Does Jaynes have a Neurological Model of Consciousness?

Discussion of Julian Jaynes's first hypothesis - that consciousness (as he carefully defines it) is based on language, and related topics.
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unconsciousdrone
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Does Jaynes have a Neurological Model of Consciousness?

Post by unconsciousdrone »

TL;DR Has Jaynes published anything about his thoughts on the neurological model of a conscious brain? (He only published his neurological model on the Bicameral Brain).

So far I have read three books on Jaynes' theory:
1) The classic "The Origin of Consciousness in the Breakdown of the Bicameral Mind". (I actually read this book twice. Fascinating!)
2) Reflections on the Dawn of Consciousness
3) The Julian Jaynes Collection

I think in either (2) or (3) (I don't have the exact page, sorry) he mentions that he has so far not specified a neurological model of a conscious mind. I highly doubt that a researcher at his caliber hasn't thought about that problem and doesn't have opinions! So I'm just wondering if there is a later publication or paper (or maybe an unpublished manuscript?) that documents his thoughts. Thanks!
Tanker62
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Re: Does Jaynes have a Neurological Model of Consciousness?

Post by Tanker62 »

I'll be following that thread, hoping that someone brings an answer to the question! Right now, I'm waiting for The Origin of Consciousness, which is taking some time to arrive, but, at least, I've got Julian Jaynes' articles on hand.
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Re: Does Jaynes have a Neurological Model of Consciousness?

Post by Moderator »

At the time Jaynes wrote his book, the scientific tools necessary to propose a neurological model of consciousness were not yet available, and Jaynes did not speculate on this. Somewhere in a question and answer session The Julian Jaynes Collection he comments on this fact (I will look it up).

Modern fMRI studies have begun to shed light on this, but even today I think we're still a very long way off. It's a topic that I need to give a fresh look.
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