Published in two parts, the present article addresses whether self-awareness is necessarily involved in each of the six kinds of consciousness that The Oxford English Dictionary identifies under the word consciousness. Part I inquires into how, if at all, self-awareness enters consciousness1: a cognitive relation between people in which they have joint and mutual cognizance; consciousness2: a psychological process of conceiving of oneself in certain sorts of respects on a firsthand evidentiary basis; and consciousness3: being occurrently aware of anything at (...) all, including nonexistent particulars. An instance of consciousness1 may or may not have a reflexive object, but it will perforce include both inner awareness and awareness of oneself as an object of the other’s awareness. Consciousness2 requires self-awareness in the forms of witnessing or having witnessed potential evidence about oneself, inner awareness of this witnessing when it occurred, inner awareness and self-awareness as involved in remembering having witnessed that evidence, occurrent awareness of features of one’s character or personality, and bringing self-witnessed evidence to bear in judging of the latter. In contrast, consciousness3, which in a particular instance may be an occurrent self-awareness, need not involve any self-awareness at all. (shrink)

Two proposals regarding what the primary psychological interface is are critically discussed. One proposal posits an actual overlap of consciousness and reality. The parts of the physical world that are directly perceived, or "self-given" — given themselves in person — to perceptual consciousness, are also elements of that consciousness. Each such part is supposed to have a kind of double existence, in the physical world and also in consciousness. Against this view, I argue that perceptual awareness makes portions of the (...) physical world self-given only in their being manifested or appearing in consciousness, whereas the portions themselves remain completely external to consciousness. Other authors claim that the primary psychological interface is an animal’s perceptual activity with respect to the ecological environment. But, this interface does not amount, for them, to the animal’s perceptual awareness in the familiar, ordinary sense of the experiencing of things by means of the senses, or as theoretically conceived of by the act psychologists of the nineteenth century; rather, perceptual awareness is a feature of the animal’s actions upon the ecological environment. Against this view, I argue that an occurrent perceptual awareness is a central, unperceivable product and part of a larger activity of perceiving and an element of the actual interface between reality and consciousness. (shrink)

This is the fifth of a series of six articles examining respectively the six concepts of consciousness identified in the main entries of the Oxford English Dictionary under the word. I call the concept of consciousness5 the unitive meaning because it is said to refer to the totality of mental-occurrence instances that constitute a person's conscious being. The present article consists mainly of an effort to answer the question of which totality of mental-occurrence instances it is to which the fifth (...) concept refers. Four possible answers are considered, and the fourth, derived form Locke, is found to capture best the dictionary's meaning. Accordingly, consciousness5 is a certain subjectively determined unity of mental-occurrence instances mat is further specified, of course, in the article. However, I also consider, finally, that the compilers of the dictionary may have had something more objective in mind as well, another meaning toward which the word is tending if it has not already arrived mere. This further sense may amount to an identification of consciousness with those components of James's stream that he described as “the very core and nucleus of our self as we know it, the very sanctuary of our life.”. (shrink)

The present article distinguishes three kinds of accounts of direct awareness : mental-eye theory, self-intimational theory and appendage theory. These aim to explain the same phenomenon, though each proposes that direct awareness occurs in a fundamentally different way. Also, I address a crucial problem that appendage theory must solve: how does a direct awareness succeed in being awareness specifically of the particular mental-occurrence instance that is its object? Appendage theory is singled out for this attention because psychologists, as they embark (...) on their renewed study of consciousness, are most likely to be attracted by appendage theory for their explanation of direct awareness. (shrink)

Considered here is the last one of the six basic concepts of consciousness that The Oxford English Dictionary identifies in its several entries under consciousness. The referent of the sixth concept, which I call “consciousness6”, is rightly understood to be a certain general operating mode of the mind. Any psychological account of consciousness6 must distinguish this operating mode from the “particular consciousness or awarenesses”, i.e., the specific thoughts, feelings, perceptions, intentions, and the like , that occur while the mind is (...) so operating, and from the other, alternative, general operating modes of the mind: such as those that are sometimes in force in place of consciousness6, when one is awake. (shrink)

In this article, which is fourth in a series of six articles, I address the fourth concept of consciousness that the Oxford English Dictionary defines in its six main entries under the word consciousness. I first introduce this fourth concept, the concept of consciousness4. by identifying the previous three OED concepts of consciousness, which I have already discussed in this series of articles, and by indicating how that to which we make reference, respectively, by means of those three concepts is (...) related to the referents of the concept of consciousness4. I then address the latter concept more directly by pursuing for the remainder of the article where the OED's fourm entry leads. Among other things, I am led to consider two competing accounts of consciousness4 that figure prominently in the OED entry, namely the intrinsic, self-intimational account of William Hamilton and the inner-eye, perceptionlike account of John Locke. Both kinds of account are very much with us today. (shrink)

The human visual system allows a number of molar activities, among them straightforward seeing and reflective seeing. Both of these activities include, as product and part of them, a stream of first-order, visual perceptual consciousness of the ecological environment and of the perceiver himself or herself as inhabiting the environment and acting or moving within it. The two respective component streams of first-order consciousness both proceed at certain brain centers and, in Gibson's sense, they are resonatings to the stimulus energy (...) flux at the photoreceptors. But the two streams differ in that only the one that proceeds during reflective seeing involves inner consciousness of the component first-order, visual perceptual consciousness . In this sense, perceptual consciousness proceeds entirely nonconsciously during straightforward seeing. This is because inner consciousness is not a kind of response to first-order consciousness, but is an intrinsic dimension of the latter when it is proceeding consciously as opposed to nonconsciously. The content of first-order, visual perceptual consciousness during reflective seeing is importantly different from the content during straightforward seeing, notwithstanding their both being kinds of seeing in the literal, nonmetaphorical sense as characterized by Gibson's ecological approach to visual perception. (shrink)

After two sections of background discussion regarding some views of inner some recent deployments of James J. Gibson's ecological approach to visual perception relevant to our understanding of reflective seeing, I present my own view of reflective seeing for the remainder of the present article. Although I include detailed references to Edmund Husserl's conception of straightforward perceptual consciousness and reflective perceptual consciousness, the present article is not about Husserl. Rather, I use quotations from and about Husserl to add resonance and (...) depth to my own conception of the complex psychological process that is reflective seeing - particularly, the stream of perceptual consciousness that is a product and a part of it, that flows at the heart of reflective seeing. It will be evident that I very largely agree with the Husserl material which I use. And I do not take the space to bring out any disagreements that I might have with him. Thus, this article has as its main purpose making known, in an introductory way, just one, my own, view of reflective seeing. (shrink)

This is the third in a series of articles that address what is known or knowledgeably held about the consciousness of fully commissurotomized people. This installment discusses three alternative conceptions with which the present author does not agree. They are Eccles's dualist-interactionist conception, Gillett's linguistic conception, and Rey's eliminative conception. With regard to the first two of these, issues are raised with the intention of helping the respective proponent to improve his conception. In the case of the third, it is (...) urged that the view not be promoted, for moral reasons, unless very strong evidence sometimes becomes available in its favor. (shrink)

This article addresses the problem of evidence for Puccetti's hypothesis of normal dual consciousness, i.e., the hypothesis that a stream of consciousness flows in each cerebral hemisphere when both are functioning normally in intact, healthy people. Evidence counts as supportive only if it is not explainable by a certain close alternative hypothesis that holds consciousness to proceed in the nondominant hemisphere only when the dominant hemisphere is unable to inhibit it . From this perspective, I discuss two experiments involving anesthesia (...) of the dominant hemisphere that were proposed, respectively, by Wilson and Puccetti, an actual experiment on normal, unanesthetized subjects reported by Landis, Graves, and Goodglass, as well as a further kind of experiment which, I suggest, may discriminate between the hypotheses. Assuming Puccetti is right, this experiment should yield a distinct pattern of reports from the dominant hemisphere about its experiences of acting as the individual deals with different kinds of tasks . Also considered is the common introspective evidence to the effect that we have only a single stream, never two distinct experiences at the same time. I argue, in support of Puccetti, that this is as it should be because introspection-at-a-distance is impossible; privileged access is internal to a stream, never occurs between streams. (shrink)

Currently in psychology, after a long hiatus, there exists an accelerating interest in the nature and character of consciousness. As might be expected at this early point in our return to consciousness, much of the relevant discussion among psychologists proceeds at the commonsense level of understanding. However, some psychologies are already moving beyond ordinary thought, and providing one or more technical concepts of consciousness. Such psychologies may be useful in improving psychologists' conceptual grasp of the referents of our ordinary concepts (...) of consciousness. Among the ordinary concepts of consciousness, probably the most basic one is the concept of consciousness3 . Among the psychologies that could be helpful is the influential ecological approach developed by James J. Gibson. This article is propaedeutic to putting Gibson's technical concept of awareness to work in improving the concept of consciousness3. First, features of the latter concept are identified; and then, with this concept firmly in mind, Gibson's concept of awareness, mainly its perceptual application, is made explicit and discussed with regard to a number of its important features. In both these ways, and others to follow based on the same materials, I hope to contribute to the conceptual sophistication of psychologists as they again seek to address the topic of consciousness. (shrink)

Published in two parts, the present article addresses whether self-awareness is necessarily involved in each of the six kinds of consciousness that The Oxford English Dictionary identifies under the word consciousness. Part I inquires into how, if at all, self-awareness enters consciousness1: a cognitive relation between people in which they have joint and mutual cognizance; consciousness2: a psychological process of conceiving of oneself in certain sorts of respects on a firsthand evidentiary basis; and consciousness3: being occurrently aware of anything at (...) all, including nonexistent particulars. An instance of consciousness1 may or may not have a reflexive object, but it will perforce include both inner awareness and awareness of oneself as an object of the other’s awareness. Consciousness2 requires self-awareness in the forms of witnessing or having witnessed potential evidence about oneself, inner awareness of this witnessing when it occurred, inner awareness and self-awareness as involved in remembering having witnessed that evidence, occurrent awareness of features of one’s character or personality, and bringing self-witnessed evidence to bear in judging of the latter. In contrast, consciousness3, which in a particular instance may be an occurrent self-awareness, need not involve any self-awareness at all. (shrink)

In The Varieties of Religious Experience, James explores in some depth, among much else, a kind of dividedness that can exist within the stream of consciousness — “the divided self.” This condition of the stream consists in crucial part of a phenomenological heterogeneity, inconsistency, discordance, or division of which disapproving notice is taken subjectively. The pertinent discordance exists among states of consciousness that comprise the same stream, is evident directly to inner awareness, and is not necessarily a matter of positing (...) or inferring the existence of a second stream of consciousness or an unconscious mental life. Typically, intrinsic theorists of inner awareness — or the immediate awareness we all have of at least some of our own mental-occurrence instances — disagree with appendage theorists concerning, inter alia, what the firsthand evidence reveals about inner awareness. I proffer in the present article an hypothesis that should help to explain why the first-person reports of appendage theorists contradict intrinsic theory with regard to inner awareness. My hypothesis derives from James’s discussion in Varieties of the not uncommon divided-self phenomenon. (shrink)

In this article, which is fourth in a series of six articles, I address the fourth concept of consciousness that the Oxford English Dictionary defines in its six main entries under the word consciousness. I first introduce this fourth concept, the concept of consciousness4. by identifying the previous three OED concepts of consciousness, which I have already discussed in this series of articles, and by indicating how that to which we make reference, respectively, by means of those three concepts is (...) related to the referents of the concept of consciousness4. I then address the latter concept more directly by pursuing for the remainder of the article where the OED's fourm entry leads. Among other things, I am led to consider two competing accounts of consciousness4 that figure prominently in the OED entry, namely the intrinsic, self-intimational account of William Hamilton and the inner-eye, perceptionlike account of John Locke. Both kinds of account are very much with us today. (shrink)

In this article, which is fourth in a series of six articles, I address the fourth concept of consciousness that the Oxford English Dictionary defines in its six main entries under the word consciousness. I first introduce this fourth concept, the concept of consciousness4. by identifying the previous three OED concepts of consciousness, which I have already discussed in this series of articles, and by indicating how that to which we make reference, respectively, by means of those three concepts is (...) related to the referents of the concept of consciousness4. I then address the latter concept more directly by pursuing for the remainder of the article where the OED's fourm entry leads. Among other things, I am led to consider two competing accounts of consciousness4 that figure prominently in the OED entry, namely the intrinsic, self-intimational account of William Hamilton and the inner-eye, perceptionlike account of John Locke. Both kinds of account are very much with us today. (shrink)

The present article is the second one in a series and begins to spell out the case for the intrinsic kind of theory of consciousness4. According to such theory, a mental-occurrence instance is conscious4 on its own, that is, as a part of its own internal structure. Considered here are a prominent phenomenologist’s argument in favor of an intrinsic theory of consciousness4, and his conception of how such inner awareness occurs in the case of objectivating mental acts, which are all (...) conscious4 in his view. Every objectivating act is a mental-occurrence instance that includes outer awareness, that is, awareness of something lying externally to the act. Every objectivating act presents an object distinct from itself, conveys awareness of that object, and — allegedly as a mere by-product or concomitant — conveys awareness of itself. This article emphasizes the question of what property of outer awareness it is that necessarily, as has been claimed, brings along with it inner awareness of the respective objectivating act. Also, this article begins to argue that, in the very occurrence of any conscious4 objectivating act, inner awareness is "interwoven" with outer awareness. Inner awareness is a part of the "thematizing" activity of any conscious4 mental act, rather than being "marginal," that is, a merely implicit concomitant of the act. (shrink)

This article contains an initial statement of the pluralistic approach together with some justification for its adoption by psychologists. Two alternative coneptions of the nature of feelings, William James's and Edmund Husserl's, are discussed with the pluralistic approach in mind. Psychologists who would practice the pluralistic approach with respect to the nature of feelings must develop a plural conception of the nature of feelings. A plural conception differs from a singular conception by simultaneously including more than a single account of (...) the relevant phenomena. Rather than wreaking destruction on alternative conceptions, the pluralistic approach is such as welcomes, encourages, and even commissions the formulation of alternative accounts of the phenomena of concern. Rightly or wrongly, the pluralistic psychologist feels closest to an ideal explanatory framework at those points in his or her plural conception where the alternative accounts are mutually contradictory. (shrink)