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Hard Problem Of Consciousness
In the philosophy of mind, the hard problem of consciousness is to explain why and how humans and other organisms have qualia, phenomenal consciousness, or subjective experience. It is contrasted with the "easy problems" of explaining why and how physical systems give a human being the ability to discriminate, to integrate information, and to perform behavioural functions such as watching, listening, speaking (including generating an utterance that appears to refer to personal behaviour or belief), and so forth. The easy problems are amenable to functional explanation—that is, explanations that are mechanistic or behavioural—since each physical system can be explained purely by reference to the "structure and dynamics" that underpin the phenomenon. Proponents of the hard problem propose that it is categorically different from the easy problems since no mechanistic or behavioural explanation could explain the character of an experience, not even in principle. Even after all the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Philosophy Of Mind
Philosophy of mind is a branch of philosophy that deals with the nature of the mind and its relation to the Body (biology), body and the Reality, external world. The mind–body problem is a paradigmatic issue in philosophy of mind, although a number of other issues are addressed, such as the hard problem of consciousness and the nature of particular mental states.Siegel, S.: ''The Contents of Visual Experience''. New York: Oxford University Press. 2010.Macpherson, F. & Haddock, A., editors, ''Disjunctivism: Perception, Action, Knowledge'', Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008. Aspects of the mind that are studied include mental events, mental functions, mental property, mental properties, consciousness and neural correlates of consciousness, its neural correlates, the ontology of the mind, the nature of cognition and of thought, and the relationship of the mind to the body. Dualism (philosophy of mind), Dualism and monism are the two central schools of thought on the mind–bo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mars
Mars is the fourth planet from the Sun. It is also known as the "Red Planet", because of its orange-red appearance. Mars is a desert-like rocky planet with a tenuous carbon dioxide () atmosphere. At the average surface level the atmospheric pressure is a few thousandths of Earth's, atmospheric temperature ranges from and cosmic radiation is high. Mars retains some water, in the ground as well as thinly in the atmosphere, forming cirrus clouds, frost, larger polar regions of permafrost and ice caps (with seasonal snow), but no liquid surface water. Its surface gravity is roughly a third of Earth's or double that of the Moon. It is half as wide as Earth or twice the Moon, with a diameter of , and has a surface area the size of all the dry land of Earth. Fine dust is prevalent across the surface and the atmosphere, being picked up and spread at the low Martian gravity even by the weak wind of the tenuous atmosphere. The terrain of Mars roughly follows a north-south ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Patricia Churchland
Patricia Smith Churchland (born 16 July 1943) is a Canadian-American analytic philosopher noted for her contributions to neurophilosophy and the philosophy of mind. She is UC President's Professor of Philosophy Emerita at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD), where she has taught since 1984. She has also held an adjunct professorship at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies since 1989. She is a member of the Board of Trustees Moscow Center for Consciousness Studies of Philosophy Department, Moscow State University. In 2015, she was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts & Sciences. Educated at the University of British Columbia, the University of Pittsburgh, and Somerville College, Oxford, she taught philosophy at the University of Manitoba from 1969 to 1984 and is married to the philosopher Paul Churchland. Larissa MacFarquhar, writing for ''The New Yorker,'' observed of the philosophical couple that: "Their work is so similar that they are sometimes di ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Thomas Metzinger
Thomas Metzinger (; born 12 March 1958) is a German philosopher and Professor Emeritus of theoretical philosophy at the University of Mainz. His primary research areas include philosophy of mind, philosophy of neuroscience, and applied ethics, particularly focusing on neurotechnology, virtual reality, and artificial intelligence. He has argued in his book ''Being No One'' that the phenomenal self is a mental construct created by the brain. His 2024 book ''The Elephant and the Blind'' compiled extensive research on meditation. Academic career Metzinger studied philosophy, ethnology, and theology at Goethe University Frankfurt. He received his doctorate there in 1985, with a thesis on the mind-body problem. In 1992, he completed his habilitation at the University of Giessen. In 2000, Metzinger was appointed professor of philosophy of cognitive science at Osnabrück University, but moved to the University of Mainz in the same year. Metzinger cofounded in 1994 of the Assoc ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Massimo Pigliucci
Massimo Pigliucci (; born January 16, 1964) is an American philosopher and biologist who is professor of philosophy at the City College of New York, former co-host of the '' Rationally Speaking Podcast'', and former editor in chief for the online magazine ''Scientia Salon''. He is a critic of pseudoscience (including creationism), and an advocate for secularism and science education. His recent work has focused on stoicism. Biography Pigliucci was born in Monrovia, Liberia and raised in Rome. He has a doctorate in genetics from the University of Ferrara, a PhD in biology from the University of Connecticut, and a PhD in philosophy of science from the University of Tennessee. He is a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and of the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry. Pigliucci was formerly a professor of ecology and evolution at Stony Brook University. He explored phenotypic plasticity, genotype–environment interactions, natural selection, and the constra ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Daniel Dennett
Daniel Clement Dennett III (March 28, 1942 – April 19, 2024) was an American philosopher and cognitive scientist. His research centered on the philosophy of mind, the philosophy of science, and the philosophy of biology, particularly as those fields relate to evolutionary biology and cognitive science. Dennett was the co-director of the Center for Cognitive Studies and the Austin B. Fletcher Professor of Philosophy at Tufts University in Massachusetts. Dennett was a member of the editorial board for ''The Rutherford Journal'' and a co-founder of The Clergy Project. A vocal atheist and secularist, Dennett has been described as "one of the most widely read and debated American philosophers". He was referred to as one of the "Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, Four Horsemen" of New Atheism, along with Richard Dawkins, Sam Harris, and Christopher Hitchens. Early life and education Daniel Clement Dennett III was born on March 28, 1942, in Boston, Boston, Massachusetts, the son of R ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Christof Koch
Christof Koch ( ; born November 13, 1956) is an American cognitive scientist, neurophysiologist and computational neuroscientist best known for his work on the neural basis of consciousness. He was the president and chief scientist of the Allen Institute for Brain Science in Seattle. He remains at the Institute as a Meritorious Investigator. He is also the Chief Scientist of the Tiny Blue Dot Foundation in Santa Monica, that funds research meant to alleviate suffering, anxiety and other forms of distress in all people. From 1986 until 2013, he was a professor at the California Institute of Technology. Early life and education Koch was born in the Midwestern United States, and subsequently was raised in the Netherlands, Germany, Canada, and Morocco. Koch is the son of German parents; his father was a diplomat, as is his older brother Michael. He was raised as a Roman Catholic and attended a Jesuit high school in Morocco. His interest in consciousness commenced as a child when ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Giulio Tononi
Giulio Tononi () is a neuroscientist and psychiatrist who holds the David P. White Chair in Sleep Medicine, as well as a Distinguished Chair in Consciousness Science, at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. He is best known for his Integrated Information Theory (IIT), a mathematical theory of consciousness, which he proposed in 2004. Biography Tononi was born in Trento, Italy, and obtained an M.D. in psychiatry and a Ph.D. in neurobiology at the Sant'Anna School of Advanced Studies in Pisa, Italy. He is an authority on sleep, and in particular the genetics and etiology of sleep. Tononi and collaborators have pioneered several complementary approaches to study sleep: * genomics * proteomics * fruit fly models * rodent models employing multiunit / local field potential recordings in behaving animals * in vivo voltammetry and microscopy * high-density EEG recordings and transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS) in humans * large-scale computer models of sleep and wakefulness This ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Francisco Varela
Francisco Javier Varela García (September 7, 1946 – May 28, 2001) was a Chilean biologist, philosopher, cybernetician, and neuroscientist who, together with his mentor Humberto Maturana, is best known for introducing the concept of autopoiesis to biology, and for co-founding the Mind and Life Institute to promote dialog between science and Buddhism. Life and career Varela was born in 1946 in Talcahuano in Chile, the son of Corina María Elena García Tapia and Raúl Andrés Varela Rodríguez. After completing secondary school at the Liceo Alemán del Verbo Divino in Santiago (1951–1963), like his mentor Humberto Maturana, Varela temporarily studied medicine at the Pontifical Catholic University of Chile and graduated with a degree in biology from the University of Chile. He later obtained a Ph.D. in biology at Harvard University. His thesis, defended in 1970 and supervised by Torsten Wiesel, was titled ''Insect Retinas: Information processing in the compound eye''. After ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Cognitive Neuroscience
Cognitive neuroscience is the scientific field that is concerned with the study of the Biology, biological processes and aspects that underlie cognition, with a specific focus on the neural connections in the brain which are involved in mental processes. It addresses the questions of how cognitive activities are affected or controlled by neural circuits in the brain. Cognitive neuroscience is a branch of both neuroscience and psychology, overlapping with disciplines such as behavioral neuroscience, cognitive psychology, physiological psychology and affective neuroscience.Gazzaniga 2002, p. xv Cognitive neuroscience relies upon theories in cognitive science coupled with evidence from neurobiology, and Computational neuroscience, computational modeling. Parts of the brain play an important role in this field. Neurons play the most vital role, since the main point is to establish an understanding of cognition from a neural perspective, along with the different lobes of the cerebra ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ned Block
Ned Joel Block (born 1942) is an American philosopher working in philosophy of mind who has made important contributions to the understanding of consciousness and the philosophy of cognitive science. He has been professor of philosophy and psychology at New York University since 1996, and a Silver Professor since 2005. Education and career Block obtained his PhD from Harvard University in 1971 under the direction of Hilary Putnam. He joined the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) as an assistant professor of philosophy (1971–1977), and then served as associate professor of philosophy (1977–1983), professor of philosophy (1983–1996) and as chair of the philosophy section (1989–1995). He has, since 1996, been a professor in the departments of philosophy and psychology at New York University (NYU). Block received the Jean Nicod Prize in 2013, and has given the William James Lectures at Harvard University in 2012 and the John Locke Lectures at Oxford University in 2 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
New Statesman
''The New Statesman'' (known from 1931 to 1964 as the ''New Statesman and Nation'') is a British political and cultural news magazine published in London. Founded as a weekly review of politics and literature on 12 April 1913, it was at first connected with Sidney Webb, Sidney and Beatrice Webb and other leading members of the socialist Fabian Society, such as George Bernard Shaw, who was a founding director. The longest-serving editor was Kingsley Martin (1930–1960), and the most recent editor was Jason Cowley (journalist), Jason Cowley, who assumed the post in 2008 and left in 2024. Today, the magazine is a print–digital hybrid. According to its present self-description, it has a modern Liberalism in the United Kingdom, liberal and Independent progressive, progressive political position. Jason Cowley (journalist), Jason Cowley, the magazine's editor, has described the ''New Statesman'' as a publication "of the left, for the left" but also as "a political and literary magaz ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
