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Open questions on consciousness: location, organization, interaction, evolution, perception, and social behavior

Determine the anatomical and computational location of the conscious component of the human brain; characterize its internal organization; elucidate how conscious processes interact with unconscious processing; identify the evolutionary advantages of the conscious–unconscious arrangement in humans; clarify the role of consciousness in perception; and ascertain how consciousness relates to social behavior.

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Background

Within a computational view of the brain, the author argues that consciousness requires no special essence but highlights outstanding questions. These span where consciousness resides, how it is organized, how it interacts with unconscious processes, why this arrangement evolved, and its roles in perception and social behavior.

These questions are positioned as central to understanding human cognition within the prene framework and its implications for social dynamics described elsewhere in the book.

References

“As an aside, while there is no ‘special sauce’ required for consciousness, there are many interesting open questions. Where does the conscious part of our brain reside? How is it organized? How does it interact with the unconscious parts? What was the evolutionary advantage for the human-gene-set to arrange things this way? What is its role in perception (see Perceptions)? And, perhaps most importantly, how are consciousness and social behavior related (see Cultural-prenes and the perception of emotions)?”

— Darwin Turing Dawkins: Building a General Theory of Evolution (2402.10393 - Adleman, 16 Feb 2024) in Part III: Computers — On the evolution of the human brain