دانلود کتاب Consciousness, Life and the Universe

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Cover
Half Title
Title
Copyright
Dedication
Contents
Foreword
Introduction: the ultimate questions of consciousness, life and the universe
1 A tale of millions of years: the origin of consciousness research (from the Old Stone Age to the Middle Ages)
Myth: facing the unknown and the abyss
Religion: the words of an oak
Philosophy: know thyself
Science: the substrates of the soul
2 A five-century quest: explaining consciousness (17th century–today)
Ghost in the machine and birth of consciousness
Measure consciousness: rise of experimental psychology
Era of consciousness: qualia, brain, computer and quantum mind
The hard problem: what is it like to be a bat or a zombie?
The emergence of the explanatory gap
The hard problem, a false problem?
The neural basis of consciousness: specialization, integration and embodiment
Global integration of brain activity
Key integrative neural structures
Computers as brains and conscious machines
The rise of information theory, functionalism and computationalism
The birth of the Turing test and conscious machines
Quantum consciousness
Consciousness: spectator or actor?
Consciousness and quantum brain
Where are we now?
3 Toward the ultimate understanding of consciousness: tracing the deep roots in life and the universe
Our essence: the hidden foundation and nature of consciousness
The indispensable substratum of consciousness
Anatomical hierarchy of consciousness
Evolutionary and developmental hierarchy of the substrates of consciousness
Functional hierarchy of the substrates of consciousness
What is consciousness?
Feeling the body: integrated internal body mapping as foundational consciousness
Sensing the world: integrated body-environment mapping as expansive consciousness
Higher cognitive functions as advanced mapping tools for augmenting consciousness
In search of the hidden part of ourselves: the nonconscious processes of the human organism
Neural information processing that does not produce conscious experience
Dissociate experimentally conscious and nonconscious processes
When the blind are not blind . . .
Markers of conscious and nonconscious processes?
Physiological processes that cannot be consciously controlled
Cognitive processes out of our control
Those automatic functions that keep us alive
Nonconscious control of muscles and action
Physiological processes that cannot be directly accessed through consciousness
The inner workings of our body insulated from ourselves
Benefits and fatal flaws of the limited conscious access to our body
Unlock the secrets of our body: map the nonconscious and expand consciousness
A so long journey: from a single cell to the human organism
Building a home: primitive internal and external mapping in unicellular organisms
Emergence of the first living structures
Membrane, the foundation of a home
The origin of internal and external mapping in living organisms
Building a body: augmented and integrated internal and external mapping in multicellular organisms
Unity makes strength: from single cells to multicellular organisms
Enhancement of senses and global homeostatic systems—enhancement of mapping abilities
Emergence of nervous systems: a further step in integrated mapping
The human organism: advanced internal and external mapping and the next leap of evolution
From a bacterium’s sensing to human consciousness
What makes our consciousness human
The next evolutionary leap of human consciousness
Deep in our cells: from particles to the universe
The origin of consciousness: what is life?
The very pulse of life and consciousness
The foundation and origin of life on Earth
Special structures in the fabric of the universe
The ultimate origin and meaning of life and consciousness: what is the universe?
The cosmic origin of the fundamental laws governing life and consciousness
The mind of God or the origin of the universe: nothingness?
The final judgment: all is meaningless?
4 Expand consciousness: toward the unknown
Expand body mapping and enhance self-regulation and self-repair
Expand environment mapping and assimilate the worlds of other life-forms
Expand the multiscale mapping of the universe: from nothingness to the entire cosmos
Conclusion: create the future
Index