Selfless Minds
Summary
While an increasing number of publications in philosophy, psychology and neuroscience investigate “self-consciousness”, this ambiguous concept often remain loosely defined. A number of authors have suggested that there is such a thing as a basic sense of self or self-consciousness in the background of any phenomenally conscious experience. Theoretical discussions of this claim have been hampered by introspective disagreement, and its proponents often appeal to the elusiveness of the basic sense of self to fend off sceptical concerns.
One promising approach to this debate is to investigate real-world cases of altered states of consciousness in which self-consciousness appears to be radically disrupted or altogether missing. By bringing key players in the field together, we hope to make progress on these matters and the set the stage for an empirically grounded and conceptually rigorous debate on self-consciousness and its limits.
Speakers
Adrianna Alcaraz Sánchez, Adrian Alsmith, Aviva Berkovich-Ohana, Monima Chadha, Anna Ciaunica, Christian Coseru, Sascha Fink, Jakub Limanowski, Chris Letheby, Thomas Metzinger, Raphaël Millière, Kathryn Swanson, Link Swanson, Wanja Wiese, Jennifer Windt
Edited collection
This workshop led to the publication of the inaugural special issue of the open-access journal Philosophy and the Mind Sciences.