3 ms·
What's really interesting is that most of us feel we're our "best selves" when we reach a state of flow. We're in the zone. We're totally non-self-conscious. T
by taneq 4y ago
What's really interesting is that most of us feel we're our "best selves" when we reach a state of flow. We're in the zone. We're totally non-self-conscious.
The only description I've ever seen of consciousness that makes any sense is that it's a kind of condition monitoring system for our minds, a cross-check evolved to catch some of the cognitive mistakes that the main machinery of our minds tend to make from time to time. And because our whole brain is linked into this system, including itself, we get that infinite regress of omphaloskepsis that we call "consciousness."
- Wowfunhappy 4y agoPersonally, I feel I'm at my most "conscious" when I'm in a flow state. I'm laser focused on one thing, but I'm actively thinking about that thing very hard! I don't do a lot of metacognition (thinking about my thinking) while I'm in a flow state, which maybe was your point. But I can think about my prior flow state thinking after the fact, and I'm aware of how much my mind was working, and what that felt like.
- IIAOPSW 4y agoHows this for a definition. Its not a definition of consciousness per se, but its a definition of the specific consciousness "you" in the general case: you are whatever you get in return when you ask yourself who you are. Consciousness thus defined exists entirely within the communicative medium. In other words, consciousness is an emergent phenomena that happens in a system of sending messages when eventually an agent starts sending messages to itself. "you" are the voices in your head not attributed to anyone else.