Consciousness

Summary. We are our greatest mystery to ouselfs

I am often surprised how people are eager to start long debates about consciousness and its implications, if animals are conscious, when the fetus becomes conscious etc. without stopping first and ponder a definition: what is consciousness? As often happens, there are several definitions in the wild and a safe bet is that no one sitting around the table has the same one. Even harder is to reason about consciousness through introspection, since it resembles trying to raise a chair while sitting on it: the object and the subject of a scientific and rigorous analysis do coincide. How can’t we possibly fool ouselves while doing so?