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Dear Editor
The papers in the Autumn 2004 number of the Journal (BJP 21(1)) concerned with the neglected topic of consciousness point to, but also manifest, many of the unresolved problems in this field. In this letter I would like to comment on some of them and then to propose an understanding which overcomes many of the obstacles.
In the first place it is important to reject the assertion that consciousness is not amenable to scientific understanding. Here, as often, William James has something to say. He observed that ‘All our thinking today has evolved gradually out of primitive thought, and the only really important changes have come over its manner … are a greater hesitancy in asserting its convictions, and a habit of seeking verification for them whenever it can’ (James 1911, pp. 15-16). He adds that:
the extraordinary progress of the last three hundred years is due to a rather sudden finding of the way in which a certain order of questions ought to be attacked, questions admitting of mathematical treatment. But to assume that the only possible philosophy must be mechanical and mathematical, and to disparage all enquiry into the other sorts of question, is to forget the extreme diversity of aspects under which reality undoubtedly exists. (pp. 23-4, my italics)
I would argue that only by adopting a far narrower definition of science than that offered by James could one justifiably exclude consciousness from scientific study. Consciousness is, of course, one of the ‘other sorts of question’, and ‘mechanical and mathematical methods’ have only a limited contribution to make. But before we resort to mystical or introspective approaches, there is a place for the accurate description of how consciousness is experienced and of how meanings may be expressed in the dispositions, activities and affects of people. And we can trace the history of these in the evolution of Homo sapiens and their development in individuals.
Consciousness is accompanied by brain activity but the