Quote:
Originally Posted by utabintarbo  Consciousness is the faculty that perceives that which exists. - To be a consciousness, it must be conscious of something external to itself. Only after it is conscious of something external can it identify itself. Descartes argued that consciousness is axiomatic because you cannot logically deny your minds existence at the same time as using your mind to do the denying. Because to be conscious is to perceive something, consciousness requires something outside of itself in order to function; consciousness requires and is dependent upon, existence. |
I think this needs to be a little bit reworked. Descartes aside, this leaves a great big hole in cases such as schizophrenics. How to define a "broken" consciousness? Consciousness cannot be axiomatic because it fails many tests. I am not conscious of many things, that does not mean that they do not exist.
Then again, Maybe I read it wrong.