“A BRIEF TOUR OF HUMAN CONSCIOUSNESS” by V. S. Ramachandran

In my first year at Psychology College, I studied <<Introduction to Philosophy of the Mind>>. Even though I was a novice in the matter, I benefitted from the passionate teachers who taught it. Thus, I began my search for books about consciousness, and in this quest, I found V. S. Ramachandran and his wonderful book “A Brief Tour of Human Consciousness.”

V. S. Ramachandran is a neuroscientist (I am still interested by the neurosciences) and the director of the Center for Brain and Cognition at the University of California, San Diego.

I found his book fascinating because the author started with discoveries about the brain to explain qualia (the problem of subjective sensations) and the self. The author describes the characteristics of the self as follows:
– “continuity: a sense of unbroken thread running through the whole fabric of experience with the accompanying feeling of past, present, future.”
– “the idea of unity of the self: we each experience ourselves as one person, as a unity.”
– “a sense of embodiment or ownership: we feel ourselves anchored to our bodies.”
– “a sense of agency: free will.”
– “the self is capable of reflection–of being aware of itself.”

V. S. Ramachandran says that he can stimulate our right parietal cortex with an electrode (while we are conscious and awake) and we will momentarily feel that we are floating near the ceiling, having an out-of-the-body experience. And this is true for all the other characteristics of the self: each of them can be selectively affected in brain disease.

“By studying synesthesia, hysteria, phantom limbs, free will, blindsight and asking the right questions, neuroscientists can begin to answer some of the questions that have preoccupied the philosophers since the dawn of history:
What is free will?
What is body image?
Why do we blush?
What is art?
What is the self?
Who am I?
No enterprise is more vital for the well-being and survival of the human race. This is just as true now as it was in the past.

Remember that politics, colonialism, imperialism and war also originate in the human brain.”

Publisher: Pi Press New York, 2004