Towards a pluralistic neurobiological understanding of consciousness.

Recent neuroscientific findings challenge the widely held assumption that similar neural mechanisms underlie different types of conscious awareness, such as seeing, feeling, knowing, and willing. These data show that, even within visual awareness, the brain regions involved, the latency of neural activity, and the information flow patterns underlying conscious perception vary depending on both external and internal factors. Different types of conscious awareness – such as perception and volition – likely have different neural processing architecture. Thus, a pluralistic approach to investigating the neurobiological underpinnings of consciousness may be more fruitful. A new framework, the JDT, is proposed which has the potential to accommodate different brain circuit-level mechanisms underlying different aspects of conscious awareness. Theories of consciousness are often based on the assumption that a single, unified neurobiological account will explain different types of conscious awareness. However, recent findings show that, even within a single modality such as conscious visual perception, the anatomical location, timing, and information flow of neural activity related to conscious awareness vary depending on both external and internal factors. This suggests that the search for generic neural correlates of consciousness may not be fruitful. I argue that consciousness science requires a more pluralistic approach and propose a new framework: joint determinant theory (JDT). This theory may be capable of accommodating different brain circuit mechanisms for conscious contents as varied as percepts, wills, memories, emotions, and thoughts, as well as their integrated experience. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]