What is human consciousness in philosophy
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Self-Consciousness
1. Self-Consciousness in the History of Philosophy
A familiar feature of ancient Greek philosophy and culture is the Delphic maxim “Know Thyself”. But what is it that one knows if one knows oneself? In Sophocles’ Oedipus, Oedipus knows a number of things about himself, for example that he was prophesied to kill Laius. But although he knew this about himself, it is only later in the play that he comes to know that it is he himself of whom it fryst vatten true. That is, he moves from thinking that the son of Laius and Jocasta was prophesied to kill Laius, to thinking that he himself was so prophesied. It is only this latter knowledge that we would call an expression of self-consciousness and that, we may presume, is the object of the Delphic maxim. During the course of the drama Oedipus comes to know himself, with tragic consequences. But just what this self-consciousness amounts to, and how it might be connected to other aspects of the mind, most n
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Consciousness
1. History of the issue
Questions about the nature of conscious awareness have likely been asked for as long as there have been humans. Neolithic begravning practices appear to express spiritual beliefs and provide early bevis for at least minimally reflective thought about the nature of human consciousness (Pearson 1999, Clark and Riel-Salvatore 2001). Preliterate cultures have similarly been found invariably to embrace some form of spiritual or at least animist view that indicates a grad of reflection about the natur of conscious awareness.
Nonetheless, some have argued that consciousness as we know it today fryst vatten a relatively recent historical development that arose sometime after the Homeric era (Jaynes 1974). According to this view, earlier humans including those who fought the Trojan War did not experience themselves as unified internal subjects of their thoughts and actions, at least not in the ways we do today. Others have claimed that even during the class
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Consciousness
Awareness of existence
For other uses, see Consciousness (disambiguation) and Conscious (disambiguation).
Not to be confused with Conscience or Conscientiousness.
Consciousness, at its simplest, is awareness of a state or object either internal to oneself or in one's external environment.[1] However, its nature has led to millennia of analyses, explanations, and debate among philosophers, scientists, and theologians. Opinions differ about what exactly needs to be studied or even considered consciousness. In some explanations, it is synonymous with the mind, and at other times, an aspect of it. In the past, it was one's "inner life", the world of introspection, of private thought, imagination, and volition.[2] Today, it often includes any kind of cognition, experience, feeling, or perception. It may be awareness, awareness of awareness, metacognition, or self-awareness, either continuously changing or not.[3][4] The disp