麻醉药帮助我们理解什么是意识_BEC初级作文

麻醉药帮助我们理解什么是意识

神经科学家已然确知，意识并不存在于大脑的任何一个特定部位——并没有一个脑区专司汇总所有的信息——但他们所知的也仅限于此。意识的本质使其难以进行直接研究，因此，在过去的一百年中这一领域的绝大部分都是哲学家们的舞台，可惜他们各执己见，没有达成多少一致意见。例如，哲学家约翰·塞尔(John Searle)将意识描述成了一种纯粹的主观体验——当你在早晨醒来时，你就获得了意识；等你在夜间入睡（或者死亡，这取决于你这一天过得怎么样）时它便消失了。而在哲学家丹尼尔·丹尼特(Daniel Dennett)撰写的名为《意识的解释》(Consciousness Explained)论著中，则大大贬低了意识的主观体验，以至有评论家戏称这本书“把意识给解释没了”。

Scientists largely ignored these sorts of debates for most of the 20th century. But in 1994, an interdisciplinary conference at the University of Arizona brought them together for the first time. That conference led to ongoing research studying the links between anesthesia and consciousness. Stuart Hameroff, an anesthesiologist and the director of the school's Center for Consciousness Studies, was an organizer of the conference. Anesthesia, he told me, is a great example of why scientists have to think about consciousness. It's not enough, he said, just to assume your patient is unconscious because she doesn't respond to pain.