scholarly journals Husserl on Minimal Mind and the Origins of Consciousness in the Natural World

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bence Peter Marosan
Keyword(s):  
Empirical Research ◽  
Philosophy Of Mind ◽  
A Priori ◽  
Natural World ◽  
The Body ◽  
Contemporary Philosophy ◽  
Ongoing Debate ◽  
Animal Mind ◽  
Level Of Consciousness ◽  
Phenomenological Perspective

AbstractThe main aim of this article is to offer a systematic reconstruction of Husserl’s theory of minimal mind and his ideas pertaining to the lowest level of consciousness in living beings. In this context, the term ‘minimal mind’ refers to the mental sphere and capacities of the simplest conceivable subject. This topic is of significant contemporary interest for philosophy of mind and empirical research into the origins of consciousness. I contend that Husserl’s reflections on minimal mind offer a fruitful contribution to this ongoing debate. For Husserl, the embodied character of subjectivity, or consciousness, is essential for understanding minimal mind. In his view, there is an a priori necessary constitutive connection between the subjective and objective aspects of the body, between Leib and Körper, and this connection is especially important for exploring minimal mind from a phenomenological perspective. Thematically, the essay has three main parts. In Sect. 2, I present an overview of how minimal mind is framed in contemporary philosophy of mind and empirical research. I then analyse Husserl’s conception of embodiment with regard to the problem of minimal mind in Sect. 3. Finally, I present a more detailed investigation into Husserl’s account of minimal mind, highlighting features from his descriptions of animal mind and consciousness in early infancy (Sects. 4 and 5).

scholarly journals Mente, consciencia y cuerpo en la obra de Friedrich Nietzsche / Mind, Consciousness and the Body in Friedrich Nietzsche’s Opus

2016 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 75-82
Author(s):  
Mario Colon
Keyword(s):  
Friedrich Nietzsche ◽  
Philosophy Of Mind ◽  
The Body ◽  
Contemporary Philosophy ◽  
Causal Determinism ◽  
German Philosopher ◽  
The Mind

ABSTRACTThe study of consciousness possess considerable relevance in contemporary philosophy of mind. However, the “scientistic” approach that dominates the aforementioned discipline, although of undisputed usefulness, contributes to the rejection of other approaches whose explanatory value has proven to be illuminating in the study of mind, consciousness and the body. One of these approaches can be found in the philosophical works of Friedrich Nietzsche. The causal determinism of the mind-body relation proposed by the german philosopher has been posited through similar proposals for renowned neuroscientists and philosophers. Nevertheless, the historical and theoretical importance of Nietzsche’s contributions hasn’t been recognized as such. The purpose of this article is to show the subtleties of the causal determination in the mind-body relation and its implications in the actual discussions about the nature of consciousness.RESUMENEl estudio de la conciencia es de considerable relevancia en la filosofía de la mente contemporánea. Sin embargo, el enfoque “cientificista” imperante en esta disciplina, aunque de indiscutible utilidad, ha contribuido al rechazo de perspectivas cuyo valor explicativo resulta revelador en la investigación sobre la mente, la consciencia y el cuerpo. Una de estas perspectivas la podemos encontrar en la obra filosófica de Friedrich Nietzsche. El determinismo causal de la relación mente-cuerpo que propuso el filósofo alemán ha sido defendido por medio de propuestas similares de neurocientíficos y filósofos de probada pericia. No obstante, la relevancia de la aportación nietzscheana no ha sido reconocida en su importancia histórica y teórica. El propósito de este artículo es señalar las particularidades sobre la determinación causal de la relación mente/cuerpo y sus implicaciones en los debates actuales sobre la naturaleza de la consciencia.

scholarly journals Dreamless Sleep, the Embodied Mind, and Consciousness: The Relevance of a Classical Indian Debate to Cognitive Science

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Evan Thompson
Keyword(s):  
Cognitive Neuroscience ◽  
Philosophy Of Mind ◽  
Indian Philosophy ◽  
The Body ◽  
Contemporary Philosophy ◽  
Advaita Vedānta ◽  
Advaita Vedanta ◽  
Classical Indian Philosophy ◽  
Mind Training ◽  
Dreamless Sleep

One of the major debates in classical Indian philosophy concerned whether consciousness is present or absent in dreamless sleep. The philosophical schools of Advaita Vedānta and Yoga maintained that consciousness is present in dreamless sleep, whereas the Nyāya school maintained that it is absent. Consideration of this debate, especially the reasoning used by Advaita Vedānta to rebut the Nyāya view, calls into question the standard neuroscientific way of operationally defining consciousness as “that which disappears in dreamless sleep and reappears when we wake up or dream.” The Indian debate also offers new resources for contemporary philosophy of mind. At the same time, findings from cognitive neuroscience have important implications for Indian debates about cognition during sleep, as well as for Indian and Western philosophical discussions of the self and its relationship to the body. Finally, considerations about sleep drawn from the Indianmaterials suggest that we need a more refined taxonomy of sleep states than that which sleep science currently employs, and that contemplative methods of mind training are relevant for advancing the neurophenomenology of sleep and consciousness.

Body schema and pain

2021 ◽  
pp. 301-315
Author(s):  
Katsunori Miyahara
Keyword(s):  
Philosophy Of Mind ◽  
Pathological Condition ◽  
Body Schema ◽  
The Body ◽  
Contemporary Philosophy ◽  
Enactive Approach ◽  
The Third ◽  
Alternative Approach ◽  
Mind And Body ◽  
Conceptual Distinction

This chapter aims to situate Merleau-Ponty’s notion of body schema within the context of contemporary philosophy of pain. In the first section, the chapter starts by introducing his notion of body schema and its role in his account of the experience of pain. It then briefly reviews current theoretical treatments of pain in the analytic philosophy of mind. It outlines representational and imperative theories of pain by mapping them onto the conceptual distinction between body image and body schema. In the second section, the chapter further argues that they are both deeply entrenched in a Cartesian dualistic picture of mind and body. To be fair, imperativism partly overcomes the Cartesian conception of the body by acknowledging the significance of the body schema. To see how theories of pain can escape the dualistic picture, thus, it will be helpful to examine imperativist explanations. The chapter undertakes this task by closely examining Colin Klein’s imperativist account of a rare pathological condition called pain asymbolia. This account, it suggests in the third section, leads to an unacceptably over-intellectual view of the body because of hidden Cartesian assumptions. It concludes by contrasting this with an enactive approach to pain, deeply inspired by Merleau-Ponty. In the last section, the chapter turns to phenomenological grounds to clarify and support this alternative approach.

scholarly journals Panpsychism, Conceivability, and Dualism Redux

2019 ◽  
Vol 34 (1) ◽  
pp. 157-172
Author(s):  
Hane Htut Maung
Keyword(s):  
Philosophy Of Mind ◽  
Natural World ◽  
The Other ◽  
Contemporary Philosophy ◽  
Conceivability Argument ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
The One ◽  
Strong Reading ◽  
Special Case

In contemporary philosophy of mind, the conceivability argument against physicalism is often used to support a form of dualism, which takes consciousness to be ontologically fundamental and distinct from physical matter. Recently, some proponents of the conceivability argument have also shown interest in panpsychism, which is the view that mentality is ubiquitous in the natural world. This paper examines the extent to which panpsychism can be sustained if the conceivability argument is taken seriously. I argue that panpsychism’s ubiquity claim permits a strong reading or a weak reading. This presents a dilemma. On the one hand, the strong reading, which is typically characterised as a form of monism, is undermined by the conceivability argument. On the other hand, the weak reading, while compatible with the conceivability argument, turns out just to be a special case of dualism. I also show that the related position of panprotopsychism cannot provide a tenable monist position because it too cannot withstand the challenge of the conceivability argument. Therefore, if the conceivability argument is taken seriously, then we are committed to a dualist metaphysics, regardless of whether or not we accept the ubiquity claim.

Beyond Concepts

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ruth Garrett Millikan
Keyword(s):  
Philosophy Of Mind ◽  
Philosophy Of Language ◽  
Conceptual Development ◽  
Natural World ◽  
Language Function ◽  
Natural Signs ◽  
Transmission Of Information ◽  
The World ◽  
Natural Information ◽  
Natural Ontology

This book weaves together themes from natural ontology, philosophy of mind, philosophy of language and information, areas of inquiry that have not recently been treated together. The sprawling topic is Kant’s how is knowledge possible? but viewed from a contemporary naturalist standpoint. The assumption is that we are evolved creatures that use cognition as a guide in dealing with the natural world, and that the natural world is roughly as natural science has tried to describe it. Very unlike Kant, then, we must begin with ontology, with a rough understanding of what the world is like prior to cognition, only later developing theories about the nature of cognition within that world and how it manages to reflect the rest of nature. And in trying to get from ontology to cognition we must traverse another non-Kantian domain: questions about the transmission of information both through natural signs and through purposeful signs including, especially, language. Novelties are the introduction of unitrackers and unicepts whose job is to recognize the same again as manifested through the jargon of experience, a direct reference theory for common nouns and other extensional terms, a naturalist sketch of uniceptual—roughly conceptual— development, a theory of natural information and of language function that shows how properly functioning language carries natural information, a novel description of the semantics/pragmatics distinction, a discussion of perception as translation from natural informational signs, new descriptions of indexicals and demonstratives and of intensional contexts and a new analysis of the reference of incomplete descriptions.

scholarly journals Laying ghosts to rest

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Donnchadh O’Conaill
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
Philosophy Of Mind ◽  
A Priori ◽  
A Posteriori ◽  
Rule Out

AbstractOne of the most widely-discussed arguments against physcialism appeals to the conceivability of zombies, being which are physically or functionally identical to humans but which have no conscious experiences. Philip Goff (Philos Phenomenol Res 81(1): 119–139, 2010; Consci Cognit 21(2): 742–746, 2012a; in Sprevak M, Kallestrup J (eds) New waves in philosophy of mind. Palgrave, 2014) has recently presented a number of different anti-physicalist arguments appealing to the conceivability of ghosts, entities whose nature is exhausted by their being conscious. If ghosts are conceivable, this would rule out a priori physicalism. If the conceivability of ghosts entails that they are metaphysically possible, then this forms the basis for arguments against a posteriori physicalism. Drawing on work on conceivability by Peter Kung (Philos Phenomenol Res 81(3):620–663, 2010, Noûs 50(1): 90–120, 2016) and my own discussion of arguments which appeal to the conceivability of zombies (O’Conaill in Mihretu P Guta (ed) Consciousness and the ontology of properties. Routledge, New York, 2019), I shall argue that ghosts are conceivable, but that what allows us to conceive of them (our ability to make certain stipulations about the scenarios we conceive) undermines the belief that conceivability is a reliable guide to possibility. While this does not undermine Goff’s argument against a priori phyiscalism, it suggests that a posteriori physicalists need not be haunted by ghosts.

scholarly journals Semidiscrete central difference method in time for determining surface temperatures

2005 ◽  
Vol 2005 (3) ◽  
pp. 393-400 ◽  
Author(s):  
Zhi Qian ◽  
Chu-Li Fu ◽  
Xiang-Tuan Xiong
Keyword(s):  
Difference Method ◽  
Heat Conduction Problem ◽  
A Priori ◽  
Inverse Heat Conduction Problem ◽  
The Body ◽  
Temperature History ◽  
Measured Temperature ◽  
Central Difference ◽  
Approximation Solution ◽  
Computational Effect

We consider an inverse heat conduction problem (IHCP) in a quarter plane. We want to know the distribution of surface temperature in a body from a measured temperature history at a fixed location inside the body. This is a severely ill-posed problem in the sense that the solution (if exists) does not depend continuously on the data. Eldén (1995) has used a difference method for solving this problem, but he did not obtain the convergence atx=0. In this paper, we gave a logarithmic stability of the approximation solution atx=0under a stronger a priori assumption‖u(0,t)‖p≤Ewithp>1/2. A numerical example shows that the computational effect of this method is satisfactory.

Review of Spanish Monographs on Nietzsche

2018 ◽  
Vol 47 (1) ◽  
pp. 488-494
Author(s):  
Oscar Quejido Alonso
Keyword(s):  
Philosophy Of Mind ◽  
Political Thought ◽  
Contemporary Philosophy

Abstract This article reviews the most relevant monographs published in Spanish between 2012 and 2018. The latter have a particular focus on the relevance of Nietzsche’s philosophy for contemporary philosophy of mind, but they are also concerned with the reception of some fundamental tenets of Nietzsche’s political thought as well as with the reception of his work in Spain and the reconstruction of his intellectual itinerary.

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