Aditi Doddavaram
The sense of a unified minimal self is a dynamical achievement of the brain, arising from the precise coordination of predictive processing and E/I interactions. While the phenomenological shifts of sickness response are well-documented, a unified computational mechanism linking sickness behaviour and destabilization of consciousness does not yet exist. This paper proposes that systemic immune...
Alexander P. Khudiakov
What is the nature of consciousness? How and why did it arise? What is the source of subjectivity as a key aspect of consciousness? The short answer to all three questions is collective behavior. This study presents the collective theory of consciousness which considers consciousness as collective or shared knowledge aimed at coordinating collective behavior. I show that any collective or...
James Heap, R Brooke Stephenson, Clare L Beasley
ABSTRACT Introduction Auditory verbal hallucinations (AVH) affect 60-80% of people with schizophrenia, yet existing assessment tools inadequately capture their phenomenological complexity. Aim To determine whether individuals with schizophrenia spectrum disorders could accurately match auditory verbal hallucination loudness to an external audio track, and to explore participant perspectives on...
J.H. Van Hateren
preprint
This book provides a comprehensive overview of my recent theoretical work that aims to explain some of the more puzzling properties of life and mind, in particular agency, goal-directedness and consciousness. It contains published papers as well as new material. Table of contents: Preface - PART I: GROUNDWORK - 1. Introduction - 2. The basic mechanism - 3. Inclusive and extensive fitness - 4....
David Barberá-Tomás, Camilo Miguel Signorelli, Adrian A. Díaz-Faes
This article analyzes the ongoing controversy in consciousness science surrounding Integrated Information Theory (IIT) from a sociological perspective. Drawing on Frickel and Gross's (2005) framework of Scientific/Intellectual Movements (SIMs), the study examines four key social processes that enabled IIT's emergence and consolidation as a successful SIM: (i) the role of high-status actors...
Giuseppe Pagnoni
preprint
This paper is based on a presentation delivered at a 2024 conference on consciousness studies in Padova, Italy. The event, titled "The Elephant in the Room: Investigating Consciousness Beyond Reductionism," was a collaborative effort between the Italian Buddhist Union (UBI) and the University of Padova. A revised version of this work is slated for publication in the conference proceedings volume.
Chandni Lal, Matt Welhaf, Michael J. Kane
preprint
Four studies evaluated probed mind-blanking reports, an off-task conscious state ostensibly experienced as an absence of thought and subjective experience. We examined whether people make mind-blanking reports to indicate uncertainty about their preceding thoughts, rather than to communicate an experienced “blank;” we also assessed whether subjects used “blank” to refer to the absence of...
Keiichi Onoda
Abstract Clarifying the mechanisms underlying the emergence of consciousness remains a fundamental challenge in modern neuroscience. Integrated Information Theory (IIT) provides a mathematical framework derived from the phenomenological properties of consciousness as its axioms. IIT proposes that consciousness is identical to a system’s intrinsic cause-effect information structure, quantified...
Heather M Hall
preprint
Anomalous self-experiences (ASEs) and basic self-disturbance have been proposed as core, and specific, markers of schizophrenia-spectrum disorders (SSD), operationalized through instruments such as the Examination of Anomalous Self-Experience (EASE). Many of the phenomena grouped under the ASE construct, derealization, depersonalization, altered embodiment, unstable self–world boundaries,...
James Thurbon, Annabelle Mitchell, Jordan J Wehrman et al.
preprint
Flicker light stimulation shows promise for inducing visual imagery, altered states of consciousness, and changes in arousal, with potential applications in relaxation and imagery-based therapeutic interventions. However, optimal utility depends on identifying how viewing conditions shape subjective and physiological outcomes. We examined whether eye condition (open, closed) modulates...