Exploring Consciousness: Old Habits and New Horizons 53dolphins, whales, elephants, etc.—as conscious, or, self-aware (Cacioppo
& Freberg, 2016).
If an outside observer were to watch you while you were asleep at
night, they might say that you have lost consciousness. Rather than being
completely blank, however, you may be deeply immersed in vivid dreams.
Likewise, a jarring sound from outside may instantly wake you up. How
would that be possible if not for some aspect of wakeful consciousness,
albeit a reduced version, remaining alert to your surroundings while you
explore the dream world? Are you not also conscious of your dreams in the
sense that you perceive them, haphazard as they may be? If you are
fortunate, you may even become aware that you are dreaming in the midst
of a dream, as in a lucid dream, which grants you agency within the dream.
As you can readily see, the lines between what does and does not constitute
consciousness are exceptionally blurry.
The challenge of sorting out the various aspects and attributes that we
associate with the term ‘consciousness’ only mounts upon examining a
wide array of contemporary psychology textbooks.
By and large, psychology textbooks written for introductory-level
students do a lackluster job of defining consciousness and generally
neglect the hard problem altogether. Instead, they tend to focus on the easy
problems, devoting their pages to explaining the neuroscience of
wakefulness and sleep, demonstrating the ways in which waking
consciousness is attentionally deficient (Meyers & DeWall, 2015), glossing
over a slew of theories as to why we dream, and outlining a variety of
drugs and their so-called effects on consciousness (Cacioppo & Freberg,
2016; Coon & Mitterer, 2015; Meyers & DeWall, 2015; Pastorino &
Doyle-Portillo, 2016).
In short, the standardized, introductory psychology textbook—insofar
as one exists—does little to inspire creative thinking or experiential,
embodied understanding. With rare exception, such textbooks provide
trivial knowledge that, while valuable for the burgeoning scientist, leaves
the big questions untouched. Furthermore, the texts frequently resort to
homogenizing language that pits a wide range of conscious states against a
presupposed, ‘normal’ waking consciousness. In doing so, the texts