[Tyler]

Self Awareness: The Last Frontier
     

The EDGE has published an essay by Vilayanur Ramachandran,
titled Self
Awareness: The Last Frontier, on one of the biggest and most
interesting problems in science today: consciousness. He starts with the
premise that most researchers today break consciousness down into two
problems: qualia and self. Qualia, he suggests may turn out to be a
psuedo problem that can never be solved. Perhaps the reason some
research think it's a problem is that they're just looking at the facts
from the wrong perspective; like an ant trying to understand a Moebius
strip. Self, meanwhile,
is a problem we may not only solve but solve within our lifetimes. In
the rest of the article he summarize a wealth of different aspects of
the self that scientists now understand in concrete terms of brain
circuitry rather than just vague psychological or philosophical ideas.
He covers things ranging from out of body experiences and transexuality
to mirror neurons and emotion. Thinking about all the things we've
learned about the brain in recent years seems like a great way to bring
in the new year. Let's put all this new knowledge to work building
better robot brains.
   

http://robots.net/article/2718.html