The minimal self hypothesis.
Consciousness and cognition October 1, 2020 Timothy Joseph Lane 22 citations
The concept of a minimal self (MS), understood as the sheer sense of 'for-me-ness' of experience, has long been considered necessary for consciousness but lacked empirical support. Recent discovery of the brain's Default Mode Network (DMN) provides a starting point for neuroimaging investigations of MS. New experimental protocols targeting states where consciousness is lost and recovered—such as Unresponsive Wakefulness Syndrome, NREM sleep, and general anesthesia—offer evidence that self and consciousness can dissociate, and that MS might be a necessary precondition for conscious experience. These findings also suggest that the concept of 'levels of consciousness' may have a legitimate role in a mature science of consciousness.