Consciousness Quote by Stanislas Dehaene
““Conscious access is also the gateway to more complex forms of conscious experience. In everyday language, we often conflate our Consciousness with our sense of self-how the brain creates a point of view, an "I" that looks at its surroundings from a specific vantage point. Consciousness can also be recursive: our "I" can look down at itself, comment on its own performance, and even know when it does not know something. The good news is that even these higher-order meanings of Consciousness are no longer inaccessible to experimentation. In our Laboratories we have learned to quantify what the "I" feels and reports, both about the external environment and about itself. We can even manipulate the sense of self so that people may have an out-of-body experience while they lie inside a magnetic resonance imager.””
About This Quote
Source Lecture: Cognitive Neuroscience of Consciousness, 2022
Consciousness includes basic awareness and higher‑order self‑reflection, and both can be measured and altered experimentally.
In simple terms: Consciousness is awareness plus self‑reflection, and we can study and change it.
Key Takeaway
Study and respect the mutable nature of self‑awareness.
Themes
consciousness
self
neuroscience
experimentation
Mood
curious
thoughtful
cautious
Type
scientific
philosophical
experimental
When to use this quote
- psychology research
- clinical imaging
- virtual reality therapy
- education on metacognition
Key Concepts
higher‑order thought
self‑model
neural correlates
Questions to Reflect On
- How does altering self‑awareness affect identity?
- What limits exist in measuring consciousness?
A Different Perspective
Manipulating self‑sense raises ethical concerns and may not generalize.
