Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing Company

Published: 2015-06-15

Total Pages: 483

ISBN-13: 9027268789

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Philosophers of mind have been arguing for decades about the nature of phenomenal consciousness and the relation between brain and mind. More recently, neuroscientists and philosophers of science have entered the discussion. Which neural activities in the brain constitute phenomenal consciousness, and how could science distinguish the neural correlates of consciousness from its neural constitution? At what level of neural activity is consciousness constituted in the brain and what might be learned from well-studied phenomena like binocular rivalry, attention, memory, affect, pain, dreams and coma? What should the science of consciousness want to know and what should explanation look like in this field? How should the constitution relation be applied to brain and mind and are other relations like identity, supervenience, realization, emergence and causation preferable? Building on a companion volume on the constitution of visual consciousness (AiCR 90), this volume addresses these questions and related empirical and conceptual territory. It brings together, for the first time, scientists and philosophers to discuss this engaging interdisciplinary topic.

Toward a Science of Consciousness II
Toward a Science of Consciousness II

Author: Stuart R. Hameroff

Publisher: MIT Press

Published: 1998

Total Pages: 790

ISBN-13: 9780262082624

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This text originates from the second of two conferences discussing the concept of consciousness. In 15 sections, this book demonstrates the broad range of fields now focusing on consciousness.

Journey to the Centers of the Mind
Journey to the Centers of the Mind

Author: Susan Greenfield

Publisher: W H Freeman & Company

Published: 1995

Total Pages: 221

ISBN-13: 9780716727231

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How do our personalities and mental processes, our " states of consciousness" , derive from a gray mass of tissue with the consistency of a soft-boiled egg? How can mere molecules constitute an idea or emotion? Some of the most important questions we can ask are about our own consciousness. Our personalities, our individuality, indeed our whole reason for living, lie in the brain and in the elusive phenomenon of consciousness it generates. Thinkers in many disciplines have long struggled with such questions, often in ways that have seemed incompatible, if not downright contradictory. Philosophers have meditated on the subjective experience of consciousness, with little attention to the physical realm, while scientists have sought to establish a causal relation between brain function and mind, often ignoring the qualitative aspects of experience. In Journey to the Centers of the Mind, neuroscientist Susan Greenfield offers an intriguing, unifying theory of consciousness that encompasses both phenomenological mental events and physical aspects of brain function. Using information gathered from clues in animal behavior, human brain damage, computer science, neurobiology, and philosophy, Greenfield offers a " concentric theory" of consciousness, and shows how certain events in the brain correspond to our qualitative experience of the world. Demonstrating the ways in which we can interpret the experience of consciousness in terms of interactions among neurons, she explores how much we can learn by continuing to find the links between our physical and mental inner worlds.

Human and Machine Consciousness
Human and Machine Consciousness

Author: David Gamez

Publisher: Open Book Publishers

Published: 2018-03-07

Total Pages: 205

ISBN-13: 1783743018

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Consciousness is widely perceived as one of the most fundamental, interesting and difficult problems of our time. However, we still know next to nothing about the relationship between consciousness and the brain and we can only speculate about the consciousness of animals and machines. Human and Machine Consciousness presents a new foundation for the scientific study of consciousness. It sets out a bold interpretation of consciousness that neutralizes the philosophical problems and explains how we can make scientific predictions about the consciousness of animals, brain-damaged patients and machines. Gamez interprets the scientific study of consciousness as a search for mathematical theories that map between measurements of consciousness and measurements of the physical world. We can use artificial intelligence to discover these theories and they could make accurate predictions about the consciousness of humans, animals and artificial systems. Human and Machine Consciousness also provides original insights into unusual conscious experiences, such as hallucinations, religious experiences and out-of-body states, and demonstrates how ‘designer’ states of consciousness could be created in the future. Gamez explains difficult concepts in a clear way that closely engages with scientific research. His punchy, concise prose is packed with vivid examples, making it suitable for the educated general reader as well as philosophers and scientists. Problems are brought to life in colourful illustrations and a helpful summary is given at the end of each chapter. The endnotes provide detailed discussions of individual points and full references to the scientific and philosophical literature.

Stairway to the Mind
Stairway to the Mind

Author: Alwyn Scott

Publisher: Springer Science & Business Media

Published: 2012-12-06

Total Pages: 233

ISBN-13: 1461225108

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Human consciousness has perplexed philosophers, artists and scientists for centuries. Some hold it to be purely physical, while others believe it transcends the material world. Now comes a book that offers a new perspective - based entirely on evidence from the natural sciences - whereby materialism and dualism co-exist. The author - a distinguished pioneer of nonlinear dynamics - bases his argument on a hierarchical view of mental organization; a stairway. Atoms give rise to molecules, neurons form the brain and individual consciousness leads to shared culture. All steps are needed to complete the picture and each level derives from the previous one. The book shows specialists how each of their fields adds to the overall picture, while providing general readers with an introduction to this investigation.

Neurophilosophy
Neurophilosophy

Author: Patricia Smith Churchland

Publisher: MIT Press

Published: 1989

Total Pages: 566

ISBN-13: 9780262530859

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"A Bradford book." Bibliography: p. [491]-523. Includes index.