The Conscious Brain - Professor Damasio (I)

Antonio Damasio is David Dornsife Professor of Neuroscience, Psychology, and Neurology, and director of the Brain and Creativity Institute at the University of Southern California.
From one of the most significant neuroscientists at work today, a pathbreaking investigation of a question that has confounded philosophers, psychologists, and neuroscientists for centuries: how is consciousness created?

Antonio Damasio has spent the past thirty years studying and writing about how the brain operates, and his work has garnered acclaim for its singular melding of the scientific and the humanistic. In Self Comes to Mind, he goes against the long-standing idea that consciousness is somehow separate from the body, presenting compelling new scientific evidence that consciousness—what we think of as a mind with a self—is to begin with a biological process created by a living organism. Besides the three traditional perspectives used to study the mind (the introspective, the behavioral, and the neurological), Damasio introduces an evolutionary perspective that entails a radical change in the way the history of conscious minds is viewed and told. He also advances a radical hypothesis regarding the origins and varieties of feelings, which is central to his framework for the biological construction of consciousness: feelings are grounded in a near fusion of body and brain networks, and first emerge from the historically old and humble brain stem rather than from the modern cerebral cortex.

Damasio suggests that the brain's development of a human self becomes a challenge to nature's indifference and opens the way for the appearance of culture, a radical break in the course of evolution and the source of a new level of life regulation—sociocultural homeostasis. He leaves no doubt that the blueprint for the work-in-progress he calls sociocultural homeostasis is the genetically well-established basic homeostasis, the curator of value that has been present in simple life-forms for billions of years. Self Comes to Mind is a groundbreaking journey into the neurobiological foundations of mind and self.

Category:

Science & Technology

Tags:

• consciousness
• brain
• evolution
• human
• body
• mind
• language
• neuroscience
• neuropsychology
• psychology
• neurons
• evolutionary
• roots
• yt:stretch=16:9
• steven
• pinker
• david
• linden
• antonio
• damasio
• philosophy
• environment

[1simonmatthews]

@DeletedDelusion By no beginning I mean just that. There was no beginning. I wouldn't say the universe (multiverse) always existed in the current form. I'd say the universe is going through everlasting change. I myself don't really understand that there was no beginning, it's a concept that is beyond me, but I do believe that this is the way it must be. It must mean that time, as we think of it, does not exist. It boggles my mind. But I think it's quite normal to feel this way!

[1simonmatthews]

@DeletedDelusion "Well, 96% is a pretty specific number..."

I'd definitely agree with that and actually thought it myself soon after my post. What I was getting at really is how unimaginable the universe (and by universe I mean everything in existence. I know some call this the multiverse, so it can be confusing) probably is. Understanding dark matter/energy won't mean we will know 96% of the universe, of course.

[DeletedDelusion]

@1simonmatthews

What do you mean when you say "no beginning" and "always existed"? If you mean that ithe universe always existed in the current form then I'd say that scientific research has proven otherwise, if you say that it didn't poof into existence out of nothing, then I wouldn't disagree.

[DeletedDelusion]

@1simonmatthews Sorry for the late reply.

"Scientist don't know what 96% of the universe is"

Well, 96% is a pretty specific number if we have almost no knowledge about a subject how can we come up with such a specific number....?

I think you are refering to the question of the so called dark matter and dark energy.

Well, does that mean that after finding out what dark matter is we understand over 96% of the universe?

I think this number is just marketing for more research funding

[BigMTBrain]

@1simonmatthews - (part 4) - To illustrate again that consciousness is dependent upon the physical brain: Someday within the next 100 years, man will have created a device that can create a molecule-by-molecule identical clone of any physical thing of a reasonable size. If that thing happens to be a working brain with a working consciousness, the working clone, when sparked to life will have and exhibit the exact same consciousness as its source until experiential divergence.

[BigMTBrain]

@1simonmatthews - (part 3) - You have fallen prey, like many minds (primarily small), to the Anthropic Principle (See Wikipedia) which basically asserts: We are here; therefore, the universe intended us to be here. That is much less objective science than it is subjective religion. Much more scientific and objective is the possibility that the universe is capable of producing novelty haphazardly by happenstance; a far more interesting scenario than a pre-programmed universe.

[BigMTBrain]

@1simonmatthews - (part 2) - In my first response, replace "the monkeys" with "evolution". That is precisely the story of how consciousness came to be. Hit-and-miss evolution, using only the elements presented, stumbled upon life, then, haphazardly yet progressively produced creatures over BILLIONS of years, that were more and more adept at surviving. Over time, from neurons collectively as increasingly complex brains, consciousness emerged and became increasingly elaborate.

[BigMTBrain]

@1simonmatthews - Regardless of WHATEVER consciousness is, it's clear it springs forth from and is wholly dependent upon the PHYSICAL brain. PROOF: Try cutting out a portion of your brain and see if your consciousness remains the same. Destroy the brain, destroy consciousness. It's purely a matter of the monkeys stumbling upon a similar level of complexity, organization, and functionality. Awareness is not a miracle as you believe. Subjectivity bars you from reason. Try again.

[1simonmatthews]

@BigMTBrain This is the last one I'm replying to because it was the last one in my notifications. Here's some news for you. No one has explained what consciousness is yet, there are only theories which are FAR from being proved. So to make claims about monkeys creating conscious brains is incorrect and has no scientific evidence to support it. It is only your subjective philosophical belief. Fact-based reason that.

[BigMTBrain]

@1simonmatthews -"Don't you think there is a little bit of a difference between [...] something that is aware of itself." NO! For the simple reason that given the elements and time required, the same monkeys could stumble upon creating a brain from which could emerge awareness. (See: "Boltzmann Brain" for starts.) Aww, da liddle baby got his ego hurt. Awww. Well, sorry. Perhaps this has been a lesson to you that SUBJECTIVE BELIEF is no match for OBJECTIVE, STRONG-THEORY and FACT-BASED REASONING.