Abstract

Consciousness entails self-consciousness. The entailment is generally denied for two reasons: some primitive forms of consciousness do not seem to require self-consciousness, and self-consciousness is regarded as a sophisticated capacity that need not accompany all conscious states. However, I show that what best explains how a mental state becomes conscious is that it is accompanied by a meta-psychological thought to the effect that one is in that mental state. I argue at some length that the meta-psychological state must specifically be a thought , and show why reductionist accounts will not yield the desired explanation. ;Self-consciousness simply involves having meta-psychological thoughts or 'awareness', and must be distinguished from 'introspection' which is a more sophisticated form of self-awareness. Thus, given an adequate theory of conscious mentality, it follows that having conscious mental states entails self-consciousness. ;After arguing that mentality per se does not require consciousness, a series of arguments for the conclusion that 'being a conscious creature or system entails being self-conscious' is explored. The arguments center around the nature of phenomenal states, de se attitudes, and episodic memory. The fundamental strategy in each case is to argue first that being a conscious system involves having a specific mental capacity , and then to show how having that capacity involves self-consciousness. Most of these arguments succeed in proving the desired conclusion