The Emergence of Consciousness. This item is unavailable.The Emergence of Consciousness

How does the conscious mind relate to the physical body? Two common views from the past offered the stark choice between dualism which said mind and body were quite separate and physicalism which said that the mind was in fact 'nothing but' the physical brain. Both these views are now widely rejected. 'Emergence' theory offers a compromise: the mind 'emerges' from the physical body but the whole person, mind and body, is more than the sum of the physical parts. In The Emergence of Consciousness philosopher Robert Van Gulick gives a clear and masterly overview and comparison of the current ‘emergent’ and ‘reductive’ approaches. Other contributors discuss more detailed aspects of the subject. The editor's own chapter argues for the radical proposal that even God is an ‘emergent property’.

Robert Van Gulick (the author of the keynote chapter) is professor of philosophy at Syracuse University. He has written and lectured widely on philosophy of mind and co-edited John Searle and His Critics (1993), a discussion of work by one of the leading names in the study of consciousness.