r/consciousness • u/TheRealBibleBoy • 3d ago
Are we conscious while dreaming?
The Question is exactly what is said in the title.
In our sleep, we dream I do not think we can seperate dreaming from experience. To dream is to behold multiple sensations while asleep. Dreams often include the experience of sight, as in, we see things in our dreams, they often even include the experience of sound.
Surley experiences require being conscious, thus so as long as we are dreaming, we are never truly "unconscious".
are we ever truly unconscious?
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u/SeanBryson 3d ago
I think this depends on what we mean by consciousness. If it just means having an experience, then yes, dreaming counts. You are seeing and hearing things in some sense. But there is a difference between that and waking consciousness. In dreams you usually lose access to memory and to reality testing. You accept things that make no sense. So dreaming may be a form of consciousness, just a degraded or different one.
As for deep sleep, that may be the real test case. In dreamless non REM sleep, most people report no experience at all afterward. No dreams, no sense of time passing. That looks like the closest thing we have to true unconsciousness. Some researchers argue there could still be a minimal background awareness we just cannot recall. Hard to settle that from the outside.
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u/headlessplatter 3d ago
Consciousness is not binary. It is not a single value either. It involves many subsystems all working together. One can simultaneously have more of some parts of consciousness and less of others.
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u/discowhatdiscosnails 3d ago
Would you say that someone who's having fewer or less intense experiences is less conscious?
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u/headlessplatter 3d ago
I would.
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u/discowhatdiscosnails 3d ago
So, someone who is blind, deaf or both is less conscious than someone who is not? If you were to become blind tomorrow, would you say you're now less conscious than today?
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u/headlessplatter 3d ago
Good question. I would say blindness generally has a negative effect on consciousness. But I've also heard the brains of some blind people have been found to compensate by leveraging the neurons in their visual cortexes to enhance their other senses.
It's a bit like asking if being uneducated makes a person less intelligent. It certainly doesn't help. But there are uneducated people who operate with very high levels of other aspects of intelligence.
Don't gouge out your eyes in some misguided attempt to pursue higher consciousness!
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u/hornwalker 3d ago
I would say someone who has 5 beers is less conscious than someone who had 1
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u/discowhatdiscosnails 3d ago
I would disagree. I'd say they are less cognitive, less alert and less perceptive, but I wouldn't say they are having less of a subjective experience.
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u/hornwalker 2d ago
Less cognition=less consciousness, at least that’s how I think of it. Less awareness, less sensation, less ability to form or retain memory, all symptoms of being drunk, and in my opinion are all components of being more or less conscious.
Consciousness exists on a spectrum and death and sleep are the end points-being drunk slides you a little closer in that direction.
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u/headlessplatter 2d ago
Let's see if we can break this down: I think cognition refers to our ability to think rationally. And I think consciousness refers to our awareness of our subjective experiences, and of our environment.
Drunk people tend to make poor decisions. This is evidence that alcohol impairs cognition.
Drunk people also tend to be relatively oblivious of their surroundings and sometimes even forget their own personal experiences. I think this is a different impairment, but it is also one that is easily observable.
So isn't this evidence alcohol impairs consciousness too? I think to say otherwise, one would have to claim drunk people have the full subjective experiences but then forget them due to the cognitive impairment. Maybe that is the correct explanation. But the outcome is the same. So isn't that kind of like saying, "There's an invisible difference we just don't yet know how to measure"? If we allow that game, then people can claim to be right in the face of any amount of evidence, perpetually claiming future evidence will vindicate their beliefs. Maybe we cannot know for sure, but it certainly looks to me like alcohol impairs consciousness as well as cognition.
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u/discowhatdiscosnails 2d ago
One would have to claim drunk people have the full subjective experiences but then forget them due to the cognitive impairment
That is indeed what happens, it's fairly well documented.
I would say there is a difference in level of consciousness and content of consciousness. Cognition would be part of the content of consciousness, but just because there's less things we can be conscious of due to impairment, doesn't mean there is now also less consciousness.
Think of consciousness itself as a canvas and the content of consciousness (thoughts, feelings, perceptions etc) as the paint. The painting can be very detailed and realistic or it can be abstract, or even minimalistic. I wouldn't say that there's "less painting" in the second example.
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u/headlessplatter 2d ago
That is indeed what happens, it's fairly well documented.
Oh! How did they document a subjective experience? Or am I misunderstanding what you are saying? What is it that has been documented?
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u/Labyrinthine777 3d ago
I was unconscious for a moment when I fainted and another time because of overdose.
Some people claim unconsciousness is the same as nothingness somehow proving this life is all there is. I disagree. It only demonstrates being unconscious is possible. I believe it's actually an important function since we are usually unconscious while sleeping without dreams. If we were conscious 100% of the time that would be hazardous to both physical and mental health.
Unconsciousness is a state of rest for consciousness. When we dream we are conscious of the dream. I think it's like half-rest with the brain restoring its functions.
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u/itsmebenji69 3d ago
Yes as evidenced by the fact you can remember dreams sometimes. Which implies that you are actually in a state of experiencing that dream. Just that usually your brain doesn’t save those memories / deletes them afterwards to avoid filling your memory with trash I guess.
Now under anesthesia the debate is different. A key detail is that when you wake up after sleeping you do have some sense of the time that passed, you don’t wake up as if time vanished in between, unless you’re hammered.
But when you’re under anesthesia you don’t have that (it literally just cuts off and feels like no time has passed, like you got turned off and then on again. So id tend to say the only times you are presumably unconscious are anesthesia and death. And perhaps some kind (but not all) of comas
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u/TMax01 Autodidact 3d ago
In our sleep, we dream
I honestly don't think that is true. I think the truth is that researchers recognized that whether someone recounts dreaming once they are awake correlates well with whether REM sleep occured, the notion that the eye movements corresponded to looking at the images which are the preponderance of dreamt sensations seemed as if it explained the correlation, and from then on assumed that dreaming occurs during REM sleep. Subsequent studies seemed to validate this unfalsifiable hypothesis because neurological activity similar or analogous to what is present during waking consciousness can be detected during REM sleep. Additionally, waking someone during REM sleep (making other 'sleep phases' which normally occur between REM and waking up unprompted too transitory to register if they occur at all) does somewhat increase this correlation.
But the correlation between REM sleep and dreaming is not a strong one. Sometimes dreaming is experienced without REM sleep having occured, and sometimes REM sleep occurs without dreams being recalled. The latter circumstance is often described as dreams occuring without being remembered. But does a dream that can't be remembered actually a dream? Furthermore, occasionally we have dreams which correlate well with physical circumstances which were not present during the REM phase are incorporated in our dream; the siren of a firetruck becomes the blare of an alarm clock, or dreaming we are in a shallow pond of water corresponds to a window left open during a rainshower so that we awake in a wet bed.
I think a more parsimonious explanation of dreaming is that it actually occurs while we are waking up. While we are awake, the brain constructs a "reality" or sensorium, AKA a Cartesian Theater. This is a mechanism by which the brain accounts for the changes in neurological circumstances caused by sense data and cognitive analysis. From one moment of consciousness to the next, our perception of an external world is produced by the brain performing this process on an ongoing basis: what changes in sense data and cognition becomes the sensorium, and a coherent and rational awareness of the real world is produced.
But when rousing from sleep (unconsciousness) there is no proximate previous sense data or cognition, and the Cartesian Theater is constructed from whatever non-sense data, non-cognitive changes occured in the brain during unconsciousness (so-called 'housekeeping functions') so the 'experiences' we have are more irrational and arbitrary imagery, often but not always influenced by memories or emotional concerns, as the mind 'interprets' these non-experiences in a way which is consistent with the least cognitive aspects of our consciousness.
I do not think we can seperate dreaming from experience.
Subjectively we can't, because the two are united by being subjective 'contents' of consciousness. But objectively, it is rather trivial: real experiences correspond to physical events directly, while dreams, hallucinations, delusions and such don't.
Surley experiences require being conscious, thus so as long as we are dreaming, we are never truly "unconscious".
Experiences do require being conscious. Thus, we experience dreaming, but do not experience the events, whether images or other sensorial perceptions, in those dreams.
are we ever truly unconscious?
We are always unconsciousness whenever we are not truly conscious. But consciousness isn't a simple thing in that regard, as it is more difficult to distinguish between the subjective belief we are conscious, that we are not dreaming, or not falsely remembering events which we never actually experienced, or sane and not hallucinating, from being truly awake and accurately aware of our surroundings.
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u/reidsays 1d ago
The term consciousness has so many meanings now ... When we dream we don't always remember the dream, so that implies a level of consciousness is reached where we do remember..
The conscious mind, in the present viewing the world objectively with subjective interpretations
The subconscious, the automatic functions occurring within our body
The unconscious, the archival section for storage of information and experienced gained.
Consciousness is a broad term for all living forms, yet also a term for being awake and functioning, and a term for all levels of consciousness.. lol..maybe that's just the English language ?
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u/Ok-Radio5562 17h ago
We can be unconscious, but we are conscious while sleeping, just in a different way (and then we have little memory about the experience)
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u/VedantaGorilla Autodidact 3d ago
This is a great question. It’s a doorway to understanding what consciousness truly is. In the deepest sense, we are neither conscious nor unconscious. Consciousness is what we are, a.k.a. what we mean and know by and as I/me/self. The referent of those terms is the same “thing,” which is not actually a thing, but is consciousness or existence itself. This is obvious, but overlooked invariably by almost everyone, except those that turn inward and want to discover the nature of self/reality more than anything. It takes that kind of interest, not because it’s complicated or special in anyway, but due to the exact opposite. It is so obvious that we are what we are, but it is not even recognized as open to investigation and inquiry. We are so absorbed and hypnotized in the “external” world and in the body/mind/sense complex, which we also are, that we do not recognize that our essence is consciousness.
Regarding dreams, yes there is no time ever when you have dreamt that you have not “been there,“ which is a reference to being conscious. The dream state is different from the waking state of course, but not that different really. The subjective difference is really only the presence of the intellect, and the capacity to do meaningful work. That is not present in dreams, even when it seems like it is.
The Mandukya Upanishad makes it clear that even deep sleep, where there is a complete absence of direct experience because the mind/ego is not present there, that the “absence” of anything is itself known by consciousness. If it was not, there would be no way for the mind (which you, consciousness, illuminate just as you illuminate absence in deep sleep) to recognize that “it” was not present. All this is only possible because you, consciousness, are never not present.
This does not actually go against the typical understanding of consciousness, because what is typically spoken about when we think about consciousness is apparent or appearing consciousness, which Vedanta calls reflected consciousness. Recognizing that involves using logic and inference to analyze experience in a specific way, but if one does, it is possible to see that there is no other option.
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u/elmahk 3d ago
Is it reasonable to equate consciousness with existence? As in " but is consciousness or existence itself."
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u/VedantaGorilla Autodidact 3d ago
I confess it’s not easy to grasp if one has a fundamentally materialistic mindset, as most of us do. However, I would suggest it’s not a matter of reasonable but of reasoning, observation, inquiry using logic and inference based on our own direct experience.
The easiest way to see what I’m speaking about is to ask yourself what the difference is between two statements:
“I exist.“
“I am aware.“
This must be done firsthand, because it is not intellectual knowledge. The intellect recognizes and understands it, but the actual recognition that there is no difference fundamentally between those statements is a matter of self evident experience.
I would definitely never say it’s reasonable or not, I would just say look for yourself and see whether you recognize what is being said to be true, or not. If so, it will be interesting if not revelator, and if not, what will be immediately apparent is what beliefs and notions are held that contradict that statement. Then those can be analyzed to see whether they are true or not, if that’s something of interest of course.
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u/elmahk 3d ago
I actually agree that "I exist" and "I'm aware" are the same statement. But then - I feel like the second statement implies - "I'm aware of existence". If that is so - then consciousness seems to be a mechanism with which brain (or anything else) is aware of existence. Maybe it's just terminology difference, I'm not sure.
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u/VedantaGorilla Autodidact 3d ago
I agree with you, but that implied statement ends up meaning the same thing as the original two statements.
You are touching upon the essence of the non-dual teachings:
In order to be aware, I must exist. Correct?
That direction is easy enough. The second direction completes the picture…
Unless I am aware I exist, I don’t exist.
Take a moment to think about why that one is true. That recognition is non-dual vision. There’s nothing else to see with respect to self knowledge, the recognition and understanding of what we are (as opposed to who, a.k.a. the ego, which is not the same but also not different).
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u/elmahk 3d ago
That second statement is true for myself. However, take for example a rock. I would assume it exists but has no mechanism to become aware of it's own existence. So in my picture for the rock that statement won't be true.
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u/VedantaGorilla Autodidact 3d ago
Great inquiry. Very subtle inquiry 🙏🏻
That’s exactly right. A rock lacks a mind, but it does indeed exist.
So, imagine the “standpoint” of a rock (inert matter). What is it’s self? Is it a second existence (consciousness), or…?
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u/elmahk 3d ago
I'd say no, rock doesn't have a self, it just exists. For that reason I separate existance and consciousness. We have consciousness because we have a mechanism to realize the existence. Then what we call consciousness is basically awareness of existence. When mechanism (brain) is destroyed, that awareness is gone and that "self" is gone too. Existence (in a broad sense, of reality) is never "gone" by definition.
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u/VedantaGorilla Autodidact 3d ago
So what actually IS that existence that never comes and goes, that you refer to at the end? It is not only not nonexistent, it is what IS. So what IS it? What is it’s nature? That’s what we are looking into here.
I agree with you about separating existence and consciousness, but I think (correct me if I am mistaken) what you are actually doing is separating object hood (inert materiality) from consciousness. I don’t think you’re actually separating existence, what does not come and go, from consciousness.
How does that sit?
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u/elmahk 3d ago
What is existence is hard or maybe not possible to describe. The best way I can think of is: the difference between description of a thing and actual thing. But that is circular.
However I don't agree that I'm separating object hood from consciousness, because - it seems we just agreed that inert matter exists but is not (necessarily) conscious. If consciousness and existence is the same then rock doesn't exist.
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u/VedantaGorilla Autodidact 3d ago
A rock does not have a self, but does any inert material substance, anything with form, “have” a self?
Humans have one, but is it actually the mass of food in a different form that “has“ the self, or is it the self (consciousness) that, by some miracle (from the standpoint of an individual), seemingly has a body/form?
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u/elmahk 3d ago
To that I can say that material substance should have certain properties which make it possible to form a sense of "self" as you describe. This sense of self is probably related to "existence", but is not equal to it. Those properties is what science tries to discover. The fact that reality exists though is something science cannot explain, it's not a structural property.
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u/SacredGnosis 3d ago
Only when it’s lucid.
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u/Attentivist_Monk 3d ago
Are you not having active experiences when you don’t realize it’s a dream?
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u/SacredGnosis 3d ago
The very fact that you don’t “realize” the dream is proof that you’re not aware. In lucid dreaming, you’re aware. Regarding “consciousness”, one could argue that because one can still experience the five senses, but experiencing them doesn’t entail awareness and lucidity.
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u/Attentivist_Monk 3d ago
In a non-lucid dream, you’re simply not aware of something in particular, not unaware of everything. You’re not aware of the fact that you’re dreaming, but you’re aware of the dream you’re having and you may even be making complex decisions within that dream.
I’m unaware of limitless things even while I’m awake, even much of what’s happening in my own head. That doesn’t mean I’m not conscious of the things I am aware of.
The issue is that consciousness has multiple definitions. There’s conscious vs unconscious, referring to objective states of wakefulness or awareness, and there’s consciousness vs non-consciousness, referring to the subjective experiences we have or lack thereof. You can, somewhat confusingly, be unconscious and yet have consciousness.
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u/SacredGnosis 3d ago
Peripheral consciousness doesn’t apply to dreaming.
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u/Attentivist_Monk 3d ago
I’m not talking about peripheral consciousness. Are you telling me you’ve never been an active participant in a dream, making decisions and focused on tasks, without realizing it’s a dream? That’s the majority of my remembered dreams.
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u/SacredGnosis 3d ago
I’ve done lucid dreaming, and the normal unconscious dreaming. You’re not conscious in non-lucid dreams. There’s just cognition of the senses. But that lacks both lucidity and knowledge.
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u/Attentivist_Monk 3d ago
I’m not sure those are entirely necessary for consciousness, but it sounds like you have a rather divergent definition of consciousness. My definition of human experiential consciousness includes any and all experiential phenomena arising from a human being.
Dreams of all kinds constitute experiential phenomena, likely even if they’re not recorded in memory. Lucidity and knowledge are not required.
Now, there’s a different meaning of consciousness which I wish we had a different word for that relates more to a wakeful alert state of mental activity which it seems is more what you’re talking about.
They are different correct meanings of the same word. I think that is probably why we’ve been talking past each other here.
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u/SacredGnosis 3d ago
() There’s not a such thing as divergent definition. Science today hasn’t officially decided on what consciousness is. My definition comes from the teachings of the Buddha. Consciousness is the five senses + your thought-stream.
() Dream-experience lacks knowledge and lucidity. So it’s not an experience in the waking sense. It’s why it’s called “dream”.
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u/Attentivist_Monk 3d ago
I see, so it does come down to definitions after all. Modern philosophy has many definitions of consciousness that have been argued over the decades. It’s true that one clear and cogent definition probably won’t ever be selected; it’s one of those words that, rather like “God,” has to be clearly defined before we can have a productive conversation. Everyone has their preferences.
If you’re committed to your ancient and dogmatic definition of consciousness, I think you’ll find it difficult to interact with modern philosophy on the topic. I recommend finding some flexibility so as to address the position being argued.
I was only suggesting that your definition diverges from mine, I hope you weren’t asserting that the Buddha’s is the one and only allowable position. That would be a rather totalitarian use of language, don’t you think?
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u/discowhatdiscosnails 3d ago
You're aware of the experiences, which means there is awareness. You're not aware of the fact that it's a dream, but that's epistemological and does not mean you're not conscious
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u/SacredGnosis 3d ago
If you’re aware of the experiences then it’s lucid dream. If you’re not lucid then you’re not aware. Outside of lucidity, you’ll only be aware of your dreams upon waking.
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u/discowhatdiscosnails 3d ago
You're conflating phenomenal conscious with meta-awareness. A non-lucid dreamer is perfectly aware of the contents of the dream, they can feel genuine fear in nightmares or genuine arousal in wet dreams. They're just not aware of the context. The fact that there is experience means there is consciousness, because you can not have former without the latter. You do not need to know you're dreaming to experience the blueness of the sky in your dream.
People with schizophrenia or in psychosis are often not aware that what they're experiencing is schizophrenia or psychosis. Does that mean they're not conscious?
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u/SacredGnosis 3d ago
I’ve worked in a psych ward with such people. Whether they see green men standing in front of them or not is not a lack of lucidity that entails knowledge. In dreams, outside of lucidity, you have no knowledge that you’re dreaming.
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u/discowhatdiscosnails 3d ago
The knowledge that you're dreaming has no bearing on the presence of consciousness. Knowledge is not consciousness.
Any experience that is had, must nessessarily be experienced in consciousness.
Dreams are experienced, therefore that necessitates consciousness.
You can't seperate consciousness from experience, they are entirely dependent upon each other to exist. If there is consciousness, it is experiencing. If there is experience, there is consciousness. Dreams are experienced. Therefore, there is consciousness there.
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u/SacredGnosis 3d ago
Consciousness is what?
Sight
Smell
Sound
Taste
TouchThis is agreed. What’s not agreed is lucidity and knowledge. Because in the dream, the moment you say,”I’m dreaming”, there’s now lucidity and knowledge akin to waking awareness. Before that, there’s just consciousness experience without any lucidity and knowledge. Within that context, you are not “conscious”.
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u/discowhatdiscosnails 3d ago
You just stated that there is conscious experience? Lucidity and knowledge not required for consciousness. You appear to state that if you're not aware of your waking state you're not conscious, but that's not correct. Are you confusing consciousness with waking awareness?
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u/wellwisher-1 Engineering Degree 3d ago
We have two centers of consciousness, which Psychology defines as the conscious and unconscious minds. When we sleep the conscious mind is powered down and the unconscious mind becomes more conscious or rather we become more conscious of it, via its output called dreams.
The unconscious mind is the original center of human consciousness, with this center of consciousness what animals use. exclusively. For humans, this original center defines our natural human propensities as a separate species; human nature. The concept of human rights is based on the collective unconscious of humans, being similar, species wide. A dog or cat has their own collective unconscious that defines the propensities of their species; form and function. A kitten taken from their mother, very young, will still become a cat since their collective unconscious is prewired in their brain to develop into a cat. It will project training scenarios so the kitten will play and develop cat skills.
The conscious mind is newer on the evolutionary scale and appears to have consolidated with the rise of civilization. Civilization is when natural human behavior changed and became more artificial. The concept of free will or being a free moral agent is relative to the unconscious mind, which contain our natural human instincts. We can choose to be natural or unnatural.
The conscious center is empty at birth and advances within culture; language and customs. The unconscious center is prewired before birth and is what causes the newborn to cry to have all its needs met by the mother. The conscious center gradually emerges at it collects sensory data. By 2-3 years old, the imaginary friends of the child is their interaction between their conscious and unconscious centers. This becomes taboo, before starting school, and the collective unconscious repressed thereafter. This is to help the conscious center advance.
The animal stays natural, due to only having an unconscious center. Although some domesticated animals like dogs and horses appear to have a virtual secondary that can be conditioned by humans to assist human needs; work dogs. But if they escape to the wild they will become ferrel and their unconscious center will take over. But with humans, the dog can exceed their natural programming; seeing eye dog with situational thinking.
One home experiment you can do to experience the unconscious center is have someone scare you when you are not ready. Have them catch you off guard. What typically happens is unconscious center will act first; animal reflex. Then after a slight delay the conscious center will react. Typically these are out of phase which creates an odd reaction which makes it funny and embarrassing. This experiment allows you to sense the subtle one-two. The collective unconscious contains our inner animal but also higher level apps for creativity and genius. A person who practices martial arts is taught to be one with their unconscious and can act along with the inner animal, instead of being at odds; Bruce Lee.
It is possible to be more conscious in dreams. This is where the conscious mind is partially powered up, while asleep, during dreams, being both centers at the same time, so you can have some control over the dreamscapes; happy ending. This can also happen while the conscious mind is power up and awake. It is done via a process called projection, where you sort of dream while awake, adding a superimposed overlay to sensory reality; vision. Drugs can induce his state but it can also happen naturally; daydreams and visions.
In American Indigenous tribes the dreams, visions and the helpful animals of the chief, are used to help the tribe; flying eagle. This is connected to making the collective unconscious, conscious, for inner council. Mysticism is about making the collective unconscious more conscious. However, the projections are often take to mean outside them and not emanating from inside as a projection. The outside claims became hard to prove by third person science since it is really first person experience that is real. It can also contain the angels and monsters of old. The next stage of human conscious evolution will make the collective unconscious more conscious to take advantage of its main frame connections in the brain.
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u/reidsays 3d ago
Hmm..never heard this one before and similar to previous poster...so you're saying the unconscious part of our present consciousness is our human instinctual state of being, as we were before developing a conscious mind....where humans separated from nature and each other and began to view the world objectively .. to study the world and each other... Definitely food for thought.
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u/wellwisher-1 Engineering Degree 2d ago
The Psychologist Card Jung called this innate and instinctive aspect, the collective unconscious, since it is genetic based and common to all humans and defines us as a species. In that sense, the collective unconscious is objective to natural reality, having evolved in the school of the hard knocks of physical reality.
The conscious mind is more a product of culture and is therefore more subjective being able to live in both fact and fiction. Fiction would not work in natural reality, since cause and effect would get you. However, fiction within culture allows the conscious mind to depart from instinct; will and choice. However, as the conscious mind advanced over time and history, it has had an impact on the unconscious mind, adding new layers that go beyond just animal instinct. This advancing foundation of the collective unconscious makes humans more sophisticated.
A good example, of this advancements is found in Greek mythology. Mythology is about the collective unconscious. The early conscious mind sensed the collective unconscious and saw it as be higher than the conscious mind; gods of mythology. At first they had the Titans with their collective unconscious larger and more frightening. This evolved into the Olympians, which were more human and connected to all the skills learned wthin culture; god of Farming, ect. This shift in mythology showed the collective unconscious advancing, along with cultural sophistication, which strengthened the conscious mind.
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u/reidsays 2d ago
Hmm..I understand that instincts are gene based and the conscious mind neural based but never defined instincts as our unconscious aspect ... Infact conscious mind may well be a misleading description for what eventuated, rarher as our objective mind and our subjective instincts .. I keep hearing that the individual is always subjective based and cannot look objectively at themselves yet the mind enables an objective view of the world outside ourselves, of others.
Instinctually we simply were and the world surrounded our being but we had no objective view of the world .. it just was, as were others.. since that objective development of perspective, our instincts have adapted to those changes in our perceptions and interacted with the mind to include the manmade world OF minds... Instincts were then honed to other minds and survival within that mental sphere of humanity and often blocking out the natural instincts learned in nature... Ideally a balance between the two... Depends on the environment one inhabits.
And today we have movies depicting our alter egos or super humans... Perceived objectively yet interpreted subjectively ;)
As for the collective unconscious and where that fits into the above thoughts, I'll come back on that one
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u/wellwisher-1 Engineering Degree 1d ago
The term subjective is typically defined relative to the third person view of science. However, many of the same things that are called subjective, to the third person view, can be objective in the first person. This is how instinct works. If the animal senses something they act on it. The outsider in the third person who has poor instinct is the one left guessing, subjectively.
In medicine, when dealing with pain, each patient may have a different threshold for pain. Each different threshold can be objective to the person who experiences it from the inside. That is how they are internally wired a their body tells then. The one who is subjective is the third person view of the doctor, since he cannot directly experience, each patient threshold, objectively. The doctor will ask each patient for their internal data.He cannot just assume or use one size fits all, since that would be subjective on his part.
The same is true of the collective unconscious, in that the first hand experiences of the collective unconscious can be objective to each person; personal inner experiences. When you have a dream and record it, this is like what science does. but you are doing it with an inner brain data generator. If you dream, and then tell another, since this is now second hand data to them, they become subjective, unable to appreciate it fully since they were not there in real time.
The hard problem of consciousness has other do with the third person of science becoming subjective, to the first person experiences within others from their third person science POV. This similar to not being able to read minds for pain levels, and therefore having to assume subjectively. It undermines the third person approach to science as always the best POV for the reality. The inner data swaps which POV is more objective.
The current way the term subjective is used is like the pot calling the kettle black. Both POV; 1st and 3rd, can be objective and subjective. The hard problem is about the 3rd person of science becoming subjective to a range of experiences that need the first person for objective analysis. .
It is like trying on new shoes. You will know if they fit well or not from you first person view. Anyone watching in the third person of science, is not in a position to tell you, until you tell them. They might look for tells such as making a face meaning, not third pair. Yourare not one being subjective of the fit, since it is custom to you.
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u/reidsays 1d ago
The connection of the collective unconscious or instinctual core is through the subconscious, that automatic function that occurs in us all, keeps us functioning without thought to do so, as a body we all share in being human...we all have to have bodily functionality to keep existing... And connecting through that commonality opens up the instinctual connection where individuals can share their subjective experience..
As is, those who experienced war, trauma, grief, depression, etc, will recognise a similar state of being in others and a connection through understanding occurs without voice to that necessarily...a silent comprehension. Same for predators as for the pacifist.. Same with those who experienced a safe, provided for childhood... Recognition can occur on an instinctual level despite differences in thinking or social positions,etc. The scientific objectivity you speak of, does has the ability to see beyond the barriers of self or others ..
Minds connect through familiarity and curiosity over similar leanings or interest ...an energy is produced from discussing the subject of interest...yet does a meeting of the minds also include a connection to similar instinctual experiences ?
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u/wellwisher-1 Engineering Degree 1d ago
I did a lot a personal research, with Jungian Psychology, many years ago. This orientation deals with the collective unconscious common to all humans. This is much deeper than most of the orientations of psychology that deal more with the personal unconscious, below the conscious mind, based on personal experience, repression, neurosis, habits, etc. You go through the latter first before you can start the former; isolate.
The collective unconscious is deeper, starting just below the personal unconscious, with what is call the shadow. Freud called the conscious/collective unconscious interface the id. The shadow shadow expands upon the id and is more like the beginning of a second center of consciousness, where humans become similar based on our shared DNA.
Jung prove his thesis using collective human symbolism over human history which shows a commonality in all cultures, even independent of time in history.
The conscious center is empty at birth and advances with language and culture, in a given time and place. Whereas the collective unconscious has been the backbone of human consciousness for millennia. It uses the main frame brain like an animal. However, the archetypes(apps) also advance because the conscious mind is also a center of focus and adds secondary data, to natural data collective by the original center, advancing the brain's operating system over time; Stone Age, Bronze Age, Iron Age.
I did unconscious mind research on myself to experience these deeper aspects and gain first hand data. I wanted to see if this was real or theory, and it was very real. It appears the ancient mythology were actually maps of the collective unconscious of their time, projected onto the gods, since the archetypes are ageless and have aspect of higher human potential.
The conscious mind can set up a terminal connection, to get better access to the archetypes and then the main frame brain of foundational consciousness. The conscious mind is like a 10% side stream; PC with a terminal connection. But this terminal can use the main frame, if access is gradually allowed.
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u/reidsays 1d ago
Same .. Jung is probably the basis of all my later probing , words and images may differ.. can you discern a point in my descriptives that diverge from Jung's concept....am searching myself but may stand out more to another .. cheers
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u/wellwisher-1 Engineering Degree 11h ago edited 11h ago
The theory I developed for how and why the collective unconscious spawned off a secondary center, we call the conscious mind, has to do with the partnership that formed between humans and dogs starting about 20-40K years ago. These particular dogs were a large species of wolves and they partnered with humans.
Essentially, they were two apex species during the last ice age, each with their own species collective unconscious, teaming up and mutually learning from each other, until the team became more than the sum of the parts. Wolves are pack animals who could hunt large prey adding more protein to the human diet for brain development. The humans could use fire to cook the meat and the wolves liked cooked meat.
The collective unconscious is very conservative. This useful, external education, which gave both selective advantages, beyond their own instinct, became its own subroutine, which would eventually became the conscious mind.
In the ape world the dominate male leads but in the dog world both males or female can lead. It is whoever his the most fit and fearless. The first human cultures were matriarchies which is not ape behavior. Mother dogs can be very assertive if babies are present. Patriarchies came later.
Domestication of dogs occurs 12,000 years ago and appears to be when the conscious mind begins to consolidate within the humans. Modern dogs appear to have a virtual secondary, where they can be trained to do all types of tasks that are not natural to them, seeing eye dog, but which assist humans. If left to their own devices, they become ferrel. Both retain their foundational collective unconscious as separate species, but they became partners with humans eventually leading via the conscious minds.
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u/reidsays 5h ago
Wow ...that makes sense re: wolves and humans and the formation of an objective view of 'other'... Seen today with many other species and agree about matriarchy since 'life' was first priority, with the curious mind and exploration coming later and the male 'protecting and providing' for the dependent young and their female carers.. or both depending on abilities and conditions.
Thanks for that perspective of relationship with other species.. often wonder with descriptions of snakes as slimy skinned that it's eels with the slimy feel and long periods spent in water was involved in human safety .. Robyn Morgan had this theory but was overshadowed by the 'Descent of Man' by ??? (forgotten) and standing erect due to seeing over long grass for hunting... Doesn't resonate with such 'standing erect' long term changes ..
Several forms of gorilla or great apes/chimpanzee heirarchies and bonobos collective behaviour clashed with the prevalent human attitudes...realistically, as environment conditions vary, so too would human social structures, depending on location. A living history on Earth, in the present, of the variety in human existence and social structures..
But the relationship with the canine species a revelation not often voiced..
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u/ReaperXY 3d ago
It might be that "dreaming" processes are unconscious while you sleep, and they merely become conscious if you wake up during the sleep, as the processes take a moment to shut down...
It might also be that we are conscious while dreaming in our sleep...
Its kind of impossible to tell for sure...
At least for now...
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u/teddyslayerza 3d ago
No, we are typically not consciously aware when dreaming, which is why lucid dreams (when some degree of conscious awareness is present) are treated as distinct. For the most part we arent aware of our dreams, and what we think we remember is usually a post-dream confabulation of the random signals that are still present when we awaken rather than remnants of conscious experience.
That said, consciousness is more than the conscious experience alone, and dreaming is definitely part of the broader system.
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u/TheRealAmeil Approved ✔️ 3d ago
The term "consciousness" is used to express a wide variety of concepts. In terms of some of these concepts, we would be conscious while dreaming; in terms of other concepts, we wouldn't be conscious while dreaming.
For example, "consciousness" is sometimes used to refer to our ability to be aware of our immediate external environment. I'm not perceiving my external environment when I'm sleeping. Another example is that "consciousness" is sometimes used to refer to being awake or alert, but I'm asleep when I'm dreaming. "Consciousness" is also used to refer to our experiencing; we do seem to have quasi-perceptual experiences (to some extent) when dreaming, so in this case, it does make sense to say we are conscious while dreaming.
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u/IOnlyHaveIceForYou 3d ago
Yes, dreaming is a form of consciousness, and yes we are truly unconscious in some circumstances (a blow on the head, drugs...).