A Bachelor’s Life of Consciousness

Abstract

Pietro Perconti’s article outlines a cognitive social theory of self-consciousness, navigating between phenomenological views and illusionist perspectives. His argument suggests that rather than being intrinsically valuable, self-consciousness is evolutionarily instrumental, facilitating social cognition. However, both extremes – self-consciousness as the pinnacle of the human spirit and the dismissal of subjectivity – pose challenges to his theory. Perconti’s alignment with functionalism and the prospect of self-conscious robots raises concerns about the reduction of self-consciousness to mere functional roles, potentially sidelining subjectivity. Further complications arise from the unclear definition of terms like ‘self-consciousness’, ‘first-person perspective’, and ‘qualia’, which the theory purports to explain. While conceptual self-consciousness is tied to social cognition, non-conceptual forms, such as self-recognition and deliberative problem-solving, suggest a broader scope. Additionally, evolutionary evidence from intelligent invertebrates like octopuses, which exhibit self-conscious behavior without social interaction, challenges the notion that self-consciousness solely arises from social cognition. Thus, while Perconti’s theory may describe conceptual self-consciousness tied to social constructs, it falls short of encompassing the complete range of subjective phenomena.