Thread: conscious vs. subconscious wakefulness

Goldenspark. I see where you are coming from with your post, and mostly i agree with you. I can't even say that I disagree exactly on any of your points, just that I see some of it from a slightly different perspective. i agree that the conscious mind has a greater degree of control during waking consciousness and that the subconscious takes a back seat, if you will, but is not asleep. When I used the term sleep, I didn't mean to imply that it was inaccessible, simply in a more dormant condition in comparison to the control it seems to take during our sleep cycles. As you stated, the subconscious is indeed active.

But I suppose my main point is that we do not have complete access to it. If we did, we would have full access to memory, and no one would ever be able to fail an exam. Opening up that access, whether you use my failed term 'woken up' as above or some other, is what I am looking for. So I really don't think we are saying that different a thing. Perhaps my choice of the word 'sleep' was ill-advised.

And, yes, brain scans certainly do show varying degrees of whole-brain involvement during different sleep cycles and waking. The only comment I can make to this beyond agreeing with your comment, is that brain scans can't tell you what is functional in terms of conscious mind, subconscious mind, unconscious mind. Scientists know that the pre-frontal cortex is involved with normal waking functions, for instance, because it shows to be active while we are awake. Yet it also shows to be true to a lesser degree while asleep; so what aspect of mind is actually doing the accessing?

I do believe that the conscious mind and the subconscious mind are inextricably linked, a single unit, if you will, but I don't believe that it means they don't have some sort of partitioning in regard to functionality and timing of said functions. Perhaps partitioning is simply something that I require to better rationalize the concept. Of course, I have no means of proving it one way or the other. So it's just my opinion. Thanks for your thought-out response.

Its very easy to keep partitioning the subconsious and conscious as if they are two separate things. The two are quite digital in their naming (conscious either on or off), and that was my point about the spectrum. I don't see that the subconscious has some magical access to our memories that the conscious mind, for some reason, does not have. That to me is a bit like saying a computer hard disk works normally to the user but has some magical back door that can make the access instant (the analogy doesn't work so well in terms of the accuracy of the memory, but you see my point?).
I only see the subconscious as a lack of consciousness, nothing more. Yes, there is higher brain function while unconscious, but that is not evidence for some other entity that is somehow different or separate from the normal mind.
Where there is perhaps some partition is that our conscious mind is not fully aware of how our mind as a whole works, for instance at the baser level of things like fight-or-flight, compassion, cruelty etc.. These things are not obvious to the conscious mind unless we have experienced them, but even then the experience can change the response.
That's where the crutch of imagining a separate entity would be useful, like a sub alter ego if you will, because then we could question it to gain insight, rather than just act out stress scenarios to see what the sub response would be.

Although I like the idea of somehow questioning the subconscious, I am skeptical of finding any earth-shattering insight. We are still just dumb apes who have only recently (in biological time) woken into a higher consciousness of self, and I can't imagine there is any magical back-door of super brain power waiting to be tapped. I guess even some basic level of insight would be fascinating, perhaps even just clarity of thought?

While I think of it, there is a reason to have two terms; subconscious and unconscious.
It doesn't sound right to me to say that someone is subconscious, when they are unconscious, but for the brain activity below the conscious level, I think subconscious is more apt, because when someone is unconscious they still have a level of consciousness, they don't have zero consciousness.

I, too, think it a hard chore to find such a back door as you say. But i hold out hope that it is still possible, without having to wait generations for our relatively newly acquired intellect to gain natural insight. Perhaps mindfulness practice will eventually bring about a level of self-awareness that will be the key. I appreciate your perspective, and as i said, I have no facts to prove or disprove either view. So we are stuck with speculation and working in our own ways to access that greater level of awareness. Have fun dreaming.


side note on partitioning. when you partition a hard drive, you don't make two physical hard drives. You still have a single hard drive partitioned for ease of use and to allow for separate functionality of each partition, when required. But they never truly lose their unity, whether you give each partition a separate name or not.