Air Quality Horizon Scanning: Response of European Regulators (Enviroment Agency Science Rep... Book

An introductory text book giving a rapid and continual overview of the current state of consciousness studies. Topics range from historical foundations, including mesmerism, Cartesian dualism, and the introspectionists; contemporary theories such as epiphenomenalism, dualism, and multiple theories of monism; philosophical theories of consciousness; empirical theories of consciousness; altered states of consciousness (ASCs) including hypnosis, runner's high, meditation, dreaming and sleep-related disorders, near death experiences (NDEs) and out of body experiences (OBEs), mystic and meditative experiences, but curiously nothing more than a passing sentence or two about drugs induced ASCs.

The text doesn't delve much deeper than a superficial overview of concepts and, occasionally, a short discussion of prominent authors or contributors to the field in question. I would have rather deeper discussion on few topics than shallow perusal of many.

I found it odd that an introductory text such as this appears to be would rely so heavily on non-layman understanding of neurological terminology and brain regions (e.g. temporoparietal junction (TPJ), amygdala, thalamus, fusiform face area (FFA), striatum, etc...).

What this book does succeed in doing is forcing the reader to critically analyze exactly *what* constitutes consciousness, whether it is an all-or-nothing phenomenon or possibly a gradient or emerging property of highly organized matter, whether it is the organization of the matter as such or the matter itself that allows for consciousness to develop, or whether matter is even essential to consciousness (dualism).

Are humans the only species with consciousness? If consciousness depends on organization and not substance then wouldn't AI be an attainable goal?