Consciousness: What is 'Awareness?'

[calebprime]

It's even better than that as far as evidence is concerned because we know the relevant brain areas involved.

I'm sure you all know about prosopagnosia, which is a particular instance of deficits in determining particular types from a set of tokens. Folks with damage to bilateral inferior temporal lobes can determine that they are looking at a face but cannot determine which face they might be looking at. The deficit extends often to other instances of not being able to determine members of a certain class while still being able to determine the class itself. This example concerns the concept of a particular face and not simply its name.

Another example that Damasio has described involves a man with a lacunar stroke in his inferior temporal lobe who lost the ability to name power tools. He could describe their use, so he retained the concept of a power tool, but he lost the ability to name his power tools. He could still name other tools that did not involve electricity.

bilateral=both sides
inferior = the underside?
temporal lobes (the lobes on the side of the head)

Can someone link to a good diagram? (In the fullness of time, of course)...

I tried to find a picture of this or to visualize it, but, no go.

Lacunar stroke or lacunar infarct (LACI) is a type of stroke that results from occlusion of one of the penetrating arteries that provides blood to the brain's deep structures.

 

[Ichneumonwasp]

bilateral=both sides
inferior = the underside?
temporal lobes (the lobes on the side of the head)

Can someone link to a good diagram? (In the fullness of time, of course)...

I tried to find a picture of this or to visualize it, but, no go.

Lacunar stroke or lacunar infarct (LACI) is a type of stroke that results from occlusion of one of the penetrating arteries that provides blood to the brain's deep structures.

Oh, sorry, I didn't think anyone else was following and I thought those participating might know the terms involved.

Yes bilateral is both sides, inferior is bottom or underneath, and temporal lobes are the side lobes where language amongst other things takes place. And, yes, lacunar infarcts are due to occlusion of small penetrating arteries -- generally due to build up of crud (or to be technical, hyalinosis) in small arteries and arterioles due to hypertension. The important point being that the stroke is very small and very limited to a particular area.

I'll look for a good diagram with the relevant stroke or other cause of damage. I have a few slides with damage in the right areas for teaching purposes, but I can't easily upload them in large part because they are at work and I'm at home now.

ETA:

I'm not sure how to do images so, I hope this link works. It will give you an idea of the general area involved, though the damage is unilateral. It is possible to see prosopagnosia with unilateral damage -- usually on the non-dominant side (most often the right) -- but we still see case reports of this, so this is not the rule. The general rule is that bilateral damage is necessary.

Here's a link to an MRI that should give you a general idea of the location. The convention is that the right side of the brain is on the left side when looking at the image, so the damage in this case is on the right side. The reference I think (I didn't read the whole abstract) is to a general visual agnosia -- which still gets the same point across.

 

[Ichneumonwasp]

"Hmm... possibly" to all of the above. I'm responding to what I took to be your call for an 'operational' definition of awareness, one that we can work with; avoiding the versed vice of calling "awareness" consciousness and vice versa. I'm having all sorts of fun trying to identify, distinguish, and label the various phenomenological states that may comprise "consciousness" (which I think should be the category term for all 'experience' [another problematic term] and the potential for experience), without doing too much damage to ordinary language usage. To that end, I think "awareness" is better spoken of as discrete phen. events within consciousness: consciousness as the global 'map' -- the working sense we have of "where we are" in every sense of that phrase, the dread dasein, or a sort of "big picture" theory if you prefer early Wittgenstein to early Heidegger (see blobru. see blobru satisfy his pseudo-intellectual name-dropping quota for the week) -- and awareness as the subject's navigation thereof. Consciousness, the integrator; awareness, the discriminator. One problem I foresee is that it's also natural sometimes to speak of stimuli and responses even at the single-cell level as "awareness" of environment, and it's not clear to me that cells have experience that rises to the prerequisite level of consciousness in the way I've defined it (of course, under some definitions, rheostats are conscious, so it really is a name-game); maybe we shouldn't fret too much, though, so long as we're always mindful of our signal choices and animal ignorance.

Ahh, I misunderstood earlier. Yes, I think that gets to a major point that we have been circling for a while -- that awareness is not consciousness itself but only with it. Maybe?

Awareness as discriminator. I like that. I'm going to have to think about that. I wonder, though, if we shouldn't speak about awareness in terms of integration as well. That is a really interesting issue. I'm afraid I'm really going to have to think about that.

You keep throwing wrenches into this. That's exactly what I hoped for, so keep it up.

OK, one thing that you know is coming next -- since this is one of the major points of this thread -- what do we mean by discrimination or discriminator? How can we break it down?

 

[Piggy]

Well, to review, a token is a particular entity, as opposed to a type, which is a class of entities. So the concept of a cup in general--the idea that it's a type of thing we can drink out of, for example--is a type. But when I actually need to apply this to drink, I need to select a particular object; I need to, arbitrarily, pick up that cup and use it to drink out of--that's the token.

So what I precisely mean here is that we actually formulate not only the general idea that cups are things we can drink out of, but the applied, pragmatic idea that this means that this particular thing, being a cup, can be used when I want to drink.

No, I mean with reference to the brain.

When you say that when I see a cup, I "identify it as a token", what are you saying is happening in the brain, exactly?

I don't believe it makes sense to talk about awareness and consciousness and perception except by direct reference to what's happening in the brain, even if we're speaking with a degree of abstraction about it, which of course we have to.

Reading that, I can't correlate it at all to brain activity.

 

[Piggy]

I'm sure you meant to say level one with your first example for anyone following at home.

D'oh!

Yes, for some reason I wrote 3 instead of 1. I hope it's still intelligible.

Proprioception is a particular form of sensation having to do with limb position. I think there may be a different word you might want to use in it's place?

Limb position is simply one example.

Proprioception: The ability to sense stimuli arising within the body.

That's from Medicine.Net. Merriam-Webster online has much the same definition: "The reception of stimuli produced within the organism".

I'm using it here ("self perception") in a somewhat wider scope than it is most often used, but I don't know of a better word for it. So that's the term I'll continue to use, unless there is a better suggestion.

 

[Ichneumonwasp]

D'oh!

Yes, for some reason I wrote 3 instead of 1. I hope it's still intelligible.



Limb position is simply one example.



That's from Medicine.Net. Merriam-Webster online has much the same definition: "The reception of stimuli produced within the organism".

I'm using it here ("self perception") in a somewhat wider scope than it is most often used, but I don't know of a better word for it. So that's the term I'll continue to use, unless there is a better suggestion.

Enteroception is sometimes used. But that is a bit of a garbage term. I'm not aware of a really good term for internal information since most of it is non-conscious.

That definition is wrong. Proprioception is limb position sense, or more properly body position sense, though it has to be contrasted with balance which is carried out by the semicircular canals. That is another type of "internal" sense that is not proprioception.

One of the problems we have with the word is that some of the same information --proprioception -- that travels to the thalamus and then to parietal cortex to convey body sense is also carried in slightly different pathways to the cerebellum where the whole thing occurs subconsciously.

 

[Piggy]

Enteroception is sometimes used. But that is a bit of a garbage term. I'm not aware of a really good term for internal information since most of it is non-conscious.

That definition is wrong. Proprioception is limb position sense, or more properly body position sense, though it has to be contrasted with balance which is carried out by the semicircular canals. That is another type of "internal" sense that is not proprioception.

One of the problems we have with the word is that some of the same information --proprioception -- that travels to the thalamus and then to parietal cortex to convey body sense is also carried in slightly different pathways to the cerebellum where the whole thing occurs subconsciously.

How about idioception?

I think per and idio capture the difference.

One thing's clear, if we're going to continue talking about these 2 things (but maybe we're not) then we can't talk about "perception of exterior stimuli" on the one hand and a laundry list of different types of intra-organism -ceptions on the other.

 

[Ichneumonwasp]

How about idioception?

I think per and idio capture the difference.

One thing's clear, if we're going to continue talking about these 2 things (but maybe we're not) then we can't talk about "perception of exterior stimuli" on the one hand and a laundry list of different types of intra-organism -ceptions on the other.

Idioception, hmm, I kind of like that. Someone might think it refers to perception of ideas though, if they don't pay attention to the second i.

You're right, though, we do need a good word to refer to all the internal information because that is a huge part of the story -- one that I meant to bring up later, but you have already done so. Enteroception is the only accepted one I know, but I'm fine with idioception. It certainly gets across the point that it is about the individual or from the individual.

 

[LightningStrike]

The human body marks the line between the worlds of awareness and consciousness. In front of the body is the world of awareness and behind the body, where you can't see, is the world of consciousness. The body marks the interface. "I" can move between the two in infinite degrees.

Attempting to understand consciousness from the position of awareness is a fanciful exercise, like a snaking beam attempting to be the space in which it moves, or something trying to be nothing. The only way is to be still and travel back on the "line" from awareness into consciousness and from there you see the big picture, and that is I assume what all contributors to this thread are doing.To me it is the an all consuming passion.


It is most important to know what awareness is and for this purpose I will use the entity "my self" to define it. Where you are it is "your self" or you, the entity who is reading this. That entity takes positions. And that position-taking happens in consciousness. Whenever "I" take a position my consciousness is the subject and that position is the object and between the two there is a line of awareness. This can be worked backwards by asking the question "who am I", Knowing that any position that occurs in inner space or anything thing that is seen there is what I am not. And in that reflection I know that I am conscious as no-thing.

If your subconscious is telling you that that means death you are quite right, but it is only the death of the entity, the position. The body and consciousness is fine and functions perfectly.


So our psychological experience of being in existence could be described as the gradual death of positions. Until the final position is seen and then consciousness is realised. The final position is a feeling of psychic force.

 

[yy2bggggs]

I don't believe it makes sense to talk about awareness and consciousness and perception except by direct reference to what's happening in the brain, even if we're speaking with a degree of abstraction about it, which of course we have to.

I respectfully, yet emphatically, disagree. You are essentially saying that top down analysis is impossible.

No, I mean with reference to the brain.

When you say that when I see a cup, I "identify it as a token", what are you saying is happening in the brain, exactly?

That something in your brain recognizes its role in being able to carry out some general planning task in some aspect, such that this recognized role is invariant under type-equivalent transformations, yet is affected by type-inequivalent transformations.

Reading that, I can't correlate it at all to brain activity.

Well, in practice, when we drink, we drink out of glasses, or cups, without even thinking about it. We don't tend to drink out of bowls, saucers, or jar lids, even though it's perfectly possible to do so. We actually work with this sort of bias, and I don't think it's too speculative to say that the reason we're biased to drink from cups is because we have a type-category that we associate with drinking. This is demonstrated by the fact that we drink from anything that is a member of that type.

The wasp pointed out correlations to specific brain areas... I don't believe I need this to demonstrate that the brain does this (and am not entirely convinced that all token-type associations are made using this part of the brain anyway), though I consider this good evidence that these areas of the brain are critical for certain type-token associations.

 

[Piggy]

I respectfully, yet emphatically, disagree. You are essentially saying that top down analysis is impossible.

No, actually I'm not. What I am saying, however, is that when we leave off speaking of what the brain is doing, then it's like trying to talk about swimming without reference to the body.

You can talk about the stroke, the pull and the kick, alignment, breathing, rhythm, acceleration, drag, turbulence, and all that sort of thing, but when asked a question like "what do you mean by accelerate in from the corner?" is asked, then there had better be an answer which is clearly related to what the body is doing.

Similarly, if you say that I "identify a cup as a token" then the answer had better be grounded in what my brain is doing when I see a cup. If it's not, then suddenly we're off into the air.

When we talk about consciousness and awareness, we're talking about the brain, that's all. I'm sure you agree.

So our terms must refer to what the brain is actually doing.

 

[Piggy]

That something in your brain recognizes its role in being able to carry out some general planning task in some aspect, such that this recognized role is invariant under type-equivalent transformations, yet is affected by type-inequivalent transformations.

I'm pretty sure I get what you're saying, but could you elaborate with an example using those 2 types of tasks, please.

 

[Piggy]

Well, in practice, when we drink, we drink out of glasses, or cups, without even thinking about it. We don't tend to drink out of bowls, saucers, or jar lids, even though it's perfectly possible to do so. We actually work with this sort of bias, and I don't think it's too speculative to say that the reason we're biased to drink from cups is because we have a type-category that we associate with drinking. This is demonstrated by the fact that we drink from anything that is a member of that type.

What's really interesting is to try to get down to the nitty gritty in terms of what clusters of associations our brains actually use to signal "This is one of those".

For example, here's an interesting study about how mouse brains recognize "my nest" and "this thing can be used as a nest".

If it falls in the correct range of size, shape, and texture, then bingo, it can be a nest.

So for us, depending on our life experience and home culture(s), there are bound to be a relatively small number of features and ranges of values within those features which signal to us "drinking utensil".

Clumping features into higher level abstractions like "nest" and "cup" allows us to navigate the world more efficiently. Although sometimes it can mislead us, as well.

So is that what you would mean by a "token", then? For a mouse, an object that is the right shape (higher edge, lower center, roughly circular) and the right size (not too small to fit in, not beyond a certain circumference) and the right texture (not perfectly smooth, not pointy, etc.) triggers the "can be a nest" token?

 

[yy2bggggs]

I'm pretty sure I get what you're saying, but could you elaborate with an example using those 2 types of tasks, please.

Types of transformations, you mean?

Should I find that I'm thirsty, I would want to solve this goal. A typical thing for me to do is to go up to get a cup of water. So I come up with another goal--to get a cup. And clean cups (which I use to drink out of) are supposed to be on the cupboard, in the kitchen.

When I reach the kitchen, I open the cupboard. Maybe all, or nearly all, of the dishes are dirty, so I could find only a single cup, or no cups.

If there's a single cup, it fits with the plan, no matter what cup it is. So I grab it and fill it with water, then I start sipping on the water.

If there were no cup, but there were a few bowls, however, I would be more likely to reassess the plan than I would be to drink out of the bowl. I might then wash out a cup. Or if I'm lazy, I might just shrug, and get a can of soda, and drink straight from it. It's possible that I would drink out of the bowl, but even if I do, that's going to be a reassessed plan, based on a bit of creativity and what I know of bowls being able to function like the cup.

Replacing one cup with any other cup (whichever cup is left on the cupboard) is a type-equivalent transformation. Replacing a cup with a bowl would be a type-inequivalent transformation.

No, actually I'm not. What I am saying, however, is that when we leave off speaking of what the brain is doing, then it's like trying to talk about swimming without reference to the body.

Alright, then it's possible that what I was doing was fine for you. The brain is doing this stuff

But I think there's been too much focus on the inputs and the processing with respect to meaning in this forum.

There's a feedback loop that people tend to miss when they focus too much on the inputs and the processing--and that is the one that goes through our motor controls to affect the environment outside of our brains, in such a way that we are able to perceive the result, and associate what we did to how it worked; in other words, this is the feedback loop that goes out of our brains and back in.

So is that what you would mean by a "token", then? For a mouse, an object that is the right shape (higher edge, lower center, roughly circular) and the right size (not too small to fit in, not beyond a certain circumference) and the right texture (not perfectly smooth, not pointy, etc.) triggers the "can be a nest" token?

Yes, and the right function as well:

In addition, we placed a glass floor over a typical circular nest so that the functionality, but not the visual image, of the nest was blocked (Fig. 5 A Bottom). Interestingly, under this glass floor scenario, the cell no longer changed its firing during the multiple crossings over the nest, as evident from both the perievent spike raster and perievent spike histogram. Thus, those experiments suggest that the cell's responses are tuned to the behaviorally determined nest function rather than viewing the mere visual images of nests through the glass floor. In another word, this form of conscious awareness of the presence of a nest is achieved by episodic, physical explorations.​

Clumping features into higher level abstractions like "nest" and "cup" allows us to navigate the world more efficiently. Although sometimes it can mislead.

Yes. The higher level abstractions are the types. And yes, it can mislead sometimes--you could say that we're biased by the types and their prototypical roles, leading to features such as functional fixedness. Which, basically, is why I don't generally drink water from bowls--it just doesn't occur to me to do that!

ETA: Thanks for the link.

 

[Ichneumonwasp]

But I think there's been too much focus on the inputs and the processing with respect to meaning in this forum.

There's a feedback loop that people tend to miss when they focus too much on the inputs and the processing--and that is the one that goes through our motor controls to affect the environment outside of our brains, in such a way that we are able to perceive the result, and associate what we did to how it worked; in other words, this is the feedback loop that goes out of our brains and back in.

Yes, exactly right and one of the reasons why I am no fan of the brain in a vat scenarios. Consciousness, however we define it, is an embodied phenomenon (set of processes, really) that includes constant looping of information to and from motor systems as well as sensory systems.

I often like to use the cerebellum as an example of this for unconscious processing because it is easier to see the info loops and the fact that the entire system works as a great big comparator, constantly updating sensory information with motor output and motor planning with sensory information and motor output (depending on which part of the cerebellum is being discussed).

Conscious processing works in a similar way undoubtedly but with other components thrown in having to do with emotional, declarative/autobiographical memory, and meaning/reasoning. There are not only feedback loops for motor control and sensory processing but also these other components and inputs from the reticular activating system. That brainstem-thalamic core of inputs is vitally important to the whole process, as is the constant looping of cortico-cortical information (which is what we see as the 40 Hz event related potentials).

It's a blooming, buzzing mess, but we can piece out the components I think.

 

[Piggy]

It's a blooming, buzzing mess, but we can piece out the components I think.

Please, let's keep this a James-free zone.

 

[calebprime]

please don't hurt me.

Here, hetero-phenomenologist and ethnobotanical-psychopharmacologist Mr. James, through pure introspection and possibly some light bondage, arrives at ontological certainty...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_qlqN3lUpzc

If you want, I'll report myself. It's a cry for help.

 

[Paul C. Anagnostopoulos]

If you want, I'll report myself. It's a cry for help.

You're such a super freak.

~~ Paul

 

[Ichneumonwasp]

Is it time to introduce change blindness yet? It certainly has much to tell us about the perception/memory side of the equation.