The Challenge of Consciousness Study

Abstract

Those unfamiliar with consciousness study may profess that science has not encountered any anomalous phenomena resulting from consciousness actively interacting with the physical realm. As a result, they may be puzzled about this paper or the entire section on consciousness in this book. However, conventional science has only explored certain aspects of consciousness such as cognition and perception, and in so doing has asked only limited questions. Science is bounded by the present dominant paradigm, which maintains that consciousness is a localised epiphenomenon of complex physical brain processes that manifests only passively in the physical world. Thus, the research questions posed by the scientific community typically reflect this view.