Four Processes Of Consciousness

[This page should probably be re-titled]

The four stages of the cycle of consciousness are

• Perception
• Thought
• Action
• Feedback

Draw a vertical line representing the boundary between you and the universe. Then draw a circle clockwise through the line. Perception is at the top; information flows from the universe through your body's organs of perception into your mind. Thought is entirely up to you. Action is at the bottom; actions flow from your mind through your body's "organs of action" into the universe. Feedback is entirely up to the universe. Feedback leads into perception and the cycle begins again.

The stages occur in sequence, but with possible backtracking, pipelining, overlapping, and multiple instances of the cycle occurring in parallel.

Every process which you carry out consciously should have a component for each part of the cycle. For an example with regard to programming, see ProgrammingIsMoreThanCoding. For writing, see WritingProgramsIsWriting.

-- EdwardKiser (revised this on July 30, 2001)

---

Ok, let's see how well this theory stands up to a merciless barrage of attempts at counterexamples--that is, examples of things that don't seem at first glance to fit clearly in any one category. After that, maybe it will be clearer what the theory buys us.

How would you classify these?

1. Empathy
2. Dreaming
3. Memorizing
4. Venting (EmotionalCatharsis)
5. Stewing
6. Sulking
7. Shaking out the cobwebs
8. Sitting bored at a boring lecture
9. Taking dictation
10. Taking dictation when the muse speaks
11. Improvising in a jazz band
12. Calculating (like calculating a tip)
13. Speaking in tongues (strange, ecstatic, often tearful behavior sometimes seen in baptist churches)
14. Obfuscating
15. Rationalizing

''I'm not sure that "perception" or "action" in the above are limited to the physical senses or physical action. If not, these all can fit. For example, while sitting at a boring lecture, you might resolve never to take a class from that professor again. The feedback you get later might be from a friend who told you that the professor was much better in other subjects, so that information causes you to go back and think about your resolution some more.''

OK, answers: [1] Thought, [2] Thought, [3] The whole cycle (because you have to test your memory and then what you don't remember yet, you study some more), [4] Action, [5] Thought, [6] Action, [7] The whole cycle (because you first perceive some cobwebs to shake out, decide to do something about them, then shake until you are done), [8] Action (a relatively inactive action, but you could choose other actions, such as leaving or asking questions), [9] The whole cycle (although habits may make much thinking unnecessary), [10] The whole cycle (what you perceive is your own output, which you improve; also, you are drawing on old perceptions), [11] The whole cycle (listening, understanding the music, adding something in, reacting to audience and band feedback), [12] Thought, [13] Action (I presume; I have never done this), [14] Action, [15] Thought.

---

Why is this a good theory?

''Theories like this can help to understand "breakdowns" - when communication fails or expected behaviors don't take place. A good theory helps in the solution of such breakdowns by getting to the root of the problem. Was it in the perception? (listening) or the logic? or the action? (skill/ability) or the feedback? (listening again)''

---

It might be useful for the development of Game AI. You program an entity. You pass it some perceptions. It thinks and returns an action. You put that action into the world, and the world creates new perceptions. Simple.

---

I don't believe these four things are distinct, but for the sake of argument :). How is feedback part of consciousness?

A cognitive set is: perception-recognition-reaction-reflection, with a feedback loop from all post-perception elements back to perception. We normally invert the final two as we can't see a reaction till after we've reflected, but this is against the evidence. The full Buddhist set (7 stages) includes the arising of ego (identification), but that's enough TrainSpotting for now :).

Technically, feedback isn't part of consciousness, since it occurs entirely on the "universe" side of the dividing line. Maybe it should be called "reaction" instead of "feedback." It really doesn't become feedback until it is perceived again.

The point of this model is to describe how consciousness interacts with the universe.