As I stated in my previous post, the first major content theme in The Atlas of Social Complexity is Cognition, Emotion and Consciousness. Chapter 6 addresses autopoiesis. Chapter 7 turns to the role of bacteria in human consciousness. Chapter 8 explores how the immune system, just like bacteria and cells, is cognitive – and the implications this has for our wider brain-based consciousness. Chapter 9 -- the focus of the current post -- explore a complexity framing of brain-based cognition, emotion and consciousness.
Brain-based cognition, emotion and consciousness
Over the last two decades, the cognitive, neurological and psychological sciences have made major progress in our understanding of mind/brain and its links with our embodied existence.
If ever a topic screamed for a complexity theory, then brain-based cognition would be at the top of the list!
But first some hard theoretical and empirical work needs to be done. In this chapter we use a social complexity framework to sort our position vis-à-vis six major debates within the field:
- cognition and life
- the mind/brain dualism
- the unconscious
- modularity
- emotions
-
brain-based consciousness
With these issues sorted, we then outline the contours of
a new complex systems theory of consciousness, which serves as a framework
for the rest of our tour.
KEY WORKDS: brain-based cognition, emotions, the emotional self, embodied mind, cognitive unconscious, consciousness, modularity, paleomammalian emotions.
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