I begin with a concept of representation based on the causal flow of the inherent information contained in physical objects and argue that it is apropos for both physical objects and phenomenal character. The implications of this are explored in the context of awareness viewed as a mental representation of the world, in which “bottom-up”, non-conceptual representation interacts with “top-down”, intentional states (in the sense of being about things, properties and states of affairs) to produce a…
Read moreI begin with a concept of representation based on the causal flow of the inherent information contained in physical objects and argue that it is apropos for both physical objects and phenomenal character. The implications of this are explored in the context of awareness viewed as a mental representation of the world, in which “bottom-up”, non-conceptual representation interacts with “top-down”, intentional states (in the sense of being about things, properties and states of affairs) to produce a hierarchical representation from which both, and their mixed states, are simultaneously accessible, and which is actively maintained by Bayesian control theory principles. The function of this representation is seen as a necessary part of the nervous system’s role as the controlling element of goal-directed behavior. This view is then examined in the context of current neurobiological investigations of sensory and perceptual processes. I suggest that this approach, although not fundamentally at odds with many concepts in philosophy, may offer a more coherent way to view mind-dependent aspects of perception than many traditional philosophical positions, which do not align easily with the concepts of empirical neurobiology. In this view many of the seemingly opposed positions in the philosophy of perception may be recast simply as descriptions of differing levels of organization or operation of the hierarchical representation. Additionally, I suggest that a consideration of the causal nature of information flow requires that there can be no final representation prior to awareness in the act-object sense, and that awareness is itself a representation, and in fact the final representation, under the same definition of representation applied to all other mind-independent and mind-dependent objects in the causal chain. That is, the actively-maintained hierarchical model is both the medium of phenomenal experience and its content. I argue that all of these positions are independent of your choice as to whether our phenomenal awareness is best thought of as being, or as being a mental correlate of, neural activity.
