Concept of Consciousness in Cognitive Science and Philosophy of Mind – An Attempt at a Taxonomy

• Authors: Jakub Jonkisz

Title variants

PL

Pojęcie świadomości w kognitywistyce i filozofii umysłu – próba systematyzacji

EN

Concept of Consciousness in Cognitive Science and Philosophy of Mind – An Attempt at a Taxonomy

• Languages of publication: PL

Abstracts

PL

The paper argues that dozens conceptions of consciousness encountered in cognitive neuroscience, the philosophy of mind, and other related fields (e.g. phenomenal, access consciousness; sensorimotor, perceptual, self-consciousness; normal, altered and impaired consciousness, visual, tactile, social, body, animal, machine consciousness) can all be understood as constituted with reference to four fundamental criteria i.e. epistemic (dealing with kinds of consciousness), semantic (concerned with orders of consciousness), physiological (reflecting states of consciousness) and pragmatic (types of consciousness). It is not only hoped that the resulting four-fold taxonomy is exhaustive and clear enough to serve as a sound theoretical framework for further scientific investigations but also that it implies the unity of consciousness. If the latter consequence is true it would mean that all of the distinct varieties of consciousness ultimately refer to a single unified natural phenomenon, analyzed under four just mentioned aspects. Even if the statement of the unity can be questioned the proposed taxonomy is itself an important step towards a proper formulation of a general concept of consciousness accepted in all fields of research.

• Publisher: University of Warsaw, Institute of Philosophy
• Journal: Filozofia Nauki
• Year: 2012
• Volume: 20
• Issue: 2
• Pages: 29-55

Dates

published

2012-06-01

Contributors

author

Jakub Jonkisz