Front Syst Neurosci
October 19, 2022
Louis N Irwin, Lars Chittka, Eva Jablonka et al.
11 citations
This collection of reviews, essays, and theories examines comparative animal consciousness from a biological and evolutionary perspective. Consciousness is defined as the process by which an animal has perceptual and affective experiences or feelings, arising from the material substrate of a nervous system. The work draws on a tradition of neuroscientific materialism, suggesting that consciousness is a biological phenomenon rooted in neural activity. It explores various aspects of how different animals may experience consciousness, taking an evolutionary approach to understand the origins and variations of conscious experience across species.
Front Syst Neurosci
November 22, 2021
Carlos Montemayor
6 citations
Consciousness research faces a cognitive-diversity problem because attention is understood as a diverse set of functions and capacities, yet consciousness is typically treated as a single, unified phenomenon. This inconsistency undermines claims that attention is necessary for consciousness or precedes conscious awareness. The article argues that consistency demands consciousness also be considered a diverse set of capacities, reflecting the multiplicity of kinds of attention. This implies diverse conscious capacities and types of awareness beyond standard distinctions like being awake, dreaming, or minimally conscious.
Front Syst Neurosci
July 29, 2024
Jose Luis Perez Velazquez, Diego Martin Mateos, Ramón Guevara et al.
4 citations
A new biophysical theory of consciousness, MaxCon, integrates aspects of several existing neuroscientific theories to find convergence points and simplify understanding of how cellular collective activity organizes to fulfill dynamic requirements. It highlights the association of consciousness with maximization of the number of configurations of neural network connections, constrained by neuroanatomy, biophysics, and the environment. A computable index indicating consciousness level is presented. The theory aims to provide a comprehensive view on consciousness and how normal nervous system dynamics can develop into pathological states, addressing the current discordance in consciousness research.
Front Syst Neurosci
July 10, 2019
Meditation involves complex brain dynamics that can be characterized by measures of dynamical complexity. This theoretical paper argues that standard neuroimaging approaches may oversimplify the neural processes underlying meditation by focusing on static or linear features. Instead, it proposes that nonlinear dynamical systems theory offers a more accurate framework for understanding how meditation alters brain activity over time. The authors suggest that meditation induces states of increased dynamical complexity, reflecting more flexible and adaptive neural coordination. This perspective shifts the focus from localized brain activations to the temporal structure of neural signals, potentially explaining the broad cognitive and emotional benefits attributed to meditation practice.
Front Syst Neurosci
January 6, 2017
The paper addresses the persistent difficulty in explaining how subjective conscious experience arises from objective brain activity, often called the explanatory gap. It argues that this gap is not merely a scientific puzzle but a conceptual one rooted in the different frameworks used to describe first-person experience versus third-person neural data. The author proposes that bridging this gap requires a shift in perspective, treating consciousness as a fundamental feature of reality rather than an emergent property of complex computation. The argument draws on insights from philosophy of mind, neuroscience, and contemplative traditions to suggest that the gap may be more apparent than real when examined through an integrated, non-reductive lens.
Front Syst Neurosci
February 17, 2015
The work examines how meditation and attentional tasks affect hemodynamic responses in the prefrontal cortex, suggesting that both activities engage this brain region.
Front Syst Neurosci
November 25, 2014
The paper critiques theories that equate consciousness with information or information processing, arguing that such approaches face significant conceptual problems. It contends that equating consciousness with information fails to account for the qualitative, subjective nature of conscious experience and cannot explain why certain information processing gives rise to awareness while other processing does not. The author suggests that these theories conflate correlation with identity and overlook the hard problem of consciousness.