What do we mean by transformation in consciousness? Everyday usage suggests a transformation is a major and lasting change: in structure, appearance, character or function. One becomes something else, and since we are emphasizing consciousness, we must add, one has an altered state of consciousness, a new perception of oneself or one's socio/physical world, a conversion in awareness, belief,...
AbstractThis book considers the exact nature of the relation between mental and neural events, how both sorts of events come about, and their relation to actions. The answers that the book provides constitute a new determinist philosophy of mind.
AbstractAmong the living cells of the human body, and of the central and the peripheral nervous systems, it is neurons or nerve cells which are most immediately bound up with consciousness — with the antecedents of mental events, mental events themselves, and their consequents, the latter being other mental events and also actions. Neurons vary from very short indeed to a considerable length,...
Abstract Throughout recorded history and across major cultural and religious barriers many persons have claimed to have, had experiences of “pure” consciousness, that is, of a consciousness free of content and intention. Major spiritual traditions are built in significant ways around the existence of these experiences and the desirability of achieving them. Yet many philosophical and scientific...
We investigated the nature of the relationship between experiences of transcendental consciousness and psychological health. In Study 1, three groups with different levels of experience in transcendental meditation (TM) and in the TM-Sidhi program (techniques that have been shown to produce experiences of transcendental consciousness) were studied, using the self-investigation method of Hermans...
In rats tested during their first exposure to a Behavioral Pattern Monitor chamber, acute injections of the 5HT-2 agonists mescaline, quipazine, 2,5-dimethoxy-4-iodoamphetamine (DOI), 2,5-dimethoxy-4-methylamphetamine (DOM), or 2,5-dimethoxy-4-ethylamphetamine (DOET) produced an inhibition of locomotor and investigatory behavior during the first 30 min of the test session. This suppression of...
Koch 1990) that outlined a sketch of such a theory. Our aim was not to produce as complete a theory of con-sciousness as possible but to indicate promising lines of experimental work, mainly neurobiological, that might lead eventually toward a solution of the problem. We made the plausible assumption that all forms of con-sciousness (e.g., seeing, thinking, and pain) employ, at bottom, rather...
A recent interview with a 34-year-old man, currently serving a life sentence for murder, revealed a remarkable case of "near-death experience by proxy." The phenomenological features of the experience unfolded typically, with some slight variation in content. The immediate drastic changes in attitude and belief following the experience are described.
The thesis Is essentially an attempt to establish a comprehensive theory of consciousness, being and knowable reality that Is fully consistent both with all the analytic arguments that can be brought to bear In formulating such a theory and with the whole of the relevant scientific and other empirical evidence. It Is considered that such a theory would very probably be an extension of the...
This paper is based on therapeutic work carried out over the last 3 years involving basic or somatic autogenic training at both an individual and a group level. Referring to records gathered from those in autogenic training groups or attending individual autogenic training sessions, we have tried to identify some figures temporelles , as derived from Minkowski’s phenomenology of temps vécu . In...