• Question: What is consciousness?

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      Asked by DIS4STERSTR1KE-TSQD to John, Laura, Luke, Rob, Ruth on 15 Jun 2016.
      • Photo: Laura Finney

        Laura Finney answered on 15 Jun 2016:

        I think consciousness isn’t completely understood but I see it as being aware of what is going on around you and being able to think about it and/or respond.

        This article gives a good comparison between you seeing an apple through your eye and a camera “seeing” an apple. How you recognise it as an apple but a camera doesn’t

        http://thebrainbank.scienceblog.com/2013/03/04/what-is-consciousness-a-scientists-perspective/

      • Photo: John Fossey

        John Fossey answered on 16 Jun 2016:

        Its a really great question – I am not sure I can answer accurately so I’ll just give my opinion

        Awareness of need sums it up. A plant needs water but does not know it, a dog needs water so changes behaviour “consciously.”

        I might be in a dangerous situation so I know I “need” to change the situation, a strawberry that is about to be squashed is not conscious of the danger or threat.

        There are hundreds of books on the subject, I suggest that because so much continues to be written suggests there is no definitive answer.

      • Photo: Luke Williams

        Luke Williams answered on 16 Jun 2016:

        It is what makes us, us.

        The best way I think to understand what consciousness is , is to look at someone without it, and the best example of this is coma patients and others with severe conditions. Naturally, being such a complex case, there are various different illnesses and conditions that result in a variety of coma like effects, but I am talking very very broadly here.

        It was once assumed that someone in a “permanent vegetative state” had no idea of the passing world. They were not paralysed, but they had no communicative ability, they had no quality of life. They would appear to be normal, to an extent, their reflexes work, but there isn’t any active response or interaction. This belief is changing, and more work I think is being done to figure out just what is going on in the brain and to see if there is a better treatment.

        Another condition is “locked in” syndrome, whereby the patient is able to think and understand, but generally unable to communicate and is paralysed. Some of these patients have been able to communicate through blinking and high tech solutions in recent times.

        Returning to coma patients, who are unconscious for a long time, those that wake up tend to do so in various stages. Whilst appearing to wake up and be totally normal, they may still technically be in the coma according to their brain function, and they will have no memory of waking up at that stage. This period may include some time in a “minimally conscious” state, whereby the patient will be able to respond to simple commands but doesn’t communicate or has any higher understanding.

        This area is really poorly understood, and some of the above advances have come because of misdiagnosis. There are relatively few treatments in many cases aside from “watch and wait”. What can be taken from this are the variety of things that we take for granted that could be part of consciousness:

        1) Wakefulness
        2) Awareness of surroundings
        3) Communication
        4) Higher thinking – reasoning, mathematics, language, science
        5) Memory

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