Consciousness Our knowledge of attention ends at the point where something tells the attentional areas to amplify perceptual signals. What is that something?

Where is the mind? Does the mind reside solely inside the brain? Put another way, where does the mind come from? Is the mind a thing, subject to the same natural laws as other things? What are the problems if it is? If it isn’t?

Dualism Many philosophers over the centuries have found it impossible to believe that the mind is merely part of the brain. The main idea of dualism is that the mind and brain are somehow separate and distinct entities. What questions does this raise?

Materialism If the mind and brain are separate, and the mind is a non-physical entity, how does the mind influence the brain? Why does a given mind appear to be tied to a specific brain? Materialism uses these questions to show that the mind must something that results from brain activity. Behaviorism Reductive materialism

Functionalism A philosophical descendent of materialism, functionalism was developed as a response to behaviorism. Behaviorism denies the utility of studying mental states. Functionalism requires it by theorizing about how the interactions of mental states yield complex behaviors. Information Processing Theory is the modern instantiation of functionalism most widely accepted among cognitive scientists.

Split-brain patients A treatment for severe epilepsy used to be to sever the corpus callosum, which eliminated routes of communication between the two brain hemispheres. One effect that this appears to have is the creation of two independent consciousness systems, where neither hemisphere is aware of what the other is doing. Patients are unable to name objects presented to the right hemisphere, but can exhibit appropriate semantic responses. Patients respond appropriately to commands given to the right hemisphere without understanding why. The left hemisphere can observe actions the right hemisphere takes, but then tries to fit them into its own context.

Unconscious processing How much do you know about what your brain is doing? Do you know exactly what you’re going to say before you actually say it? To understand the nature of consciousness, it helps to understand just how much work is done unconsciously. –Blindsight –Hemispatial neglect –Unconscious learning –Automatic processing

Backward Referral The backward referral hypothesis says that we never consciously engage an activity. Rather, we do something and then become consciously aware of it, but our mind refers are awareness back to the event, so we think we “decided” to do it. –Evidence shows that awareness of a given neural event lags behind the actual event by about 500ms. –However, it still takes time from when the neural cascade leading to an activity begins until we actually engage the activity. –This time is longer than 500ms. Thus, we still have the opportunity to interrupt the activity before it begins. –This is one possibility for the root of free will.