The Nature of Self-Consciousness

Posted 18 Sep 2005 at 23:24 UTC by steve

Christophe Menant presented a lecture titled Evolution and Mirror Neurons. An Introduction to the Nature of Self-Consciounsess (PDF format) at the recent TSC 2005 conference in Denmark. Instead of taking the top down approach to explaning consciousness, Menat proposes a bottom up approach starting with the fact that self-consciousness is a product of evolution. He is particularly interested in two evolutionary steps: the transition from simple living elements to non-human primates and the transition non-human primates to human. The three steps equate to awareness, body self-awareness, and self-consciousness. Menat has done prior research into the evolutionary advantages of consciousness and into the differences in information and meaning to primates, humans, and robots.