Category: books

Consciousness is something you do

Attention / Consciousness / Mental Action / metaphysics of mind / Philosophy of Mind / Sebastian Watzl: Structuring Mind / Self-consciousness

Many parents who look into the eyes of their newborn baby encounter something wonderful, and awe inspiring. There in those eyes they get a glimpse of a new perspective, a new point of view on the world. A new consciousness. The idea that consciousness is the subjective perspective we each …

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How attention shapes consciousness

Attention / Consciousness / Intentionality / Phenomenology / Philosophy of Mind / Sebastian Watzl: Structuring Mind

There is a subjective way you experience the world. This is way it is like for you to listen to Jazz, to look around curiously, or to taste dark chocolate. It is hard to know about what it is like for you to experience these things simply by observing your …

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Earthworms, Google servers, and an important kind of freedom

Attention / Cognition / evolution / Intentionality / Mental Action / metaphysics of mind / Neuroscience; Philosophy of Science / perception / Psychology / Sebastian Watzl: Structuring Mind

Yesterday, I sketched the priority structure framework: attention consists in the activity of regulating priority structures, which order the parts of the subject’s on-going mental life by their relative priority. Why would we organize our mind in this way? In other words, what is the function of attention?  The answer, …

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Structures of the Mind

Action / Attention / Consciousness / metaphysics of mind / Philosophy of Mind / Psychology / Sebastian Watzl: Structuring Mind

Yesterday, I suggested that we need a theory of attention that gives attention a central place in the mind and serves as a unified framework that integrates different approaches to attention, both in philosophy and in the empirical sciences. Today, I will sketch the priority structure framework and give some …

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Who needs a theory of attention?

Action / Attention / Consciousness / metaphysics of mind / Philosophy of Mind / Psychology / Sebastian Watzl: Structuring Mind

Let me tell you about my friend Jayden: these days, Jayden gives a lot of her attention to community work. Jayden has always paid attention to what matters morally over anything else. Her attention somehow just tends to be drawn to the suffering of others. Her own achievements, by contrast, …

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The Philosophy of Philip Kitcher

books / Philosophy of Science

I am writing to inform readers of Brains about a recent volume titled The Philosophy of Philip Kitcher. Kitcher’s work has been influential in many areas of philosophy. This volume surveys a range of Kitcher’s work, by a well-known group of contributors. Subjects covered include philosophy of science, philosophy of …

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