Higher-Order Theories of Consciousness

It is one thing to say to an individual person or organism that it is conscious, and it is quite another thing to say of one of the mental states of a creature that it is conscious. In contrast, there is considerable dispute as to whether mental states can be phenomenally conscious without also being conscious in the functionally-definable sense and even more dispute about whether phenomenal consciousness can be reductively explained in functional and/or representational terms.

Key Takeaways:

• Higher-order theories of consciousness try to explain the distinctive properties of consciousness in terms of some relation obtaining between the conscious state in question and a higher-order representation of some sort.
• To provide an account of transitive creature-consciousness would thus be to attempt a theory of perception.
• There is a choice to be made concerning transitive creature-consciousness, failure to notice which may be a potential source of confusion

“There is a choice to be made concerning transitive creature-consciousness, failure to notice which may be a potential source of confusion.”

Read the full article here: Higher-Order Theories of Consciousness

~Comments always welcome…

Reference:

• Stanford.edu/Plato