THE CHALLENGE OF CONSCIOUSNESS RESEARCH

             Brian D. Josephson(1) and Beverly A. Rubik(2)


1)  Department of Physics, University of Cambridge, Madingley Road,
    Cambridge CB3 0HE, U.K. (email: bdj10@cus.cam.ac.uk).

2)  Center for Frontier Sciences, Ritter Hall 003-00, Temple
    University, Philadelphia, PA 19122, U.S.A. (email:
    V2058A@vm.temple.edu).


ABSTRACT
========

The following article reports on ideas about how to study
consciousness that emerged during the course of the January 1992
Athens Symposium on Science and Consciousness, one of the principal
aims of the meeting being as far as possible to escape from
constraints on thinking about consciousness that might be imposed by
conventional modes of thought.  The first half of the report discusses
in general terms the question of opening up the mind to wider ways of
thinking, and this is followed by a more detailed compendium of
concepts and specific ways of proceeding.

-----------------------------------------

Introduction
============

Despite the great practical importance of consciousness, science has
as yet made little headway in understanding the phenomenon or even in
deciding what it is.  This article (based on a report that appeared in
Frontier Perspectives 3(1), 15-19, 1992 (published by the Center for
Frontier Sciences at Temple University)) attempts a synthesis of the
variety of views that emerged at a symposium attended by its authors
that had as its aim the exploration of some central issues concerning
consciousness (the Athens Symposium on Science and Consciousness,
hosted jointly by the Athenian Society for Science and Human
Development and the Brahma Kumaris World Spiritual University, held in
Athens in January 1992).  Particular themes utilised as focal points
for discussion at the meeting included the nature of reality and its
relationship to consciousness, the adequacy of current scientific
approaches to consciousness, the role of intuition and conditioning in
scientific work, mind-brain interaction, the nature of human identity,
and the possible need for a new scientific paradigm and/or an
interdisciplinary science of consciousness. Disciplines represented
among the participants included physics, biology, chemistry,
neuroscience, psychology, philosophy, sociology, medicine,
engineering, ecology, parapsychology, mathematics, ethology and
religion.  The meeting had as its format five working groups reporting
to a plenary session, as well as plenary presentations by individual
speakers.

The final sense of the meeting was that, given the difficulty of the
tasks placed before it, considerable progress had been made in terms
of clarifying the issues and in laying down a firm foundation for
subsequent research. One point on which there was general agreement
was that the difficulties that science seems to find when it attempts
to address the phenomenon of consciousness may be a consequence of the
constraints that a restricted view of scientific method imposes on any
kind of investigations and analyses that may be carried out.  Although
there was a minority dissenting opinion to the effect that quantum
mechanics, if interpreted in the right way, might be able to give an
adequate account of consciousness, it was generally felt that
consciousness was so subtle that it would inevitably evade the forms
of description that conventional science provides. The results
obtained by other approaches would therefore have to be taken into
account before we could hope to achieve a full understanding of
consciousness.


Studying Consciousness: General Principles
==========================================

Consciousness itself consists of experience and reflection on
experience, which reflection amplifies an existing sense of being both
agent and experiencer, and permits the individual to construct a
picture of reality, as well as to develop concepts not only of the
individual's own situation but also of the corresponding experiences
of reality of others.  From these come in turn feelings of meaning and
value.

The kinds of designations given in the above paragraph contrast
noticeably with those employed both in the neurosciences and in
experimental psychology.  The latter discipline refers to the category
indicated in the paragraph above as 'folk psychology', and does not
accord it the same status as it does data gained from a psychological
experiment.  It cannot, however, be denied that such descriptions have
clear value, and are indeed irreplaceable, within their own domain;
consider, for example, how feasible it would be to teach a person a
difficult idea if we possessed no folk-psychological concepts
concerning other people.

To disregard such descriptions purely on account of their not being
readily accessible to the methods of science seems therefore to border
on the perverse. In a search for a more open concept of knowledge in
general, it was suggested at the symposium that an _insight_ might be
an appropriate correlate to a scientific fact.  In explication of this
concept, insights themselves come from experience and reflection upon
experience, and given an appropriate system of terminology can be
communicated to others.  Moreover, as with science, insights can be
put to the test of experience in order that their value can be
ascertained.

There is one crucial difference, however, between the way that formal
science (as exemplified by specialities such as quantum mechanics)
works and the way progress occurs outside the scientific domain.
Within science, if evidence is found against an hypothesis, there is a
prevailing tendency to call for its abandonment.  Outside science, an
idea does not have to be abandoned if it is found to be wrong once; it
is simply noted that the idea does not always work and that there are
exceptions.  The idea may be a valuable one nonetheless, a state of
affairs that only the test of time can tell.  Despite this loosening
of standards, studies outside the domain of science may be carried out
systematically and in a way that involves exposing them to the
assessment of the general community concerned, just as in science.  It
was pointed out that clinical medicine exemplifies these points well,
in that it is a field where it is possible to draw conclusions of
great practical value from a collection of data that is ambiguous and
poorly controlled, and in addition encompasses experiential reports by
patients

The idea that anything said about the natural world from outside the
sphere of science is less valuable than the results generated by
science itself seems to be a very deep seated one in our scientific
culture.  Psychological and sociological causes of this state of
affairs, such as the value systems imparted during the course of a
scientific training, and fear of the consequences if orthodoxy were to
be left behind, were discussed.  It was generally felt that much might
be gained by a more broad-minded attitude, integrating with science,
to whatever extent may be possible, concepts that have already been
developed in other disciplines, and developing also new syntheses both
outside science and together with science.  But to engage in such an
endeavour in practice, as far as scientists and academics generally
were concerned, might necessitate very considerable changes in
attitude on the part of the participants, and the ability to put aside
conventional thought patterns that have come into existence in support
of the standard scientific method.  For example, science tends to be
immediately critical of new ideas and to demand, rather as in a court
of law, clear formulation as well as definitive proof of the ideas
concerned.  An entirely different, more empathetic attitude is
indicated if the aim is to understand what there may be of value in an
insight that another person claims to have had.  It is true that this
alternative attitude is not totally absent from the scientific
process, but when present it has to fight hard against the dominant
adversarial posture. The ideal situation, but one hard to achieve in
practice, is for participants in a discussion to be in a spirit of
preferring to add to the ideas of others than to be critical of them
and aim to destroy them.

After this latter strategy for interaction had been conceived,
attempts were made to put it into practice at the meeting.  A notable
change in style of interaction followed as a result.  It became clear
that participants to a discussion could indeed, simply by changing
their dominant style of interaction, move into a mode where ideas
focussing on an individual topic could be accumulated without
interruption, and synthesised into new insights. It may be instructive
at this point to include in illustration of this theme extracts from
an imaginary Socratic discourse, intended to convey a feeling for the
gradual change in the atmosphere of the meeting that transpired as it
progressed.  The discourse was written by one of the participants,
David Lorimer.

'Well, my friends, what have we learned?  I feel that a great
metamorphosis has occurred! We cannot erase our differences, and any
attempt to do so makes them more marked.  But we have seen the
emergence of a deeper collective intuition and intelligence from the
silence that followed the pain of our comparing our languages.
Language is a necessary tool of our relationships, but we can easily
become imprisoned in its constraints.  ... We have discovered a new
way of being together: a deepened awareness of difference through
entering into a relationship with each other for a while. ... We are
faced with the challenge of developing these relationships, rather
than attempting to evade them either by asserting our own point of
view or by blurring the distinctions between us. No feelings of
euphoria can exonerate us from this responsibility. ...'

One factor that influenced the shift in the mode of interaction
referred to was discussion of the concept of complementarity, which
may be rephrased in the form, 'points of view that appear to be
irreconcilable may in actuality be perfectly consistent, and even
conjointly necessary in order to do justice to the phenomena'.  In
such cases argument over who is 'right' may well be unprofitable.  To
take examples from the history of science, an argument as to whether
an electron is a particle or a wave would never have led in itself to
a satisfactory outcome since the truth is more complicated than
either.  Again, a dispute as to whether nature follows equations of
motion or principles of least action would be a fruitless one since
the two forms of description are mathematically completely equivalent.
The moral, as far as discussions go, is that while one's own point of
view may sometimes seem to be clearly right and the other person's
clearly wrong, there may be nevertheless something to be gained by
trying to understand what underlies the point of view of the other
person, and to try to assimilate it to one's own.

One issue on which a certain amount of attention was focussed was that
of the connection between the scientist, the science that he or she
does, and the influence of the latter on society and on the
environment.  Scientific training tends to lead a scientist to see
science as an activity integral to itself, and accordingly isolated
from everything else.  From this point of view moral questions may
seem to be irrelevant and only scientific ones important.  The sense
of separation of the scientist and his or her actions from the wider
world is reinforced by stating that others decide how scientific
discoveries will be used and that the consequences of scientific
discovery are in any case often quite unpredictable.  From this
standpoint of isolation the scientist can disclaim the relevance of
moral issues to his work.  It was felt that this attitude was
misconceived.  In reality science is not an isolated system, but a
powerful force having profound influences on both society and the
environment. In view of this fact, science in general and individual
scientists in particular should concern themselves to a greater degree
than at present with the potential consequences of scientific research
to the individual, to society, and to the planet.

In the above, we hope to have given the reader a general indication of
some of the major issues discussed at the symposium.   Conventional
science relies exclusively on sensory channels for its informational
input, and therefore can tackle issues relating to consciousness only
in a very indirect manner, if at all while the humanities, on the
other hand, deal directly with conscious experience, and do concern
themselves with its subtleties and its meanings. These two approaches
cannot be properly integrated together if we try to preserve an
absolute distinction between science and non-science.  The discussions
at the Athens symposium demonstrated the degree to which distinctions
made such as these are conventional in nature, designed to suit
particular purposes, rather than absolute.  The concepts and working
tools generated at the symposium, leading to a perspective on
knowledge which sees it as a unified whole of which scientific
knowledge is only a part (or a limiting case), provide an escape from
what may be regarded as an intellectual trap.


A Compendium of Conclusions
===========================

In the following, we have gathered together some of the main ideas
discussed in the group meetings and in the plenary sessions.  We hope
that this list will be useful both as a stimulation for those who have
not been exposed to these ways of viewing the problem before, and as a
source of reference.


The main points on which there was fairly widespread agreement are the
following:


(1)     The study of consciousness should be concerned not just with
definitions of consciousness but with descriptions of its mode of
operation. The phenomena of consciousness should be studied in the
aspect of subjectively lived experience rather than exclusively in
terms of objective data (as is most often the case with cognitive
psychology).  As a result, an extension is needed in the concept of
what constitutes science, defined as knowledge or the quest for
knowledge.

(2)     The 'extended science' is envisioned as in principle a
continuum of activity ranging from science as it is currently
practised to the humanities and the arts, and possibly including
insights that may be gained from spiritual or religious practices.  It
will explicitly include consciousness in its many dimensions,
including creativity; the use of symbol, myth, and metaphor; the role
of the feminine; the historical perspective; and cross-cultural
aspects.

(3)     There are many artificial dualities to be overcome by the
extended science.  These dualities or splits owe their origins both to
contemporary science and to the dominant paradigm, and include those
between ourselves and nature, mind and body, mind and matter, the
feminine and the masculine, the observer and the observed, science and
values, inductive vs. deductive logic, and philosophy and science.  In
particular, science cannot be divorced from philosophy, because one
always brings some philosophy to bear in one's thinking.

(4)       We need to move from the fragmentation that reductionism
produces to principles of complementarity and integration, from
'either/or' to 'both/and' thinking.  The conventional notion of
causality as local and physical needs to be broadened to take account
of networks of causation, non-local interconnectedness, and
correlations.  The world has suffered from the conventional
fragmentary approach, its integrity violated by considering only the
parts and thus losing sight of the whole.  Again, it must be
recognised that no single language or approach can grasp the richness
or elusiveness of nature; thus the new science should be open to new
and multiple approaches.

(5)     While science has conventionally been regarded as an objective
endeavour leading to the truth about the nature of reality, we need to
shift our thinking towards regarding its insights as being context
dependent, and to recognising that all approaches to reality are
value-influenced.  We need actively to address the limitations of
scientific approaches, verification, and theories, and to find a place
in our world view for personal knowledge gained through introspection.
The importance of intuition as a contributing factor in the process by
which knowledge advances needs to be fully acknowledged. Language
itself can provide an effective means of exploring quasi-objectively
what has previously been characterised as being purely _subjective_.

(6)    The extended science will develop in its scope beyond the
conventional framework to the qualitative attributes of being and
feeling, and will stress the importance of quality as well as
quantity.  The range of scientific information will expand to include
the anecdotal and the more tenuous aspects of nature.  Ways of
codification and utilisation of such 'soft' information need to be
developed.  There is the recognition and the acceptance that insights
of the extended science occupy a domain that falls in between
ignorance and precise knowledge.

(7)     A radically different attitude needs to be cultivated in the
new science. The old humility (humus = the earth; hence humility =
close to the earth), awe,  wonder, and delight in the cosmos which is
the beginning of all science must be restored. These are critical to
regaining a reverence for nature.  We feel that the attitude that
predominates in science at present is arrogance, which has fostered
dogmatism and scientism.  In doing science, we should let the
phenomena speak for themselves, rather than forcibly imposing our
hypotheses on the phenomena.  The importance of the scientist's
attitude towards his or her work, preconceptions, and deeper
motivations must be stressed.   Effects, however subtle, of the
experimenter on the experiment are to be anticipated and must be
examined; thus self-examination on the part of the experimenter must
be included as part of the scientific process so as to make the
processes of description more complete.

(8)     There is a novel role for the scientific collective in the new
science. A newly emergent group creativity, perhaps involving a 'group
mind' that exhibits camaraderie and cooperativeness in regard to
solving problems in addition to the creativity of the individual
should be nurtured, recognising that the power of the harmonious group
is complementary to traditional Western individualism.

(9)     Any studies on consciousness must acknowledge the inherent
wholeness and unity of the body/mind, and equally avoid losing sight
of the total person. The holistic point of view, contrasting with the
admittedly highly successful alternative of assuming a Cartesian split
and operating under largely reductionistic principles, seems essential
in order to study consciousness in its full subtlety, and to explore
its deep interrelationship with the realm of the physical.

(10)    The foundations of contemporary science, and its limitations,
should be taught to and understood by all scientific practitioners.
While the uniqueness of both individuals and groups presents
difficulties for the formalising a science of consciousness,
consciousness studies are to be regarded nonetheless as having equal
status to the physical sciences.

(11)    The new science, as science with both consciousness and
conscience, will concern itself with the consequences of science to
the individual, society, and the whole world: it is a science for the
integrity of both people and planet that should be translatable into
action.  The potential value to life of the discipline as a whole
should not be compromised by the pursuit of more limited goals. At a
personal level, the new science should help people be able to
comprehend themselves and their place in nature, facilitate the
development of empathic processes which aid mutual understanding, and
enhance the meaning of life for individuals and for society.


These points call for a considerable change in the ideology and
methodology of contemporary science.  They presume a significant shift
in consciousness within both the community of scientists and society.

Fertile areas for future inquiry include the nature of reality and how
best to understand it, the nature of consciousness and relationship
between mind and brain.  Some participants argued that consciousness
emerged from brain processes, others that consciousness was
intrinsically non-physical and interacted with the body.  Human
identity was defined by some in terms of physical and biological
substrates interacting with our sociocultural background and
conditioning; others preferred to see our intrinsic identity as
metaphysical, even if physically based and conditioned. Some
participants advocated an interdisciplinary science of consciousness
extending beyond that of the existing cognitive sciences, while others
favoured a different approach that would instead utilise the results
of the sciences whilst remaining outside the constraints of science
itself.


Acknowledgements
================

We are grateful to David Fontana and David Lorimer for making
available to us their own written accounts of the symposium.  In
addition, William Braud, Deborah Delanoy, Nick Herbert, Robert Morris,
Steven Rosen and Marilyn Schlitz have provided helpful comments on
preliminary drafts of the report. The presentation of the ideas in
this report to some extent reflects a point of view developed in
discussions in a subgroup in which the authors of this report
participated, the other members of this subgroup being Deborah
Delanoy, David Fontana, Rolf Sattler, Roger Taylor, and Danah Zohar.