Consciousness

1. Front Matter

   Pages i-xxxviii

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2. Ancient And Arabic Philosophy

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 28-28

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   2. On Plato's Lack of Consciousness

      • Amber Carpenter

      Pages 29-48

   3. The Problem of Consciousness in Aristotle's Psychology

      • Juha Sihvola

      Pages 49-65

   4. Ownness of Conscious Experience in Ancient Philosophy

      • Pauliina Remes

      Pages 67-94

   5. Sense-Perception and Self-Awareness: Before and After Avicenna

      • Jari Kaukua, Taneli Kukkonen

      Pages 95-119

3. Medieval Philosophy And Early Modern Thought

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 122-122

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   2. Intention and Presence: The Notion of Presentialitas in the Fourteenth Century

      • Joël Biard

      Pages 123-140

   3. The Structure of Self-Consciousness: A Fourteenth-Century Debate

      • Mikko Yrjönsuuri

      Pages 141-152

   4. Augustine and Descartes on the Function of Attention in Perceptual Awareness

      • Deborah Brown

      Pages 153-175

   5. Orders of Consciousness and Forms of Reflexivity in Descartes

      • Vili Lähteenmäki

      Pages 177-201

   6. The Status of Consciousness in Spinoza's Concept of Mind

      • Jon Miller

      Pages 203-220

4. From Kant To Contemporary Discussions

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 222-222

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   2. Human Consciousness and its Transcendental Conditions: Kant's Anti-Cartesian Revolt

      • Kenneth R. Westphal

      Pages 223-243

   3. The Living Consciousness of the German Idealists

      • Susanna Lindberg

      Pages 245-265

   4. The Heidelberg School and the Limits of Reflection

      • Dan Zahavi

      Pages 267-285

   5. Contemporary Naturalism and the Concept of Consciousness

      • Neil Manson

      Pages 287-309

   6. Selfhood, Consciousness, and Embodiment: A Husserlian Approach

      • Sara Heinämaa

      Pages 311-328

5. Back Matter

   Pages 329-366

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SARA HEINÄMAA,VILI LÄHTEENMÄKI AND PAULIINA REMES This book is about consciousness. It illuminates the concept in its complexity and richness, capturing its theoretical and philosophical significance as well as its problematic aspects. By taking a new look into the history of concepts, the collection questions several deep-seated assumptions about consciousness – assumptions both thematic and methodological. It argues that, even though our predecessors did not formulate their philosophical queries in terms of consciousness, they have much to offer to our current disputes concerning its central features, such as reflexivity, subjectivity and aboutness, as well as related themes, from selfhood to attention and embodiment. At the same time, the collection demonstrates that consciousness is not just an issue in the p- losophy of mind, but is bound to ontology, epistemology and moral theory. We can find premodern and early modern concepts and arguments that are interesting and even crucialto our own philosophical concerns, but we should not assume that these belong or contribute to any theory of mind isolated from metaphysical and ethical discussions: an argument that for us provides insightful descriptions of perception or self-awareness might to its writer have meant not just a theoretization of the soul or the mind, but also, and perhaps more importantly, a contribution to ethics or ontology.

• Aristotle
• Avicenna
• Consciousness
• Edmund Husserl
• Intentionality
• Kant
• Medieval philosophy
• Plato
• Reflexivity
• Spinoza
• Subjectivity
• ancient philosophy
• concept
• history of philosophy
• psychology

From the reviews:

"The fourteen essays collected in this book discuss the similarities and dissimilarities in the concepts related to consciousness from ancient to medieval, Enlightenment and nineteenth and twentieth century philosophy. … will be of interest to historians of philosophy. … I found this book an interesting read. There is a comprehensive bibliography, and both a name and subject index that will be helpful to researchers." (Peter B. Raabe, Metapsychology Online Reviews, Vol. 12 (33), August, 2008)

• University of Helsinki, Finland

  Sara Heinämaa, Pauliina Remes

• University of Jyväskylä, Finland

  Vili Lähteenmäki

Policies and ethics