Intro to ConsciousnessBSCS 2013 Fall

(November 25-29, PHIL305)

George Kampis, ProfessorEötvös University, Budapest

Resources

• The course is based on:• Blackmore, S. (2004). Consciousness: An

Introduction. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Students may wish to purchase it - although it is not required, it is highly useful.

 • Another fundamental reading is (also not required

but suggested): • Wegner, Daniel M. The illusion of conscious will. MIT

press, 2002.

Course Objectives

• Critically evaluate historical notions of cognition and consciousness

• Put handle on the question „Are we conscious?“• Discuss varietes of consciousness and free will• Become familar with neurological evidence

about the „determinism“ of conscious decisions• Get to know alternative notions of self (eg the

Buddhist notion)

Day 1

• The Cartesian Theater: dualism about the mind• Useful distinctions: phenomenal and access

consciousness, qualia, will• Causal powers of „being like“: the Mary thought

experiment• Wegner and his arguments on conscious will

being an „illusion“• Evidence for the dissociation of will and action

Day 2

• „Readiness potential“, Kornhuber and Libet• Libet's "neuronal adequacy" experiment • Libet’s “volitional” experiment• Timing in the mind: the “phi” phenomenon

Day 3

• Perception and consciouness. The blind spot• Change blindness, inattentional blindness• Visual representations and „filling in“• Externalism about the mind and its varieties• Multiple personalities, the Sperry experiment• Different theories about split minds

Day 4

• Hume and Dennett: the „bundle theory“• Narrative identity and multiple drafts theory• The biological function of consciousness, if any• NCC (neural correlates of consciousness),

correlation and causality• The binding problem• Consciousness and meditation. Non-European

notions of consciousness.