| FORM: | ARTICLE |
| Author: | Natsoulas, Thomas |
| Affiliation: | U California, Dept of Psychology, Davis, CA, USA |
| Title: | The Sciousness Hypothesis: I. |
| Source: | Journal of Mind & Behavior, 1996 Win, 1996. 17 (1): p.45-65 Reference. |
| Language: | English |
| Subjects: | Thesaurus terms: Awareness Cognition Consciousness States James (William) Psychology Theoretical Orientation |
| Added Keywords: | immediate awareness & sciousness hypothesis of mental occurrence in W. James’ “The Principles of Psychology” |
| Classification Code: | Consciousness States (2380) |
| Population Terms: Human | |
| Abstract: | The Sciousness hypothesis holds that how we know our mental-occurrence instances does not include our having immediate awareness of them. Rather, we take notice of our behaviors or bodily reactions and infer mental-occurrence instances that would explain them. InThe Principles of Psychology(W. James, 1950), James left it an open question whether the Sciousness Hypothesis is true. Nevertheless, he seems to have been tempted by the Sciousness Hypothesis. He adopted an account of inner awareness that is popular among present-day psychologists of consciousness, to the effect that awareness of a mental-occurrence instance never takes place from within its phenomenological structure, always from a certain distance, by means of a distinct mental-occurrence instance. The article clarifies and elaborates the Sciousness Hypothesis, and critically discusses a particular problem of consciousness, namely, the existence of “immediate awareness.” ((c) 1999 APA/PsycINFO, all rights reserved) |