What Is Consciousness?

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Cognitive scientists distinguish between two types of consciousness. One is called primary consciousness, which has moments of self awareness that come and go. And then when this becomes an extended and continuous experience, we talk about what i call re active consciousness because in it involves thought and reflection. That occurs in the great apes and and human seeming like the red dot test.

Michael Shermer speaks with scientist, educator, activist, and accomplished author, Fritjof Capra, about the evolution of his thinking over five decades. In this conversation, based on Capra’s book, Patterns of Connection, Shermer and Capra discuss: what it means to be spiritual in an age of science, nuclear energy and why Capra thinks we don’t need it and Shermer thinks we do, 50 years of progress or regress, limitations of models and theories of reality, limitations of analogies between western physics and eastern mysticism, mind and consciousness, and why Capra is hopeful for the future of humanity.