Review of Understanding Consciousness by Max Velmans

Robert Beshara

doi:10.7565/landp.v10i2.6514

Abstract

Understanding Consciousness can almost be said to have a plot/narrative, or a dramatic structure similar to the ‘three-act structure’ model used by numerous screenwriters. In Part I—the Setup—Velmans surveys “mind-body theories and their problems”, in part II—the Confrontation—he reconstructs “a new analysis: how to marry science with experience”, and in part III—the Resolution—he shares with us “a new synthesis: reflexive monism” (v-vi). Velmans starts off in the first chapter with perhaps one of the most basic, nevertheless hard, questions in the field of consciousness studies: “what is consciousness?”

Highlights

Velmans’s project is ambitious, for he surveys with deep scrutiny some of the most important arguments or problems surrounding consciousness, and he offers us his take on the issue through his unified theory of consciousness: ‘reflexive monism’
Velmans is critical of classical dualism because its ‘explanations’ require explanation and because it ‘splits’ the world
Velmans’s ontological monism/epistemological dualism gives us a useful analogy by which we can better understand consciousness; he compares the relationship between the brain and the mind, especially consciousness, to electromagnetism or wave-particle duality—which he calls “psychological complementarity”

Summary

Introduction

Velmans’s project is ambitious, for he surveys with deep scrutiny some of the most important arguments or problems surrounding consciousness, and he offers us his take on the issue through his unified theory of consciousness: ‘reflexive monism’. Velmans’s ontological monism/epistemological dualism gives us a useful analogy by which we can better understand consciousness; he compares the relationship between the brain and the mind, especially consciousness, to electromagnetism or wave-particle duality—which he calls “psychological complementarity”.

Results

Conclusion