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Volume 15: Number 4: Article 1
The Challenge of Consciousness
Robert G. Jahn, Princeton Engineering Anomalies Research, Princeton
University
Attempts to include consciousness within an architecture of rigorous,
quantitative science encounter several formidable difficulties, among
them the elusiveness of its definition, the plethora of mental states
that can prevail, the intrinsically subjective character of many forms
of experience, the wide variance of individual responses to sensory
stimuli, and the capacity for anomalous modes of information acquisition
and generation. Nowhere are these characteristics more dramatically
demonstrated than in research on mind/matter interactions and remote
perception, from which have been compounded large bodies of empirical
evidence, but little insight regarding viable theoretical models or
profitable strategies for superior experiments. The purpose of this
paper is to review some of that evidence, and to attempt to glean therefrom
a productive model to guide future studies. The essence of this modular
model is to set aside the common presumption that anomalous mind/matter
effects are achieved by direct attention of the conscious mind to the
observable physical processes addressed. Rather, an alternative is proposed
wherein unconscious mind and intangible physical mechanisms are invoked
to achieve anomalous acquisition of mental information about, or anomalous
mental influence upon, otherwise inaccessible material processes. Implications
for more effective experiments include subtler feedback schemes that
facilitate submission of conscious intention to unconscious mental processing,
physical target systems that provide a richness of intangible potentialities,
operators who are amenable to such interactions, and an environmental
ambience that supports the composite strategy. Theoretical requisites
include better understanding of the information dialogue between conscious
and unconscious aspects of mind, more pragmatic formulations of the
relations between tangible and intangible physical processes, and, most
importantly, cogent representation of the merging of mental and material
dimensions into indistinguishability at their deepest levels.
Keywords: consciousness, consciousness-related anomalies, engineering
anomalies, human/machine anomalies, mind/matter interactions, models
of mind/matter interactions, remote perception, unconscious mental processing,
intangible physical processes
FULL TEXT:
The Challenge of Consciousness
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