The Stream of Consciousness: XXVII. Defending Conscious Experience

Abstract

Weiskrantz's recent account of awareness is considered from a perspective that James bequeathed us. In opposition to the Intellectualists, James asks why a pure ego wielding purely conceptualizing acts is needed to give us awareness of relations and universals, inter alia. In opposition to Weiskrantz's Intellectualism, I ask how a commentary system, which has at its disposal only conceptual materials, can swoop down from on high to do the job of creating the experiences we undergo. Weiskrantz prefers the stronger of two positions concerning the relation of awareness to commentary that are consistent with his general view. On the minimal position, he would grant that experiences do takes place without commentary. However, no less so, he would conceive of consciousness as a matter of engaging in higher-order thought. He insists that one's firsthand apprehension of one's stream of experience or its components is carried out by, as it were, a higher agency: namely, a commentary system. Thus, none of our experiences is conscious unless appropriate judgment is passed upon it from outside and on high.