Understanding Consciousness - Softcover

Velmans, Max

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0415224926 ISBN 13: 9780415224925

Publisher: Routledge, 2000

Synopsis

First published in 2009. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

About this title

About the Author

Max Velmans is currently Emeritus Professor of Psychology at Goldsmiths, University of London, Visiting Professor of Consciousness Studies at the University of Plymouth. He has been researching, writing and teaching consciousness studies for over 30 years and has over 90 publications in this area.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

From the Preface: Consciousness is personal. Indeed, it is so close to the core of what it is to be human that it has puzzled thinkers from the beginnings of recorded history. What is it? What does it do? How does it relate to the physical world and to the workings of our bodies and brains? At the dawn of the new millennium answers to some of these questions are beginning to emerge. However, there is not one mind-body problem, but many. Some of problems are empirical, some are conceptual, and some are both. This book deals with some of the deepest puzzles and paradoxes.

A good story has a beginning, a middle and an end, so the book is arranged in three parts. The first part, 'Mind-body theories and their problems' summarises current thinking about the nature and function of consciousness, pinpointing the strengths and weaknesses of the dominant mind-body theories. The international 'conscious debate' has largely been fuelled by two competing world-views: dualism, which splits the universe into two fundamentally different mental and physical substances or properties, and materialist reductionism, which claims consciousness to be nothing more that a state or function of the brain. While dualism seems to be inconsistent with the findings of materialist science, reductionism seems to be inconsistent with the evidence of ordinary experience. The challenge is to understand consciousness in a way that does justice to both.

Part 2 of this book, 'How to marry science with experience', goes back to first principles. Rather than seeking to defend either dualism or reductionism, we start with a close examination of experience itself. I suggest that if one does this with care, the old boundaries that separate consciousness from the physical world can be seen to be drawn in the wrong place! This turns the mind-body problem around on its axis and forces one to re-examine how consciousness relates to the physical world, to knowledge and to the detailed workings of the brain. At first glance, these intricate relationships of mind, matter and knowledge seen to form an impenetrable 'world knot'. But, as far as I can tell, it is possible to unravel it, step by simple step, in a way that is consistent with the findings of science and with common sense.

Part 3 of this book provides a synthesis. In it I suggest what consciousness is and does. I also develop a form of 'reflexive monism' which treats human consciousness as just one, natural manifestation of a wider self-conscious universe. Although the route to this position is new, the position itself is ancient. I find this very reassuring. Understanding consciousness requires us to move from the understanding of things we are conscious of, to understanding our role as conscious observers, and then to consciousness itself - an act of self-reflection which requires an outward journey and a return. If the place of return does not seem familiar, it is probably the wrong place.

Edition details

• Publisher: Routledge
• Publication date: 2000
• ISBN 10: 0415224926
• ISBN 13: 9780415224925
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 308