Mirror-induced origination process of human self-consciousness —reconstructing consciousness-based cognitive theory
Study at a glance
AI-extracted from the abstract| Characteristics | Theoretical or philosophical paper |
|---|---|
| Key points | Argues that self-consciousness emerged when the brain's conscious reaction was repeatedly stimulated by a mirror image of the animal ancestor's own body, undergoing leap-like changes before transforming into mental self-consciousness. Proposes this as a natural evolutionary explanation and claims to resolve the "hard question" of consciousness in generation, transformation, definition, and mathematization, while offering a unified cognitive framework and a brain-inspired model for artificial intelligence. |
Abstract
Where did “we” come from? How did our self-consciousness come to be? This great mystery has puzzled philosophers and scientists for thousands of years. This study applies cognitive-behavioral experiments and deductive reasoning to demonstrate that the brain’s conscious reaction was induced in the animal ancestor of humans to undergo continuous, leap-like changes under the repetitive stimulation of a mirror image of its own body, before transforming into mental self-consciousness. It provides a natural evolution explanation for the emergence of intelligent life. In the process, this study solves the “hard question” of consciousness in generation, transformation, definition, and mathematization, and establishes a framework for reconstructing a complete cognitive theory based on consciousness and unified at the behavioral, cognitive, and neural levels. The framework systematically explains the basic cognitive processes and their interrelated mechanisms in the brain that determine individual human behavior, and theoretically explains typical cognitive behavior experiments such as the mirror test and rubber hand illusion experiment. Furthermore, this study presents an original brain-inspired model for the development of artificial intelligence and robotics in neural and evolutionary computing.