Reading � Damasio � Descartes� Error

Greg Detre

Thursday, 15 June, 2000

Prof. Rolls � Prelims Psych

 

difference between feelings + emotions

body states are inherently ordained to be painful/pleasurable

doesn�t yet explain the subjective phenomenon of consciousness, just by expressing it in purely phys terms

phenomenon > sum of its components + operations

if he�s saying that, he means: only to us, from our perspective

after all, what is their value?

dissociation � unrelated performance in one area compared to all the rest

just because we don�t have emotions to prompt us, doesn�t �/span> <FW?

but it deprives us of the censure we need to learn/respond/will ourselves self-improvement

why a collecting habit? unable to assess the value of objects?

R vs L frontal lobe effects?

the choice-making process is different from the options-generating one, because requires an emotional reponse to guide to the correct choice

emotion as the VALUE-GIVER (pg 151)

confused about shifty landscape working memory

confusingly uses �reason� in the sense of selecting a course of action, as opp to the consciousness inferential sense

is Elliott�s problem simply making the decisions, or also acting on them?

viz Nagel: unable to generate subjective instantiations of mind for self/others???

is anognosic patients� unawareness of own troubes: flattened or contentedly/zennishly unperturbed???

no suffering �/span> same social problems???

axonal �/span> prefrontal/anasognosic areas

Crick � neural substrate for FW

simultaneity of firing of different distributions of neurons �/span> unified sense of consciousness

representation rather than necessarily images

pg 94

the repository of facts + strategies for the manipulation of the images which constitute our thoughts is stored in the form of dispositional representations in the in-between brain sectors

integration by time instead

alternatives � bound in a small/specific spatial area

prefrontal cortices + anterior cingulate (limbic) global attention + working memory

perceptual vs recalled images (Humean???)

including the memory of a possible future

images = from topographic representations in early sensory cortices alone???

under �control of� sensory receptors or �dispositions�???

early = primary cortex? N, = LGN, PUL + COL etc.???

destruction of early sensory cortices blindsight (because other (higher?) areas remain intact)

achromatopsia = mental images B+W to (depending on site of lesion, surely?)

fear of selfless cognition? �perpetually recreated neurotic state�

so a neural sef is perceiving whatever the early sensory cortices throw up, either perceptual or recalled images?

damage to early visual sensory cortices �/span> < imagination in colour

dispositional � they order other neural patterns about

dispositional representations � battle stations blueprints for the other neurons (or is it t actual position they take up)

all thought is based on topographically organised representations � that is all that is knowable

convergence zones � where multi-modal sensory information converges

OR the ensemble of neurons whose firing represents a dispositional representation

mere convergence/synchronicity in time for different representations being conjured up is insufficient � need convergence spatially/physically � ganglion with inputs from all these topographical representations in the various early sensory cortices?

what happens if an organism �lost� consciousness while still functioning (skeletal movement etc.)?

what would you notice if you were to ablate the single neuron �seat of consciousness�?

how can/what can: �you construct some meaning� of it?

implicit knowledge: cannot form representations of it in mind

very dodgy explanation of verbal/symbolic/non-abstract thoughts as all representable as topographical representations, for all thought = images

all complex dispositional representations in the association corteices must first be passed through the early sensory cortices as topographical representations

processes/rules governing the deploymnet of our images utilising the rules/stratgies embodied in dispositional resp � essential for thinking but not a content of our thoughts

 

 

 

 

 

Points

good summary: pg 70c

Questions

abeyantly in �dispositional representations�

tomography

impecunious

support + modulation

what inputs + from where would a Cartesian theatre???

how does he know we think in images?

dispositional representations vs pattern associators???

convergent zone vs dispositional representation

seems an affliction which affects all the way to conscious + difficult to over-ride

anosognosics are fine with balance, knee jerk + other bodily signals?

insular = the parietal (somatosensory/early sensory cortex)?