Conscious / unconscious
The argument in favour of there being an actual need for the experience of consciousness is rooted in the sensation that conscious thought is somehow more effective than unconscious thought. It is perfectly possible to argue that whatever mental mechanisms are mooted in the creation of human behaviour you can always say at the last minute, "yes, but why can't you have all that without conscious experience?"Darwin strongly suggests to us that every aspect of living things that has evolved has done so to confer some (at least temporary) advantage for those living things as carriers of genetic material. Blackmore, at a loss to explain the survival potential of the experience of consciousness, believes that this experience is a mere byproduct of memetic evolution intended to produce some other useful effect.
- Perhaps only conscious thought can allow the artificial rigor of ordered logical thought. Logic is something we've invented and our brains are really not wired to process it with any reliability. Perhaps it is only with conscious thought that we can set up a dialogue (between ourselves and a virtual other).
- Complex brains with high levels of cross linking can hang-up with indecision. Too much conflicting data may tend to balance out, obscuring clear paths of action. Emotion creates an underlieing instability and a bias that more often than not pushes us into action of some sort. I contend it is only in conscious thought that we can generate for ourselves the emotional charge necessary for a suucessful, future, anticipated act.
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