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Neurobiological Theories of Consciousness. In CONS: 00055 a0005 Neurobiological Theories of Consciousness S Kouider, Laboratoire des Sciences Cognitives et Psycholinguistique, CNRS/EHESS/ENS-DEC, Paris, France ã 2009 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. Cognitive Influences on Neurobiological Glossary s0010 Accounts g0005 Neural correlates of consciousness –They p0010 are defined by Christoph Koch as ‘‘The Regarding the influence of cognitive theories, minimal set of neuronal mechanisms or the majority of neurobiological accounts can be events jointly sufficient for a specific seen, in fact, as extensions of preexisting cognitive conscious percept or experience.’’ They theories (e.g., for instance global workspace the- allow to avoid the difficult problem of directly ories). Indeed, one of the main tasks exercised by looking for neural bases. neurobiologists in the last two decades has been to search for cerebral or neuronal equivalents to the g0010 Panpsychism – Reflects the philosophical functional elements constituting cognitive models doctrine that everything (in Greek, ‘pan’) has PROOF a mind (‘psyche’) and is therefore conscious. (e.g., the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex for volun- Some theories presented in this article tary control, or long range axons for connecting endorse a certain form of panpsychism in brain regions associated with ‘unconscious’ and which anything that transmits information is ‘conscious’ processing). Of course, many neuro- in a way conscious. biologists disagree with this approach. Conscious- ness, because it is a biological problem, should be g0015 The hard problem – It is the problem of explaining how and why we have the reframed the other way around, by focusing pri- subjective experience of consciousness. It is marily on its structural basis rather than relying on often contrasted with the easy problem, cognitive theories, often considered too specula- which consists of describing consciousness tive. Therefore, many neurobiologists consider that as the cognitive ability to discriminate, an ideal neurobiological science of consciousness integrate information, focus attention, etc. should focus on neural structures and mechanisms in order to understand how the organic matter constituting the brain creates consciousness. The Hard Problem for a Neurobiology of s0015 s0005 Introduction VIER SECONDConsciousness p0005 Neuroscientists working on the issue of conscious- Yet, studying the neural mechanisms ‘leading to’ p0015 ness consider that it is a biological problem. They consciousness, trying to explain the ‘emergence’ assume that we will understand how and why we of consciousness, or focusing on how the brain are conscious by studying the cerebral and neuro- ‘creates’ consciousness, as often described in neu- nal features of the brain. These theories have robiological literature, sounds as if it involved an largely benefitedELSE from the recent advances in neu- immaterial soul that would magically arise from ropsychology, neurophysiology, and brain imaging the brain. This is not a new issue for philosophers in particular. However, neurobiologists have also who have also been wondering about the equiva- been influenced, on the one side, by cognitive lent mind–body problem since antiquity. More theories aimed at characterizing the psychological than a century ago, the contemporary ‘brain- determinants of consciousness, and on the other consciousness’ problem was well captured by side, by philosophical issues related to the mind– Thomas Huxley’s famous remark: ‘‘How it is that body problem. anything so remarkable as a state of consciousness 87 CONS: 00055 88 Neurobiological Theories of Consciousness comes about as a result of irritating nervous tissue, assigning too much importance to the explanatory is just as unaccountable as the appearance of the gap might actually turn out to be counterproduc- djinn when Aladdin rubbed his lamp in the story.’’ tive and impedes rather than facilitates scientific The same issue applies today: understanding con- progress. Accordingly, neurobiologists have mostly sciousness as an ‘emergent’ property ‘arising’ from focused on the easy problem, considering that functional elements of the neurocognitive archi- this strategy will progressively get us closer to tecture, without falling on a dualistic position understanding the full issue. They extended the where consciousness lies somewhere outside of ‘contrastive analysis,’ originally put forward by the brain, poses serious epistemological difficul- Bernard Baars, from the cognitive to the neurobi- ties and leads to the so-called hard problem of ological domain. While this method initially con- consciousness. sisted in contrasting conscious and unconscious p0020 Indeed, many philosophers have concluded that processes in order to characterize their cognitive there is not one single problem, but actually two features, the neurobiological approach aims at problems that are faced by anyone trying to under- characterizing the neural features. A typical exam- stand consciousness: they distinguish between the ple consists in comparing the cerebral activity so-called easy problem and hard problem. In a when subjects are presented with subliminal sti- nutshell, the easy problem consists in relying on muli they cannot report (unconscious processing) objective measures of conscious processing in with that of visible stimuliPROOF they can report (con- order to explain how one is able to discriminate scious processing). sensory events, integrate information, report men- In other terms, the current first step in trying p0030 tal states, focus attention, etc. By contrast, the to understand the link between consciousness hard problem consists in explaining the first- and the brain consists in finding out which neural order, subjective nature of qualias and phenomenal components are specifically involved during con- states, the ‘what is it like to be conscious’ as well as scious processing, but importantly not during un- how and why we experience consciousness at all. conscious processing. Francis Crick and Christoph Addressing the hard rather than the easy problem Koch have coined the term ‘neural correlates of of consciousness constitutes an important episte- consciousness’ (NCC; see Glossary) in order to mological constraint put forward by philosophers. describe this epistemological approach. According In particular, contemporary philosophers such as to them, the best strategy for a neurobiological Joseph Levine and later David Chalmers have science of consciousness is to search for the NCC. argued that trying to resolve the hard problem Underneath this approach is the crucial principle leads to an ‘explanatory gap’ that science is unable that ‘correlates’ do not imply any relation of causality to cross, at least today. Indeed, they stress the fact between the occurrence of conscious mental events that it appears impossible to demonstrate that a and their associated physiological structure. Conse- neural structure leads to a conscious experience, quently, this strategy has the advantage of leaving while denying the reverse possibility.VIER In addition, SECONDaside, at least for the moment, the hard problem of given how different they are, reducing phenomenal finding the neural ‘bases’ of consciousness. states to neural states appears almost impossible. In the following sections, I will provide an over- p0035 view of the current most influential neurobiologi- cal theories of consciousness. These theories will be s0020 Looking for Neural Correlates, Not Neural Bases largely described in an independent manner, such ELSE that each of them can be understood individually, p0025 Should neurobiologists then give up on addressing that is, without having to frame it in the context of this issue? Most neurobiologists acknowledge the alternative accounts. Only later, in the section existence of a hard problem. However, they also labeled ‘Neurobiological standpoints on the hard endorse the principle that further scientific inves- problem’ will I evaluate their explanatory power by tigations will ultimately allow us to resolve it. confronting them in relation to some important Others explicitly deny the existence of a hard conceptual issues (e.g., dissociating access vs. phe- problem in the Chalmerian sense. For some, nomenal consciousness, dissociating attention vs. CONS: 00055 Neurobiological Theories of Consciousness 89 consciousness, panpsychism). I will conclude by remain to be demonstrated. I will further discuss emphasizing how promising these theories are in the speculative aspects of this theory later (see the getting us closer to resolve the issue of the hard section ‘Neurobiological standpoints on the hard problem. problem’). For now, I shall provide an overview of the core assumptions underlying this theory. In order to appreciate the specificity of the p0050 s0025 From Globalist to Localist Accounts of Consciousness Reentrant Dynamic Core theory, it is important to understand that, regardless of its explanation for p0040 Neurobiological theories of consciousness differ in consciousness, it offers an alternative view on brain many respects. One way to portray them in a coher- structures, considering the wiring of the brain into ent manner is to follow the large spectrum ranging neuronal assemblies as the result of variation and from globalist to minimally localist accounts. By selection mechanisms that are analogous to those globalist or localist I refer to the size of the brain underlying evolutionary theories. This macrolevel states that are assumed to be sufficient for
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