What is consciousness?

I found this picture on Wikipedia under the page on Consciousness. When I copied the image in order to include it in this post, I noticed that its title features the word Bewusstsein, the German word for consciousness. Interesting. Germans are thinkers; they’ve long been known as thinkers. Hmm, I can hear some of you non-Germans groaning at that statement while remembering a particular period of the 20th Century when Germans weren’t considered to be thinking but rather reacting. Despite that sad and horrible time, I think it’s true that Germans tend to be deep thinkers. So many intellectual topics have their roots, or at least their fingers, in the German thought process.

“Okay,” you ask, “What’s on your mind today Sj?”

Consciousness. Today I’m poking around in the playground of Consciousness or Bewusstsein. When I pry apart that German word, I find that it has two pieces: an adjective (Bewusst) and a verb (sein). Bewusst can be translated into either “conscious” or “aware.” Sein is that ubiquitous verb “to be.” Literally “to be conscious or aware.”

Okay, to be conscious is to be aware.

Wikipedia’s definition also uses the word aware: “Consciousness is the quality or state of being aware of an external object or something within oneself.”

The Apple dictionary in my computer breaks the definition down even further into three parts:

• 1) the state of being awake and aware of one’s surroundings : she failed to regain consciousness and died two days later.
• 2) the awareness or perception of something by a person : her acute consciousness of Mike’s presence.
• 3) the fact of awareness by the mind of itself and the world : consciousness emerges from the operations of the brain.

The third definition is the one that I’m tossing around in my sandbox today, “the fact of awareness by the mind of itself and the world.”

The mind is conscious or aware of itself. It’s a “fact.” Is it?

“Hello Sj, how are you today?”

“Fine thank you. And you?”

“I’m well. Have you noticed that we’re not alone?”

The mind’s also aware or conscious of the world.

“Hello world!”

“The fact of awareness by the mind of itself and the world.”

Is it possible for a person to be aware that they’re NOT aware?

I love that question.

Is it possible for a person to be aware that they’re NOT aware?

Here it is again with a slight tweak.

Is it possible for a person to become aware that they’re NOT aware?

I’d love to hear from you! Feedback. Comments. What do YOU think?

The following YouTube video also addresses this topic, albeit in a completely different way: BUT it’s no longer available when I took a look-see a few years later.

Take a short break from your daily routine, pretty please with a cherry on top : ), and give it a look-see.

And then, I would love to HEAR from you. What are Your thoughts? Your ideas? Your ponderings and bemusements?

You can comment here on my blog glob post OR at my YouTube channel below this video clip.

Let’s start a dialogue to see what you and others think. This isn’t a pop quiz, and there are no wrong answers. If it’s what you think, it’s what you think.

Let’s all keep an OPEN mind and see where this takes us.

It starts simply by taking a moment, a breath, to stop, look, and listen.

D E E P    B R E A T H.

And now, without further ado, click play either ABOVE or here at Sj’s Pep Talk #6: N-o-t-i-c-e.

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p.s. the dolphin photo came from photobucket. Mahalo!