In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Books ReceivedThe Ambitions of Curiosity: Understanding the World in Ancient Greece and China. By G.E.R. Lloyd. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2002. Pp. xvi + 175. Price not given.The Art of the Han Essay: Wang Fu's Ch'ien-Fu Lun. By Anne Behnke Kinney. Tempe: Center for Asian Studies, Arizona State University, 1990. Pp. xi + 154. Paper $10.00.The Autobiography of Jamgön Kongtrul: A Gem of Many Colors. By Jamgön Kongtrul Lodrön (...) Thayé and translated by Richard Barron (Chökyi Nyima). Ithaca, New York: Snow Lion Publications, 2003. Pp. xxii + 549. Price not given.Awesome Nightfall: The Life, Times, and Poetry of Saigyō. By William R. LaFleur. Boston: Wisdom Publications, 2003. Pp. xiii + 173. Paper $14.95.Becoming the Compassion Buddha: Tantric Mahamudra for Everyday Life. By Lama Thubten Yeshe, edited by Robina Courtin, and foreword by Geshe Lhundub Sopa. Boston: Wisdom Publications, 2003. Pp. xi + 194. Paper $14.95.Between Two Worlds East and West: An Autobiography. By J. N. Mohanty. New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2002. Pp. ix + 134. Hardcover RS 525.00.The Chinese Face of Jesus Christ. Edited by Roman Malek, S.V.D. Sankt Augustin, Germany: Institut Monumenta Serica and China-Zentrum; and Nettetal, Germany: Steyler Verlag, 2002. Pp. 391. EUR 40.00.Chinese Medicine in Contemporary China: Plurality and Synthesis. By Volker Scheid. Durham and London: Duke University Press, 2002. Pp. xiv + 407. Hardcover $69.95. Paper $23.95.Confucian Feminist: Memoirs of Zeng Baosun (1893-1978). Translated and adapted by Thomas L. Kennedy. Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society, 2002. Pp. xxi + 170. Price not given.Consciousness Studies: Cross-Cultural Perspectives. By K. Ramakrishna Rao. Jefferson (North Carolina) and London: McFarland and Company, 2002. Pp. 367. Hardcover $65.00.Constituting Communities: Theravāda Buddhism and the Religious Cultures of South and Southeast Asia. Edited by John Clifford Holt, Jacob N. Kinnard, and Jonathan S. Walters. Albany: State University of New York Press, 2003. Pp. viii + 224. Hardcover $65.50. Paper $21.95.Developments in Indian Philosophy from Eighteenth Century Onwards: Classical and Western. By Daya Krishna. Volume X Part 1 of History of Science, Philosophy and Culture in Indian Civilization, edited by D. P. Chattopadhyaya. New [End Page 110] Delhi: Centre for Studies in Civilizations, 2001. Pp. xxiii + 417. Hardcover RS 1200.East and West: Identità e dialogo interculturale. By Giangiorgio Pasqualotto. Venezia: Marsilo Editori, 2003. Pp. 210. EUR 16.00.Effortless Action: Wu-wei as Conceptual Metaphor and Spiritual Ideal in Early China. By Edward Slingerland. New York: Oxford University Press, 2003. Pp. xii + 352. Price not given.Encountering Kā lī: In the Margins, at the Center, in the West. Edited by Rachel Fell McDermott and Jeffrey J. Kripal. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 2003. Pp. xviii + 321. Hardcover $55.00, £37.95. Paper $21.95, £15.95.Encyclopedia of Chinese Philosophy. Edited by Antonio S. Cua. New York and London: Routledge, 2003. Pp. xx + 1020. Hardcover $150.00.Essays on Indian Philosophy. By J. N. Mohanty and edited by Purushottama Bilimoria. New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2002. Pp. xxxvii + 347. Paper RS 525.00.Faith, Humor, and Paradox. By Ignacio L. Götz. Westport, Connecticut: Praeger Publishers, 2002. Pp. 136. Hardcover $61.95.Four Illusions: Candrakīrti's Advice for Travelers on the Bodhisattva Path. Translated by Karen C. Lang. New York: Oxford University Press, 2003. Pp. xv + 240. Price not given.The Great Awakening: A Buddhist Social Theory. By David R. Loy. Boston: Wisdom Publications, 2003. Pp. 223. Paper $16.95.The Hidden History of The Tibetan Book of the Dead. By Bryan J. Cuevas. New York: Oxford University Press, 2003. Pp. xi + 328. Price not given.Huang Di nei jing su wen: Nature, Knowledge, Imagery in an Ancient Chinese Medical Text. By Paul U. Unschuld. Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 2003. Pp. xii + 520. Hardcover $75.00, £52.00.In Dewey's Wake: Unfinished Work of Pragmatic Reconstruction. Edited by William J. Gavin. Albany: State University of New York Press, 2003. Pp. vi + 249. Hardcover $71.50. Paper $23.95.Knowledge and Freedom in Indian Philosophy. By Tara Chatterjea. Lanham, Maryland: Lexington Books, 2002. Pp. xvi + 159. Hardcover... (shrink)

In this condensed survey, I look to recent perspectives on evolution suggesting that cultural change likely alters the genome. Since theories of development are nested within assumptions about evolution (evo-devo), I next review some oft-cited developmental theories and other psychological theories of the 20th century to see if any match the emerging perspectives in evolutionary theory. I seek theories based neither in nature (genetics) nor nurture (the environment) but in the creative play of human communication responding to necessity. This (...) survey finally looks to more recent work to do with the appearance of independent self-consciousness in the individual following empathic group awareness. The result of such self-created group awareness and symbolic communication is seen to be cultural consciousness, unique to humanity, from which individual consciousness and personhood derive. I conclude by noting the general implications for these approaches in our schools, politics, and in ultimate ontological questions. (shrink)

I explore how many within modern industrial societies currently understand, manage, and respond to their emotional suffering. I argue that this understanding and management of suffering has radically altered in the last 30 years, creating a new model of suffering, “the negative model” (suffering is purposeless), which has largely replaced the “positive model” (suffering is purposeful) that prevailed in the 18th and 19th centuries. This shift has been hastened by what I call the “rationalization of suffering”—namely, the process by which (...) suffering is predominantly now understood in biological and psychiatric terms rather than in religious, philosophical, or moral. This process accompanied the great forces of secularization, medicalization unleashed at the enlightenment—forces gaining their modern expression through psychiatry, the behavioral psychotherapies, the happiness industries, as well as through aggressive market, individualistic, medical, and positivistic ideas and movements. This shift has entailed many socio/cultural implications important for anthropologists to explore further. (shrink)

This article adopts Ernesto Laclau’s notion of empty signifier to discuss Tang Junyi’s uses of the concept oflixing(‘reason’ or ‘rationality’) in his seminal workCultural Consciousness and Moral Reason(文化意識與道德理性; 1958). My dual goal, in doing so, is to bring to light the relations of power constitutive of the text’s discourse onlixingand relate them to the problematic of writing philosophy from the periphery. I argue that in this work,lixing’s dual referents—as a translation of ‘reason’ and as denoting a Neo-Confucian faculty to (...) intuit moral truths—allow Tang to inscribe himself in a philosophical field designed to exclude non-Western philosophies, while at the same time enabling him to symbolically relegate Euro-American philosophy to a peripheral position by filling in the notion oflixingwith a content that legitimizes his own agenda. Tang could thus authorize his Confucian metaphysics by presenting it as the true content oflixing, understood not only as a universal faculty enabling humanity’s access to all that is universal, but also as a condition sine qua non of for one’s inclusion in the philosophical game. By attempting to co-opt the empty signifier (lixing/reason) for his own purposes, I argue Tang employs one of two possible strategies that can be adopted by those situated at the periphery in order to oppose the hegemon; one that leaves the structure of power relations intact but working in favor of the periphery. (shrink)

This volume brings together the primary challenges for 21st century cognitive sciences and cultural neuroscience in responding to the nature of human identity, self, and evolution of life itself. Through chapters devoted to intricate but focused models, empirical findings, theories, and experiential data, the contributors reflect upon the most exciting possibilities, and debate upon the fundamental aspects of consciousness and self in the context of cultural, philosophical, and multidisciplinary divergences and convergences. Such an understanding and the ensuing (...) insights lie in the cusp of philosophy, neurosciences, psychiatry, and medical humanities. In this volume, the editors and contributors explore the foundations of human thinking and being and discuss both evolutionary/cultural embeddedness, and the self-orientation, of consciousness, keeping in mind questions that bring in the interdisciplinary complexity of issues such as the emergence of consciousness, relation between healing and agency, models of altered self, how cognition impacts the social self, experiential primacy as the hallmark of consciousness, and alternate epistemologies to understand these interdisciplinary puzzles. (shrink)

The integral consciousness -- The internal universe -- The evolution of consciousness -- The within of things -- The systemic nature of evolution -- Stages of consciousness and culture -- The spiral of development -- Tribal consciousness -- Warrior consciousness -- Traditional consciousness -- Modernist consciousness -- Postmodern consciousness -- The spiral as a whole -- What is the real evidence for the spiral? -- The integral stage of consciousness -- Life (...) conditions for integral consciousness -- The values of integral consciousness -- Integral consciousness in the context of history -- Practicing the integral lifestylevalue metabolism -- Postintegral consciousness -- Integral politics -- The politics of the spiral -- Integral politics and global governance -- Is global governance an unrealistic fantasy? -- Is global governance too dangerouswhat are the safeguards? -- Global governance and integral consciousness cocreate each other -- Integral spirituality -- The development of spiritual traditions -- Public spirituality in the integral age -- Beauty, truth, and goodnessphilosophical spirituality -- The practice of beauty, truth, and goodness -- The revelation of evolution -- The founders of integral philosophy -- Ken Wilber in context -- The evolution of philosophy as a human endeavor -- Hegel, the first integral philosopher -- Bergson, the first post-darwinian integral philosopher -- Whitehead, spiritual philosopher for the ages -- Teilhard de Chardin, master of the internal universe -- Gebser, prophet of integral consciousness -- Developmental psychology and the mapping of the internal universe -- Habermas, architect of integral foundations -- Wilber, framer of integral philosophys twenty-first-century synthesis -- What I add to integral philosophy -- The integral reality frame -- Metaphysics and the evolution of reality frames -- The integral map of reality -- Integral philosophy and human spirituality -- Some critiques of the integral reality frame -- Structures of the human mind -- Lines of development recognized by psychologists -- Wilber's theory of the lines of development -- A critique of Wilber's theory of developmental lines -- An alternative theory of the structures of consciousness -- The self as a whole -- The directions of evolution -- Evolution and the idea of progress -- Unity, complexity, and consciousness -- Directions of evolution in the internal universe -- The dialectical quality of the master patterns of evolution -- Potential applications of a dialectical understanding of evolution. (shrink)

Anthropology of the Brain In this unique exploration of the mysteries of the human brain, Roger Bartra shows that consciousness is a phenomenon that occurs not only in the mind but also in an external network, a symbolic system. He argues that the symbolic systems created by humans in art, language, in cooking or in dress, are the key to understanding human consciousness.

Uniting analytic philosophy with Buddhist, Indian, and Chinese traditions, this collection marks the first systematic cross-cultural examination of one of philosophy of mind's most fascinating questions : can consciousness be conceived as metaphysically fundamental? Engaging in debates concerning consciousness and ultimate reality, emergence and mental causation, realism, idealism, panpsychism, and illusionism, it understands problems through the philosophies of East and South-East Asia, in particular Buddhism and Vedanta. Each section focuses on a specific aspect or theory of (...) class='Hi'>consciousness, and examines a particular subject from different disciplinary perspectives including philosophy, psychology, and cognitive science. These different angles allows readers to gain insight into the intellectual challenges and problems of the study of consciousness and its place in the thought traditions of both Eastern and Western philosophy. Raising new questions, it provides a more global and holistic understanding of consciousness, presenting a stimulating and original contribution to contemporary consciousness studies and the metaphysics of mind. (shrink)

Philosophical inquiries into the nature of consciousness have long been intrinsically tied to questions regarding the nature of the self. Although philosophers of mind seldom make reference to the role of cultural context in shaping consciousness, since antiquity culture has played a notable role in philosophical conceptions of the self. Western philosophers, from Plato to Locke, have emphasized an individualistic view of the self that is autonomous and consistent across situations, while Eastern philosophers, such as Lao Tzu (...) and Confucius, have argued for a collectivistic view of the self, one that is interconnected to others and embedded within specific social contexts and situations. Here we argue that a comprehensive theory of consciousness needs to account for the role of cultural context and its bidirectional interaction with neural and genetic mechanisms in shaping a variety of conscious phenomena, from visual perception to self- awareness. We review recent evidence of cultural variation in neurobiological mechanisms underlying these phenomena and discuss the implications of these cultural neuroscience findings for the study of consciousness. (shrink)

We are currently witnessing the emergence of a ‘third culture’, driven by unprecedented developments that are changing the playing field. These include advances in AI, big data analysis and robotics. The traditional ‘two cultures’ view (S. P. Snow) distinguishes between the sciences and the humanities. The wisdoms these two cultures offer are separated from each other, with little to no interaction or mutual comprehension. However, over the past two decades, and for the first time in human history, a new, third (...) culture has appeared. This new culture, rooted in new technologies, not only pursues its own form of rationality but also supports advances in the original two cultures, deepening and expanding our individual and collective consciousness so that we can see more and do better. It will eventually give rise to new forms of consciousness based not on biochemical signals, but on copper wires and lithium chips. These new machine intelligences will change the world and force us to realise: we are no longer alone. The human species’ position in the twenty-first century will be fundamentally redefined: not as a conductor leading the orchestra, but a single string player within it. (shrink)

The notion of double consciousness, as a characterization of black subjectivity, is basic to Ménil’s critique of the alienated “mythologies” of Antillean life and its self-exoticizing literature. Double consciousness renders cultural identity deeply problematic. But it has other, more positive, manifestations, closer to a Bakhtinian idea of dialogism. Thus he praises Césaire’s use of irony as a dual voice. Ménil’s valorization of complexity and ambiguity in literature, against the simple naturalism favoured by the Communist Party but which (...) he insists is not a truly Marxist position, is thus linked to his view of the necessary “doubleness” of Antillean consciousness. Conversely, the simplicity of folklore can offer a basis for cultural identity, but not for good literature. Although Ménil emphasizes the importance of Antilleans reclaiming their history, this is less about discovering one’s roots than providing a dynamic grasp of one’s ever-changing place in a social reality governed by the Marxist dialectic. “Double consciousness” precludes the comforts of fixed identities, but it is a dialectical, not a tragic condition. (shrink)

The notion of double consciousness, as a characterization of black subjectivity, is basic to Ménil’s critique of the alienated “mythologies” of Antillean life and its self-exoticizing literature. Double consciousness renders cultural identity deeply problematic. But it has other, more positive, manifestations, closer to a Bakhtinian idea of dialogism. Thus he praises Césaire’s use of irony as a dual voice. Ménil’s valorization of complexity and ambiguity in literature, against the simple naturalism favoured by the Communist Party but which (...) he insists is not a truly Marxist position, is thus linked to his view of the necessary “doubleness” of Antillean consciousness. Conversely, the simplicity of folklore can offer a basis for cultural identity, but not for good literature. Although Ménil emphasizes the importance of Antilleans reclaiming their history, this is less about discovering one’s roots than providing a dynamic grasp of one’s ever-changing place in a social reality governed by the Marxist dialectic. “Double consciousness” precludes the comforts of fixed identities, but it is a dialectical, not a tragic condition. (shrink)

Different cultures show different understandings of consciousness, soul, and spirit. Native indigenous traditions have recently seen a resurgence of interest and are being used in psychotherapy, mental health counselling, and psychiatry. The main aim of this review is to explore and summarize the native indigenous concepts of consciousness, soul, and spirit. Following a systematic review search, the peer-reviewed literature presenting research from 55 different cultural groups across regions of the world was retrieved. Information relating to native concepts (...) of consciousness, soul, and spirit were excerpted from the sources and contrasted. Contrasting these indigenous concepts revealed important implications for understanding consciousness within a cross-cultural perspective and has practical implications for applied approaches utilizing native indigenous traditions. (shrink)

Anthropological studies of folk cultures have been made not only on the content of their dreams but also on their interpretations. While there is a wide variance in the understanding of dreaming by cultures other than our own, there is a large set which might be called the classic dream interpretation of folk societies, which was first noted by Tylor in the nineteenth century. Its main tenet is that dreams are the experiences or travels of the soul, and that the (...) soul is distinct from the waking ego who recounts the dream. The dream is a narrative about real things, not something of a fantasy nature. This leads to a different epistemological basis of dreaming than the Western framework. This paper details the extent and nature of this interpretation, and explores the psychological and philosophical issues raised by it. (shrink)

The majority of the world’s cultures encourage or require members to enter alternative states of consciousness while involved in religious rituals. The question is, why? This paper suggests an explanation for the culturally prescribed ASC from the view of Fisher information. It argues from the position, first put forward by Emile Durkheim in his magnum opus, The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life, that all religions are grounded in reality. It suggests that many of the structural elements of (...) class='Hi'>cultural cosmologies are similar and that the ritual induction of ASC may help to bring individual experience into greater accord with a pan-human eidetic cosmology, and thus with certain invariant attributes of reality. The necessity of this process is demonstrated by recourse to Fisher information. The paper shows how experiences generated during alternative states of consciousness may help to maintain a minimal level of realism in the interests of adaptation to what is in other respects a transcendental reality. (shrink)

Globalna świadomość jako pojęcie kulturowe i historyczne Artykuł stanowi analizę idei głoszonych przez przedstawicieli filozofii kosmicznej. Przedstawiony zostaje kulturowy, historyczny i cywilizacyjny charakter zjawiska świadomości globalnej. Dowodzi się w nim, że świadomość globalna jest częścią społecznego i kulturowego potencjału globalnych sieci informacyjnych oraz że może ona wskazywać perspektywę rozwoju obdarzonej rozumem ludzkości.

[opening paragraph]: First-person methodologies have evolved in the humanities from the romantic introspection of a unified self, through a modernist nostalgia for that unity, to the fragmentation of the self in poststructuralist and postmodernism, which questions the pheno- menological unity of the self based on commonsense introspection as well as the possibility of an unmediated pure consciousness event. Literary and cultural studies can benefit from the way the Journal of Consciousness Studies draws upon Eastern approaches to first-person (...) experience and corresponding western physiological research. Of particular relevance to the unity-fragmentation debate is the chapter by Jonathan Shear and Ronald Jevning, ‘Pure consciousness: Scientific explorations of meditation techniques’ in this special issue of JCS. Shear and Jevning explore pure consciousness as a state emptied of all ‘empirical phenomenal content’ , a void similar to that described in deconstructive postmodernism in terms of the experience of the real as difference. But while Shear and Jevning propose that the experience. (shrink)

What is consciousness? Why and when do we have it? Where does it come from, and how does it relate to the lump of squishy grey matter in our heads, or to our material and social worlds? While neuroscientists, philosophers, psychologists, historians, and cultural theorists offer widely different perspectives on these fundamental questions concerning what it is like to be human, most agree that consciousness represents a 'hard problem'. -/- The emergence of consciousness studies as a (...) multidisciplinary discourse addressing these issues has often been associated with rapid advances in neuroscience-perhaps giving the impression that the arts and humanities have arrived late at the debating table. The longer historical view suggests otherwise, but it is probably true that music has been under-represented in accounts of consciousness. Music and Consciousness aims to redress the balance: its twenty essays offer a timely and multi-faceted contribution to consciousness studies, critically examining some of the existing debates and raising new questions. -/- The collection makes it clear that to understand consciousness we need to do much more than just look at brains: studying music demonstrates that consciousness is as much to do with minds, bodies, culture, and history. Incorporating several chapters that move outside Western philosophical traditions, Music and Consciousness corrects any perception that the study of consciousness is a purely occidental preoccupation. And in addition to what it says about consciousness the volume also presents a distinctive and thought-provoking configuration of new writings about music. (shrink)

The Mapuche people are a native group from the extreme south of Latin America. Their culture is based on the interconnectedness between the cohabitants of the environment, including human and non-human categories of life. The closest concept to consciousness for them would be Mapuche rakizuamor Mapuche thinking, which is defined as a particular kind of reflexivity or state of awareness of the interdependence of people with natural and spiritual entities. This understanding of the human condition represents a relational ontology, (...) which cannot be translated to the predominating individualistic approach. Although the mind–body distinction is not a central point within Mapuche culture, these dimensions can be explored through crucial processes of the life cycle such as socialization, illness, and death. Contributions from cultural psychology and Indigenous psychology are taken into account regarding the challenge to address the interplay between culture and the human psyche more appropriately. (shrink)

Gesture and elaborate forms of nonverbal behaviour have been posited as necessary antecedents to language and shared conceptual understanding. Here we argue that subtle and largely unintentional nonverbal behaviours play a key role in building consensual beliefs within culture. We propose a model that focuses on the subtle and automatic nonverbal transmission of attitudes, beliefs and cultural ideals. Specifically, people extract attitudes and beliefs from nonverbal behaviour-- such extraction is both ubiquitous and efficient. The extracted attitudes and beliefs become (...) individual beliefs if encountered frequently enough. Consequently, people may come to adopt the same attitudes, beliefs and behaviours in the absence of verbal communication. Finally, one's own nonverbal behaviour reflects the extracted attitudes, beliefs and ideals of those of one's group, serving as a means for transmitting culture. The implication is that subtle nonverbal behaviour is important for the creation and maintenance of culture. (shrink)

This has been possible by the growing awareness of man about his own personal nature, about his larger society and culture and about the whole humanity. The foremost challenge of contemporary man is the discovery and affirmation of man’s spirituality and bringing it into full play in the play of life and for the attainment of some new leap forward in creation and transcendence. The cosmic dimension, therefore comprehends reason and faith, science and poetry. The cosmic dimension brings experience of (...) timelessness in love, worship and beauty The extension of this personal awareness to a larger awareness shared by thesociety enriches the social life and adds an essential element to all progress and development. This balance and harmony is the product of human creativity. Therefore the fullness of life is given to creative persons living harmoniously on all there dimensions of the cosmic, the elemental and the temporal. Some sense of discovery enters into the creative process. (shrink)

Investigation of Indigenous concepts and their meanings is highly inspirational for contemporary science because these concepts represent adaptive solutions in various environmental and social milieus. Past research has shown that conceptualizations of consciousness can vary widely between cultural groups from different geographical regions. The present study explores variability among a few of the thousands of Indigenous cultural understandings of consciousness. Indigenous concepts of consciousness are often relational and inseparable from environmental and religious concepts. Furthermore, this (...) exploration of variability reveals the layers with which some Indigenous peoples understand their conscious experience of the world. Surprisingly, Indigenous understandings of global consciousness was found not to be in opposition to local consciousness. The final concluding section of this study discusses the usability of Indigenous concepts and meanings for recent scientific debates. (shrink)

This chapter studies the scattered career of Prince Frederick August of Augustenburg (1830–1881). Caught between the German-Danish conflict within the Duchies of Schleswig-Holstein, the Prince escaped from parental pressure as well as a lack of perspectives by delving into the riches of the Indian past. As an amateur-Indologist, he reshaped his self-perception and finally wrote the first Western biography of the Mughal emperor Akbar. The study draws on the Prince’s publications and his surviving handwritten documents and tries to highlight India’s (...) role in his process of gaining self-confidence and self-awareness. (shrink)

This paper explores Dilthey's "descriptive psychology "and its significance for the anthropology of consciousness. To do justice to the complexities of Dilthey's project a significant portion of the paper is devoted to an exposition of the basic tenets of his"descriptive psychology." Most notably, his views on"experience,""aconsciousness,""introspection,"and"objectified mind"are discussed before turning to examine his concept of the"acquired psychicnexus." After outlining these basic tenets the paper turns to explore how Dilthey's "descriptive psychology"can serve to shed light on current anthropological research on (...) the experience of pain. Finally, the paper concludes with a discussion of the contemporary relevance of Dilthey's project as it explores how his ideas may further inform current theoretical perspectives in anthropology about the relationship between consciousness, culture, and experience. (shrink)

This paper outlines, from a sociological and social psychological perspective, a theoretical framework with which to define and analyse consciousness, emphasizing the importance of language, collective representations, conceptions of self, and self-reflectivity in understanding human consciousness. It argues that the shape and feel of consciousness is heavily social, and this is no less true of our experience of collective consciousness than it is of our experience of individual consciousness. The paper is divided into two parts. (...) Part One argues that the problem of consciousness can be approached fruitfully by beginning with human group and collective phenomena: community, language, language-based communication, institutional and cultural arrangements, collective representations, self-conceptions, and self-referentiality. A collective is understood as a group or population of individuals that possesses or develops collective representations of itself: its values and goals, its structure and modes of operating, its strategies, developments, strengths and weaknesses, etc. Collective reflectivity emerges as a function of an organization or group producing and making use of collective representations of the self in its discussions, critical reflections, and planning. A collective monitors its activities, achievements and failures, and reflects on itself as a defined and on-going collective being. In this perspective, human consciousness is understood as a type of reflective activity: observing, monitoring, judging and re-orienting and re-organizing self; considering what characterizes the self, what self perceives, judges, could do, should do . The reflectivity is encoded in language and developed in conversations about collective selves. Part Two of the paper applies the framework to analysing the individual experience of consciousness, self-representation, self-reference, self-reflectivity and self-development. (shrink)

'Art and Adaptability' argues for a co-evolution of theory of mind and material/art culture. The book covers relevant areas from great ape intelligence, hominin evolution, Stone Age tools, Paleolithic culture and art forms, to neurobiology. We use material and art objects, whether painting or sculpture, to modify our own and other people's thoughts so as to affect behavior. We don't just make judgments about mental states; we create objects about which we make judgments in which mental states are inherent. Moreover, (...) we make judgments about these objects to facilitate how we explore the minds and feelings of others. The argument is that it's not so much art because of theory of mind but art as theory of mind. (shrink)

© 2013 The Editors of The Philosophical QuarterlyOpening this book the philosopher might expect a treatise on self‐knowledge. However, despite its title, this is not a book on knowledge of our own minds, or even on self‐consciousness in the usual sense of being conscious of oneself. Rather, it is a book on developmental psychology, spelling out the fascinating details of the development of the human mind with a particular focus on the emergence of human consciousness. The question Radu (...) J. Bogdan raises is why, and how, consciousness develops in human beings. His central hypothesis is that consciousness is a bi‐product of the executive abilities that a small child develops in response to the complex socio‐cultural situation that she finds herself in. The executive abilities, Bogden argues, are assembled by the child's intuitive psychology, or theory of mind, which allows her to interact and coregulate with others. The origins of... (shrink)

Based on the hypothesis that the selfhood is the last outpost of sociality within a person, consciousness and the self are considered as complex spiritual and material phenomena, they include at least three main components: neurobiological activity, intimate personal environment and social context. The author analyzes an internal materialistic perspective, which infers the reduction of self and consciousness to ordinary neural processes of the brain. With this perspective, the main thing for neural activity is to maintain homeostasis, first, (...) within the brain itself, and then within the organism as a whole. Based on the latest achievements of neuroscience and the constructions of neurophilosophy, the impossibility of a significant accentuation of the production of the self against the background of the default activity of brain activity is demonstrated. The concept of protoconsciousness is introduced. In its context, it is shown that even the simplest ones can use complex algorithms for processing information, correcting behavioral errors to ensure effective existence in the life world intended for them. As a result – there is an integrative behavior, when one or another of its elements is not just a single reaction to a stimulus but formed as a result of the execution of a certain algorithm (of yet not clear structure and origin), data and commands for which come from several sources. Attention is drawn to the fact that even for a quite simple behavior there is need for some built-in spatio-temporal matrix which will be typologically similar to Kant’s forms of perception. From the standpoint of a materialistic perspective, it is proposed to consider rationality and the self, which is associated with it, as a kind of superstructure over the outconscious interaction with reality that our biological predecessors developed. However, both rationality and the self inevitably presuppose a return to sociality, without which neither the first nor the second can be conceived. (shrink)

This book explores the concept of consciousness when defined in the terms mind, spirit, soul and awareness. It consists of the edited proceedings of a colloquium held in Cordoba, at which experts in physics, neuro- and psycho-physiology, analytical psychology, philosophy and religious knowledge discussed aspects of their work related to this main theme. The following areas are covered: quantum mechanics and the role of consciousness, neurophysiology and states of consciousness, the manifestation of the psyche in consciousness, (...) the odyssey of consciousness, and science and consciousness. The discussions which follow give a multi-disciplinary perspective on the questions involved. (shrink)

Spirit possessions, trance, and other forms of altered states of consciousness are fascinating manifestations of brain states that are often seen as alien or exotic in Western media and discourse. Yet, these experiences are very common for a large number of humans around the world. In this paper we use a predictive processing perspective to examine spirit possession in Taoist rituals in Southern Thailand. These rituals involve tens of thousands of spirit mediums that enter into trance and perform various (...) acts of selfmutilation. These activities can shed new light on how sensory input is modulated and reinterpreted through top-down expectations driven by cultural narratives and frameworks. Our key argument is that, instead of being exotic and different, these states of altered consciousness provide us with powerful insights into how the mind and perception work in a culturally constructed world. Considering the role of culture as providing input into a common human cognitive architecture allows for a deeper understanding of the various facets and expressions of communalities in altered states of consciousness across human populations. (shrink)

A nation cannot exist without national culture and national self-consciousness. These concepts are decisive in the development of the nation. Values are the priorities of any nation, determined by its culture and self-awareness. The national cool is the basis for the formation and development of national self-consciousness. The aim is to analyze the influence of national culture on the formation of national consciousness. Justify their objective and subjective factors of formation, which are based on the motivational core (...) of personality behavior. National culture and national self-consciousness are the main features of a nation, without which it cannot exist and develop as a whole. National culture and national self-consciousness are one whole of the spiritual world of nations and nationalities. The development of national culture and national self-consciousness is an objective regularity. Naturally, contradictions in this process will exist and demand their resolution or escalate into conflicts. With a timely solution, they will play the role of an indicator of national development. (shrink)

V.K.: Vladislav Aleksandrovich, you have come a long way in your scientific career: from a student of the class of 1955 in the Philosophy Faculty of Moscow State University to a corresponding member of the Russian Academy of Sciences, head of the sector of the theory of knowledge and head of the division of epistemology and logic at the Institute of Philosophy of the RAS, and editor in chief of our country's leading philosophy journal Voprosy filosofii. Your field of research (...) is the theory of knowledge and the philosophy of science or, to be more specific, the cultural-historical analysis of knowledge from the point of view of the activity approach. As far as I know, the psychological aspect of the activity approach to the study of consciousness and knowledge was developed by the psychologists Lev Semenovich Vygotsky, his student Aleksei Nikolaevich Leontiev, Aleksandr Romanovich Luria, and Petr Iakovlevich Galperin. Leontiev, Luria, and Galperin were professors at the Philosophy Faculty of MGU at the time you were studying there. Tell me, did you develop your scientific interests under the influence of the Moscow school of cultural-historical psychology? (shrink)

This essay presents central themes from my forthcoming book, The Awakening of the Global Mind. This book seeks to open a new frontier of Global Consciousness that has been long emerging in human evolution through the ages. When we step back from our more localized perspectives and expand into a more integral, holistic, and global space through the awakening of the global mind we are able to discern striking mega-trends in cultural evolution across diverse cultural and religious (...) worldviews and perspectives through time. One striking finding through this global lens is that the collective wisdom of humanity is quite clear that we make our living realities through the conduct of our consciousness: our technology of minding. And when we make ourselves and worlds through egocentric patterns of thinking we get polarized and fragmented worlds that are not sustainable. This essay joins a growing chorus of visionary thinkers and futurists which recognizes that in the 21st Century we face grave planetary crises and that our ego-based cultures are at a tipping point and not sustainable. The primary crisis on the planet now is a crisis of consciousness, and our global wisdom suggests that humanity is in a painful transformation toward a more healthful integral technology of mind that ushers in a new sustainable global civilization wherein the whole human family may flourish together on our sacred planet. (shrink)