Facing up to the hard question of consciousness.
Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences September 19, 2018 DOI: 10.1098/rstb.2017.0342 (opens in new tab)
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Theoretical or philosophical paper Peer reviewed |
|---|---|
| Keywords | Chalmers Access Block Consciousness Degrees of freedom Virtual machines |
| Key points | Argues that the hard problem of consciousness is a chimera and that the proper focus should be on the 'hard question' of what happens after conscious content arises. |
Abstract
The so-called hard problem of consciousness is a chimera, a distraction from the hard question of consciousness, which is once some content reaches consciousness, 'then what happens?'. This question is seldom properly asked, for reasons good and bad, but when asked it opens up avenues of research that promise to dissolve the hard problem and secure a scientifically sound theory of how the human brain produces the (sometimes illusory) convictions that mislead us.This article is part of the theme issue 'Perceptual consciousness and cognitive access'.
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- The Role of Top-Down Modulation in Shaping Sensory Processing Across Brain States: Implications for Consciousness. Frontiers in Systems Neuroscience 2019
- Integrated world modeling theory expanded: Implications for the future of consciousness. Frontiers in Computational Neuroscience November 24, 2022
- Perceptual consciousness and cognitive access: an introduction. Philosophical transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series B, Biological sciences September 19, 2018
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