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Unconsciousness is classified into "under consciousness", "preconsciousness", and "separated pattern

Writer's picture: Hatsuo YamadaHatsuo Yamada

Updated: May 29, 2022

Studying the "Study of Consciousness" (Stanislas Duanne) can further deepen your understanding of coaching theory.

I am studying to add a unique flavour to "unconscious rewriting".


This series of blog posts are my study notes. This time, the theme that follows the unconscious and conscious

I will write a "sign of consciousness".


 

As we've seen in previous blogs, global workspace theory can clearly explain the various unconscious processes in the human brain.


In Stanislas Duanne's work, the unconscious process has reached the point where it can propose unconscious taxonomy like the Linnaean taxonomy.


Most of the actions of the brain occur unknowingly.


We know what we are doing and what we know, from breathing to postural control, from low-order vision to delicate hand movements, to character recognition to grammar.


When "inattentional blindness" occurs, you overlook the appearance of a gorilla in a costume hitting her chest.

Instead, our identities and behaviours are woven by many unconscious processors.


Global workspace theory can classify unconscious work in individual brain regions with different mechanisms.


"Inattentional blindness" is a phenomenon that is unnoticed because the visual stimulus is given far beyond the average threshold at which conscious perception appears. Still, the mind is entirely occupied by another task.


When I concentrate on writing a book, the sound of the clock disappears from my heart. In this way, awareness is hampered by inattentional blindness.


Among the unconscious information, there is waiting for information, which is called "preconsciousness".

Information is encoded by a set of neurons that are already firing and is conscious whenever it is of interest, but "preconscious" is an unconscious state.


When you stimulate a computer simulation, the activity it causes propagates and eventually ignites the global workspace.


This conscious image builds a wall of restraint around it to prevent the next stimulus from entering.

Competition at this centre is inevitable. A conscious image is defined by nothing as much as what it is.


We force some neurons in the workspace to silence to limit the content of the current consciousness and inform that it is nothing.


This expansion of inhibition creates a bottleneck in the higher centres of the cortex.

In any state of consciousness, an inactive neuron cannot see two objects simultaneously or perform two labour-intensive tasks at once.


However, it does not eliminate even the activation of the lower sensory cortex.

The lower sensory cortex functions at near-normal levels, even when the initial stimulus occupies the workspace.



Preconscious information is stored in such temporary storage areas outside the global workspace. And that information slowly disappears there unless we pay attention to it.

Preconscious information can be restored and raised to consciousness in a short period. We can look back and experience past events.


Try flashing the image faintly for a brief period invisible.

You cannot perceive hidden stimuli no matter how much attention you pay.

We cannot notice the masked words (temporally) sandwiched between the shapes.


This sub-sense stimulus causes detectable activity in the brain regions responsible for vision, meaning, and movement. Still, this activity lasts only briefly and does not reach the global ignition. Hmm.


Computer simulations have also confirmed this situation.

Short activity pulses could not trigger a global ignition.


Signals are returned top-down from the higher regions to the lower sensory cortex. When the incoming stimulus is amplified, the original activity has already been lost and replaced by masked information.


We notice preconscious stimuli if we pay attention to them, but we don't notice sub-threshold stimuli no matter how hard we try.


The distinction between preconscious and subconscious is not all of the unconscious classifications.


The rhythmic neuronal firing patterns that occur at every moment of our lives shape the life-sustaining respiratory rhythm.


This rhythm is tuned to blood oxygen and carbon dioxide levels through a clever feedback loop. This advanced neural device of breathing works entirely unknowingly.


The firing of neurons at that time is very strongly prolonged in time.

It's not a sub-threshold action, but no matter how much you focus on it, you can't make it conscious.


It is not the effect of preconsciousness. This case constitutes the third category of unconscious action, the "separated pattern".


The firing patterns that control breathing are confined to the brainstem and separate from the global workspace system of the prefrontal and parietal cortex.


For we are aware of the information in the cell assembly, the information in the cell assembly must be transmitted to the neurons in the workspace located in the prefrontal cortex and its related areas.


However, respiratory data is trapped in neurons in the brainstem.

Therefore, the firing pattern of neurons that convey the concentration of carbon dioxide in the blood is not transmitted to other cortical areas, and we are unaware of that information.

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