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The Hierarchical Organization of the Brain as a Key to the Study of Consciousness in Human and Non-Human Animals: Phylogenetic Implications

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 January 2023

R Van den Bos
R Van den Bos*
Affiliation:
Animal Welfare Centre, Utrecht University, Yalelaan 17, NL-3584 CL Utrecht, The Netherlands
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Recently I discussed a framework to study consciousness in animals (Van den Bos 2000).

This framework comprised:

  • i) a hierarchical negative feedback model of the central nervous system in which behaviour is the control of input (perception) expressed as transitions of behavioural patterns (= motion) and as transitions of mental states (= consciousness; Van den Bos 1997). Consciousness is hypothesized to be a property of neuronal networks of self-organizing systems dedicated to dealing with rapidly-changing environments affording flexibility of behavioural patterning;

  • ii) mental states - mental representations - as intentional states as described in folk psychology (feelings, desires; beliefs, insights, etc);

  • iii) the separation of mental states into two components, an invariant part (‘the presence as such’; that) and a variant part (‘the way it looks’; how), which are separately related to the organization of the central nervous system, ie a ‘neuronal network’ and ‘momentary active connections within the neuronal network determined by input and output of this neuronal network’ respectively;

  • iv) the idea that every mental state (psychological trait) - whether feelings, desires or beliefs - can be viewed conceptually as the product of a specialized neuronal network and information encoded in the network (neuronal input-output relations) which is expressed as a specific series of spontaneous behavioural patterns or in specific tests; and

  • v) a phylogeny based on the invariant part, ie mental states, and the presence of a neuronal network.

Type
Research Article
Information
Animal Welfare , Volume 10 , Issue S1: Consciousness, Cognition and Animal Welfare: Proceedings of the UFAW Symposium, Zoological Society of London, 11-12 May 2000 , February 2001 , pp. S246 - S247
Copyright
© 2001 Universities Federation for Animal Welfare

References

Baron-Cohen, S 1995 Mindblindness: an Essay on Autism and Theory of Mind. MIT Press: Cambridge, USACrossRefGoogle Scholar
De Veer, M W and Van den Bos, R 1999 A critical review of methodology and interpretation of mirror self-recognition research in nonhuman primates. Animal Behaviour 58: 459–468CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Frith, C 1998 The role of the prefrontal cortex in selfconsciousness: the case of auditory hallucinations. In: Roberts, A, Robbins, T and Weiskrantz, L (eds) The Prefrontal Cortex: Executive and Cognitive Functions pp 181–194. Oxford University Press: Oxford, UKCrossRefGoogle Scholar
Van den Bos, R 1997 Reflections on the organisation of mind, brain and behaviour. In: Dol, M, Kasanmoentalib, S, Lijmbach, S, Rivas, E and Van den Bos, R (eds) Animal Consciouness and Animal Ethics: Perspectives from the Netherlands pp 144–166. Van Gorcum: Assen, The NetherlandsGoogle Scholar
Van den Bos, R 1999 Reflections on self-recognition in nonhuman primates. Animal Behaviour 58: F1–9CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Van den Bos, R 2000 General organizational principles of the brain as key to the study of animal consciousness. Psyche 6 http://psyche.cs.monash.edu.au/v6/psyche-6-05-vandenbos.htmlGoogle Scholar
Van den Bos, R, Nolten, C and Van Veller, M 1998 Phylogenetic reconstruction of a neural network underlying Theory of Mind in primates. European Journal of Neuroscience 10: 197Google Scholar