Consciousness, Society and Values
Contents: Introduction. 1. The conscious mind: functionalism, representational theory and biological naturalism and their compatibility/S. Paneerselvan. 2. Basics of consciousness/Sangeetha Menon. 3. Absent Qualia argument: Shoemaker\'s response and its tenability/C.A. Tomy. 4. Explaining the "explanatory gap": a phenomenological analysis/Prasenjit Biswas. 5. Understanding consciousness as subject-dependent linguistic process/A.V. Afonso. 6. The speaking body: praxis, materiality and consciousness/T.V. Madhu. 7. Consciousness, society and values: a phenomenological topos of the social world/Sebastian Vellassery. 8. Consciousness and society: in defence of a phenomenological approach to social reality/Koshy Tharakan. 9. Towards a transhistorical existence: cross-cultural reflections on human time-consciousness/L. Anthony Savari Raj. 10. Consciousness as an ideological construct-an Althusserian perspective/P.K. Pokker. 11. The phenomenology of the reified mind/Murzban Jal. 12. Deterritorialization of consciousness/K. Gopinathan. 13. Tribal consciousness in India: a reflection in perspectives/O.L. Snaitang. 14. Between tradition and modernity: a phenomenological inquiry on the structuring principles of Dalit consciousness/S. Lourdunathan. 15. Knowledge and society/V. Sujatha. 16. Consciousness in Advaita Vedanta: a perusual/Francis Arakal. 17. Consciousness, reality and value: Kasmira Saiva perspective/S.E. Bhelkey. 18. From Plato\'s Republic of Kant\'s concept of "Republic"/S.V. Bokil. 19. From biblical eve to biotechnological eve and its conscious relevance/I.S. Dua and Meenakshi Gupta.
"Reflections on consciousness, society and values may take the individual through myriad of theoretical considerations, ranging from purely speculative to the concrete and substantially observable. Such reflections are justified from purely phenomenological perspective and/or from empiricistic and quasi scientific standpoint. Whether consciousness as a property of matter, as a property of protoplasm, as learning, as metaphysical presupposition, as emergent evolution, as property of behaviour or even as a metaphor, it keeps finding place in philosophical and non-philosophical discussions.
The present volume, the result of a seminar on "Consciousness, Society and Values" is a representation (of almost a fractal kind) that is available in the larger debate on the theme. The discussions on consciousness do not immediately bring the normative dimension, it does surface at the societal level, namely as society having norms. But a full and detailed discussion of the normative aspect of consciousness is possible in juxtaposing consciousness and values. This volume attempts to bring to the forefront the normative and interdisciplinary domains of consciousness.
The volume presents papers that deal with consciousness as manifested in the conscious experience, brain-independent or otherwise and methodologically, the contributions represent both the analytic and phenomenological approach on the one hand, and an attempt to go beyond the "exclusive" approaches on the other. Scholarly contributions that deal with consciousness as embodied in one\'s introspection and reflected in social and moral values, constitute the next set of papers. Studies that reflect on consciousness as expressed in collective consciousness as well as resonated in the communities and specific groups, find a substantial space in the volume. Studies of moral values reflected both in the philosophical and scientific consciousness of mankind, both from the Indian as well as western perspective, constitute the last set of papers of the present volume." (jacket)
