Consciousness and Illusion. Philosophy in Pubs - Oxford city centre session.

Consciousness and Illusion.

The question of whether conscious experience is some kind of "illusion" has often been raised in the history of philosophy, psychology and in relation to modern research in neuroscience.

The philosopher Daniel Dennett, for example, described consciousness as the brain’s “user illusion” of itself, by analogy with the way in which the icons on a mobile phone’s user interface enable the user to do things on the phone without representing how these things are actually done by the phone’s software and hardware.

Aspects of consciousness that have been challenged as illusory include: The experience of the unity and continuity of consciousness as a single integrated process; Our experience of choosing and launching actions, and of making decisions, and; that consciousness exists in some sense separately to the body.

Recent neurological research has been presented as undermining our conscious experience of decision making, as to when and how decisions are actually made in our minds/brains. While there are different views on the interpretation of results so far, many believe that the weight of evidence will demonstrate the illusory nature of our conscious experience of mental processes.

Some care is required, however, in being clear about what we mean when we describe a conscious experience as an illusion or illusory – what exactly is the nature of the illusion? After all, to imply that something is an illusion is also to imply an observer, for example.

The purpose of this session is to:

• Part 1: Select and clarify one or more claims that aspects of consciousness (or all of it) are illusory. In particular, we should be clear about the nature of the illusion that is being claimed. In this first part, we will not be taking a view on whether these claims are correct, but simply clarifying as far as possible
• Part 2: Evaluate some of these propositions, identifying arguments pro and con and moving on to decide whether we agree with them or not, and why. It is not an objective that the group achieves consensus and it is an important part of our culture to be able to understand multiple perspectives.

We will work in small groups for these two parts of the session and the groups can select uses of the concept of illusion that are of particular interest, which can include some that are referenced in the text above or others as wished.

Note that we have covered illusion in the context of Perception in a pre-Christmas session, so that is out-of-scope this time.

Also note that the image used is part of a painting by the artist Josean Figueroa (Jósean Figueroa - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia).

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Anyone can attend this session. No experience in philosophy or knowledge of the subject is required in advance. Just come along and enjoy. Our events use the the 4Cs of community philosophy:

• Caring for others, making space for their contributions
• Collaborating to get a better mutual understanding rather than scoring points
• Critically assessing what we say, clarifying what is meant and asking what reasons support assertions
• Creatively coming up with alternative perspectives, rather than dogmatically sticking to our initial positions

We welcome everyone of a wide range of ages, social and educational backgrounds etc. Don't worry if you don't have a qualification in philosophy - almost no-one does. Occasionally, attendees will be asked to watch, read or listen to a short piece of material in advance of the session (as the 'stimulus' for discussion), but this will be minimal and will be made clear in the description of the session.

We ask for donations of £1 per session from those who can afford to pay to cover the costs of the Meetup subscription. First timers are exempt. Don't feel obliged to pay if you can't afford it - or pay less. Feel free to put £5 to cover five sessions or however you want to donate - this is left entirely up to you.