The Magic Of Consciousness

SOUL DUST NICHOLAS HUMPHREY SOUL DUST The Magic of Consciousness PRINCETON UNIVERSITY PRESS Princeton and Oxford Copyright © 2011 by Princeton University Press Requests for permission to reproduce material from this work should be sent to Permissions, Princeton University Press Published by Princeton University Press, 41 William Street, Princeton, New Jersey 08540 In the United Kingdom: Princeton University Press, 6 Oxford Street, Woodstock, Oxfordshire OX20 1TW press.princeton.edu Jacket art: Soul Dust 1, 2010, acrylic ink. By Susan Aldworth. www.susanaldworth.com Excerpt from Yevtushenko: Selected Poems, translated by robin Milner-Gulland and Peter Levi (Penguin Books, 1962). Copyright © robin Milner-Gulland and Peter levi, 1962. Reprinted by permission of Penguin Books Ltd. Excerpt from “The Dog Beneath the Skin” by W. H. Auden, copyright © 1936, W. H. Auden and Christopher Isherwood, reprinted by permission. Excerpt from “Aubade” from Collected Poems by Philip Larkin, copyright © 1977, with permission of Faber and Faber Ltd, publishers. All rights reserved Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Humphrey, Nicholas. Soul dust : the magic of consciousness / Nicholas Humphrey. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-691-13862-6 (hardcover : alk. paper) 1. Consciousness. I. Title. II. Title: Magic of consciousness. BF311.H7795 2011 126—dc22 2010036759 British Library Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available This book has been composed in Garamond Premier Pro Printed on acid-free paper. Printed in the United States of America 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 Truth is as impossible to be soiled by any outward touch as the sunbeam; though this ill hap wait on her nativity, that she never comes into the world, but like a bastard, to the ignominy of him that brought her forth; till time, the midwife rather than the mother of truth, have washed and salted the infant [and] declared her legitimate. —John Milton, The Doctrine and Discipline of Divorce, 1643 Contents Invitation Prelude 1 Coming-to Explained Part One 2 Being “Like Something” 3 Sentition 4 Looping the Loop Part Two 5 So What? 6 Being There 7 The Enchanted World 8 So That Is Who I Am! 9 Being Number One Part Three 10 Entering the Soul Niche 11 Dangerous Territory 12 Cheating Death Envoi Acknowledgments Notes Index Invitation I wrote a short book a few years ago—Seeing Red: A Study in Consciousness —that met with unexpectedly good reviews, even from my colleagues.1 Unexpected, because the usual thing, in the field that has become known as “consciousness studies,” is for academics to be dismissive of each other’s ideas. The psychologist Walter Mischel has wryly noted: “Psychologists treat other people’s theories like toothbrushes—no self-respecting person wants to use anyone else’s.”2 Philosophers tend to be charier still. The review that pleased me best was in the American Journal of Psychology: “This reviewer made at least three passes through the book, each pass yielding a new understanding. The first pass left me with a feeling of: ‘Oh he doesn’t really mean THAT!’ But the second pass solidified and verified: ‘Oh yeah he really does mean that.’ And the third, and most rewarding pass: ‘Oh my god, I think he’s right!’”3 nonetheless, almost every discussion of Seeing Red had a sting in the tail. No one would allow that the problem of consciousness had actually been solved. Thus Steven Poole, writing in the Guardian: “But the ‘hard problem’ is still there, packed away into a corner of his argument. At some evolutionary stage, sensory feedback signals get ‘privatised’ in the brain and become ‘about themselves.’ Voilà, reflexivi